2010

THE McCOSKER ORATION

Old Parliament House, Canberra

Monday 8 February 2010 

Fr Frank Brennan SJ AO
Professor of Law
Public Policy Institute
Australian Catholic University

On Monday 8 February 2010, Fr Frank Brennan SJ AO, Professor of Law at the Australian Catholic University (pictured left), presented the McCosker Oration at the Catholic Social Services Australia Annual Awards ceremony held at Old Parliament House in Canberra.
Fr Brennan was welcomed by Tony Davies, Member of the CSSA Board and Director of Centacare Port Macquarie. 

Please see below for an outline of the presentation.    

Will a Charter of Rights erode religious freedom?

It’s fashionable to be dismissive of religion in contemporary Australia, said Father Frank Brennan in his 2010 McCosker Oration. He said that if secularists demand that views informed and animated by religious tradition should be shut out the public square, Australians can never hope to live in a truly democratic society.

Last year Father Brennan chaired a committee charged with reporting back to government on the community’s thinking about human rights protection in Australia. Since the committee’s report has been released a number of church leaders have expressed concern that a human rights act could threaten religious freedom.

Father Brennan said that the major areas of concern are with the impact of religious vilification laws in Victoria; the compulsory referral clause in the Victorian Abortion bill; and the exemptions for church bodies from the discrimination laws.

Some church leaders fear that a human rights act will accelerate the secularising effect of the soft left “liberal” agenda, said Father Brennan. He argued that “Those concerns would prove to be misplaced if a human rights act could be designed to ensure that parliamentarians have due regard for freedom of religion and conscience, including the conscience of the religious citizen who is out of sympathy with any prevailing soft left liberal agenda.”

“The way forward”, said Father Brennan, “is for us to insist in the public square on the need for all players to respect the right of all persons including religious people to freedom of conscience and belief, for us within our church community to respect the consciences and dignity of all including those who are gay or lesbian, encouraging everyone to form and inform their conscience and to that conscience be true, and to provide public advocacy grounded in our daily contact with the poor, informed by the richness of our Church tradition, and co-ordinated by credible Church voices in the public square.”

A copy of the 2010 McCosker Oration is available here.