In today’s Australia, reasoned argument is optional. Presenting a point of view with gentleness and grace is seen as a liability. If you want to win over the public gallery, the key is to include as many trigger words as possible. Create a swell of anger or fear among your audience; that’s the choice pathway for getting your opinion heard today.

This was the approach taken by Reverend Dr Stephanie Dowrick in yesterday’s opinion piece for the Sydney Morning Herald, ‘NSW must do better than Dominic Perrottet as premier’.

To build a case that the former Treasurer of NSW, Dominic Perrottet, is unfit to serve as Premier, Dowrick throws out one of today’s shibboleths that’s used to identity the baddies in society: fundamentalist.

Not content to call out one fundie in Australian politics, Dowrick names Australia’s Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, as another example of religious fundamentalism.

What is Perrottet’s sin? According to Rev Dr Dowrick, he is “a highly conservative Catholic with views that represent the most extreme end of a rigidly male-dominated institutional church.”

Notice the plethora of descriptive words employed in just this one sentence: ‘highly’, ‘conservative’, ‘most extreme’, ‘rigid’. This approach becomes the hallmark of Dowrick’s argument; use as much emotionally charged language as possible to win over readers.

At one point Dowrick offers an explanation of what she means by fundamentalism.

“Fundamentalisms vary greatly. What they have in common, though, is a narrowness of conviction that cannot be challenged by logic, evidence or appeals to reason.”

“In its righteousness and self-righteousness around central questions of identity, sexuality, gender politics, minority rights and an unwavering conviction that this is the ‘one, true faith’, it is also far from mainstream 21st-century Christianity. And far from the progressive, vibrant Catholicism that flourishes in many parishes and among numerous lay people active in social and environmental justice.”

If that’s the case, I assume Dowrick also believes Jesus is a fundamentalist. After all, Jesus defines all sexual activity outside of marriage between a man and a woman as immoral.

In summary, Dowrick’s fundamentalists are anyone who disagrees with her version of religion.

Dowrick admits that neither Perrottet nor Morrison would describe themselves as ‘fundamentalists’, but that’s not going to stop her using the label. She even insists that fundamentalists have a “total lack of self-awareness”. It’s a classic example of a fallacious circular argument: You are what I say you are, regardless of whether you agree with me or not. Indeed, some might suggest that is a version of fundamentalism!

“Fundamentalist is most often an epithet for those whose views on politics, theology, or church life seem more rigid than yours.” – Thomas Kidd

When it comes down to it, Dowrick is simply using fundamentalist in a pejorative sense to describe Christians with whom she disagrees. It’s an insult. It’s a disparaging comment designed to undermine another person. As the theologian Thomas Kidd points out, “fundamentalist is most often an epithet for those whose views on politics, theology, or church life seem more rigid than yours.”

The word fundamentalist once referred to someone who upheld the fundamentals of a belief system. To be a fundamentalist was neither good nor bad; it was a description of faithful adherence to one’s belief system. For example, a fundamentalist was someone who consistently upheld the doctrines of the Christian faith, as opposed to a progressive who no longer believes but still wants to keep the name Christian for various cultural reasons.

Dowrick is simply using fundamentalist in a pejorative sense to describe Christians with whom she disagrees. It’s an insult.

In a recent article for the Gospel Coalition Australia, Andrew Prideaux notes how in the 1950s English bishops referred to Billy Graham as a fundamentalist. They called out Graham’s version of Christianity as elevating “‘the penal doctrine of the atonement,’ ‘the call for conversion after evangelistic sermons,’ and ‘an individualistic doctrine of the Holy Spirit’s work which makes churchmanship and sacraments practically superfluous.’”

This bishopric description of Graham’s beliefs is not extreme – it is simply biblical Christianity, the same Christianity that has existed for 2000 years and continues to be true today. It is this now popular reinvention of the word fundamental that Dowrick is implying.

It’s at this point that Dowrick tells a fib. She claims that progressive churches are the ones ‘flourishing’ in Australia today. That is simply untrue. Progressive churches, which is code for ‘we no longer believe the historic faith’, are emptying. They may be popular among a segment of unbelieving Aussies and they may have clout at some institutional levels, but their churches were empty pre-Covid and will continue to be so afterwards. The Christianity that is growing today is in churches that hold to traditional beliefs (or what should be called biblical beliefs and practices) and are living them out with clarity, conviction, and love.

“The drips will lap it up but it is dispiriting to read this snide sectarianism. Imagine if we ridiculed Jewish or Muslim MPs like this?” – Chip Le Grand

Thankfully others are calling out the article for what it is, a political hit piece. A number of journalists are also slamming it.

Chief reporter for The Age newspaper, Chip Le Grand, said, “The drips will lap it up but it is dispiriting to read this snide sectarianism. Imagine if we ridiculed Jewish or Muslim MPs like this?”

Another journalist tweeted, “Let’s try this headline with a couple of other politicians. ‘Meet Julia Gillard – the avowed atheist and childless woman about to take Australia’s top job.’ ‘Meet Josh Frydenberg – the Jew about to be Australia’s treasurer.’ Can’t see those headlines getting a run.”

From beginning to end there is no fire in Dowrick’s argument, just a very big smoke machine hired from Bunnings. The smoke is spread thick and is designed to cause readers to believe there is also a fire. Instead, lurking behind is little more than the classic authoritarian secularist argument wanting a religious test for public office.

There is no religious test for assuming public life in Australia, and neither should there be.

According to Dowrick, both Dominic Perrottet and Scott Morrison are unfit for public office because their religious beliefs differ from hers. Since when is a person’s religious affiliation a qualification for public office?

There is no religious test for assuming public life in Australia, and neither should there be. One of the virtues of a pluralistic and democratic society is that citizens from different backgrounds and holding various beliefs can be nominated for office, and should they be elected, they can stand in parliament and even lead a government. It’s called democracy.

Let’s not play the erroneous game that secular means ‘without religion’. Australian political and public life is not designed by law or ethos to limit religious ideas inside of church buildings. Australian secularism encourages a plurality of thought and conviction. True secularism simply means that the state is not controlled by any single religious group. Parliament is not a neutral space where only non-religious views can be expressed.

I don’t have any skin in the game when it comes to NSW politics. I don’t know Dominic Perrottet from a bar of soap. Neither am I here to defend Roman Catholicism or Pentecostalism. I disagree with both of these theological positions on a number of significant points. But we are not talking about a church appointment here or calling a lecturer to a theological college, where such distinctions are important. Does Australia really want to exclude from political life Aussies who hold to traditional forms of Christianity?

No doubt many would say yes. Today’s letters to the Editor of the SMH are praising Dowrick. But let us understand, this is not a sign of a maturing and tolerant society, but one that is losing its moorings.

Dowrick writes, “Fundamentalist thinking is also highly divisive. The world consists of ‘us’ – and the rest of you. High levels of conformity are demanded; to doubt, self-question, is unwelcome or forbidden.”

It sounds as though Dorwick may be guilty of the very thing she is accusing others of representing.

Given how Dowrick is attacking Christianity, I am again reminded of how Jesus was committed to his beliefs. His understanding of the world contradicted the prevailing mood of society at that time. With love and truth, he served a people who didn’t tolerate him. It was Jesus’ convictions that led him to the cross. If there is a characteristic that defines fundamentalism (as commonly understood today) it is this, a lack of love.

I cannot comment on Perrottet’s and Morrison’s Christianity, for I don’t know these men. But throwing verbal insults at someone isn’t much of a way to progress serious conversation. And advocating for a religious means test for public office is a road Australia would do well to avoid.

This article is reprinted with the author’s permission. The original can be found here.