The Age | Parliament’s paradox: Does your work day begin by reciting the Lord’s Prayer?
How does your work day start? In the Victorian Parliament nothing gets done until the reading of the Lord’s Prayer. As many cultural conservatives tell us, we are a country founded on Judeo-Christian values.
But calls have been getting louder to ditch the daily prayer, led, not for the first time, by the Reason Party’s Fiona Patten who argues that as parliament represents a modern, multi-faith society it should not be so powerfully and symbolically tied to one small group.
According to Patten, there are 153 religions in Victoria (and the 2016 Census showed one third of us are not at all religious) so reciting the Lord’s Prayer makes Parliament “a Christian club”.
The question came up in 2019. Daniel Andrews thought a “multi-faith moment at the beginning of the parliamentary day” may be a good solution. But Liberal frontbencher David Davis thundered that the Lord’s Prayer was “a very important reflection of the Judeo-Christian tradition … part of our history, and part of our Westminster parliamentary tradition too.”
Interestingly, the term “Judeo-Christian tradition” was virtually unknown in Australia before September 11, 2001, and became a favourite dog whistle of Donald Trump used against Muslims…
…
Read the full article on The Age’s website.