12th February, 2009
JIM WALLACE

The year 2009 is well and truly upon us, with all the potential and challenges we were expecting and some we were not!

Greatest on all our hearts and minds is the Victorian bushfire catastrophe, with the state enduring the worst bushfires in the nation's history, leading to a devastating loss of life. Our hearts go out to the many people, including fellow Christians, who have lost loved ones and often everything they owned in the fires.

It has been a tragic start to the year which will take people a long time to recover from. We can only pray that people will know God's love and comfort in the midst of their suffering. In the words of Reverend Tim Anderson who leads an Anglican parish in one of the hard-hit areas: “We have a God who understands our pain from the inside...Whatever our pain we can bring it to God, confident that God knows exactly what we are going through." (as quoted in the Herald Sun).

On the political front, minds have also rightly been occupied by the crisis and it is to be hoped that Governments will work quickly and effectively to help people rebuild their lives. In this they can take their lead from the community and its generous giving in the face of great need.

From a Christian perspective, the political year ahead is shaping up to be one of the biggest so far in terms of major strategic issues with important repercussions.

Critical issues
Two issues in particular loom large with implications for Christians, church organisations and some of the important freedoms we enjoy in Australia.

One is the national consultation on a charter of rights and the other is the Australian Human Rights Commission's freedom of religion inquiry.

The Australian Christian Lobby is opposed to a charter of rights because it would fail to protect the vulnerable in society, but would transfer some of the power to make laws away from a democratically elected parliament to an unaccountable judiciary. In this way it would deliver increased power to vested interest groups who have failed to win their case with voters, while important freedoms Christians take for granted could be put at risk.

In our view, human rights are best protected through specific tailored legislation relevant to the right in question, such as legislation providing for equal treatment whilst allowing exemptions for religious organisations in recognition of their right to freedom of belief and practice.

Similarly, the Human Rights Commission's freedom of religion inquiry ironically appears to actually question Christian freedoms as ordinary citizens - such as exercising our democratic rights of free speech and engaging in public debate.

For example, one of the questions asked in the Commission's discussion paper reads: 'Is there a role for religious voices, alongside others in the policy debates of the nation?' We would have thought that the issue of freedom of speech and universal participation in government in western democracies were a matter of historical fact!

It is vitally important for Christians to be involved in the consultation process for both these issues if we are to safeguard important Christian freedoms in Australia. Please click here for more information about the charter of rights consultation and here for more information about the freedom of religion inquiry.

Time to shrug off denial
If ever we needed to draw breath and take an honest look at ourselves it is now!

There is universal acknowledgement that greed and avarice have been a large factor in the current economic downturn. At the highest levels there has been greed for profit and unsupportable levels of bonuses and remuneration, while at the individual level a similar form of greed has been exhibited in the lack of willingness to earn a house and luxuries before owning them.

A world operating according to Christian principles, believing in a fair return for work and the biblical maxim to treat others as you would want them to treat you, would not exhibit this level of avarice or the consequences. We need to influence the nation and especially the young back to these principles.

At the same time society is experiencing horrific levels of child abuse, neglect and homelessness, all well recorded as mainly due to the breakdown of family. As the UK's Dr Samantha Callan, a co-author of the Breakthrough Britain report, told the ACL's national conference last November, support for marriage and the family is the key to social stability and reversing poverty.

And yet here in Australia, as with many nations, the natural family seems to have become “the elephant in the room” - it is the solution to so much of what we know is wrong in society, but because people are fearful of being seen as critical of other family types, we fail to promote it or hold it up as an ideal.

The current discussion on a proposed national regulation of surrogacy arrangements is a major opportunity to prompt a largely distracted public out of denial before we awake and find that the surrogacy laws passed in Victoria last year become the new national standard - meaning even two homosexual men can acquire a baby in Australia through surrogacy.

This is a travesty to children, denying them the inalienable right to a mother and father and must be opposed strongly. Please join us in this very important issue for children and their rights by following the 'current consultations' at the inquiry website at www.scag.org.au to the 'surrogacy consultation' and make your views known.

Jim Wallace AM, is the managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby.

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