Religion & Society

 I recently saw “The Eternals”, one of the latest Hollywood blockbusters in the cinema. The movie is part of the “Marvel Universe” series, with that title itself suggesting something supernatural. Expecting an entertaining challenge to my faith, I was not disappointed, though I came away somewhat disturbed. The basic plot has elements that resonate with Christian viewers. It features a god-figure, Arishem, sovereign creator of good and evil. Arishem has created the Eternals as his agents to combat the Deviants, forces for evil. But the Eternals are deceived by Arishem, not realising that they are implementing his ultimate plan to destroy the earth as part of a re-creation process. Read on here ...

On 15 August Melbourne School of Theology (MST) hosted the visit of Baroness Caroline Cox from the British House of Lords. Baroness Cox has been a fearless campaigner for many years, advocating on behalf of the marginalised and the persecuted around the world as part of her work for the Humanitarian Aid and Relief Trust (HART), which has an active branch in Australia. In her presentation to a sizeable audience at MST, Baroness Cox gave attention to the drift towards secular liberalism in western societies and resulting challenges to minority groups, including Christians. She pointed out that “one of the effects of aggressive secular humanism in the UK is that many Christians now feel they suffer from discrimination and intimidation.” The same is true in Australia. Baroness Cox also referred to the co-existence of aggressive secular humanism’s assault on Christian faith and the growth of Islamist ideology.  While noting that the majority of the world's 1.2 billion Muslims, inclu...

     In a dramatic turnaround, the LGBTI lobby in Australia is proving to be a significant source of support for faith-based schools, including Christian schools.      In 2010, the government of Australia’s southern state of Victoria rolled out the Safe Schools program. The purpose of Safe Schools, according to official government speak, was to develop a mechanism to limit bullying within Australian schools of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and intersex (LGBTI) students. This program included professional development activities for school teachers accompanied by materials and recommended activities for the training of students to eliminate discrimination against LGBTI students.      The Safe Schools program was the brainchild of the Australian Research Centre in Sex, Health and Society at Melbourne’s La Trobe University. Its best-known advocate is Dr Roz Ward, a former faculty member at the University, who has been reported as declari...

I n the wake of World War II, as the world emerged from devastating conflict and entered the post-colonial era, some commentators predicted that rising prosperity would herald a new, post-religion age. The secularizing tendencies that were carving huge slices off religious allegiance in the West would be replicated across the world, according to this view. Such commentators also anticipated that religion, in its surviving form, would be rationalist, liberal and concerned with the here-and-now rather than the Hereafter. Read on here . This article first appeared in Renewing Minds: A Journal of Christian Thought , Jackson: Union University, Issue 2 (2012).

In Australia, supporters of same sex marriage (SSM) continue to celebrate the result of the postal survey taken during the months of September and October. Around 62% of Australian voters answered YES to the simple question: “Should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?” Press coverage of this result has generally taken the line that the Australian people have overwhelmingly supported SSM. Masking the details Of course, such macro statistics mask myriad details. To speak of “the Australian people” as a monolithic block on such a contentious topic is misleading. Almost 5,000,000 Australians voted against SSM. The country is clearly divided on the basis of voting statistics alone. However, this issue has revealed deep divisions of other kinds that have been under-reported in the media, itself largely pro-SSM during the campaign. One of the most interesting, and perhaps most concerning, aspects of division revealed by this vote relates to Australia’s multicultural...

Just over ten years ago I published a report on the Secular Islam Summit held in Florida, USA, on 4-5 March 2007. The report appeared in The Church Times (Issue 7516, 30 March 2007, p.12), and was cross-posted at various internet sites, including here . A decade has elapsed but the issues raised by this Summit remain as pertinent and as urgent as was the case in 2007. A slightly edited version of my original article appears below.  Speeches from the Summit can be viewed here . ========== In a striking example of self-analysis, about 500 delegates, including both practising and nominal Muslims, attended an inaugural “Secular Islam Summit” in March [2007] in St Petersburg, Florida. The summit culminated in a declaration, which can be read here . The declaration was signed by such luminaries as Ibn Warraq, a widely published author, who writes on such taboo subjects as the text of the Qur’an and apostasy; and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who fled to Holland in the 1990s from her native...

Malaysia is a country in ferment. The abduction of protestant Pastor Raymond Koh missing since 13 February after being snatched from a street in Petaling Jaya near the capital Kuala Lumpur, comes against a background of pressure against non-Muslims. The growing demand for Islamic criminal punishment codes, known as hadd or hudud (plural Arabic for 'prohibitions'), which set Pakistan on the road to ruin, is worrying . Hudud crimes warrant severe corporal punishments, including stoning for adultery, and death for apostasy.  Though limited by rules of evidence, their implementation on any statute book creates consternation, and at worst, as in Pakistan, mob rule. Yet demand for and implementation of such penalties are creeping in from conservative fringe states in Malaysia. Emerging Malaysia is described by the CIA as ‘a middle-income country [that] has transformed itself since the 1970s from a producer of raw materials into an emerging multi-sector economy’, so the ...

STEREOTYPING the world of Islam is a fruitless task; such is its internal diversity. Sectarian conflict is tearing Muslim populations apart in the Middle East, Africa and Asia. While some Muslims pursue a vision of a forward-thinking, rationalist faith, others look backwards to what they see as a pristine age when Muhammad established the first Islamic community in Medina. For the latter group, the Hadith, or prophetic traditions, are crucial in realizing their vision, enabling Muslims who want to model their lives on that of their prophet to do so. These traditions record tens of thousands of short reports about Muhammad’s actions, attitudes, concerns, preferences and prejudices. Read literally, the Hadith reports can take Muslims in many directions: to compassion for widows and orphans, to patriarchal attitudes towards women, to disdain for religious minorities, and to military jihad for the cause of Islam. Read on at the Lapidomedia website...

   Stereotyping the world of Islam is a fruitless task; such is its internal diversity. Nowadays sectarian conflict is tearing apart Muslim populations in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. While some Muslims pursue a vision of a forward-thinking, rationalist faith, others look backwards to what they see as a pristine age when Muhammad established the first Islamic community in Medina.    For the latter group, the Hadith, or prophetic traditions, are crucial in realising their vision, enabling Muslims who want to model their lives on that of their prophet to do so. These traditions record tens of thousands of short reports about Muhammad’s actions, attitudes, concerns, preferences, and prejudices.    Read literally, the Hadith reports can take Muslims in many directions: to compassion for widows and orphans, to patriarchal attitudes towards women, to disdain for religious minorities, and to military jihad for the cause of Islam. Read on here .

For today's radio interview on Vision Radio with Neil Johnson, presenter of "Twenty20", click here .

Is the West experiencing irreversible decline, with other nations and cultures moving to fill the resulting vacuum? This question was considered by Professor Michael Cox of the London School of Economics on 1 September at St Michael’s Uniting Church, Melbourne in the 6th Annual Lecture of La Trobe University’s Centre for Dialogue. Addressing an audience of around 200, Professor Cox began with a challenge. “The consensus is that a significant power shift is taking place,” he said, “but I am somewhat sceptical. Such an approach sees some nations rising while others decline. Isn’t there a better way to think about this?” Speaking of the 1990s, he said “the view was that the West had triumphed over the Soviet Union.” The power shift theory emerged in connection with President George W. Bush’s War on Terror. “Many argued that Bush had gone for broke and had failed.” This foreign policy setback was compounded in 2007/08 with the international financial crisis. “Faith in the American ...

“As we enter the 21st century, Muslim women have developed into a critical mass and are exercising their voice about their lived realities in new ways.” So said Professor Amina Wadud in a public lecture on 18 February at the University of Melbourne’s Asia Institute. The lecture, entitled "Muslim Women and Gender Justice: Methods, Motivation and Means", was sponsored by the US Consulate in Melbourne. An Islamic “ordination” debate The American Muslim activist was visiting from her base at Virginia Commonwealth University in the US. She has long been a controversial figure among Muslims, leading a campaign that gets to the root of the gender debate within Islam about women being religious leaders, rather than merely participants. While most Islamic legal scholars, both Sunni and Shi’a, allow a woman to lead prayers to women-only congregations, the leading of mixed-gender prayers is reserved for male imams. In 2005 Wadud led mixed-gender Muslim prayers in New York in a building...