Each state of Australia has an official motto.

Victoria’s motto is “Peace and Prosperity”.

* * *

Prosperity?

Last week, caretaker-Prime Minister Julia Gillard told the National Press Club, “We have begun building a strong foundation for our future prosperity investing in 21st century infrastructure . . . .”

Clutching desperately at whatever straw might help her survive as PM — her best bet was to talk prosperity . . . .

Australians love being prosperous.

* * *

Peace?

One wonders what kind of peace is Victoria’s motto referring to?

Simply there being no foreign invaders and no blood in the streets?

* You say, “We’re going well. I saw no Chinese/Russian/American soldiers manning roadblocks in town today.” Perhaps not, but did you look at the label inside your shirt? Where was it made?

* You saw no bleeding corpses in the shopping mall? No, but watching TV tonight you’ll see them non-stop — on the news and in what passes for “entertainment”.

* * *

Forget all that.

What matters is internal peace.

Ask your GP how many of his patients have peace of mind? How many live 24/7 at the verge of screaming point?

Ask your children’s teacher how much class time is spent talking about (and to) their Creator.

If God exists, and we ignore him, we’ll never find peace — denying and defying the very Origin of peace.

If God didn’t exist, then nothing but hate and chaos – the opposite of peace — could be possible.

Belief makes the difference.

God created us capable of loving him. That is our purpose. He proved it by entering history himself in the person of Jesus Christ.

That being so, all life lived apart from Christ is a bit of a waste — and the pursuit of prosperity pretty irrelevant.

* * *

If one’s first aim is pleasing God, one will gladly accept prosperity if that’s what God sends.

Or poverty, if he sends that.

The Bible describes God as a “jealous” God.

To please him, we must put him first — as individual persons and, likewise, political parties and governments.

Which makes the notion of separation of Church and State a bad joke.

In so-called modern so-called democracies, we celebrate or bewail the so-called decline and death of religion.

Meanwhile, what are others saying?

Here are a couple of quotes made recently in a speech by Cardinal George Pell.

* * *

(1) From Zhao Xiao, currently Professor of Economics, Beijing University of Science and Technology:

“These days, Chinese people do not believe in anything. They don’t believe in God. They don’t believe in the devil. They don’t believe in Providence. They don’t believe in the Last Judgement — to say nothing about heaven. A person who believes in nothing can only believe in himself. And self-belief implies that anything is possible — what do lies, cheating, harm and swindling matter?”

Many well-educated Australians would say that’s OK — one can devise and live by a real code of ethics without bringing God into it.

Sometimes it takes somebody from outside — who has experienced the cruel reality of godless society — to remind us how lucky we are still having remnants of Catholic culture in our society.

And how stupidly self-destroying we would be to neglect that Faith

* * *

(2) From Nobel Prize-winning Polish poet, Czeslaw Milosz:

“A true opium of the people is a belief in nothingness after death—the huge solace of thinking that for our betrayals, greed, cowardice, murders, we are not going to be judged.”

Christianity bothers modern trend-setters by its insistence that some things are good and others are evil . . . .

That we can’t turn our backs on God, the source of all good, without making our souls unfit to be with God in Eternity . . . .

Something we’ll have the whole of Eternity to grieve over in painful, never-ending remorse.

* * *

The Catholic Faith teaches that we can, in this life, attain real friendship with God:

* step one:  Use your will power. Force yourself to quit all bad and self-indulgent actions.

* step two:  Stop using your will power. Say, “Lord, I’ve gone as far as I can go in my own power.  Over-power and replace my every sinful thought — so that I may persevere in making my every action pleasing to you.”

Remember and aspire to what Saint Paul wrote, “No longer do I live, but Christ lives in me.”  (Galatians, chapter 2)

Last Sunday, 29 US Marines were baptised by Navy Chaplain William Hlavin in the ocean near Camp Pendleton.

All were volunteers assigned to 3rd Battalion, 25th Regiment, heading for duty in the Taliban stronghold of Helmand province.

Their Battalion Commander commented, “The spiritual and religious foundation we’re able to develop here allows us to perform our job the way we need to in a very challenging environment.”

One Marine said, “I believe and trust that God will take me and my fellow Marines back home safely.” (Forty-six 3^rd Battalion Marines were killed in Iraq)

So what is baptism? Why involve these supposedly tough men in it?

* * *

What does today’s Gospel reading in traditional Catholic churches say?

Mark’s gospel, chapter 7:

Leaving the district of Tyre, Jesus went by way of Sidon to the Sea of Galilee, into the district of the Decapolis. They brought him a deaf and dumb man, begging him to lay hands upon him.

Taking him away from the crowd, Jesus put his fingers into his ears, and spitting, touched his tongue. Looking up to heaven, he groaned, and said: ‘Ephpheta,’ which means, ‘Be opened.’

Immediately his ears were opened, his tongue loosened, and he spoke clearly . . . .

* * *

We are all deaf and dumb spiritually. The noisy, sin-filled world has deafened us.

We need Jesus himself, in the person of his priest, to welcome us and to say, ‘Ephpheta’ — so our ears may be opened to Faith and our tongues loosened to praise God.

Baptism is a Sacrament.  In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost — one God – baptism washes away all sin from the soul and confers supernatural life on the person baptised.

* * *

Those marines may misguidedly see baptism purely as a good luck charm helping them survive.

And they mightn’t have been validly baptised, i.e. not in accordance with Catholic Church practice.

However, if a person is sorry for his sins, loves God whole-heartedly, and desires to obey God in everything – yet hasn’t been sufficiently instructed to understand baptism fully and so receives a ceremony objectively flawed — God, in such a case, accepts the will for the deed.

“As your life rolls out in front of you, you’re the one who has to be in the driver’s seat,” said Prime Minister JG, introducing her new “script-free” campaign-image.

So is it the real Julia standing this time?

Can an atheist be real anyway?

Can an atheist stand for anything?

If there was no God, would there be a difference between good policy and bad policy?

Good is only really good if it means being in conformity with what is absolutely good, i.e. with the will of the good God, who is almighty and unchanging.

Otherwise what is “good” today might be “evil” tomorrow, the terms signifying merely what is in fashion or out of fashion in current thinking.

* * *

Meanwhile Archbishop Barry Hickey of Perth has spoken up:

“Many Christians are concerned that someone who does not believe in God may not endorse the Christian traditions of respect for human life, for the sanctity of marriage and the independence of churches, church schools and church social welfare agencies.”

The Archbishop said he would not seek to influence the way Catholics voted . . . but he DID comment, “Some will undoubtedly vote for Mr Abbott because they appreciate his strong Christian faith.”

* * *

Tony Abbott, ex-Catholic trainee priest, distanced himself from Archbishop Hickey’s comments:

“I’m not going to comment on anything that may have been said by any churchmen. I think that we should respect people’s private religious views . . . every contender and candidate in this election should be judged on competence and policies, not personal beliefs or religious convictions.”

That remark begs so many questions. It is so meaningless. So obviously gormless.

But so politically astute.

Mr Abbott knows that all he has to do now is exactly nothing — shrink to a microscopic un-hittable target and the election will fall into his lap — as the ALP bungles, blunders and self-destructs itself out of the race.

Lots of Christians will be looking for independent candidates for whom to vote.

Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, is highly regarded for his life spent fighting race hatred.

On becoming President, he said, “The task at hand will not be easy. But you have mandated us to change South Africa from a country where the majority lived with little hope, to one where they can live and work with dignity, with a sense of self-esteem and confidence in the future.”

No doubt his words were applauded. But were they right?

Is self-esteem the secret to a better future?

Self-esteem will, without doubt, increase our “confidence in the future”. But sometimes confidence can be misplaced.

* * *

Self-esteem is, at best, a two-edged sword.

Research shows that the very persons who do acts of race-hatred typically have high self-esteem.

The researchers comment that:

“The pursuit of self-esteem has short-term benefits, but long-term costs — ultimately diverting people away from fulfilling their fundamental needs . . . self-esteem isn’t really worth the effort.  Self-control is much more powerful.”   (www.racematters.org/deflatingselfesteemsrole.htm)

Does not everything good in your life ultimately derive from outside yourself? Pride (self-esteem) is out of place, inappropriate, not very honest.

* * *

Today’s gospel in traditional Catholic churches is a story Jesus told showing what he thinks about self-esteem:

Two men went up into the temple to pray: one a Pharisee, the other a publican.  The Pharisee, standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘I thank you God, that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I pay tithes of all that I possess.’

The publican, standing afar off, would not even lift his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner.’

This man, I tell you, went down into his house justified rather than the other. Everyone who exalts himself, shall be humbled: and he who humbles himself, shall be exalted. (Luke’s gospel, chapter 18)

* * *

If you do something good, be pleased about it.

Just as pleased as if somebody else had done it.

Be pleased because it is pleasing to God.

If you receive credit for some good act, be aware that without God’s help you could not, would not, have done it.

Colombia, South America’s only nation with both a Pacific and an Atlantic coastline — home of the best coffee grown in the world – was for centuries a Catholic nation.

In the 1990s that changed. God was dethroned by an anti-Catholic government.

Things went from bad to worse – drug lords taking over, terrorist attacks, kidnappings, murder and mayhem.

* * *

But President Alvaro Uribe, who became president in 2002, came on national television announcing that “as a nation we are going to say the Rosary together”.

He and his family were consecrated on screen by the Pope’s representative, praying to the Virgin Mary to “help us to have a Colombia that is free of terrorism, prosperous and upright, with social justice”.

“We totally consecrate to you our lives, our work, our joys and sufferings, triumphs and failures . . . protect us from all danger to our souls and bodies. Obtain for us from your Divine Son, Jesus Christ, the graces and favours we ask . . . .”

* * *

During Uribe’s presidency, things started improving. The government applied military pressure on the FARC and other outlawed groups.

Kidnappings decreased from 3,700 in 2000 to 172 in 2009.

Homicides from 28,837 to 15,817

Guerrilla numbers from about 17,000 to about 9000.

* * *

Perhaps Australia, a nation enduring yet another totally materialistic election campaign, a society in decay mode, with increasing suicide, family breakdowns, gambling, drugs, and irreligion . . . .

Perhaps Australia needs to consecrate itself to God.

Neither J, Gillard, claiming to have no religion, nor T. Abbott, religious mainly when it seems politically expedient, seem likely at this stage to sponsor a consecration . . . .

* * *

Yet, if they were convinced there were votes in it, wouldn’t they do it tomorrow?

It’s up to us — general public, priests, bishops — to pressurise the politicos until they feel they have no other option.

Pray to God that he will do the necessary miracle and soften their hard-boiled political hearts.