Religious Politics

I’m sorry God, but I don’t believe you care about politics. I find it alarming to see heads of countries involved in prayer to their own deity. That prayer to their particular deity becomes a club of exclusivity. Those of us who don’t believe in that deity are not included; that’s an uncomfortable feeling when it comes to a democratically elected leader. It’s even more uncomfortable when policies start being drafted that relate to the belief in that exclusive deity. It’s even more frustrating when you know those heads of state are not honouring the spirit of their religion despite constantly swaggering around with an elitist and smug look on their faces.

In Western countries, religions are frequently based upon conversion. I know Evangelical Christianity works that way, in particular, and over the years, I’ve experienced many street-shouters, door-knockers, friends, and family attempting to convert me to their evangelical belief system. I’ve always found this conversion fixation synonymous with superiority. Evangelical Christianity implies possessing a secret key to life or happiness and they’re willing to let me in on it if I’m open to their religious ideology. The person may not recognise it makes them appear smug and elitist, but it does to me. I’ve frequently been told of the pity held for me because of my lack of conversion and my ensuing damnation to hell.  Once again, an air of superiority: Christians are going to a lovely heaven while I’m burning in a fiery pit.  That’s elitism and superiority; pure and simple.

I have watched prayer conducted with Donald Trump and never have I seen it appear so contrived and false. It doesn’t match with the person who was overheard saying, “Grab her by the pussy.”  I have watched Scott Morrison in church and it was sickeningly contrived in its obvious election campaign effect. It didn’t correlate with his statement that, in honour of his belief in Jesus’ death and resurrection, he wasn’t going to campaign during the Easter period. Morrison also purportedly runs a prayer meeting within parliament house with his religious cronies. The actions by both these men appear to deliberately use their evangelical religions to obtain votes. Why wouldn’t they? It seems to work. There is a distinct Christian fraternity that operates within our community that overlooks imperfections in people in favour of their religious beliefs. The Washington Post have published an opinion piece in August 2019 entitled The apocalyptic myth that helps explain evangelical support for Trump amongst several other articles of the link between evangelical Christians and votes.

I am somewhat intertwined with Scott Morrison on a number of fronts; both via immediate family and extended family. As a result, I have often been exposed to insights and stories of the Morrisons that vary greatly with the lines and answers given to the media by the prime minister. One of the more appalling insights, that affected my personal life, was the national apology to victims involved in the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. A couple of my family members are caught up in the online QAnon cult. At the time of the national apology, they believed the outlandish child abuse stories of a few conspiracy theorists and that the world has been overtaken by “luciferian paedophiles”. They believed in this to the extent they convinced their friend, Scott Morrison, to include the term “ritual sexual abuse” in the national apology. The Prime Minister acquiesced. A family member gloated to me on the inclusion of that phrase, thereby rubbing my nose in his success of political influence rather than acknowledging the pain of my own child sexual abuse. Knowing the national apology was infiltrated and influenced by a QAnon cult robbed me of the meaningful impact of that speech. I was gutted and deeply hurt.

Mr Morrison was also part of the leadership team of the Baptist church about which I had made a submission to the Royal Commission. That very same church that failed to investigate my sexual abuse by two of their church attendees. Before he was Prime Minister, he sat in prayer meetings with the church minister who knew about my abuse. Did Mr Morrison know about it? I have no idea. I suspect the minister of the church spoke about it to nobody and that is my accusation against them all: they did nothing and told nobody. That was the point of the entire Royal Commission. The church leadership did not act, did not ask any questions nor make any enquiries despite being told a minor had been sexually assaulted by two of their own. Despite ongoing police enquiries, neither the current church minister nor the former church minister have made a police statement. Perhaps action was hampered by an incident involving the church minister’s child driving unlicensed and having an accident. One of my abusers was in the car with the minister’s child at the time of the accident and probably knew the insurance was claimed falsely to obtain a payout. If insurance fraud had occurred, it would certainly discourage a person from making a police statement. After all, the abuser was also now a collaborator to a fraudulent claim. The Prime Minister’s family and the church minister’s family still maintain a friendship to this day. The church minister’s family still maintains a relationship with my abusers to this day. That affects the authenticity of the national apology for me. Surely the Prime Minister could have checked the Royal Commission submission database for any churches with which he was involved. To me, Mr Morrison’s involvement with that church further taints the national apology to the extent it was meaningless to me. It was hollow and spoken insincerely to my ears. That hurts so very much. The national apology was meant to allow survivors to heal in an acknowledgement of Australia’s institutional failings, but that intent was not extended to me.

Jesus wasn’t political, quite the contrary, and it certainly wasn’t a deity who proposed democracy or bureaucracy. Trying to force Christianity to blend with a manmade political construct is not conducive to a well-rounded multicultural society. I don’t believe Jesus would have agreed with an ideology that excluded other religious groups while simultaneously promoting the will of the political class. Jesus would never have approved of indefinite detention nor of a religious discrimination bill. I also don’t believe a deity named God would approve of one of his ten commandments, “Thou shalt not bear false witness”, being so frequently dismissed by both Trump and Morrison. My grandfather used to say that a lie was a misrepresentation you knowingly convey, even if it’s only due to omission or action. Trump’s statements are so full of superlatives, they’re easily debunked as falsehoods, although Morrison’s are not quite as blatant.

If Mr Morrison is truly a Christian, why is he so glib about keeping his god’s commandments and Jesus’ teachings? It doesn’t really show an awe or fear of an almighty god. Why was his religion up for sale during the election campaign? It shows utter disrespect to his god and beliefs. Why did he alter his national apology speech at the behest of alt-right cult members? I can only guess that parading religion around assists in obtaining easy votes from the evangelical contingent of a country’s population. After all, increasing votes is the basis of political gain. I’m quite sure, though, a deity wouldn’t encourage those political votes to come at the expense of the Christian brand: a lack of integrity, no generosity of spirit, and frequent false representations made to the public.