Religion News Selection
February 19 – 26, 2023
A selection of religion news stories from Australia
(Research: Greg Spearritt)
EDUCATION
Religious schools must be allowed to keep the right to discriminate (Sydney Morning Herald)
Feb 21 – (Opinion: Kevin Donnelly) Should religious schools and other education bodies have the right, as they now do, to discriminate when it comes to whom they employ and enrol?
Religious schools can still expel LGBTQ kids. That needs to change (Sydney Morning Herald)
Feb 24 – (Opinion: Liam Elphick) This weekend, Anthony Albanese will become the first prime minister to march in the Sydney Mardi Gras. It is a move that has been widely celebrated.
Religion class enrolments slump in state schools in decade since program changes (Brisbane Times)
Feb 26 – Religious instruction has almost disappeared from Victorian state schools, as government changes to make the program voluntary and shift its teaching to outside class hours prompted student enrolments to drop by 99 per cent in 10 years.
Catholic schools hang on for dear life to the shame of homosexuality (The Guardian, Australia)
Feb 26 – (Opinion: David Marr) Shame is the business model of most churches.
INTERNATIONAL STORIES
Anglican Church
Anglicans reject Justin Welby as head of global church amid anger at same-sex blessings (The Guardian, Australia)
Feb 21 – The leaders of Anglican churches in some developing countries, including South Sudan, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, have said they no longer recognise Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, as the head of the global church.
Other
Mormon church, investment manager fined by SEC for lack of disclosure (Sydney Morning Herald)
Feb 24 – The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and its investment arm, Ensign Peak Advisers, agreed to pay a total of $US5 million ($7.3 million) to settle a US regulator’s allegations that it failed to file proper disclosures and obscured the church’s massive investment portfolio.
POLITICS
UN expert’s warning after Perrottet’s proposed gay conversion exemption (Brisbane Times)
Feb 26 – The United Nations’ lead on LGBTQ human rights says NSW should tread carefully when considering religious exemptions to its proposed conversion therapy ban, expressing concern they could fail to stop harmful practices.
RELIGION & SOCIETY
The partition of India in 1947 came suddenly, creating chaos, bloodshed and mass migration (ABC News)
Feb 21 – Before India was split into two separate states in 1947, 97-year-old Kailash Bhatnagar describes her life in the city of Lucknow in northern India as quiet and peaceful.
Logan’s harmony of faiths demonstrates Australia’s changing face of religion (ABC News)
Feb 22 – Far from the days of British colonial rule and strict Christianity, Australia’s religious diversity is increasing every year.
