Headlines:

• Let’s Face Reality, Greece is Bankrupt: Marc Faber
• Christianity on Course to be Minority Religion in UK
• In France, Lessons in Secularism to Confront Radical Islam

Details:

Let’s Face Reality, Greece is Bankrupt: Marc Faber

Greece is bankrupt and should default, well-known investor Marc Faber told CNBC Friday, arguing that a “geopolitical game of chess” was being played out in the region. The comments by Faber, the editor of the “Gloom, Boom & Doom Report,” came at a time of heightened tensions between Greece and its international creditors. The organizations overseeing the country’s two international bailouts — worth a combined 240 billion euros ($259 billion) — have said the country will not receive a last tranche of aid, worth 7.2 billion euros, until it makes far-reaching reforms. But Faber, a bearish investor known as “Dr. Doom,” said the country’s fiscal situation was unsalvageable. “Even if Greece grows at 10 percent per annum for the next ten years, it will not be able to pay its debts back,” he told CNBC. “It’s bankrupt. We better face the reality and not kick the can the can down the road. Greece should default.” Faber said that while Greece could leave the euro zone and adopt a parallel currency, there that geopolitics were coming in to play and there was no appetite in Europe to let the country exit from the single currency bloc. “I personally think it’s not so much of an economic issue as a political issue,” he told CNBC Europe’s “Squawk Box.” “Europe, and in particular NATO (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization military alliance), and the U.S. do not want Greece to leave (the euro zone) because if they do, other people are going to knock on Greece’s door — like the Russians or the Chinese maybe. It’s very much a geopolitical game of chess that’s being played.” Greece and its creditors disagree on which reforms should be implemented, however, and as such the much-needed aid remains under lock and key. This has prompted speculation that the country could soon run out of money and default on its forthcoming debt repayments to the IMF and ECB, which could, in turn, result in the country leaving the euro zone. [Source: CNBC].

Since 2008, the European Union (EU) has been a political failure, as the union is unable to show unity in economic policies required to stabilize the EU. With Greece on the verge of exiting the union the question arises, which country will follow Greece and end the EU experiment.

 

Christianity on Course to be Minority Religion in UK

Christians will be a minority in the UK by the middle of this century amid surging growth in atheism and Islam, an authoritative new study charting the future of the world’s religions predicts. According to projections by the US-based Pew Research Centre, the proportion of the British population identifying themselves as Christian will reduce by almost a third by 2050 to stand at just 45.4 per cent, compared with almost two thirds in 2010. The number of Muslims in Britain is predicted to more than double to 11.3 per cent, or one in nine of the total population during that time. But the reports predicts that biggest change in the religious make-up of Britain in the next three and a half decades will be a major expansion in the number of non-religious people. They would account for just under 39 per cent, challenging Christians as the biggest faith community in the UK. The predictions mirror analysis from the most recent UK census which saw the number of children growing up as Muslims in the UK almost double in a decade while the number of people describing themselves as non-religious also jumped dramatically. If the projections, which are based on official population figures, birth rates and immigration estimates from around the world, are borne out, it could amount to the most significant religious realignment in Britain since the arrival of Christianity. It would mean that by 2050 Britain would have the third largest Muslim community, as a share of the population, in Europe, overtaking France, Germany, Belgium and a handful of other countries. [Source Daily Telegraph]

It does not matter how much the British government dislikes Islam and works towards undermining it, Islam will prevail. Allah سبحانه وتعالى says:

هُوَ الَّذِي أَرْسَلَ رَسُولَهُ بِالْهُدَى وَدِينِ الْحَقِّ لِيُظْهِرَهُ عَلَى الدِّينِ كُلِّهِ وَلَوْ كَرِهَ الْمُشْرِكُونَ

“It is He who has sent His Messenger with guidance and the religion of truth to manifest it over all religion, although they who associate others with Allah dislike it.”

(at-Tawba: 33)

 

In France, Lessons in Secularism to Confront Radical Islam

The French government wants to send imams to classes in secularism and religious freedom as a measure to prevent home-grown extremism. Elizabeth Bryant reports from Lyon on a program that is paving the way. All are enrolled in a program on secularism and religious freedom that is jointly run by two Lyon Universities and the city’s Grand Mosque. They’re the unlikely foot soldiers of a national campaign for greater religious tolerance and to help shape a moderate, Western-oriented “Islam a la Francaise.” The drive has taken on new urgency since January’s terrorist attacks in Paris and the departure of hundreds of French youths to join jihadist movements in the Middle East. The Socialist government has responded with a raft of new measures to fight home-grown extremism. Among them: plans to enroll hundreds of imams and other key Muslim figures in civics training programs – and to make them mandatory for chaplains working in prisons and the military. But Lyon’s program has broader ambitions, as it reaches out to include government officials in the training. “If things are going to change, they need to change in all directions,” says Michel Younes, co-director of the initiative at Lyon’s Catholic University. “That means not only training imams about secularity, but also civil servants – because the subject of religion in public spaces has almost become a taboo.” “Living together has to be more than an idea,” he adds. “It’s being able to be together, think together, exchange ideas together.” France has always had an uneasy relationship with Islam, the country’s second biggest religion. Clashes over issues like wearing headscarves in public schools – now banned – to Halal butchering practices and religious burial grounds have deepened divisions and misunderstandings between the state and the five million-strong Muslim community. [Source: Deutsche Welle]

For several years now, the French government is trying to change Islam into version of Islam that is acceptable to the authorities. However, it does not matter how hard the government tries, the French public’s interest in Islam is at an all-time high. That must be worrying for the authorities.