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There are more than 200 results, only the first 200 are displayed here.
Tony Abbott has been in public life for a long time. Most recently there has been his meteoric rise to leadership of the Liberal party and to a hair’s breadth from the prime ministership itself. Charming and disarming as he can be, there is something deeply disturbing in the way he carries out his public role.
Liberal Senator Cory Bernardi dismissed Islamic banking as 'incompatible with Australia's Western values'. But Western values that uphold a banking system that treats its customers with disdain – as the Commonwealth Bank did last week – need to be questioned.
The churches, with their tradition of recognising the deeper values in human beings and society, can play an important part in generating a richer vision of Australian society. They'll need to cooperate with other groups who decry the self-interested focus in Australian politics.
The result suggests some fascinating questions. Prime among them is whether Labor panicked and threw away this election when it deposed Kevin Rudd and replaced him with Julia Gillard in June. Would Rudd have done better? The answer is probably yes.
We are wrong to assume our involvement in the political process ends with the casting of votes. If the experience of a fetid election campaign, of leadership abdicated and of a hung parliament leads us to offer more modest local forms of participation and leadership, all Australians will gain.
It would be easy to cast a donkey vote or a vote for a minor party and to thus wash your hands of the responsibility for our governance for the next three or so years. In a representative democracy, a vacuous election represents a lazy polity.
Ngunnawal Elder Aunty Janet Phillips says that for Aboriginal Australians there's no 'justice'; 'just us'. How can we turn this election into a building block for a more equal society? The answer involves weighing up the known policies and track-record of both sides to assess their impact on the growth of inequality.
The public sphere is often spoken of as debate, conversation, market place, or theatre. The dominant image this election campaign suggests have been of monologue and static. There is not much point in a public space if you can't hear yourself think there.
This election we consider a PM who is doubted because of her atheism, an Opposition Leader who is doubted for being too 'Catholic', and the Greens who are doubted as being anti-Christian. Church social agencies have been involved in important issues with each of these groups.
In Sunday's Liberal campaign launch, Tony Abbott repeated the phrase 'big new tax' five times. Through taxes, we invest in a civilised society that would provide for us in times of need. Taxes are therefore not a necessary evil. They are a necessary good.
The election has been plagued by trivial spats and personality conflicts, to the neglect of policies based on the values of equity and social justice for everyone. This reinforces the importance of church and community groups being more active in their social advocacy.
When it comes to asylum seekers, both Labor and Liberal leaders spruik policy that taps into negative community feelings toward 'the other'. Fr Francis D'Sa offers an alternative vision embracing multiculturalism and religious pluralism.
157-168 out of 200 results.