Moaist China had both the family oriented patriarchal ethic of traditional Chinese society, overlaid by a comprehensive social idealology that brooked no dissent.

Pell is so far to the right that he’s gone full circle and now resides at the extreme left.

“Democracy is not a good in itself” – for Christ’s sake!

Perhaps people like Pell do have some empirical back-up for their beliefs here
You might like to read all about the values being dissected there but the money conclusion is

“To stay out of poverty in America, it’s necessary to do three simple things, social scientists have found: finish high school, don’t have kids until you marry, and wait until you are at least 20 to marry. Do those three things, and the odds against your becoming impoverished are less than one in ten. Nearly 80 percent of everyone who fails to do those three things winds up poor.”

Of course Pell and co do have something to say about the values that encourage positive outcomes. Perhaps what he’s saying is in order to achieve positive outcomes we all need to ESCHEW “pornography, abortion, divorce, euthanasia, IVF births and embryonic stem cell research!!!”

Bring it on. Because that is how we will win. This is what the Fifties really means – the mean beast of sectarianism trying to keep its claws on a secular age and a multicultural society.

How dare they try and bring in back. Even the ghost of Santamaria, summoned by Ouija board in the Bishopric, would tell them that is a bad, bad idea. The separation of Church and State ranks with univesal suffrage as one of the great solutions invented by modern society. History was slippery with blood until we worked that one out.

I am saying that democracy depends, very fundamentally, on religions per se as institutions NOT trying to make other people live by behaviours (mostly negative) which they think are right as a matter of faith.

It stops us killing each other.

I think I mentioned in a comment on the letter by Cardinal Pell and the other Archbishops in the lead up to the election that Brisbane is lucky to have one of the few remaining Vatican II style prelates in Archbishop Bathersby. Although I’m a semi-lapsed occasional Catholic, the sort of work for justice and genuinely inclusive community that can be built in the church often despite the hierarchy is inspiring to me. It’s tragic to see Cardinal Pell willingly destroying this.

Top down morality will never work. imho. I agree with David and probably everyone here, that the Church and the State should not meddle in each other’s mad corruption. Churches are not political parties and while they should be freely able to push their agendas from the pulpit, they should never directly influence legilsation. TImes have changed and I could start my own church and a political party at the same time. (I could also top myself), but we still live in largely Xtian society with a Xtian government and I’m glad of that, so at least that when they do something absolutely abhorrent, and completely against ‘their religion’ I can at least remind them, if they are not there already, that they will most certainly be going to hell. Hah rhymes with Pell.

I’m not sure about Maoist China. Though I do like the idea of being governed by a really, really enlightened, visionary wise, person. What are my chances? Buckley’s and none baby.

The question is, in what should we believe? Enter Pell and Co with what they believe should be our core beliefs or prescriptive values. Now one of the implicit notions in their value set is that it could be likened to the undelying source code of your computer. If that isn’t ‘right’ or ‘true’, then any fancy 2nd,3rd, 4th… generation program you overlay on it will be fatally flawed. For example all the rational programs like ATSIC, DIMIA, Centrelink,Ken’s lots Mabo decision-making, etc will all come to nowt, if overlayed on a fundamentally flawed source code. Hence Ken and Cos dilemma with the results of their 4th generation programs. Pell would argue Ken should look to the source code for the answers to his human problem.

(Link courtesy of C.L..)

Furthermore, society has the right to defend itself against possible abuses committed on the pretext of freedom of religion. It is the special duty of government to provide this protection. However, government is not to act in an arbitrary fashion or in an unfair spirit of partisanship. Its action is to be controlled by juridical norms which are in conformity with the objective moral order. These norms arise out of the need for the effective safeguard of the rights of all citizens and for the peaceful settlement of conflicts of rights, also out of the need for an adequate care of genuine public peace, which comes about when men live together in good order and in true justice, and finally out of the need for a proper guardianship of public morality.

These matters constitute the basic component of the common welfare: they are what is meant by public order. For the rest, the usages of society are to be the usages of freedom in their full range: that is, the freedom of man is to be respected as far as possible and is not to be curtailed except when and insofar as necessary.

It seems to me also that you’re conflating beliefs and values.

This community is being squeezed by developers, pollies and now the church. John Brogden wants to bulldoze the block, Gaza style, and they’re singling out this precinct for special management. It’s scorched earth from every direction.

I’m amazed that they always seem to attack the poor. The churches like that in Brissie can only survive for so long, eventually these outposts of sanity will be overrun by a Pellmell assault on reality.

Good work, Ken. I bet Gummo Trotsky would do a pretty good close reading of that article too.

I’m marking exams too, by the way. Which is why I can’t keep off the blogs.

I was last down in Sydney in July last year and drove through Redfern and wondered how long such a prime piece of inner city real estate (according to the predominant “values”) could hold out against the developers.

Yes, I am. And supervising an exam as well. But it’s time to begin escapist procrastination. I might knock off 8 or 10 more papers before calling it a day, but I’m almost ready to leave it until Monday as well. I’m actually more advanced in my marking than usual at this stage of the exam period, so I don’t need to feel even slightly guilty (not that I would anyway).

I don’t think I’m particularly religious(although others may judge differently) but I’m not anti-religious either. If religious beliefs and values concur with my own, I’m comfortable with that. However it is true that new externalities will need me to apply my value set and presumably form rational beliefs, based on them. The same is true for the religious or so-called secular rationalist.

Take the new medical technologies of IVF, stem cell research and genetic engineering. Pell can look to God’s grand plan for the answers, while this conservative will turn to his ‘natural is best’ value set for answers. We may well come up with the same rational beliefs. Yes I can see the reasons for wanting to cure a Christopher Reeve, or satisfy the desires of barren couples, even to satisfy homosexual parenting desires and the like. However it seems to me that this rational belief may create more problems than it cures. Opening Pandora’s Box. What if we can control and manipulate fertility to the point where prospective parents can screen out bearing a Reeve, a homosexual child or females? Will not our society be the poorer for these choices? Wasn’t the way a Reeve coped with his life challenge an inspiration to all, if not a calling from God? What if we can choose designer babies and eventually for some(the wealthy?) achieve immortality for them with our medically generated spare parts? How do those who advocate IVF for gays, who could not naturally be parents, balance these challenges to their values? They seem to be the most ardent supporters of Pell’s God’s natural forests, but not the observa’s overall fondness for human naturalism.

In the end govt policy will come down to what the majority collectively believe, although we may get there by different ‘rational’ paths.