” Given our two countries have not formally separated church and state it’s fair to say that we are formally theocratic in our style of government rather than secular.”

It is not ‘fair’ to say that at all; to say that NZ and Australia are theocratic is total rubbish. Only a small minority of people in both countries take any religion seriously, and their governments certainly don’t. New Zealand probably takes the monarchy more seriously than does Australia, but to drag in the Monarch’s connection with the Church of England is silly. Most New Zealanders and Australians probably would not know (certainly not care) that the Queen is head of the Church of England; and it is very, very doubtful that citizens of either country think of the Union Jack on their flags as anything but a bit of history – Christian crosses indeed!.

Never heard of a “Christian National Thanksgiving Day”. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, but as an average Australian, I don’t know of it. Does anyone?

The Christian prayers in parliament are merely a piece of historical symbolism, and politicians’ behaviour certainly makes the prayers null and void.

These “hard core evangelicals” who get the ear of politicians are no more privileged than big business. All sorts of odds and sods with the weirdest ideas can lobby politicians. According to this secularist preacher, secularism caters for all, and listens to all!

A distaste for homosexuals extends well outside religious dogma.

Federal Governments give money to religious schools because it is cheaper for them. State schools are the preserve of state governments, and they give no money to religious schools. Whether or not the state schools are under-funded has nothing do with the subject.

Humanist instruction in schools? Humanists/secularists have no creed and stand for nothing. Secularism is just a pile of mumbo-jumbo put together by a group of malcontents: it is based on nothing and means nothing.

Tub thumping ‘secularists’ are just as obnoxious as bible bashers. They both have their religions.

A most thoughtful and thought provoking article.

placeta 116 of the Constitution Act, (Cth) states:

The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

Looks like there can be lots of "religion" without ever transgressing s.116

Mr Right,
I was pleasantly surprised by your post I actually saw some merit (in principle) with it until you got to:
>" Humanists/secularists have no creed and stand for nothing. Secularism is just a pile of mumbo-jumbo put together by a group of malcontents: it is based on nothing and means nothing."<

True you won’t see much in the way of meaningful discussion on what Humanism is and what they stand for in the media then again I can think of a dozen other worthwhile institutions that I never seen in the media either.
I would be foolish to make assumptions on their veracity on that basis.

Given that philosophy give the intellectual basis for our societies in the same way science/mathematics underpin our technology I think it would be prudent of you to seek out some books on that school of philosophy and their reasoning.

I you did you would then know that a “Tub thumping” secular humanist is an oxymoron by definition. Secular Humanists (like me) tend to be neutral, favouring reason this logically excludes ‘tub thumpers’ of any persuasion as their (tub thumpers) views are extreme exude intolerance and ignorance.

MAX
I find that a number of your list points particularly the first three,thanks giving day and describing Australia as being theocratic are details in search of relevance. They are anacronisms that have long lost relevance in today's Australia. Pomp and pagentary/symbolism is if not dead in Australia its on life support.
Even Christmas has more to do with 1930's Coca Cola ads and a feel good times than hard core religion.

Max writes

'Secularism is a form of neutral government that listens to all points of view'

Reading from the thousands of posts on OLO you would have to be totally gullible to believe this statement. Fundamentalist Secularists are far from neutral. Many times they fail to accept democracy and are often blind to their own dogmas. Mr Right is right for a change. He writes
'Tub thumping ‘secularists’ are just as obnoxious as bible bashers. They both have their religions.' The only difference is that secularist are often dishonest about their dogmas.

Could you imagine how much more of our population would be indoctrinated with secular promiscuity if we had no private schools where parents actually pay fees in order to get a reasonable education. You would think with their fruit of std's, teenage pregnancy, broken homes, and sexual abuse that they would crawl into a hole. But no! Louder than ever they want more condoms as if that actually ever solved any issues; they want more porn despite kids everywhere being abused; more loathing of our Christian heritage that led to more harmony than any other nations I know of. We see the violence in California recently of secularist who just can not accept democracy. Max Wallace is fooling himself.

governments seek legitimacy from one of two sources: god, or the people. a monarchy chooses god, democracy the people. australia is the former in law, neither in reality. parliament has no constitutional authority to govern, but shares the british 'smoke and mirrors' constitution where the theoretical rule of the sovereign is a figleaf on the rule of the cabinet. this avoids the necessity of ceding power to the lower class.

kerr, and whitlam, demonstrated what the law is, the politicians have made damn sure the law is kept out of sight since then.

religion also seems to depend on god, or the people. very few ozzies appear to believe in god, but rather more want to use religion to bully their neighbors, and/or, prop up their self-esteem.

a secular state takes no formal notice of religion. do anything you like at home or in public, so long as you break no laws. religious nutters can't stand this. knowing or fearing their religion is false, they proclaim it all the more loudly and fiercely, imagining noise will cover up emptiness.

sorry folks. science explains the world quite well, religion has long been exposed as nonsense. no amount of "burn them! is going to repair your history or current foolishness.

Good article from Max Wallace. Do I detect an increasing groundswell of popular support for the affirmation of Australia as a secular society of late?

Perhaps, when Australia finally grows up as an independent nation and becomes a republic, we can do so with a new Constitution that unambiguously separates religion from the State.