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My childhood memories are filled with stereotypical Aussie pastimes such as backyard cricket. But as a Muslim, I do feel like an outsider at times. Why do we constantly have to be portrayed as evil people? 'We're not all like that', I find myself shouting at certain news stories.'
Just because we can debate something, doesn't mean we should. As with any right there is the responsibility to exercise free speech judiciously. A quick survey of the Muslim population in Australia highlights the absurdity of debating whether there is a place for the burqa in our society.
I am bemused that whenever I agitate questions of Aboriginal and refugee rights I am well received by liberals, who then question my clerical entitlement to speak when I buy into debates on issues like euthanasia and embryonic stem cell research. On same sex marriage, I am attacked from both sides.
Speech given by Fr Frank Brennan SJ at the 'Law and Religion: Legal Regulation of Religious Groups, Organisations and Communities' Conference Dinner in Melbourne on 15 July 2011.
When I appeared on Q&A with Christopher Hitchens, a young man asked whether we can 'ever hope to live in a truly secular society' while the religious continue to 'affect political discourse and decision making' on euthanasia, same-sex unions and abortion. Hitchens was simpaticao. I was dumbstruck.
In the past, Christian Democratic Party leader Fred Nile saw conservative Muslims as allies. Now he, like the Australian Christian Lobby, prefers to play sectarian wedge politics. Most homophobic Muslims would rather stay silent on gay marriage than support sectarian bigots.
How many foreign heads of state could be depicted in a cartoon in an Australian newspaper, as Indonesian President Yudhoyono was, in an act of sodomy? Despite widespread negative perceptions, Australia's neighbour is achieving many positive changes, quickly.
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.
The Howard years made me feel ashamed to be Australian, and I felt about his electoral defeat the way East Germans felt about the Berlin Wall coming down: as a kind of cleansing. Rudd disappoints for a different reason.
Text from Fr Frank Brennan SJ's presentation Poverty and Plenty: Where Do or Should Christians Stand? at the Centre for an Ethical Society as part of the 2010 Series Forum at the Australian Centre for Christianity and Culture, 17 March 2010.
The challenges and opportunities are to fund equitably all networks in education and to ensure that robust morale and community engagement are hallmarks of all parts of the network, including state schools and emerging schools such as Muslim schools.
'Tonight I want to reflect in light of the National Human Rights Consultation how we as Church can do better in promoting justice for all in our land. Full text from Frank Brennan's 2010 McCosker Oration, 'The Church as Advocate in the Public Square: Lessons from the National Human Rights Consultation'.
133-144 out of 180 results.