(John Coulter, Irish Daily Star)

The Dáil and Stormont need to join forces and celebrate the 800th anniversary of the signing of the famous Magna Carta by introducing the Irish Freedom Charter to protect evangelical Christians.

Every responsible Christian and church on this island should throw its full support behind DUP Lagan Valley MLA Paul Givan’s Conscience Clause as a starting point.

It should not be dismissed as a DUP election stunt ahead of May’s Westminster poll. If successful, the Conscience Clause will offer real protection for evangelical Christians from persecution from militant atheists, humanists, agnostics, communists, and the well-organised gay community.

While campaign groups warn about the growth in Islamophobia and homophobia, society should not ignore the threat posed by Christophobia – an active campaign of hatred to persecute anyone who believes in Biblical Christianity.

As an evangelical Christian, I remain convinced Section 75 of the North’s equality laws, along with the hate crime legislation, are powerful enough to protect me.

Givan’s Conscience Clause may give a little more legal muscle to these existing laws, but it doesn’t go far enough, even though it’s a good starting point which any responsible Christian church has a moral and spiritual duty to support.

But what is really needed is an all-island Freedom Charter which protects the rights of individual Christians.

The big weakness of Givan’s Clause is that while it gives added protection to Christians from the hate mongers who peddle Christaphobia, it doesn’t protect ordinary evangelical Christians like me from militant Bible-bashing fundamentalists.

Known as ‘The Fundies’, these extremist Christians still think they are living in Oliver Cromwell’s Puritan era and behave like the cinema character played by horror legend Vincent Price in the Hammer blockbuster, Witchfinder General.

Who protects evangelical Christians from ‘Fundies’ who refuse a married couple church membership because the wife does not wear a hat to worship?

What about the ‘Fundies’ who ban women from wearing trousers in church; ban them from speaking in church or holding clerical posts, and reduce their role to nothing more than religious trolley-dollies?

What about the ‘Fundies’ who order men to ‘tone down’ their ties because the colours are too loud for church?

What about the fundamentalist eejits who maintain that autism is a punishment from God and anyone with the condition to doomed to Hell?

Equally importantly, who protects evangelical Christians from the ‘Fundie’ clerics who make knee-jerk decisions based on unsubstantiated tittle-tattle and gossip in their congregations and don’t bother their asses to check the facts?

Unfortunately, many of these ‘Fundies’ adopt the view once held by Nazi tyrant Adolf Hitler – tell a lie often enough and people will believe it.

Some finger-pointing moralising ‘Fundies’ have no concept of the law. They simply fire out their hideous accusations conceived in the depths of their imagination. They don’t care if it destroys families and people’s reputations – they just like to hear the sound of their own condemning voices.

I don’t need Givan’s Clause to protect me from atheists. My deeply personal evangelical Christian faith is strong enough to withstand whatever bile they hurl at me.

What I really need is Freedom Charter to protect me from ranting ‘Fundies’ who behave like the Biblical Pharisees. So sign up to Coulter’s Charter today!

(John Coulter, Irish Daily Star)

Christian Churches must get out of their pulpits and pews and fight to save faith schools in Ireland or the secular society will have us drowned in a sea of forced integrated education.

While it makes common sense to cut the number of administrative bodies controlling schools, that should not mean we waste millions of much-needed funding on the integrated education sector.

The North requires a single education body which at the same time protects the identity of the Christian ethos.

Listening to the pundits who sing the praises of integrated education, you would think they had magically discovered the cure for eight centuries of conflict in Ireland.

In the North, the regional colleges have been providing integrated education for more than a century.

Affectionately still known as the ‘Tech’ have had Protestants and Catholics mixing together in the classroom for generations.

Yet Stormont seems hell-bent on slashing funding to such colleges.

Likewise, Unionists should not gloat if Stormont finally decides to chop St Mary’s teacher training college in Belfast, which supplies many excellent teachers for the Catholic maintained sector in the North.

If the North loses the battle over St Mary’s, mainly Protestant state sector schools will be forced to water down their Christian ethos.

It will only be a matter of time for the trendy liberals of the ‘politically correct’ brigade are successful in banning Christian morning assembly. Meanwhile, the Christian Churches sit on their asses and do nothing.

Too many churches, especially in mainstream Christianity, are more interested in preserving their image than helping young people cope with the stresses and strains of modern society.

The pluralist and secular society has provided a more attractive alternative to the traditional Sunday School and Bible classes which were all the rage in the Super Seventies.

Instead of pushing integrated education, schools minister John O’Dowd and Alliance Learning Minister Stephen Farry should pump cash into helping existing schools provide sound Christian education classes as part of the school, college and university curriculum.

If the mainstream Catholic and Protestant denominations are not careful, teaching Christian values will be booted out of schools altogether.

In this scenario, it will be left to the growing band of smaller independent Christian denominations, such as the Elim Pentecostalists, to provide Biblical teaching to our children.

Elim is celebrating its Irish centenary this year and has become one of the fastest growing faiths on the island, pulling in converts from across the religious divide on both sides of the border.

While abortion and gay marriage are important subjects for the Christian Churches to take stands on, those churches must not forget that the real battle for the Christian faith will be fought in the schools.

Catholicism is still recovering from the sex abuse scandals while Protestantism is so split its hard to know who really speaks for the faith. Lose the schools battle and the churches might as well shut up shop for good.

Unfortunately, many Christians are too scared about upsetting people. Many clerics need to grow a set of real balls and get into the community and defend Christian values.

Too many toothless twits wearing dog collars are more interested in getting pats on the back from their flocks rather than getting their hands dirty for the faith.

What Christian education urgently requires are pastors with punch! The crisis facing faith schools is not the fault of the politicians; the gutless clergy are to blame for not defending the Christian Gospel effectively.

February 11, 2015________________

This article appeared in the February 10, 2015 edition of the Irish Daily Star.

 Commie in out of cold! Shinners are on Red alert.

Bring back the Stickies, all is forgiven!

The spirits of leading Irish commies James Connolly and Cathal Goulding must be chuckling hysterically after the Greeks elected Red Alex as its new Prime Minister.

Alexis Tsipras is an open communist and his Hard Left party, Syriza, has formed the new Greek government along with MPs from the Centre Right Independent Greeks party.

If Southern Irish voters follow the Greek example, their protest vote will see Shinner boss Gerry Adams become the new Taoiseach with the rising Iron Lady of Irish politics, Lucinda Creighton and her new planned Centre Right party, taking over as Tanaiste.

What Red Alex has achieved is to make the daft politics of looney Marxism a trendy vote winner when protesting against austerity cuts.

If Sinn Fein can keep its nerve, avoid any more IRA scandals, and get its vote out, Adams will at least be moving into the Tanaiste’s office in Leinster House.

But if Gerry was to ditch the green shamrock for the openly red hammer and sickle, would the Irish people be so pissed off with King Kenny and his cuts regime that they could give Red Gerry the top job in the Dail?

Republican pensioners would then be mumbling through their false teeth – where’s the Workers’ Party when you need it?

After the disastrous IRA border campaign finally flopped in 1962, Goulding wanted republicans to adopt a purely political agenda and an avowedly communist one at that.

In this respect, he was trying to copy the antics of Scottish communist turned Irish republican James Connolly, who by 1916 had launched his Hard Left Irish Socialist Republican Party – until the Brits shot him!

Ironically, the Provies split from what became known as the Stickies in the late Sixties because they thought Commie Cathal had become too Red!

But if Red Alex’s Greek onslaught is a benchmark, looks like Commie Cathal was right all along.

What Ireland now needs to cure its austerity nightmare is a good dose of idiotic Marxism washed down with a hopefully healthy dose of Irish Lady Lucy’s Centre Right honey!

The Stickies tried a number of brands to sell Marxism to the Irish people, including Official Sinn Fein, Republican Clubs, the Workers’ Party, and Democratic Left.

But the good old staunch Catholic voters were having none of this commie crap and the iron grip of the Irish bishops held firm.

However, all that was before the child sex abuse scandals rocked the Irish Catholic Church.

Commies may be Godless atheists, but at least they weren’t using their Marxist cloaks as a cover to abuse children.

If Red Alex can persuade the Greek middle class to go communist, could Red Gerry nudge the Southern Catholic middle class to make Sinn Fein the largest party in the next Dail?

And this would be the perfect excuse for Stormont’s Deputy First Minister, the dark green Mr McGuinness to become the Assembly’s Red Marty, ruling alongside a Red Robbo from the Unionist camp.

Working class loyalists are constantly moaning they have been abandoned by the middle class run Unionist parties.

Red Alex has certainly proved it’s cool to be a commie. No wonder British Labour boss Red Ed Miliband was in the North trying to court Northern MPs.

The Christian Churches have failed to give proper leadership, so maybe it’s time to revamp the old Communist Party of Northern Ireland.

Just call me Comrade Coulter from now on! After all, judging by His Sermon on the Mount manifesto in the Biblical New Testament, Jesus Christ was the first real communist.

(John Coulter, Irish Daily Star)

Tonight I won’t sleep for fear of nightmares because tomorrow has become one of the toughest days in my life and has been for several years.

Tomorrow (Tuesday 27th January 2015) is International Holocaust Memorial Day when many across the globe remember the six million who perished in Nazi death camps in the 1930s and 1940s.

But it will have added significance as tomorrow marks the 70th anniversary of the liberation of one of the most notorious camps, Auschwitz Birkenau in Poland, where more than a million humans were murdered.

After almost 37 years in journalism, I thought the Irish conflict had enabled me to experience every emotion imaginable. Wrong! I still have nightmares about the visit to that place of mass genocide; that’s why I want to stay awake for all of tonight, so the nightmares won’t come back.

As I started on the Auschwitz tour to write my article, I was physically ill. Passing through the camp gates with its sickening iron sign in German, I had to rush back into the visitor’s centre and vomit.

Hitler’s SS had its genocide machine at Auschwitz down to a fine art – butchering 3,000 people every half hour. Just imagine everyone killed in the Troubles dying in only 30 minutes.

Nothing in life ever prepares you to confront racism. I once spent 18 months researching a two-part series on links between republicanism and the evil Ku Klux Klan in the US.

But one of the KKK’s supporters lived in Ireland and within hours they had traced me, forcing me to leave the North until the heat of the story cooled.

Officially, I was taking my annual leave. In reality, I was getting out of Ireland on the best plane available. I stayed at a camp site in Jersey. Ironically, the Klan nearly had its own vengeance on me because I almost blew myself apart lighting a camping stove!

One of the creepiest moments of my career hunting racists came when I interviewed former British National Party (BNP) MEP Nick Griffin, then Chairman of the National Front (NF), over lunch.

He was accompanied by a few senior cronies. He handed me a booked entitled Attempted Murder, which basically was a rant about people opposing the NF.

I almost puked over Griffin during that working lunch when I discovered a half page on myself, claiming my articles exposing the Front were “lurid publicity designed to frighten the NF away from involvement in Ulster”.

I’ve always pondered if Griffin knew I was the John Coulter criticised in the NF’s ‘wee black book’ and this was his way of letting me know I was being watched.

Or maybe it was just one of those strange coincidences in life where Griffin happened to give one of the NF’s strongest critics a copy of its silly, but sinister wee book.

Worse was to follow when after another of my exposes, the NF retaliated by publishing my name and home address along with a photo of me in its hatesheet, National Front News.

The Front did its homework well, carrying precise details of my employment, university career, trade union role and details of my dad’s political activities.

The RUC gave me lectures on personal security, but eventually I knew I would have to leave home as the NF shoved a copy of the hatesheet with this ‘expose’ on me through my home letterbox.

Then a Klan source from the Knights of the Invisible Empire took great exception to an article I wrote entitled ‘The Orange Swastika – the rise of new millennium Loyalist Nazism.’

This so-called Grand Dragon arrived at my doorstep, issuing the immortal words: “You don’t blow my cover, and we won’t blow up your house!”

My message to politicians, church and community leaders is simple – I have personally suffered for my stand against racism, so please do not bore me with pious words of condemnation.

Take positive action and get those tougher laws I want against hate crime. I don’t want racism to become Ireland’s new sectarianism.

January 28, 2015

Ireland’s spooks across the island need Dandy Dave and King Kenny to introduce internment of suspected jihadist radicals on both sides of the border if the Emerald Isle is not to have its own Charlie Hebdo massacre.

We are not combating the deadly Ebola virus with a sticky plaster and cough sweets, and as a society we will not be able to protect ourselves from jihadists with a ‘softly, softly’ approach.

So round up all the jihadists, launch a B Specials-style armed community police force, and allow it to use Black and Tans tactics against any and every suspected jihadist radical.

MI5 and the Irish intelligence community also need to stop behaving like frightened pussy cats and become more like the Israeli Mossad or the old East German Stasi secret police who knew everything about everybody.

Look at how the Mossad hunted down the Black September terrorists after they murdered Jewish athletes at the 1972 Olympics in Munich.

East Germany may now be part of a united nation, but it never suffered a terrorist campaign because of the excellent intelligence gathering Stasi activities.

The majority of British and Irish citizens want the political gloves taken off and an iron fist policy adopted towards jihadist terrorists from the likes of Al Qaeda, Islamic State, Hamas, the Taliban or Boko Haram, all of whom have been responsible for thousands of murders across the globe.

The Paris slaughter cannot be dismissed as a French problem. The American State Department has already warned there are at least six jihadist cells operating in Ireland because Shannon airport was allegedly used as a refuelling point for US planes taking jihadist suspects to Guantanamo Bay.

Sources within the Brits’ intelligence community suspect that dissident republicans have been trying to link up with Islamic terrorists for mutual training in the same way as the Provos got into bed politically with Palestinian extremists.

While MI5 head spook Andrew Parker boasted that most terrorist attacks in Ireland had been foiled last year, he warned it was unrealistic to expect every planned attack can be stopped.

Oh yes they can, Andy Boy, if you and all your spooks in Ireland act tough like the hero Parker from Spider Man and not the pathetic Parker puppet from Thunderbirds.

Internment became a dirty word in 1971 because it was based on outdated information. But if Dandy Dave and King Kenny can agree sweeping new snooping powers, the spooks can build up a comprehensive list of suspected jihadists to intern.

And that can be the solution to what to do with the Maze site – convert it into Ireland’s Camp X-Ray for processing all jihadist suspects.

And before the trendies in society start screaming about human rights, we need to remember that these jihadists don’t give a damn about human rights – even their own, when they use suicide bombers.

One of the most terrifying interviews I did recently was with a radicalised Muslim. They actually make the so-called republican and loyalist hardmen of the Irish conflict look like pussy cats.

The interview got off to a bad start when I referred to Al Qaeda as terrorists. “They are not terrorists! There are no terrorists in Ireland!”

What about police warnings about dissident republicans who have killed and bombed people, I asked. “Dissident republicans are not terrorists! They are like Al Qaeda; they are freedom fighters!”

But dissidents recently tried to send a letter bomb to the PSNI Chief Constable, I pointed out. “Did the bomb explode?” she snapped. When I said ‘no’, she said: “That’s because there was no bomb; it was all lies; propaganda put out by the American government!”

Who are the terrorists then, I queried. “MI5!” There was no point in continuing given the totally closed mind I was dealing with.

Remember My Name.

We are patrolling outside Gereshk.   You may know  the place.  Helmand province.  In sunny Afghanistan. It is hot – very hot. I am a long way from home. I miss the family, the children, the fun. But I joined up of my own free will. This is my job. My duty. This is for my country. We walk in a straight line at the side of the road. If you could call it a road. Dirt track more like.  I cradle my rifle in my arms. It looks causal but we are always on alert. We are very visible which is risky but we have back up if we need it. We watch for ambushes and hints of the enemy. This particular place is a hot spot , plenty of action. I always dreamed of the action, wanted it so badly that until my first fire fight.  Then it was a case of I wish I had a deeper hole to hide in.  Any soldier will tell you. The hours and days of boredom, repetitive tasks,  tedious patrols. Then  bang. It all goes haywire. Contact with the enemy. Heart in throat.  Adrenaline. When minutes are like hours. The thing that really worries me is the ambush.  No warning. No signs. No chance to fight back.

And today it happens. It is a pure blue sky above. Its mid-afternoon.  Just a usual patrol. I hear the soft whistling sound but we all react too late.  A massive explosion tears the air, raises a huge cloud of dust,  bodies are thrown to the ground. Me included.

Bullets start flying kicking up dirt. I don’t care. Im lying on my side and I can’t move. I see things but I cant hear. Im know I’m hurt but strangely there is no pain. A total numbness.  I think,  ‘where’s my rifle’,  when I need it. But I can’t move my arms or legs.  I am then aware I’m being dragged from behind. I dragged behind a small mud brick wall. Some shelter at least. I suddenly feel cold but the sun beats down on my face.  My hearing is returning. I can hear the phut of bullets digging into soil and mud. There is a lot of shouting. Some screaming. I look up into the face of my best friend. He looks shocked. I can’t believe it. He’s crying. I know what’s happening here. My war is over. I recall the first time I seen the aftermath of an explosion.  Bodies blown apart. I wanted to cry and be sick.  I want to say to him ‘Tell me the truth’,  ‘Is it bad’, but my mouth doesn’t seem to work either.  I just want to close my eyes and sleep.

I think back to my childhood days. Warm summer days playing hide and seek with my brothers and sister.  Then my own children.  My son,  my little man. Carrying him on my shoulders.  Laughing.  And my daughter.  My beautiful daughter who got all her good looks from her mother.  As my wife always told me with a smile.  I am so sad. And much colder now. I know I won’t be seeing them again. Ever. How will they cope? How will my children grow up? Will they remember me with fondness?  And my elderly parents.  Just one more time to say I love them dearly?  Too late. Far too late. I think it strange,  that its getting dark. It’s not night time yet.  I hope someone remembers me when this war is over. Im only 28 years old.  Like so many others.

Remember my name.

Khan Fawad Shinwari.

After reading an article in relation to the PUP by Charlie Freel, on the Long Kesh Inside Out website, I felt compelled to respond.
I must place on record from the outset that I agree with much of what Charlie says, however I think it could be directed in a different manner. I do not intend to stray into my views or vision of the PUP, because that is not my place as I am not a member of the party. I simply wish to highlight the positive work of Julie Anne Johnston.

I have in the past published articles calling for the principles of ‘For God And Ulster’ to be adhered to and it is a matter of record that I oppose gay marriage and the dilution of biblical principles. I believe in Protestantism and am extremely uncomfortable with left wing politics or socialism. My views on that are well known and I do not intend to rehash them. That is not what this response is about.

I believe that Julie Anne Johnston has been a breath of fresh air for working class loyalist communities- her political views differ from mine on a massive scale- however her genuine belief in doing what is right for her community and her desire to stand by people who need support is unquestionable.

I am writing this blog not to defend Julie Anne’s politics or the politics of socialism- which I oppose- but instead to defend Julie Anne as a person.
She is genuine, caring and by all accounts an extremely effective constituency worker. She has time for everyone and on a personal level she was straight out offering public support to me and in contact to see if she could help with the contrived political case against me.

Julie Anne has never sought to aggressively push her political or social views down anyone’s throat and she is a rare breed on the left wing of politics- she preaches tolerance and she shows tolerance of others viewpoints, even if she is opposed to them. She practices what she preaches.

I will continue to articulate my political views and vision of loyalism, which are different than Julie Anne’s, but I will support her right to continue to promote her views & visions. I think to personally attack her is grossly unfair and I think that someone who is working as hard as Julie Anne is for the loyalist community deserves nothing but praise and support.

Jamie Bryson

PROGRESSIVE UNIONIST PARTY OR PINK UNIONIST PARTY???

As someone who right from day one has always voted PUP when available, I am becoming increasingly alarmed by the media campaign being waged via the Guardian Newspaper, Republican websites and twitter, by those attempting toconstruct a “Pink Trojan Horse” within the PUP.    Personally speaking Ihave no problem with whatever immoral sexual activities these individuals get up to, in the privacy of their own homes, in the company of other willingly consenting ADULTS.
What I do object to is the fact that, support, for these anything goes immoral practices are being portrayed as policies, which are endorsed by the PUP as a party. If the PUP as a political party, still wishes to associate its self with the original unalterable policies of Northern Ireland Loyalism proclaimed within the Ulster Covenant and adhered to by the Ulster Volunteers of 1912 and the Ulster Volunteers of the seventies, IE,”FOR GOD AND ULSTER”, then it needs to make its position perfectly clear to the ordinary decent people of Northern Ireland and the World, regarding the basic Christian moral principles and the basic human moral principles proclaimed within the Original Ulster Covenant.
Unfortunately due to the deliberate efforts of Pink News, Republican web sites and twitter, the Guardian article has now been copied world wide as PUP supported policies.
The PUP, for its own electoral gain and in defence of our Forefathers staunch, basic Christian and basic human moral convictions must understand that, because the vast majority of Working Class Loyalists, do not support buggery, or any other form of fatal, disease spreading, sexual activity between homosexuals, bisexuals, or heterosexuals, THIS DOES NOT MEAN THAT THE LOYALIST WORKING CLASS ARE HOMOPHOBIC.
It also needs to understand that the Loyalist Working Class, because of their basic Christian and basic human moral principles, greatly treasure the sanctity of life for the unborn Child, while at the same time have the basic common sense to realise that, in some extreme circumstances, abortion is the right course of action for both Mother and Child, if the Mother so decides.The pink section of the PUP needs to stop spouting the intolerant declaration, that if you are not pro choice in every situation, then you have to be pro Life in every situation.    THE LOYALIST WORKING CLASS HAVE THE BASIC CHRISTIAN AND BASIC MORAL UNDERSTANDING AND RIGHT TO DECIDE WHAT, IS THE CORRECT COURSE OF ACTION FOR THEY, THEMSELVES.
In the case of immigration, the PUP needs to realise that, because the vast majority of the Loyalist Working Class are opposed to the present rampant, uncontrolled, immigration system swamping, solely working class areas. THIS DOES NOT MAKE THE LOYALIST WORKING CLASS RACIST.
Finally in the case of cultural hobbies, like the Irish Language and Ulster Scots, the vast majority of the Loyalist Working Class would have no objection to anyone taking up these cultural hobbies, in their own time and totally at their own expense.  However at the present time these cultural hobbies, are being misused as a political football by the IRA, to deliberately cause offence to the Loyalist Working Class, at the expense of unwilling tax payers. The totally useless Irish Language, is also being forced down some Children’s throats at school, at a time when Chinese, Polish, and other relevant languages would be of much more advantage for our children.  THIS DOES NOT MAKE THE LOYALIST WORKING CLASS ANTI-IRISH.
In short the PUP, needs to start proclaiming its policies on its own presently defunct web site and on other Loyalist Working Class web sites, so that the Loyalist Working Class do not have to depend on second hand, deliberately biased reports of PUP policies from republican and pink news sources.

Charlie Freel.