In Depth:  Australia

letter from Australia

David Robertson

They say that when America sneezes the rest of the world catches a cold. At least that remains true for the Western world. A great example of that was seen in the State of Queensland in Australia this October.

The ruling Labor party seemed on course for a crushing defeat in the State elections, when the Premier Stephen Miles decided to make abortion an issue. Taking a leaf out of the Kamala Harris playbook, he suddenly started arguing that ‘women’s reproductive health rights were at stake’. Although he did not win, it was intriguing that most of the mainstream media in Australia saw this as a sensible vote-winning tactic.

Iain Taylor

A transgender woman (a biological male who identifies as female) from Australia has won a discrimination case against a women-only social media app, after she was denied access for being male.

The Federal Court found that although Roxanne Tickle had not been directly discriminated against, she was a victim of indirect discrimination, when a decision disadvantages a person with a particular attribute. It ordered the app to pay her the equivalent of £5,100 plus costs. The case is both a landmark ruling about gender identity and addresses the increasingly contentious question: what is a woman?

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Sydney Anglicans are often (rightly) held up as a bright light in an otherwise darkening denominational structure. But is the light beginning to dim?

In a revealing, insightful and helpful report to the Sydney Anglican Synod, the facts on church size were revealed and analysed. The report is worth reading in detail, but in summary it shows that over the decade 2013–2023 the number attending Sydney Anglican churches declined by 7% (or 14% if you measure it by the size of the growing population). In 2013 adult attendance was 47,801. By 2023 this had declined to 44,592. Meanwhile the population of Sydney continues to grow – from 4.76 million people in 2013 to 5.26 million in 2023. It is expected to grow by another million by 2041.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Australia is a nation of states. And they are different states, with a different ethos. Although all seem to be heading in the same regressive/progressive direction, the state of Victoria seems to be leading the race to the bottom. Indicative of this is ‘Rising’, Melbourne’s third annual taxpayer-funded arts festival, held in June 2024.

Amongst the good arts projects, and the bad, there was also the downright ugly. For example, you could listen to ‘queer Filipino ghost stories’. Then there is Anito – a ‘megafauna dance deep time from Sydney’s underground quest and diasporic club scenes’. Or you could go to Crip Rave Theory, ‘a disability-led party and a political statement which draws on disabled/crip knowledge to create more intersectionally-accesible party spaces’. Crip stands for cripple. Until five minutes ago this would have been regarded as grossly politically incorrect, but apparently some academic in some humanities department, probably in the US, has decided to reclaim the language and so ‘cripple’ moves from being an insult to a political badge – doubtless soon to have its own flag!

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Scott Morrison, former Prime Minister of Australia, retired from politics in February.

That in and of itself would not seem significant to much of the Australian press and political commentariat, never mind the UK. But it was a significant event for the culture and for the church. Morrison’s final speech to parliament was a revealing insight to the problems facing Western politics – and especially a Christian who gets involved.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

A national student mission in Australia is getting underway after more than 2,000 undergraduates attended a special conference in preparation.

The Australian Fellowship of Evangelical Students (AFES) is the largest student campus ministry in Australia. At the end of 2023 over 2,000 students (across Australia and many parts of the world) were transformed by, trained in, and sent with the gospel of Jesus at the AFES National Training Event.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Recently the Australia electorate voted on an important constitutional referendum which would have recognised the indigenous Aboriginal people in the constitution and would have established a separate indigenous Voice to the Parliament.

In order to pass, this amendment required four of the six federal states to vote in favour, as well as a majority of the electorate. In the event every single state voted against, and over 60% of the electorate. It was a humiliating and, to some, surprising result. Some have called it Australia’s Brexit moment.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Most people outside Australia would be surprised to learn that around 25% of Australia’s children are educated in private Christian schools.

Some of these are big posh Anglican schools for the elites, but the vast majority are for the middle class and poor. The Anglican diocese in New South Wales oversees 30 schools.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Under parliamentary privilege, Andrew Wilkie, an independent Member of Parliament in Australia, made an astonishing series of revelations concerning the finances of the Hillsong Church – the Australian-based worldwide franchise claiming a worldwide membership of 150,000.

This membership has severely declined after a number of scandals, not least with the former senior pastor, Brian Houston, who is currently on trial in a Sydney Court, accused of covering up his father’s child sexual abuse.

Iain Taylor

Widely-circulated figures which appeared to show a significant decline in church attendance for a major Australian evangelical group are now known to be an example of internet ‘fake news’.

A table of attendance figures now circulating on the web claims to show that Anglican churches in Sydney lost 10,000 regular attenders in the year the Sydney Anglican diocese gave money to the ‘No’ side in a national same-sex marriage postal vote.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Australia is experiencing a new government and a new Prime Minister.

As predicted before the recent election, the Labor party won and its leader, Anthony Albanese, was duly elected PM. It is noticeable and a reason for thanksgiving that there was no dispute about the result and the former PM, Scott Morrison, handed over the reins of power before all the votes were counted!

letter from Australia

David Robertson

The Australian Anglican General Synod met for the first time in five years in May. It was the first Synod since same-sex marriage was legalised in Australia.

The Synod revealed a number of things about what is happening in the Australian Church. The largest diocese is in New South Wales where Sydney Anglicans are almost uniformly Biblical Christians. The importance of Sydney Anglicans for the worldwide evangelical church means that what is going on here is important for elsewhere.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

Having gone from drought to bushfires, then plague and war; many Australians were caught up in severe floods in New South Wales and Queensland. It is little wonder that some Christians feel that this has an ‘end times’ feel. The floods were the greatest for 40 years. But there are other seismic events shaking Australia as well.

On Thursday 24th February, Archbishop Kay Goldsworthy of Perth Anglicans presided over an ordination of four new deacons. One of those was of a man who had been living in an unmarried relationship with a woman for several years (they have children); and the other was of a man in a civil partnership with another man. This was done in contravention of both the Anglican and Biblical teaching on marriage. Meanwhile, in NSW, Bishop Rod Chiswell is being taken to court because he asked a gay organist in a civil marriage to desist either from playing the organ, or his ‘marriage’.

Iain Taylor

As Evangelicals Now went to press, political manoeuvring in Australia’s lower house has meant that the passage of Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s contentious legislation to outlaw religious discrimination was looking increasingly uncertain, with elections looming this May.

Morrison’s government claims that ‘The Religious Discrimination Bill, and associated legislation, will ensure Australians are protected from discrimination on the basis of religious belief or activity – just as they are protected from discrimination on the basis of age, sex, race and disability’. Mounting opposition from some of his own Liberal MPs, and uncertainty as to whether the Labor opposition and some senior senators will back the Bill – with or without a number of amendments – have led to intense debate on the issue, both inside and outside Australia’s Parliament.

letter from Australia

David Robertson

The Presbyterian Church in New South Wales has a problem – a shortage of ministers.

This Protestant, evangelical and reformed denomination is expecting approximately 30–35 ordained and inducted ministers to retire by the end of 2026. There are also an increased number of people leaving ministry prematurely, for reasons such as burnout. 25% of churches are without a minister, but the Presbyterian college and other training institutions are currently only producing between six to eight ordination graduates each year. The bottom line is that they are not seeing enough men going to be trained for ordained ministry and the rate of people leaving exceeds the rate of those joining.

An influential Pentecostal church in Melbourne, Australia, appears to have taken a significant step towards liberalising its views on same-sex relationships.

Bayside Church, located in the southern suburb of Cheltenham, says it has ‘listened to the Holy Spirit and… studied Scripture’ prior to releasing a new statement about inclusivity.

GAFCON Australia is planning a new Diocese for Anglicans who feel they have to leave their existing denominational home.

In November 2020 the Appellate Tribunal of the Anglican Church of Australia (ACA) found no canonical objection to the Diocese of Wangaratta continuing services of blessing for same-sex unions. It used similar reasoning as the Church of England project Living in Love and Faith (LLF) – that theologians are divided over what Scripture says, and that sexuality is not central to the Christian faith.

David Robertson

Australia is fighting battles on several fronts just now.

The war with Covid has gone remarkably well for the various States – at the time of writing there are only 39 known cases in the whole country and almost all of them are from overseas. Furthermore, the economy which briefly dipped into recession is soaring back – largely thanks to the price of iron ore and the wealth of Australians now being spent in Australia, rather than on overseas trips.

The conservative Diocese of Sydney has said the Anglican Church of Australia is ‘on a trajectory towards disintegration’ over a decision to allow the blessing of same-sex unions.

The church’s national appellate tribunal – a legal advisory body comprising three bishops and four lawyers – has ruled that Anglican priests may give a blessing to same-sex couples who have already been married elsewhere.

The state of Victoria is on the brink of passing a Bill* that would see someone face ten years in jail for engaging in anything it classifies as ‘conversion therapy’. The Bill details how it will be prohibited to provide a talking therapy, or prayer, even if requested to do so, resulting in people being denied the chance to explore aspects of their lives with a pastor or qualified therapist.

In his blog, Australian pastor Murray Campbell called for the ambiguity of the Bill, with regard to prayer, to be clarified. He writes: ‘For teaching abstinence or offering pastoral counselling in line with the Bible’s vision of sexuality, and praying with fellow believers that they will be godly … does this fall foul of the Bill?’

As with the United Kingdom, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests which have swept across the United States have overflowed to Australian society. The tangle of BLM issues with the reality of the Covid-19 pandemic has triggered bitter debate and some social dislocation.

The weekend of 6–7 June was a particular focal point. BLM protest organisers announced plans for significant gatherings in Australia’s major cities to draw attention to the deaths in custody of Aboriginal Australians arrested for various reasons. There have been at least 432 indigenous deaths in custody since a Royal Commission examined the issue in 1991. This has been a simmering matter for decades, erupting into protest action at various points in time, and almost predictably piggybacking onto the worldwide BLM activism presently underway.

As Australian churches entered the New Year, the attention of the church media was devoted to several pressing issues of debate, both domestic and international.

The push in Australia for the somewhat euphemistically named ‘same-sex marriage’ has been increasing in momentum in recent times. Opposition is coming from various quarters, including the different Australian churches, in partnership with other faith communities.