Fester,

I think we can all agree on the subject of the sorry cards.

We can acknowledge that schools don't always get it right.
And that includes religious schools as well.

Take the toxic culture of the schools run by the Christian
Brothers where decades of horrific child sexual abuse
took place. The Opus Dei schools where kids were encouraged
the group practice of corporal mortification, the deliberate
experience of pain and discomfort so as to be "closer to God."

Schools where families are asked to sign "statements of faith"
that implied transgender students are "offensive to God," and
"immoral." Private schools where anti-Semitism is practiced.
Where Nazi salutes and rantings of violence are regularly
practiced.

And the list goes on.

Well done David. You now stand ethically above the ABC in my estimation. As for welcome/acknowledgement of country, I think you would have a better understanding of religious coercion and manipulation than me, as I have never had any religious affiliations other than a few discussions with people from religious cults who were unable to convince me of anything (I'd imagine that this would come as no surprise to you).

I certainly feel that welcome/acknowledgement of country is at least manipulative and coercive, and given what I feel is the implication of a spiritual connection of the land with indigenous Australians, it is also a religious imposition and unconstitutional.

https://adelaideanglicans.com/news/why-christians-should-encourage-the-use-of-welcome-to-or-acknowledgement-of-country/

Welcome to country and acknowledgement of aboriginal elders past and present is a religious ceremony of animism and ancestral worship. This is the worship of ancient aboriginal culture. It has nothing to do with those who have built this great Nation, it is totally aboriginal.

Quote, "Animism is a belief that all objects and living things have a soul or spirit. It is considered to be the earliest form of religion. The term animism comes from the Latin word anima, meaning breath, spirit, or life. Animism is a way of perceiving all things as animated and alive. It is also an anthropological construct used to compare different systems of beliefs."

In classification of religions: Morphological
Ancestor worship, prevalent in preliterate societies, is obeisance to the spirits of the dead. Fetishism, the veneration of objects believed to have magical or supernatural potency, springs from the association of spirits with particular places or things and leads to idolatry.

Dear Josephus,

I don't think that animism is more ridiculous than a religion which has a god in three parts, life after death, virgins having babies, hell, heaven and the devil. That religion and animism seem like a pile of rubbish to me. However, Christian missionaries pushed their religion on people who worshiped a rainbow serpent. They had absolutely no respect for people who didn't believe what the missionaries believed. However, I don't expect you to give up your beliefs even though they seem ridiculous to me. I respect your right to believe what you will. Christian missionaries showed no such respect for the religion of the Aborigines. I think all religions are primitive ways of dealing with the world. However, if one is going to respect one religion one should respect any religion whose proponents obey the law of the land. People who practice idolatry have as much right to practice idolatry as you have to practice your religion.

Ah Foxy. Yes, indeed Australia has an infestation of Nazis, just like Ukraine or anywhere else I'd imagine. There will always be revolting people, but the worst that can result from that is to believe we need a revolting system of rule to deal with them. Then we all lose. Acknowledgement of country/welcome to country is not so different from a Nazi salute as you might think.

Dear Dave,

There you go again typecasting Christian missionaries. They are human beings too you know.

Dear Fester,

Christian missionaries as well as Muslim missionaries or other kinds of missionaries are human beings. Some are very flawed human beings. I tend to resent them. You have possibly never been subject to attention from a missionary. I have been many times, and I have found it unpleasant. It is very arrogant for a person to try to get you to adopt that person's beliefs. If a person is dissatisfied with their beliefs, they can seek people and written material which will give them information about other beliefs, Perhaps, we can learn to accept that other people have different beliefs and ideas from us rather than trying to change them to accept the beliefs we have. We can learn to live with them. We can tell other people what we think and believe, and they can tell us what they think and believe. I think taking Aboriginal children away from their parents and forbidding them to speak their language or practice their religion is evil. It alienates them from their family and their culture. My mother was a teacher in the St. Regis Indian Reservation in the US. Indian kids were forbidden to speak the language or practice the religion of their parents. Good people do good things, and bad people do bad things. For good people to do bad things, that takes religion. Missionaries can do great evil.