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In trying to convince my atheist goddaughter to embrace her Catholic schooling, I found an unlikely role model. I'd never thought of Greer as a chip off the old block of a convent education. Now I realised that that's exactly what she was.
Traditionally, Catholic-Labor links have been so strong that wits described the Church as 'the Labor Party at prayer'. NSW Labor Premier Kristina Keneally represents a growingly assertive Catholicism which might be described as progressive, rational and independent.
Social commentator Frank Furedi wrote that the Pope's UK visit provided Britain's cultural elite with 'a figure that it is okay to hate'. We might regard the angst as a manifestation of the growing pains that are to be expected in a world of emerging pluralism.
It's not that Catholicism has nothing to answer for, but the problem is that caricatures quickly become facts. Many Catholics have learned to 'cop it sweet', but there comes a point where you have to say something. The papal visit to the UK might just be it.
This election we consider a PM who is doubted because of her atheism, an Opposition Leader who is doubted for being too 'Catholic', and the Greens who are doubted as being anti-Christian. Church social agencies have been involved in important issues with each of these groups.
It could have been a mistake for Gillard to 'come out' as an atheist, as if giving witness to a firmly held religious belief. Abbott did better by declaring candidates' religious views a private matter that should not distract from voters' judgment of their policies.
What do Hans Kung, Geoffrey Robinson, and Pat Power have in common?
The Melbourne Storm salary cap scandal indicates a major ethical breach somewhere within the club. Perhaps their senior executives might benefit from the NSW trial of school ethics classes.
An ego-driven, take-no-prisoners approach dooms atheism to remain an exclusive club. Only by forming alliances with the moderate religious community will atheists be able to preserve the elements of society they value most, such as freedom of enquiry and the separation of Church and State.
Australia's first Global Atheist Convention will feature such speakers as Richard Dawkins, Philip Adams and Peter Singer. I look forward to it with the same tempered gloom that would descend upon me if a convention of Christian evangelists came to town.
Modern atheists in the West and modernist Muslims in Islam are both abusing religion. Their discourse about God has been influenced by the popular demand for scientific empirical verification, and they have lost confidence in the ability of figurative language to open a way to truth.