Weekend Wrap for 30 October 2022

Rob Baillieu – Moderate Liberals in Victoria have learned nothing. The state needs a Matt Kean.
"Once again, Victorian Liberals have failed the test of leadership. This week, the state’s opposition leader, Matthew Guy, promised to amend the Equal Opportunity Act to allow religious institutions to discriminate based on their faith. In practice, this will allow discrimination on the basis of gender and sexuality. The lack of resistance to the policy by anyone in the Victorian Liberal party is heartbreaking and politically isolates the LGBTQ+ community." (23 Oct 2022)
Read more at The Guardian

Stan van Hooft – Is opposition to abortion and homosexuality really a ‘religious view’?
"Religious people believe that there is more to life than the material and historical world in which we live. But the paradigmatic example of a religious view would be the belief that God exists. This leads to a variety of further beliefs which influence how people live their lives. For example, there may be a belief that whatever happens is ordained or willed by God and therefore serves some purpose. There may also be beliefs about what happens to us after we die, with God playing a central role in our eternal destiny. Views that condemn abortion and homosexual acts do not obviously fit into this paradigm." (23 Oct 2022)
Read more at Pearls & Irritations

Lucy Hamilton – News Corp is normalising fascistic politics.
"[News Corp’s James Morrow] selected a number of positions held by Meloni (and De Santis) to celebrate as goals for Australian politicians. In particular, he selected: family, national identity, religious identity and gender identity. Meloni and De Santis want national identity to be as close to monotone as possible: patriotic and uncritically supportive of a mythical nation that never existed in the way their nostalgia recreates it. In this lens, religious identity is intricately tied to that mythical national identity. Their nations are white Christian nations, they assert, whatever other versions of history will say. Anyone with a contrary story should remain invisible. There is little ambiguity in the fascist politics evoked by these dogwhistle terms." (23 Oct 2022)
Read more at Pearls & Irritations

Garry Deverell – How the churches can reckon with their colonial legacy.
"The questions then arise: How are you settler Christians, you immigrant Christian communities — you who have empowered and enriched yourselves at the expense of Indigenous people — going to let that power go? How are you going to redress the balance? How will you take the power you acquired by genocide and ecocide and return it to those you wronged, and continue to wrong?" (24 Oct 2022)
Read more at ABC Religion & Ethics

Peter Wertheim – Labor’s decision to reverse Australia’s recognition of West Jerusalem represents a failure of policy and process.
"While a number of people within the government privately conceded that the policy reversal was problematic in substance, and that the process that led to it was indefensible, officially the government attempted to justify itself. It attempted to deflect attention away from the shortcomings of its processes by reviving its criticism of the previous Coalition government’s “decision to play politics” in December 2018, when it had recognised West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, following the announcement of its intentions to that effect in the lead-up to the by-election for the seat of Wentworth, with its large Jewish constituency." (25 Oct 2022)
Read more at ABC Religion & Ethics

Monica Doumit – When suborning conscience is the goal.
"Does anyone doubt there will be submission after submission to this inquiry suggesting that allowing health professionals to conscientiously object to providing abortions or dispensing contraception is denying women “reproductive healthcare”? Or that the solution proposed will be to force doctors, nurses and pharmacists to participate in abortion or prescribe or provide contraception as a condition of their registration? Or to require religious hospitals to provide abortions as a condition of receiving federal funding?" (26 Oct 2022)
Read more at the Catholic Weekly

Dr Lee Duffield – Democracy in danger: The rise of Right-wing demagogues.
"The successes of the “Teal” women’s group in the Australian Federal Election this year showed non-ideological Liberal voters at last getting alarmed about the way their old “moderate” party has gone — so many of their elected members and officials acting only like corporate lobbyists or espousing dicta of extremism and intolerance." (27 Oct 2022)
Read more at Independent Australia

Shibu Thomas – Out gay Sydney MP Alex Greenwich reflects on a decade in NSW parliament, Oxford Street and his Equality Bill.
"Over the past decade, Greenwich has stood up for LGBTQI rights and pushed significant law reforms through NSW Parliament. In 2019, he introduced a bill to decriminalise abortion, which was passed by the NSW Parliament the same year. In May 2022, the voluntary assisted dying bill, spearheaded by Greenwich, became law in the state. Both bills had bipartisan support of MPs." (27 Oct 2022)
Read more at the Star Observer

Reb Halabi – By reversing the Coalition’s decision on West Jerusalem, Labor has put peace back on the table.
"The Albanese Labor government has rescinded the previous Coalition government’s recognition of West Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. Although East Jerusalem is within the Palestinian Occupied Territories, it is under Israeli control. Jerusalem is the last issue to be discussed when a two-state solution is reached and Jerusalem, ideally, would be shared. Jerusalem is the holy site of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, making for a cauldron of sacred yet ill feelings among the three faiths. And herein lies the problem." (28 Oct 2022)
Read more at ABC Religion & Ethics

Lucy Hamilton – The IPA launches campaign to harass teachers. Why???
"[Bella] D’Ambrera is the director of the Foundations of Western Civilisation Program at the IPA. This program’s focus is an Orbanist dogwhistle, a polite version of the Great Replacement conspiracy that says Elites (Jewish people for the hardcore devotees) are consciously destroying western civilisation by importing people of colour and inculcating shame about the only truly worthwhile civilisation to have existed. Orban’s utter loathing of diversity – cultural and personal – is clearly visible throughout the IPA’s work." (28 Oct 2022)
Read more at Pearls & Irritations

Ben Schneiders, Tom Steinfort and Natalie Clancy – Mormon church invests billions of dollars while grossly overstating its charitable giving.
"The global Mormon church has overstated the amount it gives in charity by more than $US1 billion ($1.56 billion), apparently to make itself appear more generous than it actually is, and the US-based church is now under scrutiny over an alleged international tax minimisation scheme that involves Australia-based church entities. ... 'The Mormon church will have you believe that it’s a religion that dabbles in business, but the evidence clearly shows that they are a business dabbling in religion,' said former Mormon and whistleblower Ryan McKnight." (29 Oct 2022)
Read more at The Age

Si Gladman – ‘Infiltrate, Impact, Impel’: Raising up Christians for the Liberal Party.
"Upon signing up as a member of the Liberal Party in Victoria, some churchgoers have been handed a one-page document with the title ‘Political Participation for Godly good’, according to a Liberal Party member. The document provides a flowchart matrix to guide new members on how they can participate in their local branch meetings, known as State Electorate Convention and Federal Electorate Convention meetings. It also details how they can influence the party’s State Council and State Assembly. In the top right-hand corner appears the italicised motto: Infiltrate, Impact, Impel." (29 Oct 2022)
Read more at Rationale Magazine