Link Highlights | May 2018
Friday, 1 June 2018
| Ethos editor
Link highlights – May 2018
Below is a selection of links to online news and opinion pieces from May 2018. To keep up-to-date with our posts, ‘like’ us on Facebook and/or follow us on Twitter.
The articles below are selected by the editor, Armen Gakavian, at his discretion. Neither the editor nor Ethos necessarily endorse the views expressed in these articles.
Anzac Day
Tseen Khoo writes: For Japanese Australians, the connections with Australia's war-time history continues to be particularly fraught. Whether they are early or more recent migrants, Japanese Australians have many narratives and expressions of complex identities that are now gaining voice.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55290
Asylum seekers, refugees and migration
Cindy Wu writes: Refugees are persecuted because of race, religion, nationality, and social or political affiliation. May we who follow Christ embrace refugees without regard to those categories.
https://www.lausanne.org/content/lga/2018-05/we-too-were-once-strangers
Fatima Measham writes: These are people living precariously: pregnant women, families with young children, elderly people. They are being 'transitioned out' of Status Resolution Support Services based on 'job-readiness'. The move not only illustrates the arbitrary nature of immigration policy, which sets people up to fail; it is institutionalised sadism.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55660
Frank Brennan writes: For the good of the refugees who have languished for five years on Nauru and Manus Island, and for the good of the Australian body politic, it's time to put an end to this inhumane chapter in Australian history. Keep the boats stopped. Bring New Zealand into the mix now. Empty the camps. And fight your elections on matters of substance which don't impose untold harm on defenceless children.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55694
Billy Graham
Michael Oh writes: As the world continues to remember and celebrate the life and legacy of Billy Graham, I want to share this special video with you reflecting on his legacy at Lausanne 1974 and beyond. We are admonished to ‘Remember your leaders, who spoke the word of God to you. Consider the outcome of their way of life and imitate their faith.’ (Hebrews 13:7)
https://www.lausanne.org/about/blog/remembering-billy-grahams-lausanne-legacy
Child sexual abuse
RASP POST: John Warhurst writes: General apologies don't go far enough. Compensation is necessary, but also not enough. The reputation of the church would now be higher if there were more obvious signals of accountability by those in charge. The offer of resignation made as a group to Pope Francis by the entire Chilean hierarchy is a breath of fresh air.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55608
Disability
Shane Clifton writes: The view that disability, happiness, and faith are self-contradictory occurs because our vision of each is too narrow.
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/opinion/the-bewildering-and-beautiful-diversity-of-disability/
Domestic violence
Bruce Ashford, J. D. Greear and Brad Hambrick write: Pastors who wish to support, protect, and counsel survivors of abuse are often left wondering how best to minister to them. They know abuse is a multi-faceted evil. They want to provide the best counsel possible. But several misconceptions around the issue can cloud the thoughts and guide the actions of well-intentioned church leaders.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/2018/may-web-exclusives/4-myths-about-responding-to-spousal-abuse.html
Kylie Beach writes: Attendees at Time to Act held at North Sydney’s Independent Theatre heard journalist Julia Baird and an expert panel discuss the action churches need to take in the wake of a sold-out forum last year, called Time to Listen.
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/australia/reading-the-red-flags-of-domestic-violence/
Economics, finance & inequality
Rotten Apples or Biased Barrows? Responding to the Banking Royal Commission, Gordon Preece argues that better regulation and the threat of longer sentences are necessary but insufficient. They cannot provide an inner moral compass or character, the virtues embodied in names such as Prudential or Provident, which are urgently needed if trust and transparency are to be restored.
http://tma.melbourneanglican.org.au/opinion/loss-of-moral-compass-behind-banking-scandals-270418
Andrew Hamilton writes: The banking royal commission has come to resemble the earlier child abuse royal commission. To observers who share a public-spirited interest in the decent functioning of institutions, the similarities invite reflection on why two apparently different forms of institution should behave in such similar ways.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55273
Anthony Asher writes: While codes of conduct in banking may help, the tsunami of financial regulation over the past few decades has swept aside much of the sense of personal accountability.
https://theconversation.com/why-we-cant-just-throw-more-regulation-at-the-ethical-issues-raised-by-the-banking-royal-commission-96646
David Coates’ latest book Flawed Capitalism: the Anglo-American Condition and its Resolution, traces the similarities and differences between the two great examples of modern deregulated capitalism.
https://www.socialeurope.eu/flawed-capitalism-on-both-sides-of-the-atlantic
Andrew Hamilton writes: Government measures to reduce the welfare budget are no longer presented as just punishment but as a way of addressing social evils. But they imply that the people in need of benefits compose the social groups infected by the evil. But governments have the duty to respect people as humans, not ciphers, to provide benefits that help people live with self-respect, to take responsibility for the disadvantage of Indigenous Australians and involve them in its healing.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55607
Gordon Menzies and Donald Hay write: Properly defining human nature is a prerequisite for good theory and policy. After all, identity is more than individuality, fulfilment is more than utility, and society is more than markets.
www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/18/4845420.htm
Bruce Duncan writes: The Vatican has launched a stringent critique of abuses in global economies, abuses that are driving astonishing inequality and threatening ecological sustainability. 'Oeconomicae et pecuniariae questiones' reiterates the call for an urgent dialogue between politics and economics to advance human life and wellbeing.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55703
Andrew Hamilton writes: As the royal commission prepared to resume its hearings into financial services, the Vatican released Oeconomicae et pecuniariae quaestiones, on the ethics of markets. Although written independently, passages of the document could have been mistaken for factual reporting of the royal commission.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55695
End of life
Neil James Foster writes: Changing the law around euthanasia and assisted dying is not a good idea in the interests of society at large and the vulnerable sick and elderly in particular.
https://lawandreligionaustralia.blog/2018/05/10/euthanasia-and-assisted-dying-the-law-and-why-it-should-not-change/
Lyle Shelton writes: Conservative politicians and church leaders need to advocate publicly for palliative care and for the dignity of all human life. If politicians and advocates in favour of assisted suicide are the only ones speaking, it is no wonder the public become confused. As a society we already routinely kill our unborn on demand. Is the routine killing of the elderly next?
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/opinion/is-the-euthanasia-movement-morphing-into-a-movement-for-suicide-on-demand/
In Voice for Values, Martyn Iles speaks with Professor Ian Olver about the important issue of euthanasia in light of the decision by Australian scientist David Goodall, who travelled to Switzerland in order to legally end his own life at 104 year old with no significant health complications.
https://www.acl.org.au/the_rightness_and_the_wrongness_of_helping_someone_die
Happiness
Ben East writes: In Happiness, author Aminatta Forna questions the idea that adverse experiences make you less of a person. “Life is not perfect and things happen, but we’ve become over protective and fearful of adversity because of what it might lead to. We need to approach life with a bit more fortitude.”
https://www.thenational.ae/arts-culture/books/author-aminatta-forna-happiness-is-a-strange-western-concept-1.727805
Homelessness & housing
Hal Pawson and Cameron Parsell write: A decade after the launch of a national campaign against homelessness, the trends are all going the wrong way. A new annual report highlights what's gone wrong and what must be done.
https://theconversation.com/homelessness-australias-shameful-story-of-policy-complacency-and-failure-continues-95376
Identity
Russell Grenning writes: The warriors for this reshaping of our language insist that even if there is no immediate offence to anybody there could be some offence imagined somehow, somewhere and at some time so it is best to be careful and nip it in the bud.
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=19719&page=0
Indigenous affairs
Sarah Maddison writes: Progressive Australians want a process that restores a sense of moral legitimacy to the nation. But far from concern about settler Australia's moral legitimacy, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples seek treaty as recognition of their political difference. Treaties on these terms are unlikely to be acceptable to the settler state.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55341
Fatima Measham talks to Thomas Mayor, a Torres Strait Islander and the NT branch secretary of Maritime Union Australia, who has been bringing the Uluru Statement to different communities. He talks about what the past year has been like and what he thinks it's going to take make the vision at Uluru a reality.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55702
Law, human rights and free speech
Scott Kirkland writes: It’s hard not to see the inquiry as an effort to appease Christians who opposed the reform. But if freedom just means my right to assert myself without regard to others, it is difficult to sustain a healthy political culture.
https://theconversation.com/australia-needs-a-better-conversation-about-religious-freedom-96411
The Religious Freedom Review’s completion has prompted calls to remove religious exemptions from discrimination laws, but the Salvation Army has warned exemptions are necessary to allow religious bodies to appoint staff “that subscribe to the beliefs of the organisation".
https://probonoaustralia.com.au/news/2018/05/religious-freedom-review-reignites-discrimination-exemptions-debate/
Should religious protection extend to the marketplace? Chris Fotinopoulos writes that ‘bigotry is bad business, so why not let the consumer determine who gets away with what in the marketplace?’
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=19740
Danielle Celermajer writes: In order to develop effective prevention strategies regarding torture, what is required is a more capacious, sophisticated and empirically informed map of the conditions that cause and sustain its practice.
www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/15/4843772.htm
Robyn J. Whitaker writes: Some Australian Christians claim to be persecuted – this is not only wrong, it is an insult to thousands around the world who are at risk because of their religion.
https://theconversation.com/christians-in-australia-are-not-persecuted-and-it-is-insulting-to-argue-they-are-96351
Stephen McAlpine argues that Robyn Whitaker understates the threat to the church and overstates the church’s role in persecution of LGBTI people. However, the persecution rhetoric is ultimately self-defeating for Christians. And while persecution includes vitriol and slander for belonging to him, this is the age of Twitter and Facebook, where slander and vitriol are the new normal.
https://stephenmcalpine.com/2018/05/30/are-christians-persecuted-in-australia-its-complex/
Martin Luther King
John Wood writes: Of all the thinkers and heroic figures to have fought for and influenced the American experiment there is no one whose perspective is more important to guiding us through the trials of the current day than that of Dr. King. And sadly, there is no one whose true philosophy has been more obscured by the passing of time.
https://areomagazine.com/2018/05/05/the-philosophy-of-nonviolence-the-lost-legacy-of-martin-luther-king/
Mother’s Day
Cynthia Banham writes: As a daughter, I still crave my mother’s approval, probably because it is so hard coming. As a mother I am terrified of messing up, and yet I still catch myself doing things I swore I’d never to do to my child: like arguing with his dad in front of him.
https://thenewdaily.com.au/life/relationships/2018/05/12/mothers-day-relationship-daughter/
Politics, society & ideology
The idea of the common good drove some of the most important social developments of the 20th century. Today, nations seem to be losing faith in the idea. David Rutledge and Michael Shirrefs speak with philosopher Hans Sluga.
www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/philosopherszone/the-fate-of-the-common-good/9711298
Tom Jacobs writes: New research finds that, when evangelical organizations raise their profile by sponsoring a high-profile political campaign, a backlash ensues. Evangelicals would be wise to consider the consequences of their political advocacy.
https://psmag.com/news/is-the-christian-right-driving-americans-away-from-religion
Marcia Pally writes: Populism doesn't have its own, distinct origins. Its roots are among the myths, history and symbologies that nourish other aspects of society. The left and right versions of populism have arrived at their differing positions by drawing, not on divergent Americas, but on shared historico-cultural materiel.
www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/03/4838732.htm
Is Marx still relevant? The most important takeaway from Marx’s view of history, argues Peter Singer, is that the evolution of ideas, religions and political institutions is not independent of the tools we use to satisfy our needs, nor of the economic structures we organise around those tools, and the financial interests they create. Yet we have internalised this view, and in that sense we are all Marxists now.
https://www.socialeurope.eu/is-marx-still-relevant
Russell Grenning writes: The warriors for this reshaping of our language insist that even if there is no immediate offence to anybody there could be some offence imagined somehow, somewhere and at some time so it is best to be careful and nip it in the bud.
http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=19719&page=0
Adrian Pabst writes: Faced with scandals like the abuse of private data and election meddling, perhaps we are at the cusp of a backlash against social media manipulation.
http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/09/4841000.htm
A considerable number of Christians see in the communist ideal of a classless and stateless society a secularised version of Jesus’ vision of the kingdom of heaven. But is there a difference? Will Jones writes.
https://faith-and-politics.com/2018/05/28/jesus-was-no-marxist/
Race and racism
Andrew Webster writes: Smith and Carlos have argued since then that their protest might never have happened without Norman, whose upbringing in the Salvation Army in Melbourne had taught him the importance of treating people equally.
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/peter-norman-to-be-recognised-for-role-in-1968-black-power-salute-20180427-p4zc2y.html
Timothy Kazuo Steains writes: Journalist Stan Grant has argued that we need to stop talking about Meghan Markle's 'mixed race' identity. But our society still categorises people according to race - and we need to discuss this.
https://theconversation.com/meghan-markle-and-why-being-mixed-race-matters-in-australia-97081
Religion in Society
Greg Clarke writes: If the strong, warm light of understanding is shone on much of our deeply ingrained culture, we can bring Jesus out of the shadows, first as a fuzzy outline but then, with more effort and input, in glorious colour.
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/opinion/letter-to-an-unbelieving-nation/
Joshua Searle asks: What does theology have to say to the homeless people on the streets of our own cities who die in solitude, unknown and unpitied without anyone even to mourn their loss?
https://www.christiantoday.com/article/what-is-the-point-of-theologyexecute1/129175.htm
Os Guinness speaks with John Sandeman: ‘Our Lord’s words … are not in favour of a pietism that is privatised, or the current notions in the English-speaking world of the ‘Benedict Option’, which I read as retreating into communities in order to be prayed for. … What we need today is a powerful vision of calling … that thrusts Christians out to engage society. Only the gospel will give a good outcome for the future.”
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/opinion/why-donald-trump-is-not-the-real-issue-facing-america/
In response to Os Guinness’ interview with Eternity, Rod Dreher writes: Most Christians, Evangelical and otherwise, who misunderstand the Benedict Option do so because they find it too threatening to their own position. My question is: are there theological reasons why Evangelicals in particular don’t understand the concept.
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/os-guinness-homer-simpson-the-benedict-option/
Dwight N. Hopkins writes: James Hal Cone (died 28th April 2018) taught us how the gospel of Jesus is for the poor and the oppressed, the bruised and the wounded, and that the mission and message of the gospel is not antithetical to but is the essence of liberation. Cone’s theology has forever changed the course of pedagogy, international relations, institutions of all faiths, governmental debates and inter-generational legacies.
https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/achievement-james-h-cone
Sexual abuse and #MeToo
Al Mohler writes: The #MeToo moment has come to American evangelicals. This moment has come to some of my friends and brothers in Christ. This moment has come to me, and I am called to deal with it as a Christian, as a minister of the gospel, as a seminary and college president, and as a public leader. I pray that I will lead rightly.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/may-web-only/al-mohler-humiliation-of-southern-baptist-convention-metoo.html
Richard Beck writes: Mohler seems genuinely anguished and searching for answers, but he can't offer an accurate diagnosis of what went wrong. He seems legitimately perplexed. He says nothing beyond the same old, same old: Men are in charge, but they shouldn't abuse the women under their leadership.
https://experimentaltheology.blogspot.com
Rebecca Davis writes: When evangelical leaders defend their words and actions instead of seeking to correct them, they demonstrate that something far deeper and darker is going on here than simply ignorance or even willful ignorance, which is bad enough. They demonstrate that they want to continue to breed a generation of abusers.
http://www.heresthejoy.com/2018/05/paige-patterson-and-a-culture-that-breeds-a-generation-of-abusers/
S. J. Wickham writes: It’s astounding when churches don’t give overt support to advocates for the abused, but I think this could be about to change. I thank God for the #MeToo and #ChurchToo campaigns. The church must advocate for the abused, not be part of the problem.
www.tribework.blogspot.com.au/2018/05/why-biblical-advocates-deserve-church.html
Sexuality
Marguerite Johnson and James Bennett write: Australia has a long history of intervention into people’s sexual orientations and gender identities, including conversion therapy. Yet this therapy has not received the same level of public scrutiny as it has overseas.
https://theconversation.com/treatments-as-torture-gay-conversion-therapys-deep-roots-in-australia-95588
Anna McGahan is "both a queer woman and a deeply devoted Christian". Her self-granted label won't satisfy fundamentalist Christians, she knows, and it might ruffle some feathers in the queer community too. Karl Quinn writes.
https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/tv-and-radio/queer-married-to-a-man-devoted-christian-the-divinely-complex-anna-mcgahan-20180509-h0zv4q.html
Slavery
John Sandeman writes: Australia’s first Modern Slavery Bill passed through the NSW Legislative Council last night, with big businesses to monitor supply chains.
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/australia/slavery-is-real-and-we-will-fight-it-says-nsw-parliament/
Social media
Adrian Pabst writes: Faced with scandals like the abuse of private data and election meddling, perhaps we are at the cusp of a backlash against social media manipulation.
http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/09/4841000.htm
Spirituality
"Looking back at the past five decades, I realize that those same bombs that brought so much suffering also brought great healing. Those bombs led me to Christ." By Kim Phuc Phan Thi.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/may/napalm-girl-kim-phuc-phan-thi-fire-road.html
Ralph C. Wood writes: Flannery O'Connor refused to relegate Satan to an abstract principle and thus to irrelevance. But while she envisioned Luciferian evil in traditional terms, she does not make him obvious, lest he be dismissed as a mere bogeyman.
www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2018/05/03/4838855.htm
Sport
Andrew Webster writes: Smith and Carlos have argued since then that their protest might never have happened without Norman, whose upbringing in the Salvation Army in Melbourne had taught him the importance of treating people equally.
https://www.smh.com.au/sport/peter-norman-to-be-recognised-for-role-in-1968-black-power-salute-20180427-p4zc2y.html
US politics
Robert Reich writes: Trump isn’t the cause of what’s happened to America. He’s the consequence – the product of years of stagnant wages and big money’s corruption of our democracy. If they really want to stop Trump and prevent future Trumps, Democrats will need to address these causes of Trump’s rise.
https://www.socialeurope.eu/how-to-stop-trump
Martin E. Marty writes: Carter the then-Southern Baptist was properly, but briefly, applauded by evangelicals as one of their own. But all that was back when evangelicals were still lowercase-“e” evangelicals, before millions of them capitalized on their newfound cultural and political visibility with new typography — Evangelicalism with a capital “E” — and became a virtual political party, or at least provided the base for one.
https://divinity.uchicago.edu/sightings/jimmy-carter-and-hope-news
Kenneth L. Woodward writes: To choose Clinton, US Evangelicals would have to overlook her decision to drop all previous moral qualms about supporting abortion on demand; ignore her ties to President Obama’s stand on certain religious-liberty issues, and forget their doubts about her Methodist presumption of moral probity. To opt for Trump required overlooking his moral turpitude and manifest lack of character; to accept as authentic his conversion to political conservatism.
https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/how-religion-got-trump
War, peace & nonviolence
"Looking back at the past five decades, I realize that those same bombs that brought so much suffering also brought great healing. Those bombs led me to Christ." By Kim Phuc Phan Thi.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/may/napalm-girl-kim-phuc-phan-thi-fire-road.html
Welfare
Andrew Hamilton writes: Government measures to reduce the welfare budget are no longer presented as just punishment but as a way of addressing social evils. But they imply that the people in need of benefits compose the social groups infected by the evil. But governments have the duty to respect people as humans, not ciphers, to provide benefits that help people live with self-respect, to take responsibility for the disadvantage of Indigenous Australians and involve them in its healing.
https://www.eurekastreet.com.au/article.aspx?aeid=55607
Work
Jean-Marie Jungblut writes: Careers are alive and well. Despite the widespread opinion that we are witnessing the end of careers and flexibilization of working life as a whole, the data does not bear this out. In fact, a large majority of people seem to be in stable employment for most of their working lives.
https://www.socialeurope.eu/careers-still-matter-even-in-todays-gig-economy
Ruth Bancewicz writes: Sam Berry demonstrated that every single Christian is in full-time ministry. And he showed us that it is indeed possible to be a real scientist and have a real Christian faith.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/april-web-only/sam-berry-myth-of-holy-hierarchy-science-faith.html
Young people
Sam Chan writes: In our postmodern age we must acknowledge the role of community perspectives and tradition in shaping our perception of truth. In light of this, how we can engage in fruitful evangelism in a 21st-century, postmodern world?
https://www.eternitynews.com.au/in-depth/postmoderns-need-jesus-too/