AS GOVERNMENT MOVES TO APPROVE STRIKES AGAINST ISLAMIC STATE IN SYRIA, THE PRIME MINISTER PLEDGES

We will provide refuge

‘Fleeing Christians should go to the front of the queue’

The Australian, 8 September, 2015

Put to one side that the number of those fleeing to whom we will provide refuge will as a matter of national pride be determined by our wishes rather than their needs, that this nation fashioned a policy on refugees to stop refugees going to the front of the queue, and that these awful words would have given most offence to the man named Jesus of Nazareth, the man called Christ, whose name is invoked to discriminate against people on the ground of their religion, a proposition that shames all religion if it is not offensive to all religion, what kind of moral bankruptcy do we have here?

A long time ago, an English traveller said this of religious strife in the Balkans.

When a Muslim kills a Muslim, that does not count; when a Christian kills a Muslim, it is a righteous act; when a Christian kills a Christian, it is an error of judgment better not talked about; it is only when a Muslim kills a Christian that we arrive at a full-blown atrocity.

You will not therefore be surprised to learn that that the Archbishop who called for preference to be given in providing refuge to those people who shared his religious beliefs also supported the bombing of those in Syria who do not.

If you see a child being pursued by a killer, and it is within your power to make that child safe from the killer, and you refuse to do so because it does not suit you, what is the difference between you and the killer?