A report by Muriel Fraser, via the NSS: “The increasing emphasis on religion and religious identities has led to the transformation of multiculturalism into multi-faithism” – and the ones who suffer the most are South Asian women. This is the conclusion of Pragna Patel’s important new study, Faith in the state? Asian women’s struggles for human rights in the U.K. Patel has long experience working with these women in a London-based resource and advocacy centre, the Black Southall Sisters.

At the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) on Tuesday, 15 April, states belonging to the Organisation of Islamic Conference demanded that Holland prosecute one of its MPs for “defamation of religion”. IHEU and NSS sound the alarm on freedom of expression at the UN | International Humanist and Ethical Union.

Editorial from Terry Sanderson of the NSS: “The Secularists” (that’s you and me and anyone else who doesn’t trust religion to behave properly when it gains any kind of power) have been given a new adjective to go before their name. We’re familiar with the “militant” secularists, “fundamentalist” secularists and “extremist” secularists tags, but the Archbishop of Canterbury has decided that he will call us “principled secularists”. We are the people he seems to fear most, the ones who he claimed in a speech last week, are staging an organised assault on all religion.

I received a mail order catalogue of kitsch in this morning’s post. The praying gnome caught my eye. I hadn’t realised that gnomes are religious. The blurb says, Wishing Well Planter Gnome – Bring a little good luck charm into your garden. This three-in-one light sculpture is made from hand-painted resin and is weather-proof. Solar panel charges by day and comes on at night, with two LED lights to cast a delightful glow

A CHARITY set up by an ardent Christian to fight slavery and the opium trade has identified a new social evil of the 21st century – religion. A poll by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation uncovered a widespread belief that faith – not just in its extreme form – was intolerant, irrational and used to justify persecution. Pollsters asked 3,500 people what they considered to be the worst blights on modern society, updating a list drawn up by Rowntree, a Quaker, 104 years ago.

This is the story that The Telegraph was on about the other day: For the first time, pupils will have the opportunity to study Humanism as part of a Religious Studies GCSE, according to draft proposals for a new Philosophy and Ethics course from exam board OCR . OCR’s Religious Studies suite offers two courses, including a traditional faith-based approach with its World Religions GCSE, where students can study Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Sikhism.

Ann Keen, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Health, has written to the BHA about the planned celebrations for the 60th anniversary of the NHS, including a “national service of celebration” for NHS staff, patients and stakeholders to be held in Westminster Abbey on 2 July. The BHA wrote back to ask why a national institution is being celebrated with a religious event that will exclude many people involved with and committed to the NHS.

E-mail: mail@suffolkhumanists.org.uk Event description: Grace By Mick Gordon and AC Grayling Issues of faith, love, and humanity are at the core of this intimate family drama in which Grace, a scientist and champion of atheism, is faced with the decision of her son Tom to become a priest. A collaboration between Humanist philosopher A.C.Grayling and theatre writer and director Mick Gordon, the characters offer solutions to their deeply opposed ways of looking at the world even as they rage.