Foxy, OK, your definition of secular is a limited one.

But you must delve into the history books to see how this statement misses the point about Australia being a secular nation, "Funding of schools is a separate issue. All schools receive Government funding."

Yes, and the DOGS case is the reason why, and why we are not secular anymore, as well as the more recent decision to fund religion directly into public/private schools via chaplains.

You seem to accept the state funding religious schools as a 'commonsense' move.

It is not at all, but it is very Australian.

It would never happen in the secular US, from whence our s.116 wording was drawn.

Odd, examinator, that you did not list the UK as a non secular nation. And since we have a UK queen here who can only be an Anglican, we are tainted by the same slops bucket spills.

Were Australia ever to drag itself into republican status, the first 'hit' would have to be the end of all funding to religion... something that the Rudd's and Turnbull's would never dare to do... thus exposing their sham republican credentials.

Dear TBC,

The Government funds all schools for the education
of Australian children.

The National School Chaplaincy Program is a voluntary
program - not all schools choose to participate in it.
It is also not compulsory for students to participate.
Only 2,700 schools were granted funding in 2007.
The grant is $20,000 per annum for schools that applied.
And, during 2010 the Government will be examining
options for the future through a broad and detailed
consultation process.

As for our PM's qualifications concerning Republicanism -
I'm in no position to judge the man on that issue.
We'll have to wait and see. We all know where the previous
PM stood - and I can only hazard a guess where Mr Abbott
stands.

Foxy,
>>Australians are free to follow any religion they choose…(or) not to follow a religion.”
Well put, indeed. There is tolerance and its sibling empathy, as in Jeremy Riffkin’s “The Empathic Civilisation”. I have not read the book, but I would agree with most in http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeremy-rifkin/empathic-civilization-whe_b_478552.html (I think the author places empathy too much in opposition to reason and spirituality in that of religion).

>>"atheism is the acceptance that there is no credible scientific or factually reliable
evidence for the existence of a god, gods, or the supernatural." (… Australian Atheist Foundation's website). <<

Thanks for quoting here a “definition” that - I presume - most, if not all atheists, agree with, though “belief” instead of “acceptance” would make more sense to me. However, I accept (pun not intended) that “belief” is a tabu for some atheists. I put “definition” in quotation marks, because it relies on other a priori undefined terms, like evidence - a subjective, or at least culture and context dependent concept - or existence (apparently meaning objective, observer-independent).

As to “evidence”, to my knowledge, none of the languages I am familiar with has an equivalent of “evidence” (you have only proof, testimony etc). As to its English usage, e.g. a photo of the accused about to stab the victim was unheard of in a court 200 years ago, would be accepted as convincing evidence some 70 years ago, and is practically worthless since Adobe Photoshop .

See http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=3445#82573 as to e.g. my defense of the working scientist’s tacit assumption of the existence of an objective (physical) reality, an existence questioned by some contemporary philosophers. As the sarcasm goes, soon after some philosophers started to doubt the existence of the Creator some of them came to doubt the objective existence even of His creation.

My alternative position (with a similar built-in ambiguity): “the acceptance that there is no credible scientific or factually reliable evidence for the reducibility of ALL reality to phenomena of physical reality perceived by our senses and investigated by (natural) science“.

I think we should be able to treat both positions as legitimate.

Foxy

Perhaps you work for DEEWR, so perfect is your recitation of their fib sheet.

Rudd is extending and continuing the NSCP scheme, he has already told his chums at the ACL that, and remember, this is an election year, and Abbott has promised to entrench it forever, so Rudd is competing for the votes and he will not back down even when faced with the damage he is causing to secular schooling.

Gillard has not got a clue what actually happens in schools, and is simply fed the appropriate words to blurt out for the TV news, so she will not oppose Rudd's extension of evangelising either.

The 'consultation' process is nowhere in sight, and will not be an honest process anyway.

The scheme is far from voluntary, and it is not policed either by state or Commonwealth governments.

The scheme allows a particularly pernicious form of Christianity to be peddled in schools to a captive audience, aimed at 'unchurched' students.

DEEWR know this and ignore it.

The same sort of crew who brought young women the Mercy Mission wheeze is given free access to students to deliver sexist gendered nonsense during school time, with offers of more-and-better after school at various churches.

Maybe you do not have children in a state school to learn all this first hand?

Dear TBC,

You seem to have missed the point.

I did say this is a voluntary program for
schools and students in the schools who want
to participate. It is not mandatory for any
one. People have a choice.

I don't understand what your problem is.

As far as my children are concerned they started
in private schools, and finished in state schools.
They also finished university. So I fully understand
all sides of the bigger picture.

Dear Examinator,

I read everything you post with great interest -
and of course you're always challenging.
Which I enjoy very much!

Dear George,

Thank You for your post.
And as always for generating some more points
for lateral thinking.

Foxy... "I did say this is a voluntary program for schools and students in the schools who want to participate".

Sadly not, chaplains are given free access to all students, and impose themselves on all sorts of important school activities.

The idea of an 'inclusive' public school has been thoroughly undermined.

People who do not want any contact with these evangelising 'chaplains' have to withdraw from school activities.

Their school experience is being altered to avoid these interlopers.

Chaplains also use their position to evangelise and proselytise for Jesus.

This is not hidden, but openly proclaimed in various documents in schools, newspapers and on the web.

Public schools should not be a market place for one, or any, religion to spruik the wares to a captive audience.

If your children have already finished uni' then it is doubtful that you have experienced first hand the effects of DEEWRs NSCP evangelising operators, who have only been in schools for a couple of years.