UK: Watchdog tells church it can keep advertising its belief in miracles
By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent
(Filed: 05/10/2005)

Religion recorded a rare victory over science yesterday when a church was allowed to retain a poster offering the prospect of miracles.

Critics complained to the Advertising Standards Authority that the poster, which pictured a man with a microphone hugging a child beneath the words "Miracles, Healing, Faith", was misleading and irresponsible.

They said that the Penial Pentecostal Church in Brentwood, Essex, was claiming an ability to cure medical conditions but could offer no scientific proof, and the poster "preyed on the credulity of vulnerable people".

But the church, run by Michael Reid, a former Metropolitan Police officer turned insurance salesman turned evangelist, said the poster did not specifically refer to cures or medical conditions.

The words "miracle, healing, faith" were merely a statement of its belief in the Christian Gospel, it argued, and most people were aware of the Christian belief in the miraculous. The rest