A flaming article brimming with lies, obsecuring the truth.

This is purely an issue of sectarianism, and sensible people should ignore the screaming queers of the secular madhouse; most notably the SMH.

Dan

Does anyone take Fitzsimmons seriously? If this cousin of Falau's worked for KMart, and he rubbished his employer, he would be sacked. The same would happen no matter where he worked. Nothing to do with religion. The man is an idiot; nothing like his cousin. Only another idiot would take up his case.

Dan,

<<A flaming article brimming with lies, obsecuring (sic) the truth.>>

Are you writing about my article or that by FitzSimons?

ttbn,

<<Does anyone take Fitzsimmons seriously?>>

The Sydney Morning Herald does, otherwise he wouldn't be employed.

<<If this cousin of Falau's (sic) worked for KMart, and he rubbished his employer, he would be sacked. The same would happen no matter where he worked. Nothing to do with religion.>>

In the example of Josiah Folau and his sacking by St Gregory's College, it had everything to do with religion. He defamed his employer's values and was justifiable sacked.

I agree that if he worked for KMart and rubbished his employer, he would deserve the same treatment that St Greg's gave him.

All left-handed masturbators will go to hell for not conforming to the established right anded norm. And indeed any normal heterosexual who for any reason engages in anal sex, uses contraceptives or bullies others who believe differently. All the result of choice!

If anal sex is sinful? It is sinful for all! This is my religious belief! Therefore, I'm entitled to give voice to it in the public square.

Ditto Folau's cousin.

All current Christian Philosophy and practice has its origins in the beliefs and permission of the pagan sun-worshipper Constantine.
All divine inspiration is reported to us via those who claim the same. Even some not taking their meds.

Which Folau ought to do. And just leave others to worship how they please and whomsoever they please. be it the creator or Constantine's Christianity, or some pretender/paedophile, kiddy raping warlord trying to enforce their errant will or hate-based rules.

The God of love didn't anoint Folau or Folau' cousin, both of whom ought to get back on their meds ASAP. I'm taking mine!
Alan B.

To OzSpen.

Hello OzSpen. That's an interesting discovery for today, Spenser Gear attachment to OzSpen. It all makes sense now.

Yesterday's discovery was meeting the new Nazi dog catcher for the area, on a bush trail five Kim from civilisation.

Life is brimming with surprises.

No, I feel this issue is inside the bounds of a sectarian debate alone. The Catholic Church has a very legitimate rite to dismiss the services of a renegade employee who undermines an institutional employers religious belief system, with bitter comment opposed to their core values.

I do not see that Israel Falou is bound by the same rules as his cousin, since secularism, under the democratic rite of free speech, holds ALL opinions as equal.

It is a shining example of a need to legislate particular freedoms for religious belief beyond the moral argument under which secularism attempts to position homosexuals and gay rights, as ii sees the need of "special" protections, and offers them special privileges. Equality proves itself a farcical right by comparison.

Dan

I wonder if nurses who are pro killing unborn babies and even up to birth should be allowed to work in maternity wards.

Peter FitzSimons has always been one of the fruitier specimens from the radical left, and I have always taken his utterings with a decent spade of salt.

The issue of Josiah Folau's sacking has only 2 things in common, christianity and the name Folau. Any employee of any company that rubbished the company to clients would be in serious trouble.

Dear Shadow Minister,

You write;

“The issue of Josiah Folau's sacking has only 2 things in common, christianity and the name Folau. Any employee of any company that rubbished the company to clients would be in serious trouble.”

What? Are you serious? Where has he rubbished the 'company's clients'? His letter was to the parent of someone who had attended the 30 member church his father runs. The only reason this came to light was that the SMH got hold of it and printed the story.

This case certainly does have bearing on the Falou matter and of religious freedom in general and for you to dismiss it is churlish.

And when is a school taking government money deemed a 'company' and the students 'clients'? You have actually attempted, as did the author of this article, to reverse the onus. Josiah did not put his beliefs up on social media rather they were delivered in a private exchange. Are you seriously now defending the school for sacking him?

Unbelievable.

Steele, maybe he wasn't sacked. Maybe he resigned. If I had an employee who wrote a letter like this to someone about the core values of my organisation, I'd be asking them whether in good conscience they should continue to work for me. And an honest employee would most likely say "No". Which is what this article suggests probably happened: http://cathnews.com/archives/cath-news-archive/35666-folau-s-cousin-exits-job-over-catholicism-comments

But this is about core values. A core value of football is not about being a non-Christian, or non-Muslim, or non-Buddhist etc, all of whom have views on the legitimate role of sexual conduct. There is a case for viewing a community organisation like a football code as a utility. Just as electricity companies can't cut people off because they don't believe in gay marriage, neither should a sporting code.

I wonder that if I was employed by the Labor Party and I told people to vote Liberal, would I get the sack?

I wonder that if I was employed by the Labor Party and I told people to vote Liberal, would I get the sack?
is Mise,
Instantly ! But those Labor supporters who make up 95% of the Public Service aren't sacked by the LNP despite working against the Govt !

Dear GrahamY,

I'm sorry but I am enjoying the knots people are tying themselves into in order to claim the cases have little in common, you are no exception I'm afraid.

Just to be clear, I don't think either should have been shown the door. Israel because Rugby Australia is a governing body for a sporting code and as such should not be beholden to sponsorships when deciding the make up of the national team. Josiah because the Catholic School is receiving a good proportion of its funding from the Australian people and as such should not be requiring adherence, token or otherwise, to the Catholic faith from its teaching staff.

Indeed should any teacher coming out of graduate school have to accept the fact that one third of the jobs in the profession are closed to him or her in this country because of their religious beliefs? Aren't we very much in danger of returning to the sectarian nonsense we once experienced? 'non-Catholics need not apply'?

If some whackjob independent school that isn't receiving a cent from our taxes then they can set all the rules they want, but not the Catholic sector which receives grants in the billions.

Josiah was not airing his views within the confines of his employment, nor did he do so on open social media, yet you are seemingly happy to cut him loose.

You certainly are being inconsistent on the religious issue although I'm not sure why you can't see it. But more than that you appear to be ready to forego what once was a cornerstone of the Australian identity, the very egalitarian 'a fair bloody go'.

Cont..

Cont..

Many claim Israel was a victim of political correctness, so why can't Josiah be deemed a victim of religious correctness?

Your argument that “There is a case for viewing a community organisation like a football code as a utility.” is an interesting one. I suppose a response would be that Rugby Australia is attempting to maximise that utility by being as inclusive as possible to all Australians both as players and as spectators. Israel's actions were deemed a threat to that inclusiveness and so he was asked to refrain from public statements which RA felt was undermining their efforts. I don't agree with their response but do agree they were within their gambit to take some form of action.

Inconsistency is your forte, not mine Steele. I have always said that Israel should not have been sacked because his beliefs have nothing to do with the job that he is paid to do. I would be inconsistent if, in a case where someone's beliefs did have something to do with the job they are paid to do, they shouldn't face some sort of reprimand.

Whether the comments are on twitter, or in an email, is irrelevant.

It is inconsistent to argue that anyone getting government funding has to employ anyone, whether they agree with their belief system or not. RA gets government support, so on that basis it has no right to exclude Israel because of his religious beliefs. So there you go. You say you don't agree with RA but they were within their rights. But you disagree with the Catholic church, and that weren't within their rights. How's that for inconsistency within inconsistency?

Your problem is you don't like religion, so you twist and turn to entertain your prejudices.

BTW, check out the word "utility" in a dictionary. In another inconsistency you're using it in a different sense to the one I was using. A utility is a company or organisation that provides a public good, like electricity, or water, or gas etc. We treat utilities differently from other businesses because they supply a staple commodity and have a monopoly or quasi-monopoly.

Dear GrahamY,

“Your problem is you don't like religion, so you twist and turn to entertain your prejudices.”

Please show me a single example of me doing that in my response to you. If you can't then why even bring it up?

I can just as well say “Your problem is you like religion, so you twist and turn to entertain your prejudices.”

This is an example.

The Catholic School wants Josiah to essentially hold views that he doesn’t believe to be true because they say so, not because of his free choice.

A civil society is also a secular society. That doesn’t mean that no religion has a place, but that all religions have their own place, but none may be enforced, and religion includes the idea of positive non-belief, like atheism.

Yet the Catholic school is taking an essentially sectarian point of view in our secular society and seeking to compel a particular religious view of the world on its teachers. This is outrageous and needs to be called out.

Whichever way you look at it, Josiah should have been permitted to stay.

Full stop.

As to the utility I can't see why our interpretations of it differ at all. I just made the point that a policy of inclusiveness was completely consistent with delivering a 'public good'.

This is a very interesting article. I love examining moral questions where the intrinsic difficulty in delineating where moral boundaries begin and end, has to take into account moral priorities and moral quandaries.

One gets the impression that given the furore over Israel Folau's sacking, and his defence by free speech advocates (like me), gave his brother Josiah a chance at his own 15 minutes of fame, by emulating Israel, with a twist. That is, Josiah got sacked for claiming that the religious organisation that he worked for was in league with he devil.

Now that is interesting. Does Josiah have the right to publically criticise his own religious employer? I would have to say that under freedom of speech, he does. Although most people would consider what he did to be completely reprehensible as it violates the tacit rules of polite behaviour. Why does Josiah even work for people he utterly despises? And why should any organisation be compelled to hire people who publically attack them? But under our present crazy Anti Discrimination Laws, all organisations, including religious ones, must hire people who's values or lifestyles are opposed to that very organisation's religious teachings. In western societies, religious organisations have traditionally always gotten legal exemptions when it comes to laws that their religion expressly forbids, on the grounds of religious freedom.

But under political correctness, not anymore. The priests of this new religion of Leftist Humanitarianism can see an opportunity to give their religious competitors some grief using their entrenched bureaucratic power within the supposedly secular state. And naturally, they have grabbed that heaven sent opportunity with both hands. Hence the furore.

Surely the best compromise is to allow religious organisations to discriminate over the kinds of people they hire? Especially since Christian religious organisations seem to be the ones most disadvantaged by anti discrimination legislation. The idea that a homosexual would even apply for a job in a Muslim religious organisation is a bit of a stretch. Muslims have a bad habit of reacting violently towards any person who gets in their faces over their religious beliefs.

I think some of the comments in this thread certainly give credence to the following adage;

"Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit:

There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect."