LJ-SEC: (ORIGINALLY POSTED BY crazyjane13)

The Australian Christian Lobby just hosted a conference that was simultaneously broadcast on the net. Their guests included the Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, and the Opposition Leader, Kevin Rudd.

As part of the conference, both leaders were quizzed extensively about their beliefs, and - sadly, but unsurprisingly - both stressed their "Christian" links. In fact, they tried to outdo each other in their bids to win the "Christian" vote - Howard by announcing a clean-up of the internet that will involve filters at both user and server ends as well as more money for the Federal Police, and Rudd by pledging to have "family impact" statements prepared before every cabinet decision.

(It should be noted that the "family impact" statement is the favourite platform of Family First, the political party with notorious links to the Assemblies of God.)

The media here is reporting it as being about the "Christian" vote, throwing around the latest Census figures that show approximately 75% of respondents identified as Christian. Even leaving aside the fact that those Census figures include every denomination that even remotely identifies as Christian, what the media have completely failed to do is any research whatsoever.

Five minutes' digging on Google found this on the Australian Christian Lobby :

While carefully claiming a non-denominational standpoint, they make it very clear that "our source of truth and the justification for a position on a single issue will be based on the character of God and by critical analysis in relation to natural and special revelation (the Bible)." (my italics) Dissent is discouraged, and anyone with a problem dealing with that is referred to the relevant state office. They even have a justification for not using overtly "Christian" language - people who aren't believers won't understand, so they encourage members to use non-biblical language even though that is the sole criterion for their position on any given issue.

The Managing Director's message makes it clear that the issues with which they are most concerned are same-sex marriage, "sanctity of life" (abortion and euthanasia), internet pornography, radical Islam and removal of the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act.

It also mentions four organisations as representative of those to which it "tithes". Linda's House of Hope is a Catholic refuge for abused sex workers. Jesus : All About Life is connected to the Bible Society, and almost impossible to penetrate. The Fatherhood Foundation smells very, very bad. Again, it trumpets its non-denominational status, but language in its beliefs statement concentrates on the pre-eminence of the father in the home, the "importance" of a father to unborn children, the "spiritual and natural" act of conception, heterosexuality as being the only good environment for a child, etc. There's an appeal to the Constitution's preamble, which mentions God, as support for the idea that the Australian state should be governed along "Judaeo-Christian" (their term) lines - starting with the Ten Commandments. They hang a lot on the words of a guy called Brian Molitor from the Malachi Global Foundation, whose site is nigh on impenetrable but has the same stink to it.

Finally, AIDS Hope for Africa (SIM), which is actually Samaritan Strategy Africa. The mission statement here is blatantly Dominionist - kingdom of God on earth, biblical law in government, Bible as "infallible word of God", and the work of "Satan" in distorting people's view of the "truth". Their work is primarily aimed at establishing churches throughout Africa - bugger all about AIDS. They, in turn, list the World Evangelical Alliance as one of their partners.

The point here is that the ACL, itself suspiciously Dominionist, and linked with overtly Dominionist groups, has just successfully set itself up as representative of the "Christian" vote in Australia. They've gotten away with it, too, because the politicians are more interested in kissing ass than figuring out whose ass they're kissing - and because the media are too goddamned lazy to do some basic research.