Restoring Faith

I have a great love and admiration for a certain elderly snaggletooth nun by the name of Sister Wendy Beckett. In fact, back in a meme post in 2005 I listed her as one of my 7 Celebrity Crushes.



The thing I've always loved about Sister Wendy, having watched all her art documentaries over the years, is that she may be cloistered most of the time but that certainly hasn't made her viewpoint narrow. She never shies away from sexuality, and the realm of human desire and emotion. She brings a certain Big C and little c humanism to her Christian faith.

So when I found this quote on her thoughts on gay marriage on Towleroad it made me love her all that much more, but I can't say that I was frankly all that surprised:

Q: You've spoken out about gay marriage. How do you balance what you believe with what you have sworn to uphold?

Sister Wendy: I believe in loyalty. We should respect our church, but never believe that the church has the last word. The church is saying "this", but I believe that sooner or later "this" will change. "This" is not the mind of our Lord. God is all love. It's a delicate balancing thing. The Church has changed it's position over the years, and because the spirit is with the Church, in the end the Church will always get it right. But in the end. The spirit of the Church is the meaning of love, which hasn't yet, perhaps, been fully understood.

Well said Sister. Now, why does that seem so hard to understand for so many Christians? Not all, granted, but many. Too many.

Change

I watched hour after hour of the election night coverage on Saturday night, eager to see what my fellow Australians would do. Whether the Liberal government of the past 11 years would be returned, or whether Australians would vote for change.

Some paste-up graffiti electioneering in Newtown.

They voted for change, with a huge swing away from the sitting government.

We now have a new Labor government. It just goes to show, you can beat the drum on money and the economy all you want, but you cannot forget a strong social agenda. Record low unemployment and a strong economy (partly due to the current mining and resources boom) is not enough if people think their rights are not being respected, if schools and hospitals are being underfunded, if the disadvanteged are not being given a voice, and if long term issues like climate change or not being addressed.

It seems to me it was as much an anti-Liberal vote as anything else. Especially given the fact that John Howard appears to also be only the second Prime Minister ever to also lose his position as the local member for his own electorate. It will be close, and postal votes need to still be finalised, but it seems like it's not just the party that has been given the thumbs down by Australia, but the man himself.