MOST READERS will be at least somewhat familiar with names like Israel Folau, Lyle Shelton, Archbishop Julian Porteous and Rev Campbell Markham who have each been viciously attacked with anti-discrimination and other weapons of lawfare for the unpardonable sin of fearlessly preaching the Gospel.
And now I am humbled to be considered worthy to be added to that list of courageous men.
“They summoned the apostles and had them beaten. Then they ordered them not to speak in the Name of Jesus and released them. So they left the council rejoicing because they had been considered worthy to suffer dishonour for the sake of the Name. And every day both in the temple courts and from house to house, they did not stop teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus was the Christ.”
– Acts 5:40-42
A shockingly frivolous complaint against the Church And State ministry and me personally has since been made with the Queensland Human Rights Commission, falsely alleging that I vilified and humiliated an individual because of his race and religion.
Instead of following Scriptural commands for how to settle disputes amongst believers instead of inviting the world to judge us, the gentleman immediately resorted to blunt threats with legal weapons.
I’ve been forced to seek legal advice. The first step is I will have to attend a mandatory conciliation to deal with this accusation.
The process is the punishment.
But why did the gentleman complain?
It is my custom at the beginning of meetings I convene to perform an acknowledgment that the country belongs to God only. Indeed, I quote Psalm 24:1 which contradicts the claims of Aboriginal religion that the spiritual entity it calls “Country” requires deceased ancestors to permit someone’s arrival or travel through it.
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it.
The world and all its people belong to him.”
If that is “racist” and reasonably likely to humiliate or vilify individuals – and it most certainly is not – then how is contradicting Christian religion’s claims about Creation and spiritual destiny not also “racist”?
A lady accompanying the complainant (who shall both remain nameless to help focus on the issue being contested) asked the first question after the presentations from myself and the ACL Qld Director, Rob Norman, as part of our tour of Queensland to help brief Christians in preparation for the coming election.
The importance of the physical and social context – a private, ticketed meeting for Christians, held by a Christian political teacher and a Christian lobbyist and activist, in a Christian church, for the purposes of Christian political advocacy – is this.
If the debate and critique of religious and political truth claims cannot take place there without someone employing the power of the State to punish unapproved opinions with the cudgel of anti-discrimination proceedings, then where can contested ideas be honestly examined?!
The complaint is as frivolous as it is baseless – breathlessly, emotively fabricated.
The complainant has written that in my very brief history of the Christian foundations of American and Australian democracy I neglected to mention the massacres of indigenous people, the dispossession of indigenous people and the theft of their children and land and destruction of culture.
Only taking half an hour for my presentation and not a four year under-graduate tertiary education in history, I felt it best to stick to the facts pertinent to the point of Christian involvement in the coming election. I freely admit to not considering including any tangential accounts of Australian settlement or this continent’s adverse pre-settlement history.
However the grist of the gentleman’s complaint is that when I was questioned by his friend about my alleged lack of sensitivity to Aboriginal people’s feelings, I gave an honest, Scripturally and philosophically accurate, unflattering assessment of Aboriginal religion.
At no point did I make any remarks about anyone present, about anyone personally, or any group of people. I categorically reject the claim that anyone, let alone the complainant, was in fact vilified or humiliated, intentionally or otherwise.
To the contrary, it is incoherent to imaginatively infer that a criticism of that once-traditional religion is a criticism of any Aboriginal people, because so fractionally few of them still hold to those unhelpful beliefs. Dr John Fleming notes ABS data about Aboriginal people’s religion now:
“Overall, 54 per cent of Aboriginal And Torres Strait Islander peoples reported a Christian affiliation, almost the same as the non-Indigenous population (55%).
In 2016, less than 2 per cent of the [ATSI] population reported adherence to Australian Aboriginal Traditional religions or beliefs. This has remained steady over the last 20 years. Christianity is now a crucial part of indigenous cultures whether secularists like it or not.”
– page 153, The Spirit Behind the Voice – The Religious Dimension of the “Voice” Proposal, 2023 Connor Court Publishing
The fact of the matter is that there are many people who choose to be offended by all manner of objective Truth, and the only way to avoid offending them is to say exactly what they already believe and to confirm their presuppositions and prejudices, or to say nothing at all.
The entire point of the Church And State ministry and no less this tour specifically is to rouse sleeping Christians from silence and self-censorship (perhaps from fear of offending), and, motivated by sincere love of neighbour, speak up about the unrighteousness and injustice in the land.
I factually described traditional Aboriginal beliefs demonstrated in Welcome to/Acknowledgement of Country rituals, smoking ceremonies, mandated reverence for “sacred sites”, the Aboriginal flag and the Aboriginal tent “embassy” as based in animism, and demonstrating the spiritual fruit of division and rebellion. Surely these are not surprising or novel criticisms!
For any pulpit to remain silent on State-imposed paganism is a disservice to those unwitting congregants who might otherwise believe it harmless.
I have written about these many times before, and, consistent with my manner of response on the night in question, have never made my remarks personally humiliating or vilifying.
Any claim to the contrary is simply wrong.
What I preach and teach is that humility of heart before Almighty God – as prescribed in our Preamble – is the only thing that can save Australian politics, parliaments, politicians and voters.
I wholeheartedly believe only the Truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ has effective power to save people and nations, and that Truth cannot be suppressed by our silence in the face of pagan, false religions which demand to be honoured and affirmed.
To mingle Christianity with animism is the blasphemy of syncretism, and must not be permitted in Christian mouths, buildings, services or sermons by anyone who wisely fears God. To mingle grave deceptions such as are held by animism with the Truth of the Gospel and the light of Scripture is to darken the eyes of our understanding and to hatefully keep people from righteousness and salvation.
To worship created things instead of the Creator is unambiguously described in Scripture as incurring the wrath of God, and for the love of my indigenous neighbours I will never stop preaching the unadulterated Word of God and religion of Jesus Christ.
It is not my worthless opinion. It is the foundation of the Apostles, and, “no one can lay any other foundation than the one we already have.“
It was this compassion, confidence and certainty which the gentleman falsely misrepresented as being humiliating and vilifying of Aboriginal people instead of my actual meaning – critiquing wrong ideas.
The complainant wrote that he felt “set upon and verbally attacked”, that I was “whipping up the crowd”. When a preacher preaches Gospel Truth frequently suppressed by others, shouts of Amen and loud approval naturally ensue to praise God – not Dave!
If I said such things as he accuses me of I would certainly apologise, for what an ugly, unChristian thing to do.
I only preached the Truth in love with all the certainty that I believe the Gospel, and for that I can never, ever honestly apologise. I can not, and I will not.
A (sometimes) wise philosopher once observed:
“Just because you’re offended doesn’t mean you’re right.”
– Ricky Gervais
And so I become this week’s face of freedom of religion, freedom of political communication and the open assault on public preachers of the Christian Gospel.
There is no natural, absolute freedom of speech. Freedom has a purpose, and it is certainly the mutual pursuit of Truth: to search for and discover Almighty God.
The support I ask for now is firstly this: that my admittedly knee-trembling courage, such as it is, become contagious and that you also, in love and certainty, preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ: the only Way to God, the only Truth, and the only Life. The Gate is narrow and the Way is difficult that leads to life – but there it is. There is no mixing it with false religion.
Don’t let this soon-forgotten instance of religious persecution or the menace of the anti-discrimination industry chill either political debate or preaching the Good News.
Secondly, I ask for your generous support of the Human Rights Law Alliance. They are representing me pro bono, as they do the epidemically increasing number of targets of such religious persecution for ordinary people leading authentically Christian lives. Such people don’t have even the small platform I do, so please know that your donations will continue to defend us all, not just me.
When you give to this specially created GiveSendGo campaign, funds will go firstly to defending this frivolous complaint. If it is as quickly defeated as it ought to be, all leftover funds – and I pray there are tens of millions – will continue to fund HRLA’s expert defence of religious freedom in Australia. No funds given there will come to me privately.
[Opportunity to partner with this ongoing mission is at the bottom of this page, as it has been for many years.]
This is how we make our voice heard. This is how we push back against the weaponisation of para-judicial anti-discrimination tribunals by the enemies of Christ and His Truth. This is how we restore a free social context for the uncompromsied preaching of the Gospel.
God bless Australia with humility, righteousness and Truth.
P.S. Join me in praying blessing for the complainant, that his heart will soften and he will be freed from chains of unforgiveness and other burdens on his soul. Pray also for me and every Australian Christian that we would have the revelation of and confidence in the One True God exhibited by Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego:
“If our God Whom we are serving exists, He is able to rescue us from the furnace of blazing fire, and He will rescue us, O king, from your power as well. But if He does not, let it be known to you, O king, that we don’t serve your gods, and we will not pay homage to the golden statue that you have erected.”
– Daniel 3:17-18
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Dave Pellowe is a Christian political educator & commentator, founder of The Good Sauce, convener of the annual Australian Church And State Summit and host of Good Sauce’s weekly The Church And State Show. Since 2016 Dave has undertaken the mission of arming Christians to redeem culture through events from Perth to Auckland, videos, podcasts and articles published in multiple journals across Australia and New Zealand. [more]
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