Australian Religions

In the movement known as Spiritualism, successful performances of "mental mediumship" are rarely smooth. At services held by the Canberra Spiritualist Association, mediums attempt to provide evidence of life after death by describing a deceased person's character in ways recognizable to audience members. A medium's verbal performance de-emphasizes heteroglossia while developing vivid spirit characters. Audience members sometimes do not understand or accept what the medium says, but small "failures" in performance help build a larger sense that mediums and audiences are working to gather evidence. As they work, mediums foreground and background their agency at the same time, displaying their fluency in spirit

The Family was founded by Anne Hamilton-Byrne in 1963 in Melbourne, Australia. Hamilton-Byrne taught she was Jesus Christ and proclaimed her first follower, Dr Raynor Johnson, her John the Baptist. The Family combined Christian and Hindu ideas with the use of psychedelic drugs, and an eschatological focus on the emergence of a new society after the destruction of the present era. The Family came to prominence in 1987 due to police investigations into illegal adoptions, child abuse, and other charges. In 2016, journalist Chris Johnston and filmmaker Rosie Jones published a book and a documentary both titled The Family, creating a new media storm around Hamilton-Byrne and her remaining followers. This article analyses Hamilton-Byrne as a charismatic and innovative spiritual teacher, and considers the role of the media both in consolidating and undermining her powerful image, and in revealing deeply-held concerns about “cults” and deviant spiritualities in twenty-first century Australia.

The study of new religious movements or new sectarian groups that originated in Australia is in its infancy. This paper examines two fringe Christian groups led by brothers Lindsay and Ronald Grant. Lindsay, with his ex-wife Del (Adeline) Agnew, directed a sinless perfectionist sect known as Tinker Tailor (named for an interior decorating company owned by the group) in Sydney, that had connections to the right wing of the Liberal Party. Ronald Grant, with Alan Neil, led The Fellowship in Melbourne. Tinker Tailor was in the main Anglican, and The Fellowship Presbyterian, but both groups espoused secrecy, and a theology of holiness at odds with mainstream Christianity. Those who left were cut off from family, and members who offended endured cruel discipline. Members experienced violence including public humiliation, surveillance, authoritarian control, and physical beatings. Both groups collapsed in a torrent of scandal, including adultery and family breakdowns, excommunications and suicides. To date there is no academic work on Tinker Tailor or The Fellowship. Christian popular authors David Millikan and Morag Zwartz have published short books on both (Imperfect Company [1991] and Fractured Families [2004]). This paper focuses on three elements: the nature of sinless perfectionist theology; the insistence on obedience and discipline; and the role of the charismatic leader(s) in both organisations.

Local religious history rarely ventures into discussion of religious trends and issues. Instead, local studies concentrate on the story of a single denomination, or even a single church or faith community. This paper presents the religious history of a local region (the Sunshine Coast in Queensland) from the perspective of context: the social changes and interests that influenced local developments. In this study, the initial success and later diminished influence of the Salvation Army on the Sunshine Coast is read in terms of opportunities and challenges posed by the particular conditions of different decades.

The article examines the full range of religious thought in Sydney in the past century, not only in philosophy and theology, but in literature, history and commentary on economics, politics and law. Mainstream Sydney Anglicanism and Catholicism are treated, but also smaller traditions like theosophy. Major figures include Broughton Knox and James McAuley.

On Sunday 10 November 2019, a beautiful sunny day in Sydney, 300-odd esteemed guests, interested visitors, and Caodaists attended the opening of the Điện Thờ Phật Mẫu or Holy Mother Temple of New South Wales on Wattle Avenue, Carramar. To mark this special occasion, this booklet has been written to explain something of Caodaism and then consider aspects of the construction of this temple, its style, its rituals, and most significantly, the unique aspects of the deity it honours – exploring her importance in the faith and throughout East Asia.

This paper examines the ambiguous role of religion in multicultural Australia. Despite theoretical commitment to religious pluralism, there are some notable examples that highlight significant flaws in the application of Australia's multicultural ideals. A case study of a contemporary issue relating to Australian Aboriginal religion is provided to demonstrate the difficulty multicultural policies have in recognising the values of non-Christian religions.

Editors: Cristina Rocha, Mark P. Hutchinson and Kathleen Openshaw In Australian Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Arguments from the Margins, Rocha, Hutchinson and Openshaw argue that Australia has made and still makes important contributions to how Pentecostal and charismatic Christianities have developed worldwide. This edited volume fills a critical gap in two important scholarly literatures. The first is the Australian literature on religion, in which the absence of the charismatic and Pentecostal element tends to reinforce now widely debunked notions of Australia as lacking the religious tendencies of old Europe. The second is the emerging transnational literature on Pentecostal and Charismatic movements. This book enriches our understanding not only of how these movements spread worldwide but also how they are indigenised and grow new shoots in very diverse contexts.

The indigenous people had inhabited the Australian continent for tens of thousands of years, but the history of modern Australia began with the British settlers in 1788. When the convicts and freemen started to arrive in the Oceania region, the various denominations of Calvinism were transmitted into the colonial land of Great Britain in the nineteenth century. The Presbyterianism that was based on the Church of Scotland and European Reformed heritages was founded in the 1820s. The Congregational Church was established by Charles Price in New South Wales in 1833. The Wesleyan Methodist Church emerged in the region of Australasia (including New Zealand) in 1875. Each Calvinistic tradition denominationally witnessed its prosperity of unity at the turn of the twentieth century, but there was an interdenominational unity movement through the so-called, the Uniting Church in the 1970s. Many local churches voluntarily re-joined the new religious organization from the Calvinistic denominations. Then, who are the Uniting Church? What do they believe and pursue? How are they innovative in comparison with the traditional churches? What kind of conflict or confusion exists between the old ones and the new one? This paper explores the religious figures of the new uniting movement in relation to the context of Euro-British Calvinism. The social liberalism of the Uniting Church is particularly regarded to depict an authentic identity of Australian Calvinism in the late twentieth century.

General Editor:
Dr Paul Hedges, University of Winchester, UK

International Editorial Advisory Board:
James Miller
Khaleel Mohammed
Musa Dube
Eloisa Martin
Marion Maddox
Makarand Paranjape

Table of Contents:

Volume 1: Theoretical and Academic Debates
Introduction
Paul Hedges
Chapter 1: What is Religion? Or, What is it We’re Talking About?
Anna S. King and Paul Hedges
Chapter 2: Is the Study of Religion Religious? How to Study Religion and Who Studies Religion
Paul Hedges and Anna S. King
Chapter 3: Charisma, Scriptures, Revelation, Texts: Sources of Religious Authority
Christina Welch and Paul Hedges
Chapter 4: Religion and Embodiment: Religion and the (Latin-American) Bodies that Practice it
Renée de la Torre
Chapter 5: Religion, Commodification and Consumerism
Vineeta Singh
Chapter 6: Terror/ism and Violence in the Name of God
Lucien van Liere
Chapter 7: Belonging, Behaving, Believing, Becoming: Religion and Identity
Paul Hedges and Angela CoCo
Chapter 8: Why are there Many Gods? Religious Diversity and its Challenges
Paul Hedges
Chapter 9: Is Religion Dying? Secularization and Other Religious Trends in the World Today
Jayeel Serrano Cornelio
Chapter 10: Christian and Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist: Can you have a Multiple Religious Identity?
Rose Drew
Chapter 11: Empires and Religions: Colonialism, Post-colonialism, and Orientalism
Clinton Bennett

Volume 2: Debates in the Public Square and Ethical Issues
Introduction
Paul Hedges
Chapter 1: Women in Religion: Does Gender Matter?
Kayla Wheeler
Chapter 2: Friend or Foe? Current Debates in Science and Religion
Allison P. Coudert
Chapter 3: Sexuality and Religion: Homosexuality and Religious Values
Maria das Dores Campos Machado
Chapter 4: Religion and Human Rights: Conflicts and Connections
Nazila Ghanea and Farrah Ahmed
Chapter 5: The New Atheists
Ian Markham and Chrstine Faulstich
Chapter 6: Censorship, Free Speech and Religion
Christoph Baumgartner
Chapter 7: Is Religion Environmentally Friendly: Connecting Religion and Ecology
James Miller
Chapter 8: Religion and Culture: Religious Artefacts as T-shirts, Toys and Museum Exhibits
Christina Welch
Chapter 9: Are Religions Prejudiced? Religion and Disability
Susannah Cornwall
Chapter 10: Religion, Nationalism, and International Relations
Enzo Pace
Chapter 11: Religion and Politics
Marion Maddox
Chapter 12: Riots, Mass Casualities, and Religious Hatred: Countering Anti-cosmopolitan Terror through Intercultural and Interreligious Understanding
Anna Halafoff

Volume 3: Specific Issues and Case Studies
Introduction
Paul Hedges
Chapter 1: The Rise of Fundamentalisms
Christopher van de Krogt
Chapter 2: Loving the “Enemy”: An alternative Narrative on Jewish-Muslim Relations
Yafiah Randall
Chapter 3: Buddhism, Nationalism, and Violence in Asia
Jude Lal Fernando
Chapter 4: Religion and Bioethics: Human Genetics and Embryo Research
Neil Messer
Chapter 5: What do Americans think of Muslims?: The 9/11 Islamic Community Centre
Khaleel Mohammed
Chapter 6: New Religious Movements, “Cults”, and the State
Ryan J. T. Adams
Chapter 7: Shariah Law and Women in Islam
Adis Duderjia
Chapter 8: Can Christianity take New Forms? Christianity in New Cultural Contexts
James Cox
Chapter 9: New Religious Movements in Global Context
Nobutaka Inoue
Chapter 10: Scandals
Marion Maddox
Chapter 11: Can Christians Engage in non-Christian Practices? Eastern Meditations and Contemplative Prayer
Fabrice Blée

This presentation addresses a small part of a larger question ‘how is Hinduism developing in Australia and what can we learn from its struggles and successes?’ In this research, I examine a small part of this history as it concentrates on planning issues and development procedures that concern the Mukti-Gupteswar Temple in Minto. Although this temple’s location on Eagleview Road in Minto seems an ideal place to locate a Hindu place of worship, I cover here some of the extensive battles this small community has had to make against a local council that has actively worked for many decades to close this sacred space. I conclude by linking this struggle to other experiences of Indian Australians in their temple building and include a brief examination of what ‘religious freedom’ in Australia entails as it
plays out at a local council, rather than at the national level.

The apostle Paul, who sought to be 'all things to all people', wrote about Jesus Christ in a manner that broke beyond the confines of any one culture. His reflections on Jesus gave encouragement to the fledgling Christian communities of his own day as they searched for their identity and role in a world antagonistic to them. These same writings shed light on our questions about Jesus as we explore what it means to be a Christian community in Australia today.

In Australia, the most persistent fault line of what historian Michael Hogan famously dubbed the “sectarian strand” has been the issue of religion in schools.  In particular the issue of whether confessional schools, whether Catholic or Protestant, should receive the greatly coveted benefit of State-Aid.  With the increasingly plural complexion of Australian society, coupled with the increasing politicization of issues surrounding curriculum and accreditation, it was perhaps inevitable that minority religious groups would eventually be caught in the political cross-fire in their attempts to raise their children according to their own faith-based values.  The Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, who over the past twenty-years have built up their own religious system, are no exception here and their high public-profile, coupled with their strict beliefs, have presented them with an acute set of challenges in an increasingly complex and heavily-regulated educational economy.  This paper will look at the historical and contemporary issues surrounding the issue of religious schooling in Australia and how the Brethren’s particular response to this can be understood within the wider context of these debates.

The discussion about religious freedom in Australia is likely to reshape religious communities in counter-productive ways. This paper endeavours to show why religious freedom is important and to identify responses that are emerging. It reflecting on the tone and tenor of the discussion as a contest between fear and love. The issue of religious freedom is explored in three broad sections. First, it reviews how the Commonwealth Government has endeavoured to understand and address the issue of religious discrimination. Next, it explores several issues that emerge from this legislative process particularly what Christians are seeking such protections and the problems that arise from such efforts. Finally, attention turns to the larger narrative framework used by advocates campaigning for religious freedom most of which are grounded in fear. An alternative framework of the generous neighbour is suggested.

Rjabchikov, Sergei V., 2021. About the Rongorongo Record with the Name of King Hata on a Wooden Artifact from Easter Island. Paper. 2 pages.

Abstract. The brief inscription on a fragment of a staff ua has been decoded. The name of the Rapanui king Hata has been read. The additional information is presented, too.

The original was first delivered by Sergei V. Rjabchikov as the paper “About the Rongorongo Record with the Name of King Hata on a Wooden Artifact from Easter Island” on the scientific session of the Sergei Rjabchikov Foundation – Research Centre for Studies of Ancient Civilisations and Cultures in Krasnodar on October 6, 2021.

Keywords: Easter Island, Rapanui, Rapa Nui, Polynesia, rongorongo, script, writing, hieroglyphic script, folklore, Austronesian

Mary MacKillop was canonized as St Mary of the Cross in 2010. She was proclaimed as "A saint for all Australians". Accordingly, this collection is an ecumenical collection where contributors from different traditions engage the saint in the light of their own understandings of saints and holy people.

Editors: Cristina Rocha, Mark P. Hutchinson and Kathleen Openshaw In Australian Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements: Arguments from the Margins, Rocha, Hutchinson and Openshaw argue that Australia has made and still makes important contributions to how Pentecostal and charismatic Christianities have developed worldwide. This edited volume fills a critical gap in two important scholarly literatures. The first is the Australian literature on religion, in which the absence of the charismatic and Pentecostal element tends to reinforce now widely debunked notions of Australia as lacking the religious tendencies of old Europe. The second is the emerging transnational literature on Pentecostal and Charismatic movements. This book enriches our understanding not only of how these movements spread worldwide but also how they are indigenised and grow new shoots in very diverse contexts.

In this month’s episode of discourse we have an update from Australia. Professor Carole Cusack (University of Sydney) and Ray Radford (University of Sydney and RSP) sit down with Dr. Breann Fallon (Sydney Jewish Museum and RSP) to discuss religion in Australian current affairs. This team of three first consider a conservative article on the amendments Equal Opportunity Bill in Victoria which claims “religion cancelled” and “parents cancelled.” Yet, there is no denying that the three are speaking from lockdown and the conversation turns to religious exemption from vaccination, including the history of this in Australia, as well as religious symbolism at anti-lockdown protests. To end the episode, the trio discuss the interesting timing of opening up in time for Christmas — is this an offering at the temple of consumerism? Whilst there is no answer, it is an interesting take on the impact of COVID-19 on religious festivals.

When religion is invoked in Australian sociocultural and political negotiations, religion tends to be politicised predominantly through institutionalised, racialised and gendered perspectives. Further, discussions frequently employed narrow interpretations of religion. This understanding of religion only partially reflects the religious condition in Australia and is not fully representative of it in its substance and nuance, nor breadth and depth. This argument is based on an examination of Australian news media’s construction, depiction and representation of discourses on religion in national debates. Using the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s discussion program Q&A as its subject, the study argues for a broader understanding of religion, viewed as a spectrum.

The “Introduction” to Meredith Lake’s The Bible in Australia: A Cultural History starts with a description of the tattoo that Koby Abberton, former professional surfer and member of the notorious “Bra Boys,” sports between his collarbones. The tattoo says “My Brothers [sic] Keeper”; Lake identifies the text as Genesis, chapter 4, and spoken by Cain to God, after murdering his brother Abel. This con- temporary, popular cultural reference argues for the Bible as possessing relevance in contemporary Australia, despite the declining number of inhabitants identifying as Christian evidenced by the six-yearly census data after the introduction of the “religion question” in the 1970s. She distinguishes between the “Bible and culture” (p. 8) and the “theological Bible and the life of faith” (p. 11). The book is in four parts. The first, “Colonial Foundations,” covers the colonisation of Australia by the British and the ways the Bible was received by the convicts (many of whom were Catholics and at odds with the Anglican administrators of the colony), In- digenous people who were missionized by Christian clergy (and efforts to render parts of the Bible into Indigenous languages, such as that of Lancelot Threlkeld who translated Mark’s Gospel into Awabakul with his Indigenous collaborator Biraban), and the activities of Christians in the nineteenth century to establish a godly society.

Post-Millennial middle-class Brazilians have been flocking to Hillsong International Leadership College for the past decade. Some start learning English as teenagers and fundraise for years to be able to have “the College experience.” Others defer their university studies and risk not having a job for the opportunity to join Hillsong. Drawing on three years of fieldwork research in Australia and in Brazil this paper explores why studying at Hillsong College has become a dream for this cohort. I argue that by making Pentecostalism cool, fun and fashionable on the one hand, and more amenable to middle-class sensibilities (with a focus on love and inclusion rather than on judgement and spiritual battle), Hillsong has been able to attract sectors of the Brazilian Pentecostal population who felt displaced in the very conservative, money-focused, scandal-prone local Pentecostalism. In Hillsong they see the possibility of living a global, successful, and inclusive Pentecostalism, one where love for others, volunteerism, and social inclusion are central. Keywords: Hillsong, Brazil, middle-class Pentecostalism, cosmopolitanism, globalisation

Cari amici, vi trasmetto con preghiera di diffusione la call for papers del primo seminario internazionale sul Ramo D’Oro di James Frazer. Questa edizione sarà dedicata all’analisi del primo volume dell’editio maior: The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings. L’incontro si terrà a Nemi dal primo al quattro luglio 2020. Vi sarò grato se potrete segnalare la call a quanti ritenete possano essere interessati.

a presto

Call for papers “The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings. I Seminario Internazionale sul Ramo d’Oro di James Frazer” (Nemi, 1-4 luglio 2020):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1g5lRDG6eKAIDTH-K_S4lGh3YvYj3CM38/view?usp=sharing

Call for papers “The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings. 1st International Seminar on The Golden Bough” (Nemi, July 1-4, 2020):
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jR8SCielX7obbL8UGGy9yhn1XQK0zOzF/view?usp=sharing

Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni”

The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings
I Seminario Internazionale sul Ramo d’Oro di James Frazer
1-4 luglio 2020
Nemi (Roma)

Call for Papers

Il seminario vuole essere un’occasione di confronto interdisciplinare sul primo volume dell’editio maior del Ramo d’oro di James Frazer: The Magic Art and the Evolution of Kings.
Tre sono le finalità del presente incontro:
1) Riflettere collegialmente sugli aspetti teorici e metodologici dell’opera Frazer, sia in rapporto alle altre opere dello studioso che agli studi a lui contemporanei.
2) Rilevare l’influenza diretta o indiretta delle teorie e delle interpretazioni di Frazer qui esposte negli studi e più in generale nella produzione culturale a lui successiva.
3) Porre attenzione sulle credenze, sui miti e sui rituali oggetto di analisi da parte di Frazer in questo volume dell’editio maior, verificando l’interpretazione dello studioso alla luce dello stato attuale degli studi e della documentazione oggi disponibile.
In particolare, si potranno avanzare proposte di intervento sulle seguenti tematiche:
1) Il concetto frazeriano di “magia”, così come esposto nel primo volume dell’editio maior, in rapporto alle altre opere di Frazer e agli studi a lui contemporanei.
2) L’impatto del concetto frazeriano di “magia” sugli studi e più in generale nella produzione culturale a lui successiva, anche in rapporto al dibattito accademico attuale sulla tematica.
3) Il concetto frazeriano di “religione”, così come esposto nel primo volume dell’editio maior, in rapporto alle altre opere di Frazer e agli studi a lui contemporanei.
4) L’impatto del concetto frazeriano di “religione” sugli studi e più in generale nella produzione culturale a lui successiva, anche in rapporto al dibattito accademico attuale sulla tematica.
5) Le credenze, i racconti, i miti e i riti analizzati da Frazer nel primo volume dell’editio maior, ponendo attenzione al rapporto tra l’interpretazione frazeriana e gli studi a lui contemporanei e riconsiderandola criticamente alla luce dello stato attuale degli studi e della documentazione oggi disponibile.
6) L’impatto negli studi e più in generale nella produzione culturale successiva a Frazer delle interpretazioni di credenze, racconti, miti e riti analizzati nel primo volume dell’editio maior.

Nota
Le principali aree storico-culturali di cui Frazer analizza le tradizioni in questo volume sono: l’antico Egitto, il Vicino Oriente antico, l’antica Grecia, Roma antica, il mondo germanico medievale, l’Europa cristiana e le sue tradizioni folcloriche, l’Africa, l’India e il Sudest asiatico, Cina, Giappone, Australia e isole del Pacifico, le Americhe.

Comitato Scientifico: Igor Baglioni (Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni”), Stefano Beggiora (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia), Paride Bollettin (Universidade Federal da Bahia), Alessandra Broccolini (Sapienza Università di Roma), Laura Carnevale (Università degli Studi di Bari “Aldo Moro), Alessandra Ciattini (Sapienza Università di Roma), Enrico Comba (Università degli Studi di Torino), Fabio Dei (Università degli Studi di Pisa), Carla Del Zotto (Sapienza Università di Roma), Adriano Favole (Università degli Studi di Torino), Chiara Ghidini (Università degli Studi di Napoli “L’Orientale”), Rita Lucarelli (University of California - Berkeley), Elena Mazzetto (Université Libre de Bruxelles), Mariano Pavanello (Sapienza Università di Roma), Francesca Prescendi (École Pratique des Hautes Études - Paris), Sergio Ribichini (Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche), Lorenzo Verderame (Sapienza Università di Roma).

Segreteria organizzativa: Igor Baglioni, direttore del Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni”.

Gli studiosi interessati a presentare un contributo possono inviare un abstract di non più di una pagina (max 2.000 battute) al direttore del Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni” (igorbaglioni79@gmail.com) entro e non oltre il giorno 20 aprile 2020.
All’abstract dovranno essere allegati: il titolo del paper; una breve nota biografica degli autori; un recapito di posta elettronica; un recapito telefonico.
Le relazioni potranno essere presentate nelle seguenti lingue: francese, inglese, italiano, spagnolo.
L’accettazione dei papers sarà comunicata (via posta elettronica) alle persone interessate entro il 30 aprile 2020.
Entro il 20 giugno 2020 dovrà essere consegnato (sempre in via posta elettronica) il paper corredato da note e bibliografia. La consegna del paper è vincolante per la partecipazione al convegno.

Date da ricordare:
Chiusura call for papers: 20 aprile 2020.
Notifica accettazione paper: 30 aprile 2020.
Consegna paper: 20 giugno 2020.
Convegno: 1-4 luglio 2020.

La partecipazione al convegno è gratuita. I relatori residenti fuori la provincia di Roma saranno ospitati nelle strutture convenzionate al Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni”, usufruendo di una riduzione sul normale prezzo di listino.
È prevista la pubblicazione degli Atti su Religio. Collana di Studi del Museo delle Religioni “Raffaele Pettazzoni” (Edizioni Quasar) e su riviste scientifiche specializzate. Le relazioni da pubblicare saranno oggetto di un peer review finale.
Sono previste visite serali gratuite ai musei e ai monumenti dei comuni nell’area dei Castelli Romani. Il programma delle visite sarà reso noto contestualmente al programma del convegno.

Per informazioni:
igorbaglioni79@gmail.com