Religion Down Under

[dreamer_easy]

A snotty SMH article by Adele Horin nonetheless contains some interesting facts: recent surveys reveals that only about half of young Australians believe in God. Confusingly, at the last census five years ago, 71% of Australians identified themselves as having some religion (the vast majority of whom said they were Christians). Horin makes a very good point that Australian politicians who chase votes via religion are unlikely to succeed, but she doesn't address an obvious fact: if 80% of Australians support stem-cell research and are pro-choice, and 68% of Australians are Christians, then much (if not most) of the support for stem-cell research and choice must be coming from Christians. By muddling together Christianity, conservativism, and religion generally, Horin is alienating progressive allies because we don't share her beliefs - a commonplace atheist blunder.

Comments

[drox.livejournal.com]

...only about half of young Australians believe in God.

...five years ago, 71% of Australians identified themselves as having some religion... (the vast majority of whom said they were Christians).

One possible conclusion (though more research would be required) is that significant numbers of people have a religion without believing in God.

While some religions don't have a God, the next bit

...(the vast majority of whom said they were Christians).

leads me to suspect that many of these people "have" a religion that does have a God (in this case Christianity) but they don't actually believe it. They "have" this religion in the sense that they grew up with it and it's comfortable; it's "theirs", but they don't really believe.

It might all be in the phrasing.

[i-ate-my-crusts.livejournal.com]

That's my feeling too -- tht when they say they are christian, what they mean is that they are culturally christian rather than practicing christian. It's funny that the phrase "secular jew" is one I have heard, but not so much "secular christian", to refer to this kind of cultural affiliation.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

I occasionally stumble over that myself, taking half a second to remember that while my background and culture are Christian, I'm not!

[murasaki-1966.livejournal.com]

I use "secular Christian". I adapted (with her permission)the phrase from a Muslim friend who used it to describe her cultural alignment. Basically, I grew up in the culture (e.g Christian or Muslim) and absorbed some of the beliefs (most of the 10 commandments, etc), but do not practice the religion or subscribe to its core beliefs (I have a little trouble with resurrection; the friend had problems with certain parts of the Koran).

Basically, I'm pretty agnositic.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

There are several sources of information in Horin's article, including the survey of Australians born 1976-1990. I think I did some muddling of my own in my posting - if older Australians are more likely to believe in God, then there's nothing "confusing" about the figures.

[sheramil.livejournal.com]

i stopped paying attention to government statistics when i learned that they consider people in the Work for the Dole program to be "full-time employed".

one day a week, earning seven dollars an hour.

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Our Census lady was nice and wore a yellow hat, so I know the Census at least is true.

[murasaki-1966.livejournal.com]

My favorite quote on religion:

"But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

- Thomas Jefferson

Also a nice comment by a favourite US cartoonist on how religion constrains women.
http://anntelnaes.com/images/AT-021206DrawingALineCOL.gif

[kateorman.livejournal.com]

Oh - that cartoon - neatly expressed!