Backing for Christian legal bid

The case could have implications for religious groups across the UK.

The Evangelical Alliance has backed a Christian Union group that is taking legal action after being banned from student facilities.

Exeter University Evangelical Christian Union was suspended from the student guild and had a bank account frozen.

The guild took action after students joining the union were required to sign a statement of religious belief.

The union is seeking a judicial review at the High Court under the Human Rights Act.

The student guild said the union was the only society with barriers to entry and breached Equal Opportunities policy.

The union said members were asked to sign a statement of belief in Jesus as their God and saviour while officials were asked to sign a more comprehensive statement of belief.

Wider implications

Ben Martin, a member of Exeter's Christian Union committee, said their fundamental freedoms of belief, association and expression had come under threat.

"We are quite prepared to stand up for those freedoms, hence why we are going to court," he said.

In backing the union, the Evangelical Alliance said some "crucial clarifications of human rights law" were at stake in the case.

Dr David Muir, of the alliance, said: "Christians have always used statements of faith to define, express, and defend their beliefs; the freedom to do that is an essential religious liberty."

The case could have implications for religious groups across the UK.

As well as Exeter, the Christian Union at the University of Birmingham faced a suspension of a bank account and exclusion from free use of student union premises.

Similar action is also said to have been considered against Christian Unions at Edinburgh's Heriot-Watt University and some London medical schools.