Russell Blackford's Secularist Religion

This took me all afternoon to write.  On ABC religion site you will find Australian atheist Russell Blackford's "Why the secular state has no moral mandate".  American political theologian William Cavanaugh answered a major justification of Blackford's argument with "The 'Wars of Religion' and other fairy tales".  This generated a reply from Blackford called "Don't mention the war! A response to Cavanaugh".  This is an intervention on Blackford's second contribution.  My perception was that Blackford was attempting to build an argument for the exclusion of religous arguments from modern political debate.  Further, I think Cavanaugh had nailed the problems with Blackford's argument.  (Note I have edited it)

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Russell, I cannot agree that the William Cavanaugh in “The “Wars of Religions” and other fairy tales” got you wrong.  You have over simply history while Cavanaugh historiography is subtle and well argued. You want to establishment of a religion or world view for the modern Australia and need to a myth to justify this new religion.  You falsely call that 'religion 'secularism'.  Its doctrine is to exclude other religious reasoning from the public debate, there by establishing a religious test and, hence, destroying secularism!

True secularism lacks a religious or world view test for citizenship, pubic office or public debate.

You base your ideology on the myth that there were wars of religion.  You use two devises.  The first is repetition. In your opening paragraph of “Why the secular state has no moral mandate” you repeat the idea of religious wars three times.  Cavanaugh replies that prior to 1700 the distinctions between religion, state, political philosophy, society and so on did not exist.  He names a number of political alliances between those of different religious views.  He point to his own and others work to reinforce his argument.  Cavanaugh then concludes, “If "religion" cannot be separated out as the cause of these wars, then the idea that peace was made by the secular state setting religion aside into a private realm becomes suspect.”

That brings us to your other devise, you ignore the historical context.  The first is the use of the term ‘religion’.  You use it in a modern sense.  As mention above, that sense of the term did not exist prior to 1700.  The other is your comments of Locke’s A Letter Concerning Toleration (1689). Even though I have never read the essay, I feel I have a better understanding of Locke’s discrimination against Catholicism than you.  It appears to us moderns as that era's confusion between religion and politics.  About the same time, Britain excluded Catholics from the throne.  Thank you, Guy Fawkes!

Your real objection seems to be the use of theological reasoning in modern political discourse.  You over simply ‘political’ theology and ignore it depth.  Cavanaugh reflects my frustration with atheists’ pretence of neutrality.  Like the communists of old, they claim to have a scientific reasoning on their side, ignoring all the assumptions they take for granted.  There is none of the humility of political theology.  A great example is the recent address to the German Parliament by Pope Benedict XVI.  He claimed that the modern basis of the law came from the Romans and the Greeks, a point on which I agree.  Christian ethics is never complete; it simply has a vision for humanity. 

At the same time, in the period we have been discussing and without the language, Christians made the first pleas for religious freedom, established the first governments without religious tests and, hence, invented secularism.  This Christian, with my meagre intellectual resources, will defend secularism against anyone, like yourself, who wishes to pervert it and make it a religious test!

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Please, tell me if I have nailed it.

What Leadership Challenge?

The mother of all beef ups is the continual sager of Kevin Rudd challenging Julia Gillard for the ALP leadership.  They never materialise for one simple reason, they do not exist!  For over a year, both the conservative crossbenchers supporting the government, Tony Windsor, member for New England, and Rod Oakeshott, member for Lyne, have said that the if Labor changes its leader they will withdraw their support for the government.  In other words, a change in Labor’s leader will cause a snap election!  Something Windsor pointed out on the 7:30 Report (Monday, 5 February 2012).

The continual speculation about the federal Labor leadership comes from the anti-Labor right.  They are the only beneficiaries.  The right needs a government in crisis, not the government that steered us through the Global Financial Crisis and definately not a government attempting to build a more socially just Australia.  Their allies are jaded journalists who fear missing the next Labor leadership change.  They forget that most of the ALP caucus missed it too.  However, given the chance, the ALP members voted Rudd out.

So ABC has stopped talking about policy and focusing on political tactics.  Last Sunday (5 Feb 2012), I wasted my time in watching the Insiders.  Barry Cassidy had one thing on his mind – ALP leadership speculation.   He wasted an entire interview on with Australia’s Treasurer, Wayne Swan. Cassidy tried to manoeuvre Swan to either criticise Rudd or speculate about the fictitious leadership challenge.  Cassidy got angry when Swan refused to play ball.

Like Peter Lewis on the broadcast version of The Drum (Monday 6 Feb 2012), I can find no reference to any internal ALP source for any leadership challenge to Julia Gillard’s federal Labor leadership.  The supposed challenger, Kevin Rudd, denied there was any challenge.  Other ministers and member of the ALP caucus are saying they are not being sounded out about any challenge.  The key crossbencher Tony Winsor, on whose vote the Government requires, even does not think there is a challenge.

The only one to offer any source is the young Turk, Tim Wilson from the extremist right wing Institute of Public Affair.  In reply to Peter Lewis on The Drum, Wilson said that Tony Winsor had said that he had been approached.  The implication was recently approached.  Yet on 7:30Report (Monday, 6 February 2012) interview Tony Winsor said he had been approached about twelve month ago, hardly current for any recent leadership speculation. 

It is about time the media start reporting policy not political tactics.  We can start having a debate about Tony Abbott address to the National Press Club or Julia Gillard address to theAustralia -Israeli Chamber of Commerce.  There is a debate about what constitutes fairness in the Australian workplaces between employer groups and unions now.  There is little to no mention of this in the press.  No one is holding the right to account for is definition of workplace flexibility which is always preceded by complaints about overpriced workers in Australia.  Listen to Prue Goward on The Drum on Thursday, 2 February 2012 or Joe Hockey and Judith Sloan on Q&A onMonday, 5 February 2012.  Let face it, the political right does not want a social just Australia!  Above all, the right don’t want a debate about policy but political tactics! 

Ben Eltham suffered the same Insiders I did and picked out the right’s confirmation of this policy free zone.  Quoting the transcript Eltham reports:-

"Is there a point," Barrie Cassidy asked, "at which journalists will say to Rudd supporters, who have been on the phone the whole time, 'You've been banging on about this for almost a year, it's time to put up or shut up, we'll just stop listening'?"

"No," replied Nikki Savva, "These stories are too intriguing."

To right Nikki, why talk about policy?


PS I am willing to bet that there will be no challenge to Julia Gillard before the next federal election.  Say $10

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