Arnold Jago, Mildura Vic., letter in New Life, 21 Jul. 2005:

Uganda’s President, Yoweri Museveni, said, ‘I’m against condoms in schools. I have grown-up children. My policy was to frighten them out of undisciplined sex.’ Despite conventional condom-peddler theories, putting the fear of God into young people’s heads works best …

[Meanwhile, back in the 21st century ...]

Barney Zwartz, ‘Catholic guest angers Presbyterians’, Melbourne Age, 9 Aug. 2005:

A Presbyterian minister who invited a Catholic bishop to preach in his church has run into trouble with his presbytery. Douglas Robertson, senior minister at the Scots Church in Melbourne, invited auxiliary bishop Mark Coleridge to give a service in May …A senior Presbyterian who did not want to be named said the incident had caused ‘quite a stir’ and that Mr Robertson had ‘overstepped the mark’. ‘We are Protestant, we are protesting against the Roman Catholics, and what is a man of Catholic heritage doing in our pulpit?’

[Meanwhile, back in the 16th century ...]

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Filed in: Their Own Mouths

‘New Pentecostals’, like the ones you’ll find at mega-churches such as Sydney’s Hillsong, are heavily into prophecy. The ability to forecast future events is regarded as a direct gift of God – specifically, his Holy Spirit division – and is one of the most highly-prized Pentecostal talents.

The Australian Prayer Network (APN) offers a collection of ‘Prophetic Words’ wherein we can avail ourselves of the divine wisdom. These forecasts come straight from the horse’s mouth, the prophet merely acting as a voicebox for his or her incorporeal master – especially when the prophecy is preceded by the words, ‘Thus saith the Lord’, as in, ‘Thus saith the Lord, thou shalt wear thy blue dress to the party next Saturday’; or sometimes, more dangerously, ‘Thus saith the Lord, thou shalt marry Jim and not Fred’ or ‘thou shalt become a missionary to Zaire’. It therefore comes as a surprise to see APN attaching the following exemption clause to its collection of pearls:

The extent to which [these prophecies] reflect the word of the Lord is left to the discernment of the reader.

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Filed in: Christian Right, Pentecostalism

Is the Bible a historically accurate document? Most people would probably give it at least some credence: ‘Well, there was Moses and Abraham and so on, and Israel and Babylon, and of course Jesus …’

Confining ourselves to the Old Testament (OT) for the moment, would you be surprised to learn that many scholars feel that it’s almost impossible to derive any firm historical information from this source at all? And that it consists of little more than pious fiction?

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Filed in: Biblical criticism, Creationism

Last night we saw the unedifying spectacle of several senior politicians from both sides of politics, led by would-be Prime Minister Peter Costello, ingratiating themselves with the happy-clappers of Hillsong:
Costello soaks up Hillsong’s praise The Age, 5-Jul-2005.

No doubt taking the lead from George Bush and Tony Blair, they’ve decided that wearing their faith on their sleeve, if not on their forehead, is good politics. Well maybe it is, in certain quarters. No doubt the Hillsong believers are warm supporters of Costello, if the rapturous welcome they gave him is any guide (this is his second trip to Hillsong). But what of the rest of the population? The pollies are saying faith is good, God is good, Christianity is good, while conveniently ignoring the divisiveness of such platitudes, and the huge divisions that exist within Christianity let alone between Christianity and other faiths. And does that mean that the 25+% of non-believers in Australia, or the 19.8 million people who don’t support fundamentalist Pentecostal Christianity, are now regarded by our potential future PM as second-class citizens?

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Filed in: Christian Right, Pentecostalism, Politics

I feel the public should be made aware of the female child murderers among us. Information regarding child murders should not be secret.
(Anonymous contributor to Melbourne Age Online Forum, Age, 1 July 2005, regarding abortion.)

This little piece of psychopathia reminded me of a mystery I have yet to solve. Perhaps my perceptive readers could help enlighten me.

On 16 July 2001, Peter James Knight walked into the Fertility Control Clinic in East Melbourne, Vic. and shot dead Steven Rogers, a security guard. Knight was then wrestled to the ground by two men, one of whom was later awarded the Star of Courage, the highest Australian bravery honour for a civilian. It later emerged that Knight, an anti-abortion fanatic, had gone to the clinic equipped to kill everybody inside. After his arrest, Knight refused to identify himself to police and was known for some time as ‘Mr X’.

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Filed in: Abortion