So Cory Bernardi has finally made his move and put his career where his mouth is. A brave move whatever one might think of his politics, but one where at least his job won’t be at risk for another five and a half years.
He leaves the Liberal Party no worse off really. He’ll still support them. But it’s not a good look, electorally. At the moment it’s easy to watch the Liberal Party imploding. But it shouldn’t come as a surprise to those of us who have witnessed the party’s evolution over the past 50-60 years.
The decay has come from within. It has come because the ultra-conservative wing of the party, Cory’s wing, feels the party is losing its grip on values it believes are central to its raison d’être.
The irony though, is that those values, now under threat, were never part of the party’s original platform, not Menzies’ party. They came in by stealth and quite recently at that. They are essentially Catholic Church values. They are Opus Dei values.
Around 30 years ago, the Liberal party began a covert transformation, so covert in fact, that few inside the party even noticed it was happening.
It began with a disproportionate influx of Catholic members that traditionally, would have been more comfortable in the Labor Party.
This new membership came primarily as a result of encouragement from within the Church, which saw its traditional influence in the Labor Party falling away. It was coming from within Opus Dei.
Traditionally, the Liberal Party was a bastion of Protestantism. At one point when Sir Robert Menzies was Prime Minister there was only one Catholic Liberal member in the House of Representatives.
By the time Tony Abbott became the first Catholic Liberal Party Prime Minister, nearly 50% of his cabinet was Catholic; all this added influence, when only 25% of Australians claimed to be Catholic.
The disproportionate nature of this representation is even starker when one realises that only 15% of Australian Catholics are actually practicing Catholics, i.e. those who attend church regularly.
Church teaching opposing communism, divorce, abortion, gay marriage and euthanasia has been progressively under threat since the 1970s and as local parish congregations continued to dwindle, the need for the Church to have strong parliamentary influence became paramount.
To the Catholic Church, power is everything.
The current disproportionate representation is by no means accidental or coincidental. But lately, things have not been going well for it. The elevation of Malcolm Turnbull to the leadership has upset the cosmic order of things and the conservatives (aka, hard-right Catholics), see themselves on a collision course with irrelevance.
The defection of Cory Bernardi from the Liberal Party is a symptom of this malaise. This image of him as Australia’s Donald Trump is misplaced. Bernardi is nothing like Trump. If anything he is the opposite of Trump.
But he can see where the populist shift is going. And that is what concerns him.
Bernardi is not a populist, he is a committed Christian conservative concerned that a populist movement in Australia, as might be witnessed with the rise of Hansonism, is gaining momentum.
Primarily, Bernardi is concerned with the threat Australia’s secular lifestyle and the influence of Islam, means to traditional Christian values. His defection won’t weaken Catholic influence within the Liberal party but he did not think it was doing enough.
What he thinks he can achieve out on his own is not known, possibly even to him. But clearly his idea of where Australia should be heading is at odds with Liberal party agenda.
What we do know, is that the Catholic agenda within the party comes at the expense of rational policy decisions, something that will do the party no good at all.
Therefore, we can expect that the crumbling of the party will continue.
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Sadly for Tony Abbott he was a little late in ensuring the church was protected from the royal commission into child abuse.
He’s going to have a bastard of a time protecting his fine churchman mate in Rome I reckon. Vigorous cops are already circling that particular alleged member of the 7.1 %.
Given the recently announced statistics regarding pedophilia and the Catholic Church, it would seem that the only raisond’etre for this church was/is as a haven for rock spiders. Why is it that still so many believe the lies, hypocrisy and hate that oozes from the mouths of these “good Christians”, these “honourable members”, this scum that makes up the political class.
I have seen more honor and truth in a dead cane toad than these bastards will ever know. And the tragedy is that we live the bullshit that these scum sucking politicians feed us and MSM so gleefully support.
How does it go again? Poor fella my country?
Thanks AIMN, you have become my primary source of current affairs.
Thank you John. I do have one serious problem with what you say, and that is your use of ‘Catholic’ when you’re actually referring to ‘some Catholics’.
In particular, ‘To the Catholic Church, power is everything.’ This is simply not true. SOME Catholics are like that, but ALL? Or even most? Really, what do you mean by ‘the Catholic Church? Opus Dei is not the Catholic Church – it is a group of people who are also members of the Catholic Church. There are many, many Catholics who oppose them, who deplore them.
I’m kind of seeing the rise of Opus Dei style politicians as a last ditch effort or in stock market terms a dead cat bounce. At least that is what I hope – though the time scale is many decades or a century or two.
Dead Cat Bounce meaning:
“a temporary recovery in share prices after a substantial fall, caused by speculators buying in order to cover their positions”
I was once told to be wary of heavily indebted companies that suddenly start an advertising frenzy. When the ads – which they cannot afford – don’t work, that will be the end of them. The heavy advertising usually does not work as they don’t have products that people want – like the churches. I see Christian fundies in their sponsoring and training of politicians as being the equivalence of this situation. What is a person like Bernardi, but an advertisement for fundie values.
Opportunists like Reinhart often find common ground so may jump on the bandwagon and supply funds.
Maybe he sees the sucess of Morrison’s happy clappers being told to vote?
Kate Ahearne, I was raised Catholic and practised until I was 52. I am now 71. I say that because even though I am NO LONGER Catholic, I am still regarded as a ‘lapsed Catholic.’ When I refer to ‘The Catholic Church’ I am referring to The Vatican and official Catholic Church Management. Do not delude yourself that Opus Dei is not Catholic or that the Church in anyway distances itself from it. There are forces within the Curia who are members of Opus Dei who would bring back the Inquisition if they could. These same individuals still control what believing, practising Catholics THINK! Yes,there are many Catholics that want nothing to do with Opus Dei, but these same people have no idea how much influence Opus Dei has inside the Curia. Opus Dei people are stalwarts of pre-Vatican II, and would happily have those who still practise, a captive of their mindset. To them, power is EVERYTHING!
Rather than banning Muslims from entering Australia perhaps we should stop Catholic Priests who statistically are more dangerous.
John, I do not delude myself that Opus Dei is not Catholic. If you had read what I wrote with any care, you would know that. Opus Dei exists WITHIN Catholicism, but it is not equal to Catholicism, In other words, Catholicism is not the same as Opus Dei.
You say, ‘These same individuals still control what believing, practising Catholics THINK!’ Your sentence needs the word, ‘some’, doesn’t it? – as in ‘These same individuals still control what SOME believing, practising Catholics THINK!’ There are a great many Catholics who simply live their lives in the spirit of the Gospels in the best way they can.
John you should have included the beady-eyed Chief Clown of the IPA circus ,too. John Roskam is Catlic as well…Opus Dei was promoted along with The Knights of the Southern Cross at a school where I taught. It was interesting to note that in this place all the palaver of “nurturing” the students was in fact indoctrination in the best Communist sense and that staff were treated very shabbily.
Andrews, Brandis, Pyne, Abbott, Turnbull… all noted for their empathy and social values. And let’s not mention the human values exhibited by those paragons of virue Dutton, Morrison and Hastie … bloody Hypocrites all of them. I’ve been mentioning this for years…
http://shanewombat.blogspot.com.au/2017/02/little-malcolm-and-his-struggle-against.html
between the Catholics and the IPA, we don’t have a chance, can we have another DD please
Kate, how can Opus Dei not be equal to Catholicism if it exists within Catholicism. This is just a play on words, of the same theological claptrap I used to hear from the pulpit. It goes something like, “how can Jesus not be equal with the Father if He exists within the Father?”
I suspect you are a practising Catholic and I wish you well, but not so much if I thought you were trying to influence me toward Catholic teaching. THIS is what Opus Dei is doing. Don’t get me started on the Gospels. They are not what you think they are. I am a student of biblical scholarship. I know what they are.
Visited the Vatican some years ago during a tour of Europe. What an eyeopening sickening experience. (Word of advice for anyone considering a visit queue from the left, right side not allowed entry, go to the back of the queue.) After paying an entrance fee,we were greeted by a gift shop (scuse pun) manned by nuns. Then greeted by art works, gold, so much opulence, so many treasures absolute acres and acres of treasures. If they sold half of it off I’m sure they could end world poverty.
I don’t think their God or Jesus would be very proud of them, in fact they would be ashamed.
Don’t even get me started on the pedophiles.
Michael, the Vatican is no place for devout Christians. You have described it well.
John, A kidney exists within a body. Is the kidney the same as the body? Is the kidney equal to the body? Is the kidney the body? No, of course not. It is part of the body. Opus Dei exists within the Catholic Church, but the Catholic Church is much larger and inclusive of all sorts of people who have nothing to do with Opus Dei, I don’t know what part of that is so difficult for you to understand. Nothing mysterious. None of your Trinity stuff. Just logic.
And, contrary to your suspicions, I am not a Christian of any kind.
Michael, Yes, I had a very similar response to visiting the Vatican.
There’s an elephant in this room and I’ve decided to name it. If you are incapable of making your own decisions and thinking for yourself and need some sort of spirit guide to tell you what to think say and do, then you need serious help. And it won’t come from the church. Ever.
Christians as a group follow the teachings of someone described in a book written without the assistance of one single person who ever shared a space with this “christ” chap.
Christians of all persuasions are deluded. They need their heads read. They need to protect their kids from the church. They need to grow a brain. They need to exercise that brain.
And most importantly they need to remember that those of us who think don’t need them telling those of unlike mind set how to run our lives. The choice of being christian is just that. A choice. Which makes precious little sense.
The Catholic church is the church of the Nazi party. That’s enough for me.
(Even though Hitler himself was Lutheran, all his inner group and high-level party members and the bulk of the German population were Catholics. The Pope of the time directed all good Catholics to do as Hitler said.)
I should note, just to avoid misleads, that while I despise the Catholic church, I have many delightful Catholic friends (mostly “recovering Catholic”).
lawrencesroberts, Rather than banning Muslims from entering Australia perhaps we should stop Catholic Priests who statistically are more dangerous.
A marvellous suggestion!
Sir Scotch, right on. The book in question was written about 300 years after the esteemed gentleman was deceased.
All three Abrahamic religions are based on the same damned book and the main argument of the followers of the three A faiths seems to be “Our subtle variant of the fairy tale is truer than yours'”.
Having said that, I hear Miriam. I also have several Muslim and xtian friends who are smart, decent people, mostly who work in the caring professions like I do and they have strong social justice values.
Kate Ahearne, if the Kidney becomes cancerous, can it kill the body? You state ‘There are a great many Catholics who simply live their lives in the spirit of the Gospels in the best way they can’. You are the one missing the point. How can we all live our lives the way we want when we are way over represented in Parliament by Catholics who wish to tell us how to live our lives rather than allowing us to live it the way we want to without any of their religious claptrap. At the end of the day the Catholic church protects Paedophiles, when you refer to some Catholics and not all, it is you who are deluded. Anyone who is a member, a follower or a sympathiser for the Catholic church is an easily led idiot who should be ashamed of themselves and should never be in a position of power over any other human being.
If he puts his career where his mouth is, will that shut him up?
By way of confession (Apologies, Mr Kelly), disclosure. I was a lapsed catholic in my early teen’s. After putting red vinegar in the sacramental wine cup, that future was not bright. Notwithstanding my misdemeanour, I remained ‘religious’ until my late teen’s. After that, I guess I became a collapsed catholic. My dad explained the difference between an atheist and an agnostic in these terms.
“An atheist believes there is nothing up there. An agnostic hedges the bet.”
As for religious zealot’s, regardless of their creed, you have to admire someone who understands that their creed does not allow them to disavow the obligations of high public office.
“Yeah, that’s an easy one for me, Elaine. It’s an easy one. I’m really fortunate. I grew up in a wonderful household with great Irish Catholic parents. My mom and dad are sitting right here. I was educated by Jesuits at Rockhurst High School in Kansas City. My 40th reunion is in 10 days. And I worked with Jesuit missionaries in Honduras, now nearly 35 years ago, and they were the heroes of my life. I try to practice my religion in a very devout way and follow the teachings of my church in my own personal life. But I don’t believe in this nation, a First Amendment nation, where we don’t raise any religion over the other, and we allow people to worship as they please, that the doctrines of any one religion should be mandated for everyone. For me, the hardest struggle in my faith life was the Catholic Church is against the death penalty and so am I.
But I was governor of a state, and the state law said that there was a death penalty for crimes if the jury determined them to be heinous. And so I had to grapple with that. When I was running for governor, I was attacked pretty strongly because of my position on the death penalty. But I looked the voters of Virginia in the eye and said, look, this is my religion. I’m not going to change my religious practice to get one vote, but I know how to take an oath and uphold the law. And if you elect me, I will uphold the law. And I was elected, and I did. It was very, very difficult to allow executions to go forward, but in circumstances where I didn’t feel like there was a case for clemency, I told Virginia voters I would uphold the law, and I did. That was a real struggle. But I think it is really, really important that those of us who have deep faith lives don’t feel that we could just substitute our own views for everybody else in society, regardless of their views.”
That was from Tim Kaine, in the VP debate, last year. Mike Pence was the one arguing that his creed either mandated or dictated how he would regard the inconvenience of the constitution he is now required to uphold. Good luck, America. May your god go with you.
Now we have a pint sized dog, a corgi, no less (and certainly no more), barking. Yeah, Gina, you picked a whiner there. My bad, a winner. Here was me thinking your bitches were normally bananas.
Whilst I have no problem with religion, or religious people, I have a problem when they tell me what to think, or how to think.
Thank you Mr Kelly, and commenters. Take care
Can the proposed fence around parliament house be used to keep the religious extremists out?
If 7% of the officials in the union movement were pedophiles then they would lock the lot of them up for the safety of the community.
Great article that sums up what the LNP is about.
Sir Scotchmistery
Bravo! I would expand that to include the practitioners of all religions.
John Kelly.
One side of my family is R.C. When I was five, I came home crying because the nuns had told me during religions instruction, that’s what they called religious indoctrination in those days, that I and my family were going to hell for some reason that I can’t remember. My mother promptly removed from me that class and I was spared from a religious upbringing. I am grateful.
Thanks mum.
“Religion has actually convinced people that there’s an invisible man — living in the sky — who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever ’til the end of time! But He loves you.” — George Carlin
“Convince someone to do God’s will and you can convince them to do anything.” — Unknown.
Cheers.
I was brought up a Catholic. My mother a devout Catholic, suffered a verbally abusive marriage because she had made a vow in front of God. I wondered, along side a swath of emotions as I held her hand while she died, if she would have been disappointed, that after all that, God wasn’t there to meet her. It compounded my grief and my anger, that she had wasted her life on a man, drinking whiskey & joking 20 minutes after her death.
My uncle is a priest in one of the wealthier suburbs of London.He goes to La Gavroche for dinner, drives a BMW and is a member of a mens’ club in Pall Mall. Holidays are spent in Tuscany. He has a collection of antiques left to him by wealthy parishioners. I’m not going to even comment on that.I’ll save that for another time.
How can there be a God, when those men rape children? How can they truly ask us to ask forgiveness for our sins, sitting in a confessional box of someone who has abused a child so badly, they may never see out their adult life? What do they know that we don’t? They all they have to say is five Hail Mary’s and every thing is washed clean? Listening to the RC today, I heard one of the experts say- “this is not the case of one bad apple. This is systemic.” This is about power.
I hope not only the Liberal party implodes, I hope the Catholic Church- which has NOTHING TO DO with love and forgiveness, is outed for the deplorable cult it is. Its a fancy boys club. Its a business. Nothing more nothing less.
For me, I texted the Catholic Primary school today I do relief for and told them to take me off their list. I will not work for an institution that constantly enables clergy to kill off the souls of kids as young as 10, while all the time hypocritically tells us how we should live our lives. ‘
Goodonya Jaq and thank you for sharing your story.
Cheers.
Kidney is good with steak in a stew. If the kidney was a body I’d be right for the winter.
Personally, I can’t see any connection with the so-called Christians in Parliament, Catholic or Protestant, to what I read in the NT when younger.
Thereare lots of good Xtians, but not in politics and not too many fundamentalists. You can’t serve two masters.
great to see religion get a hit. Especially the jesuits with 4 schools in Australia they have produced, the rabbott, bill. joyce, pynenut, hockey, bullock and more???
Trunbull, Albo and Cash are lesser catholics with most of the women, as expected with the catholic religious’ attitude, being protestant.
The scot/irish used to ask ‘what are you’ at dances and that is not a life time away.
I used to think that religion is your business and as long as you don’t force your beliefs on me, so go ahead believe what you will..
But that is silly.
The people running the country believe in a good male god who forgives and accepts into heaven, pedophiles, men who murder women and children(at least one religion rewards such men) and suicides.
They support and subsidise schools that perpetuate their beliefs by indoctrinating children which I consider myself lucky to have escaped, unlike my god blessing sisters.
Surely religious schools separate students from sharing the Australian way? Therefore are not in the best interest of a multicultural society?
Money is the root of ALL evil and the Vatican sits on mountains of it.
Need I say more?
I remember when I was in Primary School, after scripture class, skeptically asking the local priest why he believed in a god that made the universe; can’t it just have existed forever?
He was a nice bloke, but smiling, he condescendingly answered that everything has a beginning so must have been created, and that it was a god that did so.
I asked, “Who created god then?”
As I have since come to expect of the religious mind he then showed the most appalling limitation of his critical faculties. He answered that god doesn’t have a beginning; that he exists forever.
I was amazed at how he could be serious. Never mind that he said all this without an iota of evidence, he did so in direct contradiction to his own statement from a moment before, but somehow blithely unnoticed. This, for me was the end of any possibility of religion ever winning me over, if this is what it does to the human mind.
When I was in High School one of my closest friends, and one of the smartest people I’ve ever known was deeply religious. We used to have wonderful discussions about cosmology, quantum physics, electronics, computer logic (long before the days of personal computers), but I could never discuss religion with him. It was a blind spot in which he miraculously lost all power of logic and reason. He always remained calm and gentle, but suddenly unable to use any of the tools of his normally very sharp mind.
Wot a joy to read the above about the “the above”. Loved the tiny asides like, “Catlic” (I’ve got a few bog and non-bog Irish in the background) and “What are you?”, so redolent of an earlier age which I can remember. I also appreciate Harquebus’ comment on ALL religious enthusiasts as not all non-christian religions are without their destructive zealots. At least christianity had to endure the irritation of the enlightenment which trimmed their wings a bit. Tony Abbott likes to trot that one out as an attempt to lift christianity above the religious mire, but he’s a poster-boy for pre-enlightenment: that’s what the poor man doesn’t understand. He’s aeons away from anything approaching enlightenment and a check-list of his fabulous beliefs could approach a slightly, SLIGHTLY, updated member of the Inquisitors. Cloud Cuckoo Land writ large!
This mess won’t be cleaned up unless the terms of reference of Inquiries includes all facets of the problem. To focus on the Church is a good first step, but to ignore other participants is not alright. And what were MSM elite, editors and journos doing for all those decades when they failed to follow up on the stories of child abuse? A few skeletons in the closet too?
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/liberal-senator-bill-heffernan-says-former-prime-minister-a-suspected-paedophile-20151020-gke2o0.html
Miriam English’s comment re the limits of imagination of the religious mind made good reading for me.
@Paul u would suggest that the limits of imagination of the Liberal mind would reflect the same lack of any capacity to engage in a productive discourse as that of a religious mind.
A child of the 50s, I was brought up Protestant (Methodist, to be more precise). The Proddy/Cath divide was massive and in my street were twin girls, Maureen and Mary, same age as me, but we were not encouraged to seek each other out. My Mum was marginally more philosophical as I was allowed to go to their house, but they were not allowed to mine. From memory I went only twice and was not made very welcome.
As a small child, I was very curious and a great reader, (not much changed from then in that respect). I had asked about the meaning of Public, in terms of Public School, and was told that a Public school was ‘where everyone, except the Catholics could go.’ Not long after this, travelling my car I saw a telephone box. ‘Everyone but Catholics can use that telephone’ I said. (Five year old’s logic!) My mother was puzzled. “Everyone can use the phone box’, ‘No, but you said ‘public’ means ‘everyone but Catholics’ ‘., .
Some 20 years later I was working as a teacher in a Catholic (High School) College. I was the only female on the secondary staff. I was approached by one of the Brothers, to spend a weekend with him I was amazed, incredulous! ‘You know that’s not going to happen – you’re a celibate (?) Brother, and I’m a married woman.’ He was not deterred, saying that none of that mattered, kept trying to persuade me.
Some after school conversations with others on the staff, indicated that the sex education for the boys consisted of: try not to do it, but if you do, just go to confession and it will be ok. A few years after I left there, I found out that there had been a pedophile ring at the school and at least one of the boys affected had committed suicide. I stayed less than a year, as the atmosphere was ‘just not right’.
The whole philosophy of Catholicism seems to be: do whatever you want and just confess next Saturday and all will be fine!
And all this from a bloody spelling error. God said (please note “god” there is capitalised only as the first word in a sentence), “go out and celebRate”.
The dickheads still get it wrong.
[There’s an elephant in this room and I’ve decided to name it. If you are incapable of making your own decisions and thinking for yourself and need some sort of spirit guide to tell you what to think say and do, then you need serious help. And it won’t come from the church.]
For some it is more about needing to believe in a greater being/ or externality so that they do not become too self-absorbed, selfish and egotistical. I get the impression that it seems to be a necessity for many who suffer from addiction problems otherwise the 12 Step program doesn’t work.
I often wonder whether Roman Catholics in Federal Parliament are in breech of Section 44 of our Constitution as they seem to bear allegiance to a foreign state (same for C of E too, I guess):
“Any person who:
(i) is under any acknowledgment of allegiance, obedience, or adherence to a foreign power, or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or a citizen of a foreign power; or”
…
“shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a senator or a member of the House of Representatives.”
Well said Andew.
With the reorganization of the NSW cabinet following the resignation of Mike Baird, Opus Dei has increased in strength, and now controls the purse strings of the state, with Opus Dei member Dom Perrottet becoming Treasurer. We live in evil times.
Miriam, you said Hitler was a Lutheran, but my understanding was that he confessed to one of his generals shortly before his death that he remained committed to his Catholic faith throughout his life. It was his Catholic faith that underpinned his Jew-hatred and which permeates Mein Kampf.
Bernardi’s departure changes very little and in many respects is of benefit to the Libs.
He does not need to relinquish his Senate spot, so he gets to retain his generous $300k salary package for the next 6 years before he faces an election. Free of the constraints of the party, he is able to do and say anything he wants. He also knows he was never likely to win one of the top senate spots next time, so in his eyes, this was a risk free endeavour.
For the party- they have rid themselves of a troublesome liability who wouldn’t toe the line. He may believe he nos has power, and he can rant and rave, but the party knows full well he is a pissant, and they can be as nasty as they like because he is never going to side with the ALP and Greens when it comes to senate voting. So the party is always assured of his vote, no matter how poorly they treat him. OH, he will kick and scream and rant, but he will always vote with the Libs.
Silkworm, that’s interesting. I wouldn’t be surprised if that was so. Yes, the Catholic church is the original antisemitic organisation. In many ways the Catholic Church has brought more evil on humanity than any other.
In God’s name.
@JimHaz – I understand that only too clearly.
I’m a smoker. No help from above with it though.
They call them practicing Catholics because even after all these years of ” teaching” they still haven’t got it right. Here’s a tip, they never will either.
It’s funny that Catholicism disobeys so many of its own religion’s rules.
➤ There is not supposed to be anyone between you and god, but Catholicism interposes an entire labyrinthine organisation there.
➤ Wealth is to be disdained, but the Catholic church is one of the wealthiest organisations on Earth.
➤ You’re supposed to pray quietly by yourself and not make a great show of it, especially not putting yourself above others and wearing ornate robes.
➤ You’re not supposed to make any graven idols to pray to — that’s the crime of idolatry.
➤ You’re not supposed to drink wine in church.
As for the LNP’s association with any mutation of Christianity, let alone Catholicism, the Bible clearly says more than once, that you should help the poor and not seek wealth.
Cory Bernardi and others who pretend to be conservative politicians, are actually fake Christians. They pick and choose from what they want to believe (which is easy to do considering the many hundreds of contradictions in that muddled book of myths). They believe in a kind of magical self-entitlement.
When it comes to cognitive dissonance and hypocrisy you can always rely on religion to set the standards, especially when they work in tandem with politics. The Liberal Party in particular is becoming a sort of local Taliban.
There’s a relevant saying from The Church of the Subgenius – “We don’t practice what we preach because we’re not the sort of people we’re preaching to”.