Yes, the constitution is in breach.

It is wrong to for Government to fund religion and religion to dominate over Government, it is possibly illegal.

In principle, modern constitutions tend to include this for ethical reasons. They always has been and always will. That is why it is in the constitution.

Funding religious schools is a strain on taxpayers, particularly to those who are not religious. For some, the tax dollar raised is spent on those who preach to hate you. You have every right to be annoyed that those who make your life a living misery are funded by your taxes. Especially if you are Islamic, gay or lesbian, or staunchly atheist. All these subsidize belief systems that inflame and perpetuate persecution from religious zealots, you pay in taxes, are hell bent on kicking the Christ out of your dignity.

Governments should not subsidize church schools for this reason. They insist on having the right to persecute or expel lesbian or gay identified students and the disabled.

As churches, however, anyone who wishes to donate to these institutions have their donations tax deducted. So if we have private schools, surely it would not be so difficult to privatize their funding. All you need is enough donations from like minded people digging deep: a few weeks before tax day, and it all comes back in your tax return anyway. You can chose to pay where their tax goes. End of problem.

"I guess we are on different sides of a few arguments, but both represented by the same Parliament. A Parliament, I might add, that was founded by people who were religious and still has many Members today who are religious."

I read somewhere that 30% of Federal parliamentarians are active church-going Christians, whereas only 9% of the the general population are such. This could mean, that with respect to religion, Federal pollies are "unrepresentative swill".

Danielle,
You have hit the nail on the head these are my thoughts exactly. The federal government spends the money of religious people on supporting religious schools, This is as I said an area of personal choice, if we wish to take our children to Church on Sunday it is up to us. My daughter attends a public school, and I read lately Melbourne's elite are doing likewise in increasing numbers.

Schools are there to educate people not give sermons or mass, they should have a "human relationships" subject instead of chaplins, or perhaps a social worker. In my mind as a religious person there is no room in schools for such a service.

whilst we are at it, we could start by abolishing all govt support to that second most insidious of religions - enviromentalism
this cult receives zillions of tax dollars in addition to it being preached ad nauseam in our schools.

THe lies of evolution are taught openly in schools so it makes a lot more sense to teach about the truth of creation. The religion of humanism (man believeing he is god) has proven a complete failure. No wonder many of the 'believers' in humanism send their kids to schools where they don't have to put up with the fruit of its flawed beliefs.

Shonga and Danielle, very well put.

I've posted my opinion on this subject before. My youngest daughter had some extraordinarily frightful 'Christian' education in public primary school.

Teaching of comparative religion and other philosophies would be a wonderful adjunct to our children's education. Wish there could be funding for that instead.

Sorry Runner, not even most Christians follow your line of thinking on evolution and take the creation story literally. Are they then Godless amoral people as well?