You might like to know some more about the people who support Bill Muehlenberg on his CultureWatch site, and even occasionally perform the difficult feat of outflanking him on the right.

I won’t bother for the moment with Jonathan Sarfati and Tas Walker, both of whom are senior staffers at Creation Ministries International (CMI), Australia’s leading Young Earth Creationist (YEC) group. Brief (and glowing) biographies are available for both of these gentlemen at the CMI site. Muehlenberg is uncharacteristically coy when it comes to defining his own position on creationism (YEC, Old Earth Creationist, Intelligent Design supporter etc.), but YECs like Sarfati and Walker are among his favourite people.

Ewan McDonald is an outspoken adherent of the ‘biblical worldview’ espoused by Muehlenberg and frequently contributes supportive comments to the latter’s blog items. McDonald is a former President of the Victorian Division of the Young National Party, a post he evidently held around the mid-1990s. During this time, the ultra-conservative Australian League of Rights saw fit to publish one of his media releases on gun controls in the wake of the Port Arthur massacre:

With the rejection by Mr Howard of the option to crimp the magazines of self-loading and pump-action shotguns, I think it is not an exaggeration to say that the new gun laws are probably more draconian than we should have expected had the Keating Government been still in power. (On Target, 9 Aug. 1996)

McDonald was rather quiet for some years after this, but suddenly re-emerged around 2005-6. A brief biographical entry that appeared on the Christian Witness Ministries site in 2005 described him as a farmer at Timmering in northern Victoria. By this time he had married and had two young children. His interests included politics, philosophy and ‘the creation/evolution controversy’. He had also developed an interest in ‘biblical worldview studies’, another way of saying ‘Christian dominion theology‘, whereby nations should conform themselves to some concept of biblical law. This bio also noted that McDonald had formerly attended the Kyabram Assemblies of God (Pentecostal) church.

McDonald began contributing comments to Muehlenberg’s site in mid-2006, taking a strong YEC and general dominionist line right from the start, asserting that:

Christians [must not] be selective in which ‘biblical standards’ we should be prepared to defend.
(17 Jun. 2006, ‘comment on Evangelical Alliance paper‘)

The problem with ‘biblical standards’ is that no two people seem to agree on what they are, but anyway Ewan now felt strongly enough about the whole thing to run for Fred Nile’s Christian Democratic Party (CDP) in the November 2006 Victorian state election. He contested the Legislative Council seat of Northern Region, and a fuller biography was now forthcoming. McDonald’s assessment of himself was highly illuminating:

A self-confessed ‘no nonsense conservative’, Ewan believes in a separation of the institutions of church and state, but that does not mean Christian morality should be excised from the laws of the state. Ewan believes the majority of problems facing Australia stem from the fact that over several decades the atheistic worldview of secular humanism has all but replaced the biblical Christian worldview in Australian society … As Ewan says, ‘Secular humanism has become the unofficial religion of the state.’

McDonald has now repeated the ‘Humanism is a religion’ mantra on many occasions, but it suits his self-image perfectly:

Ewan has an unorthodox approach to politics - rather than trying to be popular, he is only interested in doing what is right. As a member of Right to Life Australia, Ewan is strongly committed to opposing abortion in all its forms and considers abortion to be the most serious issue facing our state and nation.
(www.cdp.org.au/vic/CDPVicEwanMcDonaldProfile.htm)

He concludes this bio by listing his ‘diverse range of interests, from shooting to philosophy and theology’, although he omits to tell us which one he prefers. Sadly, second position on the CDP ticket is not the ideal place from which to win a parliamentary seat, and Ewan scored 62 votes or 0.02% of the total cast. (The CDP total in this electorate was about 0.5%, rather less than the party usually registers.)

In a CDP press release issued prior to the election, the party announced its intention to ban all abortions ‘with the possible exception being those rare instances when the physical life [sic] of the mother is judged to be at risk if a pregnancy were to be continued‘. McDonald elaborated thus:

Unlike many of those who favour abortion on demand, I reject the belief that humankind evolved from primitive ape-like creatures. As a Christian party we believe that men and women were created in the image of God[; therefore] human life is sacred and should be protected from conception to natural death. (’Christian Democratic Party to Contest November State Election’, undated media release)

So if you’re reading Ewan McDonald’s comments on Bill Muehlenberg’s site, don’t imagine that he’s just your average punter having his two bobs’ worth. Christian Democratic Party, Right to Life Australia, Young Earth Creationist, Pentecostal, enthusiastic shooter, proud possessor of a ‘biblical worldview’ - pretty much the full hand, really.

Filed in: Abortion, People, Politics