Religion News Australia
Dec 31 – Jan 13, 2023
Religion news stories from Australia
(Research: Greg Spearritt)
ABUSE
Phillip Gordan Ronald Salt pleads not guilty to dozens of child sex offences (ABC News)
Jan 12 – A former church youth worker has pleaded not guilty to dozens of child sex offences.
Catholic bishop subject of Vatican investigation no longer in control of Broome charities (The Guardian, Australia)
Jan 13 – The Catholic bishop Christopher Saunders, who is accused of sexually assaulting and grooming young Aboriginal men, has been removed as the person responsible for nine Broome diocese charities, records show.
In Australia’s Magdalene laundries ‘fallen women’ worked in harsh conditions for no pay (ABC News)
Jan 13 – In 1890, on a patch of lawn in the Sydney suburb of Tempe, Cardinal Patrick Francis Moran made an announcement at the opening celebration of a new “retreat for fallen women”.
CATHOLIC CHURCH
These African communities are finding belonging and support in the embrace of the Church (ABC News)
Jan 12 – When George Piech Meat arrived in Australia in 2004 after years as a refugee, his first port of call was a church.
INTERNATIONAL STORIES
Judaism
How a secret tunnel in a New York synagogue led to 10 arrests and a brawl (ABC News)
Jan 10 – Police in New York City say 10 people were arrested amid a brawl in a historic Brooklyn synagogue on Monday, after the discovery of a secret tunnel prompted authorities to intervene.
Religious Violence
Who are the Houthis? Yemen-based militants behind the Red Sea attacks (Brisbane Times)
Jan 12 – After the US has warned for weeks that it could retaliate against Houthi attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea, the US and UK have launched significant military action.
Police shooting at Wieambilla inspired ‘true threats’ from US man (Brisbane Times)
Jan 12 – An American accused of messaging the family who shot two Queensland police officers later used the killings to bolster his alleged threats against public figures, US prosecutors have said.
Other
Tennessee after-school Satan club holds first meeting despite protests (The Guardian, Australia)
Jan 12 – Children had a “great time” at the first meeting of an after-school Satan club at a Tennessee elementary school this week, organizers said, despite dozens of protesters who condemned the meeting.
ISLAM
Anti-Semitic sermons underline how Islam has changed (The Australian)
Jan 12 – (Opinion: Henry Ergas) Islam’s problem is not only its extremes it’s the extremism of its mainstream.
JUDAISM
Radical cleric lashes out at Jews and NYE (The Australian)
Jan 1 – Australia’s peak Jewish body has slammed a radical cleric’s latest sermon, which said Israelis were ‘descendants of pigs and monkeys’ and called NYE festivities a ‘celebration of foreskin’.
Also: Anti-Semitism ‘unchecked’ amid radical sermons (The Australian)
Jan 3 – Anti-Semitism is ‘running unchecked’ in NSW with Jewish and political leaders at a loss as to the apparent inability to charge extremist clerics calling Jews ‘monsters’.
POLITICS
Unions warn on religious work bias (The Australian)
Jan 3 – Union leaders have raised concern over signals from Labor that it will introduce religious discrimination laws in the first half of this year.
RELIGION & SOCIETY
Sleepwalking towards a fresh jihadist showdown (The Australian)
Jan 1 – (Opinion: Peter Jennings) Pro-Palestinian’ protests should have rung alarms in democracies’ intelligence and security organisations that radicalised individuals would travel to the Middle East.
