Early Release & Silent Prayer

Pictures of jubilant convicts leaving prison early on account of overcrowding have made the headlines. 1,100 more are walking away from prison gates in the next few days. Judges and magistrates gave carefully considered determinations of sentence based upon mitigation, aggravation, previous convictions and an assessment of danger to the public; politicians have simply released them back onto the streets because of the successive governments which failed to make sufficient space to detain them.

A few days ago, an army veteran was convicted for silently praying outside an abortion clinic. Adam Smith-Connor, a reservist who served in Afghanistan, was ordered by a court to pay £9,000, which he described as “criminalis[ing] thought”. He was prosecuted for breaching a Public Spaces Protection Order (PSPO), which bans protests, including silent prayer, within a buffer zone around that Bournemouth ‘clinic’.

So attack someone, rob someone or burgle his home, and you may now leave prison early, not owing a penny. Dare to pray outside an NHS death camp, and you will be walloped with a criminal conviction and a hefty financial burden.

Rather than Early Release & silent prayer, this benighted land needs the silent release of early prayer, and much of it.

O God, arise, therefore judge thou the earth: for thou shalt inherit all nations. Psalm 82:8, Geneva Bible