gillards atheism will bother a lot of people

"Will Gillards atheism alienate the religious? Hell, yeah.
Most of them - the wedding and wake religious wont really care. We are, after all, a professedly secular society. But the big, the powerful, and the rabid will care.

Look at what happened last Easter. We had a bunch o bishops declaring atheism a lonely, evil, amoral state of being.

Cardinal George Pell was, for once, one of the most restrained.

Catholic Bishop of Parramatta Anthony Fisher blamed atheism for Nazism, Stalinism and abortion, while Sydney Archbishop Peter Jensen said atheism was just another religion and also a recipe for loneliness.

The Salt Shakers are already arming themselves for spiritual warfare, raising their concerns that Gillard is both a Fabian socialist (gasp!) and a member of Emilys List, which they describe as a very feminist , pro-abortion group.

Threatened, much?

Especially when the tax benefits of religions are under the microscope, when same-sex marriage just keeps lingering on the agenda, and when theyve got pretty used to loudly religious leaders who turn up to Hillsong and bandy about thanks for the great God, creator of us all.

If the Australian public turned off Kevin Rudd because they felt that he did not stand by his moral challenge, then lets hope Ms Gillard has the courage to stand by hers.

It must be hard for politicians to resist that rich vein of gold that is the religious sector.

It kind of works like pyramid sales. You just need to convince a few and they spread the word - after all, thats what theyre good at.

Some of the Christian organisations, for example, carry out surveys of all candidates, quizzing them on crucial ethical questions about euthanasia, abortion, etc.

Then they can rate and rank the pollies and parties and make their recommendation to the masses.

And the masses are getting more massive. The Pentecostal churches are huge these days, with thousands packed in.

They have schools and clinics and television studios. They have podcasts and concerts and famous singers and business coaching and radio stations . All of which can broadcast your message if you can just get the leaders on side.

Then theres the fundraising for political campaigns, the connections with political parties So, despite the straightforward way in which Ms Gillard revealed her lack of faith, she took a fairly complicated risk.

The very fact of that risk will bode well in many peoples minds. It means when faced with the choice of saying what was politically expedient and politicians have a myriad ways of skirting around the truth and just coming out with the truth, she chose the truth.

Frankness is one of the most difficult characteristics for politicians to hold on to, but one of the most precious when they can.

Lets all pray to the Flying Spaghetti Monster that Ms Gillard can hold on to hers."

>Good luck with that!

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http://www.thepunch.com.au/articles/gillards-atheism-will-bother-a-lot-of-people/