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

[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.