What Australians really think about religion

Occams Barber said:

When I talk about relevance I mean as a moral authority. We've already effectively ignored Christian views on gender, sexual preference, SSM, sex outside of marriage, the confessional, abortion, birth control,assisted death/euthanasia etc. Christians and Christianity are free to have input but 'because Bible' or 'Christian tradition' is no longer a valid reason.

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Yes. The idea that the Christian position* on any given matter should prevail, or is automatically treated as right or good, is gone. I think that's a good thing.

What worries me a little now is that the pendulum is almost going the other way and sometimes it seems we are less free to have input, because it's almost seen as tainted from the get-go. I think (hope?) that will settle in time.

*Noting here that on just about any issue you've listed as well as a host of others, there is of course no one "Christian position"; and the one which happens to have the most money/political clout behind it may not be the one held by the majority of people who actually actively practice the faith.

But yes, the shift you've described in yourself mirrors my perception of the shift of the community as a whole. No longer - when I'm out and about and identifiable in my role - do people mostly respond to me as a welcome presence or mostly harmless or a social curiosity, but there is much more open hostility.

Amazingly, our federal parliament still begins each day with explicitly Christian prayer.

Occams Barber said:

There may be some exceptions but I think that small list covers areas which consistently meet with official disapproval. One problem I'm seeing is the fragmentation between the views of lay people and church hierarchy. Add splits within the hierarchy and within laity and it's hard to identify what the view is. I'm left with whatever is the recognisable "official" doctrine. One conundrum is that 62% of Australians voted for SSM yet, almost without exception, churches have declared it wrong. Is the church it's people or the hierarchy?

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Even officially, I think if you took a sample of - say - the biggest six denominations, you'd find considerable variability. (For the record, once you get past the Catholics, the Anglicans, and the Uniting Church, just about everyone else is tiny, demographically speaking. I think one of the difficulties many Australian Christians have is that Catholicism is so dominant here that many outside the church assume that what Catholics say or do is the Christian view or practice, but that may be very far from accurate).

But yes, for sure (and especially for Catholics) what the hierarchy says and what the people in the pews actually think don't necessarily neatly line up. And when you have denominations that can't even make up their mind what their official line is (that would be my lot) it doesn't help.

But the Church is the people. The hierarchy carry out their functions on behalf of the people. (The hierarchy would do well to remember that, sometimes, imho).

Occams Barber said:

I'm sorry you're copping the sharp end of this but it's almost inevitable given the respect and deference given to priests and pastors and the consequent betrayal of trust. Even as a non-believer I once conceded priests a certain unquestioning deference. My shift has placed me in opposition to those who want to continue with the expectation of unjustified Christian right and privilege as well as those who use Christianity as an excuse to express their personal prejudices and ignorance.

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Oh, I know. And I'm trying not to sound whiny about it because so much of the anger is completely justified and righteous.

Occams Barber said:

I think I know you well enough to know that you don't belong in either group.
OB

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I try... am far from perfect, but I try to remember that "First, do no harm" is as important to the cure of souls as to the cure of bodies.

Occams Barber said:

Substitute 'psyche' for 'soul' and I'll agree

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I don't believe in "souls" as a "thing," but the "cure of souls" is part of the traditional job description for the clergy.

David Neos said:

Atheists don't have that many children while religious people do. With immigration, that data might change.

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Immigration into the untied states made 'that data' (statistics) a lot worse in the untied states.
Where would people emigrate from in enough numbers to Australia, and the right people instead of the wrong people, to help that data change for the better instead of making it worse ?

Occams Barber said:

It's ok.
I'm an atheist.
We all carry fire extinguishers.
OB

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Could be a good thing - realizing the need.... the fire lake is real, and even the demons shudder already in terror knowing that is their destination ...

Occams Barber said:

What???
Don't believe in souls?

I thought soul as a (metaphysical?) thing was a kind of central Christian belief.
If there aren't any souls - how do you save them?
OB

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fwiw, the Bible says how souls are saved. Few on earth ever find out.

yeshuaslavejeff said:

Immigration into the untied states made 'that data' (statistics) a lot worse in the untied states.
Where would people emigrate from in enough numbers to Australia, and the right people instead of the wrong people, to help that data change for the better instead of making it worse ?

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Honestly, Australia can't support a very large population. We simply don't have the water, or the arable land, to do so. So the idea that immigration into here is going to solve anything much is probably a naive idea at best (said by an immigrant!)

I would say that the Christians here have work to do. We need to get our own houses in order, repenting of what needs repenting of and allowing the Holy Spirit to change the culture of our institutions; and we need to conduct ourselves with regard to our secular society with integrity, compassion and care. And then we might find that people are able to see the value in who we are and what we do.

Until we do that, it's entirely unreasonable to blame secular Australians for accurately identifying our weaknesses and discerning that we are not likely to have much to offer them!

Occams Barber said:

What???
Don't believe in souls?

I thought soul as a (metaphysical?) thing was a kind of central Christian belief.
If there aren't any souls - how do you save them?
OB

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The idea of the soul - as a sort of metaphysical entity which is different from but connected to our bodies during our earthly lives - is highly problematic. I would say that it does not accord with the Hebrew worldview at all, and owes more to Pagan Greek philosophy than any Christian Scripture.

I would suggest that where many English translations have "soul," a better word would generally be "life." The Christian hope is not for the continued existence of a disembodied soul, but for bodily resurrection.

Occams Barber said:

Who are the 'right people' and what is a 'data change for the better'?

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What do you think would make the data you posted "better" ? (or better for the people anyway?)

Occams Barber said:

Ten years ago we cremated my mother. A couple of months ago my sister was cremated. When my 98 year old father moves on he will also be cremated, as will my brother. I will also be cremated once they've removed the spare parts.

When my family is bodily resurrected someone will definitely need to bring the vacuum cleaner.

OB

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??

Honestly, OB, that's a bit silly. Nobody thinks resurrection means the reassembly of the exact molecules which made up your body at the point of death. Which is just as well, because no matter what we do with our bodies they don't remain in the same state; that's the whole point of the thing about "ashes to ashes, dust to dust." Our bodies decay, and leave them long enough there's nothing left to identify. Cremation's just kind of a sped-up version of that process.

But my point was; what we see described in the Scriptures and the early Creeds isn't the idea of some kind of "immortal soul" which goes on in a disembodied state once the body has died. It's of Christians looking forward to the resurrection of the body.

Dust to dust, ashes to ashes. ?

"As we drove away from Mar Saba, we saw places where trash is regularly dumped into the Qidron, and some of it was burning. It reminded me of the biblical description of the Hinnom Valley just south of Jerusalem, which was a perpetually burning garbage dump, helping provide some of the imagery for Gehenna, or hell. Of course the fact that child sacrifice was sometimes practiced in the Hinnom adds to the horror!
?

Occams Barber said:

People have been emigrating to Australia since 1788. When you look at the data proportionately to population we're one of the highest immigrant nations in the world.




Who are the 'right people' and what is a 'data change for the better'?

We have migrants from India, Africa, South East Asia, the Middle East, South America, the UK and various parts of Europe. We even get the odd North American. We have yet to get someone from Antarctica but give it time....

OB

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Where there not many deportations in the beginning?

Thinking here of,

Occams Barber said:

Christianity's best friends appear to be struggling economies and poor education so I expect it will continue to grow in poorer countries.

In the wealthier Western nations Christianity is on the decline although there will always be a [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse] congregation of adherents, What is also changing is the influence of Christianity as a moral authority. As you can see in the OP, religious leaders are not trusted by 70% of the Australian population and only 15% believe the country would be better off if more people were religious . This suggests that Christianity is becoming increasingly irrelevant here.

This, in my opinion, is a good thing.

OB

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I do wonder if it has to been done by design since the last century or so. It's possible, I think the West was influenced by anti-religion of some sort out there.