We are a Christian nation!

Before this rant begins, a little background information is needed in order to justify my subsequent posting and attack on Australian Christianity. Around a week ago, whilst listening to Chris Smith on 2GB, a rather stereotypical Christian caller got on the air and proceeded to launch into a vehement attack on the notion of not reciting the Lord's Prayer before a session of Parliament. With nauseating patronage, Smith agreed over and over, supporting the caller's assertion that banning the Lord's Prayer would be 'stupid' and that 'left-wing loonies' should have better things to complain about. The bullshit alarm went off for around the millionth time this year, hence my decision to finally bite the bullet and get one of these blog things.

Now what the hell is so difficult to understand about secularism? For years we have heard the Right go on about Australia being a 'Christian Nation'. For Christ's sake, can't Aussie Christians get a different catch phrase? I'm not going to bother going into the pretty obvious notion of the separation of church and state, because it should be so well known and understood now that it's pretty frightening that a hell of a lot of people in this country don't, or refuse, to understand it. What I will say is that while we have leaders like Kevin Rudd, who openly endorses Hill$ong as a good thing and has been recorded dancing around at Hill$ong congregations in joy like a priest in a playground, separation of church and state will slowly wither away until all we have left is a lovely Christian theocracy. Callers like the one from Chris Smiths' show, who I will refer to as 'W.', would like nothing better, barring the probable future scenario of deporting all Muslims, Hindu's, Jews, Buddhists and other assorted heathens and brown people to somewhere like Madagascar. To people like this, repetition of the Lord's Prayer in sessions of Parliament is not only desirable, but should be extended to all other government institutions, including schools.

Why is it necessary to ban the Lord's Prayer before Parliament? Firstly, it's totally fucking useless. Our leaders should be figuring out ways to deal with the inevitable recession and the degeneration of New South Wales infrastructure instead of paying lip-service to the invisible man in the sky. Total bullshit. Secondly, it's a fundamental infringement of the secular tradition on which Australian government was founded. If they recite the Lord's Prayer, they have to recite all other religious declarations of faith, which would be even more of a waste of fucking time. The solution? Don't recite any fucking made-up religious bullshit at all, then, Voila! Everyone is happy! Especially me.

The usual boring, repetitive argument against this is that 'yer, but 'straya wuz christian an we r built on christian values and its a tradition'. ...and? There's loads of traditions that we don't perform anymore. Kidnapping Aboriginal children and brainwashing them into 'civilized', Christian beliefs was a huge part of Australian tradition, and look what happened to that. It only happens in the Northern Territory now. The Australian media, until the 1970's, used to deliver news in a refined, received pronunciation British accent. That fell out of use when Australian nationalists deemed everything British, more specifically English, to be bad. Tradition is a ridiculous argument for keeping the custom if the custom itself is unnecessary or detrimental to modern society. Face it, Australia is, and is always going to be, a multicultural melting pot of different religions and beliefs, no matter how much the conservative lunatics deny it. Therefore, get the Lord's Prayer the fuck out of Parliament! It serves absolutely no purpose and its continual use only serves to annoy the fuck out of other religions, and more importantly, rational, clear-thinking atheists.

I know this kind of radical, socialist and completely un-Australian attitude will irk people like W. Blow me. Aren't people sick to death of the stranglehold Christianity still has on this country? Only Christ knows how hellish it would be to be an atheist in somewhere like America or the Philippines. To be fair, Australia has got one of the lowest church attendances in the Western world. This should be comforting, but it friggin isn't. You know why? It makes it all the more annoying that while Christianity is, thankfully, withering away amongst the general populace, it is steadily increasing amongst the politicians. Rudd prances about at Hill$ong like a fuck. Tony Abbott pretty much used to enter Parliament dressed as the fucking pope. Benedict XVI visits Australia and they give him Randwick Racecourse with our tax money! Cardinal George Pell threatens any politician who dares vote for bills that support stem-cell research with ex-communication and they fucking back down! Sick of it all. Fuck Christians, fuck George Pell, and fuck the Pope.