Anglican Church accused of paganism, advocating genocide

Wed, 2010-05-12 21:23 by nimby

As I noted in my earlier miscellaneous comment and as was reported in the Melbourne Age of 9 May 2010, the Anglican church has rightly called for both a decrease in natural population growth and a decrease in Australia's current record high rate of immigration. The Citizens Electoral Council, which believes that not only Australia, but the whole world, is underpopulated, responded, on 11 May 2010, with one of its typical hyperbolic media releases. The CEC accused the church of promoting the British Royal Family's secret plan to cull the world's human population. It also accused it of promoting pagan beliefs in support of preserving the natural world, rather than what it held to be true Christianity focussed solely on what is (supposedly) good for the human species.

Below I reproduce the whole media release, together with my responses.

The Anglican Church General Synod paper can be downladed from here (pdf 277K),

How many people would Jesus kill off, what babies would he stop from being born, and which immigrants would he keep out of the country, to stabilise our population? Citizens Electoral Council leader Craig Isherwood demanded the General Synod of the Anglican Church explain, following their call for human genocide reported this week. (my emphasis).

The Church of England in Australia is pushing the agenda of its church leader, Queen Elizabeth II, and her husband Prince Philip, to cull the world's human population.

In a March discussion paper, the Anglican Public Affairs Commission has echoed Prince Philip's call for genocide to preserve ecology, linking overpopulation and ecological degradation:

My response: A human plague would cause "genocide", not population targets.

Out of care for the whole of creation, particularly the poorest of humanity and the life forms who cannot speak for themselves ... it is not responsible to stand by and remain silent, the commission paper said. Looking for a practical application of their genocide doctrine, the Anglicans called for reduced immigration and an end to childbirth incentives.

My response: Letting people live in their own country is their definition of "genocide"? Family planning is not "genocide". How can those not even conceived be killed?

All policies of ‘population-control' or ‘population-stabilisation' are genocide,"Mr Isherwood charged.

My response: How does this logic work? Genocide by definition is: "The systematic and widespread extermination or attempted extermination of an entire national, racial, religious, or ethnic group". On the contrary, mass immigration is blurring national boundaries and ethnic and national groups. Stabilising population is about protecting human lives, of now and future generation, and is in our best interests.

The sanctimonious Synod won't admit that in polite company, but the British monsters who cooked up this evil--from Malthus to Prince Philip--are explicit about it.

My response: What's Prince Philip got to do with Australia's immigration policies?

Anglican Parson Thomas Malthus, was on the payroll of the rapacious East India Company when he wrote his 1798 essay The Principle of Population, with its popularised fraud that because human population grows geometrically, it outstrips food production which only grows arithmetically; the solution, the devout churchman said, was to make the streets narrower, crowd more people into the houses, and court the return of the plague. ... and particularly encourage settlements in all marshy and unwholesome situations. But above all, we should reprobate [condemn--Ed.] specific remedies for ravaging diseases ... .

My response: How are humans different from any other species without predators and natural enemies to stop their destructive over-population? Malthus was ahead of his times. Overpopulation is the cause of terror, wars, diseases, conflict and famine.

Prince Philip, the husband of the Church of England's "Defender of the Faith", was as explicit as Malthus: You cannot keep a bigger flock of sheep than you are capable of feeding. In other words conservation may involve culling in order to keep a balance between the relative numbers in each species within any particular habitat. I realise this is a very touchy subject, but the fact remains that mankind is part of the living world. ... Every new acre brought into cultivation means another acre denied to wild species.

My response: Since when did environmental responsibility and not overstocking the paddocks become "culling"? Once the paddock is full, it is negative returns for the farmer.

Mr Isherwood said the Synod's position on this issue was paganism:

This is not Christianity; it is the Cult of Gaia--Mother Earth--worship, an age old superstition used by the oligarchy to subdue the masses, he said.

In true Christianity, human beings are not animals, but each individual is created in the image of God, and each individual human life is sacred.

My response: The "image of God" was in Genesis, before the Fall, not now! If we are in the state of sin, we are not "sacred". That's why Jesus had to die on the cross - as a redemption.

That Christian idea actually expresses the unique human quality of creative reason, by which human beings make the scientific discoveries which produce the new technologies that enable humans to support expanding populations.

My response: Our finite planet, and natural resources, won't keep expanding, and this is clear today. There is no biblical basis whatsoever for this idea.

Australia isn't overpopulated--what a sick joke! Australia is grossly underpopulated, and if we unleash the creativity of Australians and the people who wish to become Australians, to develop large-scale water infrastructure, green the deserts, harness nuclear power, pioneer nuclear fusion, launch a space program and everything else we could do, there is absolutely no limit to our nation's growth.

My response: The degradation of soils, waterways, the Murray river, loss of biodiversity, climate change, peak oil and peak everything are signs that Australia is already overpopulated -- as is the rest of the planet. Basing human population growth policies on yet to be achieved scientific achievements and exploration is dubious policy-making, to say the least!

Adhering to and preaching obsolete ideals, even when those ideals fly in the face of the mathematical and scientific reality, and is mis-representing Christian doctrine and our responsibility to care for Creation.

There is no God-given mandate that permits humanity to liquidate ecosystems that are needed for our shared survival just because of our economic and social systems demand growth. Already we have ecosystems and finite natural resources being consumed at peak levels. Ecosystems, including forests, water, oceans, fish stocks, waterways, wetlands are under stress, and with the overlay of climate change, could collapse large portions of the Earth and cause famine and drought - and ultimately become uninhabitable. We could be the next threatened species!

“Mankind is the most dangerous, destructive, selfish and unethical animal on the earth.”

– Michael Fox, vice-president of The Humane Society

Topic:

Comments

John Marlowe

Wed, 2010-05-12 16:58

Permalink

Paganism's reverence for nature has more legitimacy

Citizens Electoral Council leader Craig Isherwood claiming: "This is not Christianity; it is the Cult of Gaia--Mother Earth--worship, an age old superstition used by the oligarchy to subdue the masses"

Isn't Christianity an age old superstition used by the oligarchy to subdue the masses?

History has repeated genocides in the name of Christianity and one doesn't have to travel far. Look at what the missionaries did in the name of Christianity to Aboriginal communities and their children up until the 1970s. Where are the church apologies and financial compensations to the Stolen Generations?

Paganism's reverence for nature would seem to have more legitimacy and morality.

I see no problem advocating a sense of connection with Nature - after all it is non-discriminatory, non-denominational, non-critical and not prejudiced.

Anonymous (not verified)

Wed, 2010-05-12 19:55

Permalink

Reverence for nature

No, it's not the aims and nature of "Christianity" that caused genocides, terror and captivity of Australian Aborigine children, it is human use of it to support the political status quo. There is a difference! Christians see the beautiful things in Nature as part of the "created order". Just as a beautiful musical piece points to the existence of a gifted and creative composer, so Nature points us to am infinitely wise, good Creator. Reverence for Nature should be an natural expression of worshipping the Creator, but due to human frailness, their propensity for self-fulfilment through materialism and self-centred spirituality, it means that the churches on the whole have failed to promote this ideal. This has left the "door" open for secularism, atheism and nature worship.

Anonymous2 (not verified)

Thu, 2010-05-13 02:50

Permalink

Nature-worship

What is wrong with nature-worship? A nature-worshipper.

Eco Engine (not verified)

Thu, 2010-05-13 12:13

Permalink

Worshiping nature?

Proposed by James Lovelock as the earth feedback hypothesis, it viewed our planet as a living organism. It is a seductive model, and explained the planet's feedback systems impacting on it's health. However, worshiping Nature is ignoring the real Creator. It remains a model, not a diety. It lacks an analysis of existing power structures as well as historical patterns of inequality in which political realm occurs, and a structure for social justice to address the exploition of humanity and other species. It also underestimates the destructive potency of the human species.

Sheila Newman

Thu, 2010-05-13 17:19

Permalink

Universe and laws of thermodynamics = Nature/God

If nature includes the laws of thermodynamics and the entire universe (which to my mind it does) then it seems okay to me to worship it; you won't find anything more powerful. I think that this is what people mean by god.

Anonymous (not verified)

Thu, 2010-05-13 04:17

Permalink

Anglican Church full marks plus CEC and SA two sides same coin

For once the church makes a good and courageous decision and candobetter runs with a headline that fails to trumpet that. How about changing this: "Anglican Church accused of paganism, advocating genocide" to "Anglican Church damned by crazed CEC for progressive and enlightened population policy" or something shorter, if anyone can think of it. Really, full marks to the Anglicans. It would be great to get more articles on this matter and how the Church came to this decision. As for the CEC... One wonders what they want. They behave as if they are some kind of marginal group, yet their main policies are exactly those of the government and the opposition, which both want to overpopulate and overdevelop the planet. Apart from a few policies which, perhaps, the CEC have nothing to lose by occasionally raising, such as Citizens Initiated Referenda, the CEC policies are so similar to those of the government and opposition that I cannot understand why the party exists. It should be jumping for joy to have Labor or Libs in power. Except, the CEC could be a front for the big political parties, herding some marginal voters into easily identifyable paddocks. It also looks as if the parties that form the Socialist Alliance are also working for the government, since their policies don't differ either - overpopulate and overdevelop, whilst preaching consume less, but surely knowing that with more population and more development, of course we will consume more. My impression there is that the SA herds people who, left to their own devices, might usefully protest on good grounds. Again, I cannot understand why the SA exist, if they are what they purport to be. They should be jumping for joy as well to have Labor or Libs in power.

James Sinnamon

Fri, 2010-05-14 13:18

Permalink

Defends title of article about Anglican Church, CEC, population

I personally liked Vivienne's choice of title. I take your point that the Anglican Church should be highly commended for having had the moral courage to swim against the tide of short-term greed masked as humanitarian "political correctness". I have no doubt that that was Vivienne's intention as you will see if you also read Vivienne's earlier comment on the Anglican Church (which, perhaps also should hve been an article). However, it is not always easy to think up a short title that will achieve everything that we would like it to. The headline also needs to persuade people to read the article in the first place. As you yourself have found to think up a short title that would have done justice to the Australian Anglican synod would not have been easy. No doubt Vivienne judged the best way to achieve all her goals was to draw our attention to the apparent idiocy of the CEC's stance on population, immigration and the environment, that it revealed in its almost Spanish Inquisitorial response to the Anglican Synod's stance. I think that her choice of heading would have been best likely to achieve all the goals. For my own part, I added the link to the Anglican Church's document on population (pdf 277K) so that people could read for themselves the ethically and scientifically sound stance that they have adopted.

Vivienne (not verified)

Thu, 2010-05-13 14:12

Permalink

Prince Philip and "genocide" accusations

#AddComments"> Anglican Media Melbourne - add your comment Prince Philip emerged in a television interview this week as the model royal “eco-warrior” who believes overpopulation has contributed to the pressures on the world and that anyone who believes in God should go green. This sounds quite reasonable! Philip, international president emeritus of the World Wide Fund for Nature, has been passionate about conservation work for many years. The WWF have the daunting task of trying to save species from extinction, and protect wholesale selling-off of habitats. He said, "The more people there are, the more resources they'll consume, the more pollution they'll create, the more fighting they will do. We have no option. If it isn't controlled voluntarily , it will be controlled involuntarily by an increase in disease, starvation and war." This is a far cry from advocating genocide!

Anglican Church accused of paganism, advocating genocide

Topic:

Comments

Paganism's reverence for nature has more legitimacy

Reverence for nature

Nature-worship

Worshiping nature?

Universe and laws of thermodynamics = Nature/God

Anglican Church full marks plus CEC and SA two sides same coin

Defends title of article about Anglican Church, CEC, population

Prince Philip and "genocide" accusations

Add comment

Filtered HTML

Tags in Topic

Help save injured wildlife

Recent comments