The Australian Federal Government in 2008 set up a National Centre for Excellence in Islamic Studies.

The Centre has run workshops — and now published a booklet—on the theme of “Bringing Muslim Perspectives into Australian Schools”.

All paid for by you and me out of our taxes.

* * *

Their booklet complains that Australian school textbooks mostly have “a western or European perspective”.

Why not? Our system of government is based on ideas brought here from Christian countries in Europe — and Islamic refugees arrive here by the boatful seeking to escape the “benefits” of Muslim culture, hoping instead  to reside somewhere with a western, Christian-oriented, worldview or perspective.

The booklet does NOT mention that in many Muslim-majority nations women are stoned to death for adultery and young girls undergo female circumcision.

* * *

The booklet claims that Muslims worship “the same God that was worshipped by Abraham, Moses and Jesus.”

This is false. The God of Catholics is a Trinity. God, who is one and unique in his infinite nature is three really distinct persons, the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

This understanding is unacceptable to Muslims who dismiss it as blasphemy.

* * *

Don’t hold your breath waiting for the  Australian government to fund a Centre for Excellence in Catholic Studies.

When Mr Abbott yesterday merely said his coalition might enable parents of Catholic school children to claim school fees as a tax deduction, there was a “furious” response from the Australian Education Union, which called the plan ”regressive”.

Australians need to understand that any education not explaining our world in terms of being created by a Creator, who created us and all things out of love, and who has come to this world in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, who is both God and man . . . .

Any education leaving out this foundation for all other knowledge is a form of child-neglect, cruelly unjust to the young.

The Greens Party talks non-stop about “sustainability”.

The Greens’ policies would, however, turn Australia into an unsustainable, self-destructing mess in no time at all.

They talk about human rights — but would deny the right even to remain alive to both the oldest and the youngest in our world.

If you are vulnerable, and look like getting in the way of those more powerful, modern or trendy – no matter what your age – the Greens will encourage your extermination.

* * *

For example, last year in the Senate, Bob Brown moved a motion to legalise euthanasia. And similar motions have been introduced by Greens MPs in state parliaments – e.g. in Victoria in 2008, and in both South Australia and Tasmania during 2009

The Greens in NSW now announce that they plan to move for Victorian-style, open-slather, abortion-on-demand laws in their state. There is going to be plenty more of that kind of thing.

The Greens’ official Population policy states that government should  “increase contributions to programs that empower women and increase their access to a wide range of safe family planning options . . . .”  (Policy 14)

In English, that means “safe killing of unborn babies, if inconvenient . . . .”

* * *

While speaking of laws designed to cause more deaths, we might mention the Greens’ Drugs policy.

The Greens recommend — not only the madness of more needle-handout “exchanges” and legal injecting rooms for injecting illegal drugs – but also the providing of heroin on prescription to “registered” addicts. (Policy 13)

That should result in plenty more Greens-style deaths.

* * *

Sir Robert Menzies held a referendum to ban the Communist Party.

It failed.

The time has surely come for a referendum to ban the Greens Party – arguably the most destructive force in Australia today.

The Gospel reading in traditional Catholic churches today:

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in the clothing of sheep, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.

By their fruits you shall know them. Do men gather grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree brings forth good fruit, and evil trees bring forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can an evil tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that does not bring forth good fruit, shall be cut down, and cast into the fire. So by their fruits you shall know them.

Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven: but he who does the will of my Father who is in Heaven, he shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.  (Saint Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 7)

* * *

God says we must judge self-styled prophets by their fruits (their actions).

Is it OK to judge the Catholic Church by its fruits, some of which have been disgusting?

* like child-molesting priests who have made it easier for those wanting to destroy the Church’s credibility.

* and historical injustices by the Church towards Jews — harming them, even killing them.

I have received criticism of yesterday’s blog-post, where I defended Pope Pius XII from accusations of “anti-semitism”, by quoting prominent Jews who said the opposite.

I concede that my life has been liable to turn people off the Faith. I pray to God to forgive me and change me.

I submit, however, that the same isn’t true of Pope Pius XII.

* * *

The Catholic Church claims to be God’s ongoing incarnation on earth today.

What it teaches is to be believed as an act of obedience to God.

The Church, in turn, is obliged to live justly, so as to make God’s goodness recognisable in our actions, not just our words.

Every individual Christian must regard himself as a “tree” in God’s vineyard. God has planted us in the good, fertile ground of the Church and “waters” us by his grace, received in the Sacraments of his Church.

The day approaches when God himself will arrive to see what kind of fruit you and I are bearing.

German historian, Michael Hesemann, said this week that Vatican archives reveal how Pope Pius XII may have saved 200,000 Jewish lives by secretly securing visas to help them escape Nazi Germany. (Sydney Morning Herald, 8 July 2010)

Other historians, it seems, are not convinced, preferring  the “Hitler’s Pope” tag sometimes thrown at Pius XII.

* * *

Time magazine, 23 December 1940, quoted Jewish scientist, Albert Einstein, saying, “When the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing they always boasted of devotion to truth: but, no, the universities were immediately silenced. Then I looked to the newspaper editors, who in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom, but they, like the universities, were silenced . . . .

“Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing the truth.

I had never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I felt a great admiration and affection because the Church alone had the courage and persistence to stand for truth and moral freedom . . . .”

* * *

The New York Times editorial, 25 December 1941, said: “The voice of Pius XII is a lonely voice in the silence and darkness enveloping Europe this Christmas. He is about the only ruler left on the continent who dares to raise his voice . . . .”

* * *

In 1945, Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Isaac Herzog, praised Pius XII for his “life-saving efforts on behalf of Jews during the Nazi occupation . . . .”

* * *

Rome’s Chief Rabbi, Israel Zolli, actually became a Catholic in 1945, taking the name Eugenio – the Pope’s Christian name – at his baptism.

* * *

In 1955, Israel’s Philharmonic Orchestra performed a Beethoven Symphony before Pius XII “in appreciation and thankfulness for the great work of humanitarian aid performed by Your Holiness in rescuing large numbers of Jews during the Second World War.”

* * *

When Pius XII died in 1958, Golda Meir, Israel’s Foreign Minister, wrote, “When fearful martyrdom came to our people in the decade of Nazi horror, the voice of the Pope was raised for the victims . . . we mourn a great servant of peace.”

In a speech yesterday at the Australian Institute of Family Studies annual conference, Professor Alan Hayes spoke of a “revolution” in Australian families.

The mothers of 34 percent of babies born in 2008 were unmarried, compared with 8 percent in 1970.

Now 78 percent of couples live together before marrying, compared with 23 percent pre-revolution.

The Professor said, “For many children it has been a good revolution, but it depends on the extent to which they are in safe and stable homes.”

Also that, “It is more important to focus on how a family functions than on its form”.

Was he was trying to say that marriage is irrelevant? 

If so, he is incorrect.

* * *

A 1998 government Inquiry by the Australian Standing Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, entitled “To Have and to Hold”, concluded that:

“Marriage benefits the health and well-being of individuals, and, conversely, separation and divorce bring with them elevated risks for both former husbands and wives and their children.

The Committee concludes that marriage and relationship breakdown costs the Australian nation at least $3 billion each year. When all the indirect costs are included, the figure is possibly double. When the personal and emotional trauma involved is added to these figures, the cost to the nation is enormous.

“In comparison, the Committee notes that the Commonwealth Government spends just $3.5 million per annum on preventive marriage and relationship education programs, and $2.05 million on parenting skills training. This is a 1000-fold difference. The imbalance is manifest and the Committee believes it requires correction.”  (www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/laca/Inquiryinfam.htm)

* * *

Remember, the Family was invented by God who created us. Marriage was invented by God. Marriage is a Sacrament of God’s Church.

Through Catholic Marriage, as with all Catholic Sacraments, God offers grace.

Grace is a practical thing. The Sacramental grace conferred by Christian Marriage provides married couples with extra power, available by no other means, for dealing with life’s day-to-day problems.

Ask your neighbourhood policeman who regularly attends domestic fights. Do those shacked up unmarried behave more or less violently and irresponsibly than those who are married?

Australia’s new National History Curriculum has been criticised as being political propaganda in disguise.

It certainly pushes Aboriginal, anti-Catholic and/or environmentalist (“sustainability”) perspectives.

No harm in mentioning Aboriginal traditions, of course. They are nearly 3 percent of our population. Perhaps they should occupy about 3 percent of the history course.

But Aboriginal issues receive coverage at great length — their “struggles for recognition and equality” etc.

“Christianity” is mentioned just twice.

* * *

The website video * about this curriculum says there will be “less in it”, but it will be “more explicit”. Poor brainwashed kids.

One of the boffins on the video explains why the curriculum must ignore our Christian and European heritage.

The content must appeal, he says, to a student whose refugee family has just arrived from Sudan, or elsewhere, which may have a non-Christian background.

Perhaps it would interest such students to learn why they are safer here.

What it is about Australia that makes them less likely to be beheaded here, or for their mother/sister to be raped here, or why our next change of government may not be accompanied by shootings in the streets.

* * *

History classes should take a good look at mediaeval Europe.

Health, education and welfare workers then required no wages — they were religious brothers, priests and nuns. 

Unpaid: their life consisted of saying their prayers, tilling the soil to feed themselves — the rest being free for healing, teaching and helping.

Celibate: they didn’t have to divide their time between God’s work and family ties.

The day is overdue for the Church to again create a new God-centred society inside (and in competition with) the present crumbling, anti-God shambles we call contemporary society.

For starters, we would need lots of people becoming priests, brothers and nuns — traditional ones, not trendy ones.

It will happen – but not until young people realise that being in religious orders is an alternative lifestyle, different, unconventional — a full-time sharing the divine life of God. 

That isn’t the message they’re getting at present.

They’ll get it even less from the propaganda onslaught looming when the Gillardians take education over completely.

(* www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/Home)