religious discrimination bill

The Straw Man is about to burst!

/ MurrayCampbell / 4 Comments

The straw man mock-up of the Religious Discrimination Bill is getting stuffier with every passing day.

It wasn’t enough for Judith Ireland and Luke Beck to write a couple of fictional pieces last week for Fairfax. Their collation of hypotheticals have been mistaken by some readers as fact, but in the end, their scaremongering ended up belittling religious and irreligious Australians alike!

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Apparently, the straw man has yet more room to fill. A string of articles this week (once again thanks to our friends at Fairfax) have continued to make hay out of the Religious Discrimination Bill. This overstuffed straw man is about ready to burst, even before they even finishing preparing to light the bonfire.

Take, for example, The Royal Women’s Hospital. According to reporting in yesterday’s The Age, they are arguing that the Religious Discrimination Bill will lead to Doctors refusing to perform abortions and even to abortion freedoms being stifled.

First, Doctors are already protected by law to refuse to perform an abortion. Second, and contrary to the straw man, this Bill is primarily aimed at protecting already existing freedoms of religious Australians, not introducing new rights. Third, if abortions laws are tightened in the future, it won’t be the consequence of this Bill but because Australians once again acknowledge that unborn children are human beings and therefore must be treated with due dignity and worth.

Former High Court Justice Michael Kirby has joined the fray with a piece in The Age, arguing that the Bill will divide Australians and not unite them.

What is Michael Kirby’s evidence that this will be the case? For the most part, he entertains a similar line of hypotheticals that have already been paraded in the street. There is however one concrete example. He mentions the case in Victoria where a Doctor allegedly refused to prescribe contraception or advice to a patient about IVF. It is important to note however that this alleged incident has nothing to do with the drafted Religious Discrimination Bill. This case has arisen under existing laws in Victoria and not because of a Bill that has yet to be even debated before the Parliament.

It is worth noting the kind of language Justice Kirby employs to describe the kind of person who is advocating for the Bill:

“it actively facilitates intolerance and will work to divide rather than unite Australians”

“support those who use religious belief as a weapon against non-believers.”

Is this really the state of mind and heart of religious Australians? We are wanting legal protection for the purpose of using our beliefs as a weapon? There is more…

“This is something obsessive religious proponents demand”.

Of course, any person who supports this Bill is obviously ‘obsessive’ and unreasonable and a fool! For a decisive knock out punch, Justice Kirby concludes by bringing out one of the big words,

“We should be vigilant to preserve it, not erode its legacy by enacting laws to appease an extreme minority.”

Are our mainstream Christian denominations now to be described as ‘extreme’? Are Anglicans, Presbyterians and Baptists, ‘extreme’. Extreme in what and how? For affirming what Christians have believed and practised for 2,000 years? For cherishing ideas that have created the freedoms and societal goods that we enjoy today in this country?  We all know how appalling extremists are, but labelling people in this false way is incredibly slanderous.   I understand, resorting to this kind of rhetorical game can be effective and persuasive, but it does nothing to aid truth-telling and it only further exemplifies the fracturing of civil society. Of course, there are some religious tools in our community; I don’t see anyone denying that. But this narrative being spun by Kirby and others is simply disingenuous.

As I wrote earlier in the week, I’m not saying that the Bill cannot be improved. My preference would be that we live in a society where such legislation isn’t required.  It is important to remember why this Bill is even being considered: it is because of the unreasonable and hardline secularists who will not tolerate Australians who do not fully endorse their narrow way of looking at the world. The same people who cry out for love speech are calling fellow Australians bigots for not supporting their causes, and are going to great lengths to silence these Australian and even remove them from their places of employment.

Wouldn’t it be advantageous and refreshing to see disagreeing Australians discuss these matters with civility and sitting down together without spitting coffee at each other?  I remember one such example. Back in 2017, Andrew Hastie and Tim Wilson sat down with a Coopers beer in hand and chatted about their differing position on gay marriage. It was polite, honest, and respectful. Yet within hours, social media was alight with hate, and with photos of people destroying bottles of Coopers and with pubs declaring that they would no longer serve the Aussie beer. That’s the problem, we no longer wish to talk across the table or to show kindness to those who disagree with us. There is only one flavour in town and that is ‘outrage’.

Whether it is Michael Kirby or Luke Beck, the media, and the rest of us (including those who support some kind of religious discrimination bill), we really need to put the straw man out to pasture and rediscover those out-of-fashion virtues, kindness and authentic tolerance. The Religious Discrimination Bill is aimed at going some way to hold together this fraying society, but I do hope that wherever it finally lands, Christians will keep speaking truth in love and to love our neighbours whoever they may be. Yes, sometimes we will fail to do so, and so we should ask for forgiveness. We should hold to the faith once for all delivered to the saints. If our society so determines that this is extremism, then so be it. Let us be extreme in loving God and in wanting good for others

 

 

Australia is wrestling with Religious Freedom

/ MurrayCampbell / 3 Comments

The fight against the Religious Discrimination Bill is heating up with a submission from some of the nation’s powerful Unions and with a bank telling everyone to love their way or go away.

The Sydney Morning Herald is reporting that the Australian Council of Trade Unions and the Australian Industry Group have written a letter to Attorney General, Christian Porter, warning the Government about perceived flaws in the Bill.

I am not saying that the Bill is perfect and that improvements cannot be made. I personally wish there was no need for a Religious Discrimination Bill in Australia, but hardline secularists continue to threaten religious freedoms and raise the temperature against religious Australians such that a Bill has become important, if not necessary. 

So what are the Unions’ concerns? According to Dana McCauley, the primary issue relates to “a risk of harm to the staff and customers of Australian businesses”.

“Employers are concerned the provision will conflict with their obligation under workplace laws to provide safe environments free of bullying and harassment, risk damage to their reputations, harm productivity and make it harder to recruit and retain staff.”

The argument goes like this: this Bill will give religious people license to be mean and say horrible things to other workers and customers and employers won’t have the power to stop it. But is this the case?

Associate Professor, Neil Foster, has detailed that “The Bill does not authorise all religiously motived” acts, and second, the Bill does not create rights to new forms of horrible speech, but it does protect freedom of speech that operates against the background of already existing rights.

“The “right” to make offensive remarks, is a right which already exists as part of our long tradition of protecting free speech, even speech which we don’t like and which upsets people. That is why we need a right to free speech- none of us are tempted to censor speech we agree with!”

There has been a tidal wave of pressure to succumb to the new sexual code of conduct, and I can’t but help conclude that the ACTU and AI are just the latest to succumb. To be fair (relying on the SMH’s reporting), they are not against the Bill altogether, but those parts that they believe will undermine the employer.  Part of the issue with this tidal narrative is that religion is seen as a threat to business and as a threat to social cohesion. In reality, it can serve as a constructive partner. It is a little odd that Australian businesses are wanting to squeeze out religion when globally the world is becoming more religious.  As Dr Brian J. Grim (President of the Religious Freedom & Business Foundation) has observed through his research,  “religious freedom is good for the economy, good for society, and good for business”.

Underneath this wave is a strong current to strip religious Australians of their freedom to hold and speak of their beliefs. This is no mere hypothetical; the proof is in the Israel Folau case, and in many other cases that have not gained attention by the media. Remember, it was not the tone of Folau’s Instagram posts that led to his dismissal (even I took issue with his tone), for as Rugby Australia’s CEO, Raelene Castle, admitted, even quoting the Bible would have been cause for Folau’s sacking. 

There are many workers who speak with me in private, employed across professions and industries, and who have been frightened into silence by their workplace, afraid they will lose their job if they dare mention their faith in Jesus Christ.  To be more accurate, the fictitious Jesus who embraces the new sexual morality is permissible, just not the Jesus who subscribes to the Bible. 

Both the ACTU and AI have an invested interest in this discussion and ought to be heard. I get it, anyone believing the straw man arguments may well express concerns over religious workers causing “workplace bullying, aggression, harassment including sexual harassment, discrimination, or other unreasonable behaviour”.  In reality, such cases are unusual. Is there no room for discussion and disagreement over life’s biggest questions, either in the workplace or on people’s private social media accounts? This rhetoric about harm and bullying too easily becomes political speak, cloaking what is really going on under the guise of justice and human rights. 

In some quarters, bullying is now code for, this Christian doesn’t support gay marriage. Or, that employee doesn’t join in workplace rituals for LGBT celebration days. And, I don’t like the article my colleague shared on his Facebook page and so I’m reporting him to the HR department.

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Let’s look at the ANZ’s new messaging. ANZ has released a document entitled, “Your Guide To Love Speech“.

“During the 2020 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Festival, ANZ is taking a stand against hurtful language and has launched #LoveSpeech – a national campaign to educate Australians on the impact that hurtful language has on the LGBTIQ+ community.”

“By changing hateful messages to give them new meaning, we hope to create awareness, understanding, and unity. That’s what Love Speech is all about.”

I assume the document (with its accompanying posters) are mandatory in ANZ workplaces. I also assume that ANZ board are comfortable for staff to share this messaging outside of work. Indeed, ANZ specifies that this is a “national campaign to educate Australians”.

I am all for ‘love speech’, but what ANZ mean by love is, the unqualified affirmation of the new sexual ethic. And what they consider hate speech includes what are reasoned and deeply held beliefs for millions of Australians. It is quite extraordinary but ANZ feel so confident about their posturing that they can explicitly state that mere expression of a belief in heterosexual only marriage is a form of hate speech.

My question to ANZ is, what will happen to employees who cannot get behind this campaign and who hold a different opinion? What is to become of employees who are discovered expressing a different opinion? What will happen to the employee who either at work or in public voices disagreement with this campaign?

Are we to conclude that affirming gay marriage and transgenderism is an inherent requirement for employment at a bank?

It’s not as though ANZ, Rugby Australia, and some Unions hate religion, they just can’t accept religion that doesn’t fully embrace their virtue signalling.  This is about controlling religion (specifically Christianity). This wave of authoritarian secularism pervades our education systems, now employment, the public square, and may soon pour inside religious institutions and churches. We are fools to think otherwise. The gods of secularism will not tolerate an alternative, even if means dismantling the faith upon which the structures and fibres of our great society were built. Religion is to be controlled, much like during the good old days of Ancient Rome or in today’s Communist China, where Christianity is permitted so long as all the non-communist bits are deleted. This would all sound crazy and like the ravings of religious nut stuck on hyperbolic drive, except that Australia has already begun witnessing this cultural control. 

And that is why the Religious Discrimination Bill matters. The Bill aims to preserve the kinds of freedom Australians have enjoyed for decades. This is about maintaining a healthy pluralism and retaining an essential ingredient of a civilised society.  It is difficult to assess the Union’s letter through the lens of a newspaper article, for the spin may not accurately represent the written concerns; I don’t know. Is there warrant for further consideration of the “Folau clause”? Perhaps so. Of course, we should want the Bill to be as fair and useful as possible.

The broader issue is of course, that the culture has shifted. Increasingly, religious people are being informed that their opinions are not welcome in the public square. It is not acceptable to believe in heterosexual-only marriage. It is only okay to share views that fully conform to the narrow and intolerant sexual agenda that is being preached in most almost every sphere of life in contemporary Australia.  The Federal Government is acting to introduce the religious discrimination Bill for the very reason that religious Aussies are losing their jobs and being squeezed out of schools, because of their religious convictions. 

Whatever the outcome of this religious discrimination bill, I hope and pray Christians will continue to follow the ethic give to us by the Lord Jesus Christ: to honour him and to respect those among whom we work, to be gentle and kind and to give reason for the hope we have and to not shy away from the good news we have come to know and cherish above everything. 

What I’ve observed from an exchange with Peter FitzSimons

/ MurrayCampbell / 2 Comments

Last night Peter FtizSimons tweeted an article that was published in the Fairfax newspapers, written by Monash University’s, Associate Professor Luke Beck. With the headline, “Religious discrimination bill backfires on Christians”, Beck mounted a shallow and rather silly case in which he not only threw paper-thin arguments at Christians but also managed to insult everyone else.

I wrote a letter to the Editor, which was published in The Age yesterday (see below), and I tweeted my response to Fitz last night. He asked a couple of polite questions which I responded to with the brevity that Twitter only permits. But then, with a mountain of surprise as thick as thin a slice of toast, the retorts came thick and fast from twitter’s moral mob.

Following this brief exchange with the Fitz, I have been reminded of the following:

1. Ignorance of Christianity is sky high in Australia.

2. Churches failing to deal with sin in their midst have done enormous damage to the Gospel

3. Churches who protect bad theology and promote false versions of Christianity have caused huge social confusion and damage.

4. The sins of the past are not forgotten

5. Lots of people must be learning their history from the back of cereal boxes or from National Geographic rather than from, you know, actual history. (I speak as someone who studied history at university)

6. People are prepared to whitewash the historical record in order to sustain their point of view.

7. People are getting their information about the religious discrimination bill from the media outlets who propagate their already formed views. Responding to or challenging misconceptions is like trying to roll a boulder up a mountainside.

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What should Christians do?

1. Own our sins, confess them and repent of them

2. Stop protecting and promoting garbage theology that comes from Marx’s cell in hell

3. Don’t whitewash history. Some people have done horrendous things in the name of Christ

4. Remember the Gospel is good news. It really is true and good and beautiful and life changing.

5. Become more like the Lord Jesus: Love God and love our neighbours

6. Do good to those who don’t like you

7. Twitter is a poor platform for exchanging ideas and having meaningful conversations

Finally, I’m reminded of these words spoken by the Lord Jesus,

“By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. 18 A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them.” (Matthew 7)

 

 

My letter in The Age (Feb 21):

Luke Beck’s attempt to scare Christians away from the religious discrimination bill amounts to shooting blanks; noisy but harmless. Firstly, Christians are quite used to people insulting their faith. It’s been happening for 2,000 years and there’s little reason to think that will change.

Second, I suspect many unbelieving Australians will be surprised by Beck’s small opinion of them, suggesting that they would stoop so low that “Employers will be able to ridicule Christians in the workplace” and “Doctors will be able to humiliate Christian patients.”

If you’re mean to us, we’ll be mean to you! While Beck seems content to attribute that modus operandi to our society, I much prefer Jesus’ ethic, “But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you”.

 

 

The Age published a response to my letter today (Feb 23):

“Pastor Murray Campbell knows his theology but perhaps not his history. Christians, over many centuries, have not merely insulted, but tried to obliterate the faiths of others. The Crusades, the Inquisition, the burning of witches, missionaries as agents of the colonial power in Africa, Asia, the Americas and Australia…the list goes on.

It’s difficult to reconcile the pastor’s words of love and tolerance with the history of the institutions he represents

All over the world, Christians have attempted to wipe out cultural and spiritual practices and even committed genocide in the name of their God. Take a look at the record. Christians are not the victims here

Susan Green, Castlemaine”

3 brief responses to Susan:

Hi Susan

  1. Like I mention above, I studied history at university. In fact in both of my degrees I have studied lots of history.
  2. Your examples go some way to demonstrate the kinds of issues I have raised in this blog post about popular history telling.
  3. Perhaps you could have read something I’ve written before declaring my ignorance of history.