Rev Mark Weeden is wrong to assert that Parliament’s law requiring the Prime Minister to request an extension to Article 50 from the EU targeted an individual (Oct/Nov).
The Benn Act was not aimed at the Prime Minister’s person, but at his office as head of the government.
As a retired civil servant, I know that UK law lays thousands of obligations upon individual secretaries of state, eg the Transport Secretary must appoint examiners of public passenger vehicles under the Road Traffic Act 1991 and the Work and Pensions Secretary must give a right of appeal when determining a claim for benefit.
The issue is not in targeting individuals or groups; it’s in whether the policy can be justified objectively.
Regarding Christians’ relationship to the law of the land, I disagree with Mark’s comparison of Dr Martin Luther King Jr to Daniel, early Christian martyrs and Corrie ten Boom. While Dr King was a great civil rights leader, there must be a question mark over his Christianity, because of his adulteries which have not been denied.
Also, King quoted negro spirituals about being “free at last”, but he meant something entirely different from what his forebears meant when they sang of heaven.
Paul Mackrell
Slinfold, West Sussex