Scott Morrison, Australia's first evangelical prime minister, was at the Hillsong tabernacle in Sydney’s outer suburbs last week preaching love and redemption.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison onstage before a Hillsong congregation last week.
"Love God, love people," Morrison told a large congregation.
Now, anyone’s religious beliefs are a matter for them. As the Pope said in the case of same-sex relationships, "Who are we to judge?"
On the other hand, if you’re the prime minister of a secular country where not much more than half the population identifies themselves as Christians, those in public office should tread warily in the proselytising business.
All this brings us to the debate about religious freedom. Whether we like it or not, agitation about religious rights and responsibilities has intruded into the public square because of the case of rugby union player Israel Folau.
Illustration: Simon Bosch
We won’t dwell on the Folau matter except to say that he has every right to hold fast to religious beliefs that would see much of the population, Catholic idolators included, destined for hell.
One might find his views repugnant, but this is not necessarily the point. I’m with Gillian Triggs, the former president of the Australian Human Rights Commission, on this when she asks the question of whether Rugby Australia’s sacking of Folau for genuinely held religious beliefs was proportionate to the harm done.
In the meantime, the country’s elected representatives will ponder legislation to be brought forward by Attorney-General Christian Porter to put into law a religious discrimination statute modelled on section 7B of the Sex Discrimination Act of 1984.
In summary, this imposes a "reasonableness test" on whether an individual might feel they have been discriminated against on the basis of their sex.
A Religious Discrimination Act would have similar provisions aimed at protecting religious freedoms for individuals and institutions. It would seek to guard, particularly, individuals in the workplace who may fear discrimination on account of their religious beliefs.
As we have noted, this is a highly contentious area, potentially, given the circumstances of the Folau case in which an employer is seeking to impose contractual obligations on someone whose sincerely held religious beliefs put that individual in breach of his employment contract.
However, Liberal senator James Paterson’s claim that a Religious Discrimination Act is required because people of faith like Folau "feel like they are being crowded out of the public square" is at best dubious, and at worst scaremongering.
This provokes the question, why do we need to put ourselves to the trouble of the significant distraction of a religious discrimination debate since freedom of religion is protected explicitly by section 116 of the constitution in contrast to no explicit protection for free speech?
Based on a review conducted by former John Howard-era minister Philip Ruddock, the government appears to have settled on a relatively minimalist Racial Discrimination Act that treads lightly.
Tim Costello, senior fellow at the Centre for Public Christianity, has warned against legislation that would cover "extreme" examples of discrimination such as the Folau case. He had not seen evidence of persecution of Christians in Australia.
"Christians need to calm down," he said.
Among those who "need to calm down", in Costello’s view, is Liberal senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, who is calling for a bells and whistles Religious Freedom Act to protect "ordinary people of faith" who are worried about getting into trouble if they "quote the Bible".
Perhaps the most compelling argument for a Religious Discrimination Act has nothing to do with Christians being denied the right to quote from the scriptures, but the protection it would afford religious minorities such as Muslims, Jews, Hindus and Sikhs.
Again, section 116 of the constitution would seem to be adequate for this purpose. That was certainly the view of Chief Justice John Latham in a 1943 Jehovah’s Witness case.
Finally, we would have saved ourselves a lot of trouble if we had got round to legislating a Charter of Rights that would amount to an omnibus protection of core rights and freedoms including freedom of speech and freedom of religion.
The last serious attempt to introduce an Australian bill of rights foundered in 2009 during the Kevin Rudd government. This leaves Australia as the only significant Western democracy without an omnibus freedom charter.
There is no logical reason why Australia should be without such a unifying document instead of piecemeal legislation that risks overlap and confusion.
In the debate about press freedom that arose from the Australian Federal Police raid on the ABC and the home of a News Corp journalist it was interesting that Michael Miller, chief executive of News Corp, lamented the lack of an Australian bill of rights.
Miller may have overlooked the fact that it was a ferocious campaign by News in 2009 that spooked a jittery Rudd government into abandoning such a charter in one of its meekest moments, among several including its capitulation on climate change.
Morrison could do worse than review arguments for a rights charter given concerns about press and religious freedom. There is no compelling reason why Australia’s democracy should be alone in the Anglosphere without such statutory rights protections for its citizens at the Commonwealth level.