Professor Richard Dawkins is in Australia again.

He’s promoting his new book, “The Greatest Show on Earth”, which, he says, sums up the evidence for the fact of evolution.

His previous book, “The God Delusion”, sold well and the new one will doubtless be a clone of it.

Professor Dawkins will be addressing whoever turns up at Sydney Opera House next Sunday, 2pm.

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Most Australians aren’t enthusiastic about evolution. They doubt whether intelligent human beings emerged from the mud of prehistoric swamps without some kind of a “guiding hand”.

Most Australians aren’t very enthusiastic about organised religion, either.

In this latter fact Dr Dawkins sees his chance of marketing yet another “pro-evolution, anti-God” book.

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But both Dr Dawkins and the Aussie punter are making the same fundamental error of logic which renders any conversation between them worthless, logic-wise.

 *  the average evolution-skeptic probably doesn’t know that his/her thoughts are illogical

 *  Dr Dawkins probably does know – but he doesn’t care. He’s on a mission to stigmatise God and everybody who believes in God. He intends to succeed, no matter what tactics he must stoop to.

So what is this logical boo-boo that both sides of the debate (non-debate) have fallen into?

* * *

Both parties assume that if the evidence shows that we developed from the same ancestors as other animals (apes etc.) then there cannot be a God.

Once you put this down in simple words like that, it’s clearly nonsense.

* * *

A few days after the destruction of the New York World Trade Centre, this Professor Dawkins blamed the disaster on “religion” — calling religion “a ready-made system of mind control which teaches the dangerous nonsense that death is not the end”.

He was referring to how young persons can be persuaded to blow themselves up if convinced it is a certain way to enter heaven.

Another dishonest argument:

What he says may or may not be true about the “religion” of Islam.

It is NOT true about the religion of Jesus Christ.

To believe that two plus two equals four does not require faith.

It is just something that you notice to be true. It is self-evident.

It is a natural truth and no supernatural input is necessary to see that it is true.

* * *

To know that God exists is another example of the same thing.

The need for a Cause for creation to exist – which exists in its own right and is not itself a part of creation — is also self-evident.

The arguments against God existing are always a little bit more complicated, because they have the disadvantage of being nonsense.

* * *

Yet there are things we need to know about God which are not so obvious.

God wants us to know, not just that he exists, but also that he loves us.

This is something that we do not just notice but must, by an act of free will, choose to believe.

To live as though God is a loving God means, not just a nodding acceptance, but more of a self-giving.

To live as though a loving God has plans for our lives involves taking risks for him.

This is where all true faith is “blind” faith. That is the nature of faith. Not that faith goes against reason. No, it goes beyond reason and gives reason a reason to exist.

As Saint Mary Magdalen de Pazzi wrote:

“Not to believe in you, O my God, requires more ‘faith’ than to believe in you. Your love for me is so great that I no longer need ‘faith’ to believe in it.”

* * *

Human suffering is sometimes quoted as a reason to doubt God. But is not suffering an opportunity, not to abandon belief, but to put it on a deeper level?

Blessed Mary MacKillop wrote to her mother:

“In the trials, annoyances and anxieties we daily experience, may we ever recognise that loving Fatherly Hand that only seeks to draw us closer to himself by giving us opportunities to suffer something for him.”

What is a saint?

Webster’s New World College Dictionary defines a saint as a “holy person.”

However, we’re already hearing a lot of baloney about Mother Mary from people keen to play down her holiness.

Yesterday a chappie on the South Australian Catholic Church payroll told the media: “The thing about Mary is she’s a bit more vibrant, she’s not a goody-two-shoes type figure . . . .”

* * *

Cringe.

Are we so afraid of the notion of holiness that we must pretend that even true saints — who have given their whole lives to sacrificial devotion in the hope of becoming holy — are not really holy at all, but are, in fact, just a little bit like us?

Are we determined to domesticate even this greatest and holiest and most God-centred and prayer-centred Australian of all time, and make her ordinary – so that we, in our state of personal decay and feeble compromise, need not feel embarrassed or challenged to change ourselves?

* * *

Pope John Paul II warned against this: “Dear friends: Mary MacKillop cannot be understood without reference to her religious vocation . . . Mother Mary of the Cross did not just free people from ignorance through schooling, or alleviate their suffering through compassionate care. She worked to satisfy their deeper, though sometimes unconscious, longing for ‘the unsearchable riches of Christ’.”

* * *

Here is a prayer that Mother Mary MacKillop used in her personal devotions:

“I resolve, with the help of God’s grace

to die any kind of death,

or to suffer any kind of pain,

either of mind or body,

or any other affliction that can befall me,

sooner than for one moment to commit a deliberate and known sin

against God’s love,

and the claims he has upon my duty and service. 

Hitherto I have sadly forgotten my great end . . .

I will come back to thee, my Eternal Father . . .

Let me not prove a coward in thy service. 

Let me love to be humiliated and persecuted,

so that I may, during the remainder of this short life,

remain as near to thee, my Jesus,

in the thickest of the strife,

as in thy Divine Wisdom thou art pleased to permit.  Amen.”

* * *

Holy Mary MacKillop, Saint Mary of the Cross, traditional Catholic, please pray for us.

Prime Minister, Mr Kevin Rudd, said last Wednesday that he personally favours a 21-year old minimum legal drinking age, quoting links between Australia’s high P-plater road deaths and alcohol-swallowing.

But is it not probable that most teenage drunks will vote Labor (if still alive when next election happens)?

And likewise most people who sell alcohol?

It is hard, under Australia’s present form of “democracy”, to imagine any major party – especially Rudd’s so-called “Labor” — doing anything real to upset either of those two interest groups.

* * *

Federal Opposition leader, Mr Abbott, commented that 18-year olds drinking is OK with him, because he is not a “wowser”.

Deep stuff, eh?

* * *

The scientific evidence about drinking ages and alcohol-related mayhem is, of course, well and truly in.

Professor Ian Hickie, at Sydney University’s Brain and Mind Research Institute, really does want legal alcohol drinking ages raised to 21 — on the basis of research showing that young people’s brains are particularly susceptible to alcohol damage.

Also the US experience, which provides further evidence –- in those states which have raised their drinking age to 21, accidents and violence involving youths having fallen . . . .

* * *

Both sides of Australian politics are carefully testing the water. Could it be that winning the next election is almost as important to both of them as is doing the right thing — i.e. preventing teenage deaths?

* * *

Once again, the Church isn’t much help.

Two generations ago, when young Catholics celebrated their Confirmation, they were encouraged to sign an undertaking not to drink before turning 21. Many adhered to that promise.

Will that excellent practice ever be re-introduced?

Or would Church leaders need to “test the water” too – so as not to offend anybody – pretty much like a bunch of politicians?

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Prince William’s visit has Australians talking again about whether Australia should become a republic, cutting all ties with Britain and its Royal Family.

Sydney law professor, G. Williams, says, “The idea that someone should be born into the highest position in Australian Government is more than quaint; it is objectionable . . . inconsistent with what is otherwise a democratic and egalitarian system.” (Sydney Morning Herald, January 20)

Democratic?

Does democracy guarantee that a people will be well-governed? Does democracy facilitate God’s will being done, which is (according to Our Saviour Jesus Christ) what we should pray for every day?

* * *

There are built-in problems with democracy.

Politicians in democracies are never quite out of election mode — never resting from jostling for political favour.

The media reduce “democracy” to a distraction, a game — Howard versus Rudd, Obama versus Clinton — as though they were all charisma-exuding, Australian Idol/American Idol contestants. 

With democracy, our rulers will always be would-be celebrities, with celebrity (i.e. super-saturatedly-self-absorbed) mindsets.

Always show-ponies.

Nearly always millionaires.

Nearly always for sale, conscience-wise.

* * *

What about democracy’s good points?

Last November, voters in Switzerland voted to ban the building of new minarets on mosques.

Swiss government spokespersons condemned the measure, saying it violated Switzerland’s “tradition of tolerance” — but under Switzerland’s People’s-Referendum system, the government was stuck with it, and was obliged to issue a statement saying it “respects this decision; consequently the construction of minarets is no longer permitted”.

The Swiss People’s Party had forced the vote by collecting 100,000 signatures within the previous 18 months.

That’s real democracy.

How about a People’s-Referendum system for Australia?

Do we really believe in democracy – or do we prefer ongoing government-by-media-brainwash as at present?

* * *

So is democracy a good thing or a bad thing?

Perhaps it is simply an irrelevant thing?

What is relevant then?

The answer will appear on this blog tomorrow.

Stand by.

Being promiscuous can still kill you.

American researchers recently surveying 263 college student couples found 64 percent to be both infected with the same strain of cancer-causing human papilloma virus (HPV) within 4 months of starting to have sex with each other.

HPV causes cervix cancer.

Researcher in charge, Dr F. Coutlee, says that, because all these HPV transmissions happen early in new relationships, this “reinforces the need for prevention.”

What does he mean by “prevention”?

Presumably condoms: if so, the whole project has been a waste of time and money.

Everybody knows that young people sloppy enough in their lifestyle to be having sex outside marriage are not people likely to discipline themselves to use condoms each and every time they perform the deed.

* * *

Condoms are not very on-turning.

Who prefers showering with their raincoat on?

Or washing their feet with their socks on?

* * *

What alternative is there to condoms as a way to prevent youthful venereal disease?

At the risk of seeming to offer a genuine alternative, one might suggest chastity, i.e. not having sex until you marry and then only having sex with the person to whom you are married.

To do this, it helps to believe in God, and to love him above all else.

If one really believes in God — really, not just half-heartedly — it becomes possible and normal and agreeable to restrict oneself in this way.

* * *

Many Catholics recite daily a morning prayer called the Office of Prime, part of which goes like this:

“Now that the sun has risen, let us as suppliants ask of God that in today’s acts He preserve us from all that may hurt us . . . may our inmost soul be pure and the folly of impurity find in us no place . . . so that when day has gone, and night, as God planned, has returned, we may be found free from sin through our self restraint and thus sing praise to Him.”

Praying that prayer sincerely every morning, a person finds him/herself able to live a life filled with love, completely free of sexually transmitted diseases.