secular.help

Secular Australia

Introduction

Australia (a Wikipedia link) is an island continent. Its largest cities are Sydney and Melbourne. Its capital is Canberra (which is wholly contained within the state of New South Wales. The population of Australia is about 28 million.

Australia has a legally secular government with a largely non-religious or informally-religious population, though it retains cultural and institutional religious traditions.

Australia is a culturally diverse society. About one third of citizens were born overseas and therefore there is a wide variety of religious beliefs among its citizens. There is no legal barrier to the observance and practice of any religion.

Australia is known for its cultural and religious tolerance. Despite the extremely wide range of religions (often in close proximity to each other), the rate of incidents to do with religious intolerance is extremely low.

History

Indigenous people

  • Ancient habitation: There is evidence of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples inhabiting the island-continent for over 60,000 years.

European exploration and colonization

  • Early contact: Dutch navigators such as Willem Janszoon and Dirk Hartog mapped sections of the northern and western coasts in the 17th century.
  • British claim: James Cook charted the east coast in 1770 and claimed it for the British.
  • The First Fleet: On 26 January 1788, the First Fleet arrived at Sydney Cove. Under Governor Arthur Phillip, the British established a penal colony.

Growth and Federation

  • Gold rushes: The discovery of gold in 1851 brought a wave of free immigrants from Europe, China, and elsewhere, thus boosting the economy and population.
  • Self-governance: During the late 19th century, the colonies achieved representative governments.
  • Federation: On 1 January 1901, the Australian Federation united six separate British colonies (New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, and Tasmania) to form the Commonwealth of Australia.

Modern Era

  • World wars: Australia contributed personnel to global conflicts, earning a distinct national identity through events such as the ANZAC campaign at Gallipoli.
  • Immigration. There have been many broad intakes of foreigners into Australia, most to do with: mining activities, overseas wars, and educational opportunities.
  • Social reforms: Key milestones included voting rights for Indigenous Australians in 1962 and the dismantling of the White Australia policy in the 1970s. Events like those shaped a diverse multicultural society, which continues to the present day.

The aboriginals traditionally believe in a Dreamtime as the basis of creation. Different language groups and regions recognize specific ancestral figures, however rather than separating the secular from the sacred, spirituality is tied directly to the physical environment, rocks, rivers, and song lines. Based on official national data, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people make up about 3.8% of the total Australian population.

In addition to the six states, there are two territories: the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory (ACT). The ACT is landlocked within the state of NSW. Canberra is a city within the ACT and it is the capital of Australia. Canberra houses the national parliament of Australia – where the national government resides. The national government has two houses: The Representatives (the lower house) and The Senate (the upper house). Each state has its own parliament. Each state is made up of a number of local government regions called councils.

Australia has supported other countries in many wars around the world, however it has never fought in a religious war and it has never gone to war under a religious banner.

In terms of religion, the history of religious affiliation in Australia is as follows:

It is expected that in the near future, “No religion” will overtake the number of people who believe in any sort of religion. It is also expected that “No religion” will surpass the 50% mark, and therefore be the dominant “religious” position.

Current day

There are remarkably few issues that arise from religion in Australian society. While there have been religiously-motivated violent incidents, they are rare. There is a relaxed attitude by people in Australian society that results in a hands-off approach to other cultures and religions. Almost universally, there is a philosophy of tolerance towards other people’s beliefs and practices.

“Hate” tends to come in the form of good-natured derision by: states towards other states, cities towards other cities, city towards country, country towards city, and almost everyone towards New Zealand. That pretty much wears everyone out and leaves no real energy for the actual hatred of other people. In short, the average Australian is so used to dealing with people of other cultures and religions that there is a general acceptance and tolerance. The fact that there is also a strong pub-based and sport-based culture acts as a leveller and distraction.

There does seem to be a grouping of some cultures by suburb, e.g. one or more nearby suburbs being predominately of one culture, e.g. Chinese, or Indian, or Islamic, or Jewish. The main result of those areas is a higher predominance of national dress, restaurants, and religious establishments, e.g. places of worship. There is a general acceptance by people in those areas of other cultures. If those areas are a problem for some people, they are easily avoided.

There are the usual religious nutters who stand outside of railway stations trying to hand out brochures to convert people to their brand of silly religion. Those guys are easily avoided and the vast majority of passersby do avoid them.

Demographics

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) takes a census of the population every five years and publishes the results. The following is the link to the ABS page to do with Religious Affiliation in Australia.

Religion in Australia (a Wikipedia link) is as follows (the results of the 2021 Australian census):

  • Christianity: 43.9%
    • Catholic: 20%
    • Anglican: 9.8%
  • No Religion: 38.9%
  • Not stated or Unanswered: 7.2%
  • Islam: 3.2%
  • Hinduism: 2.7%
  • Buddhism: 2.4%
  • Sikhism: 0.8%
  • Judaism: 0.4%
  • Other Religion: 0.5%

For more details, see Irreligion in Australia (a Wikipedia link).

Also see the section on this page (below) to do with problems in the way the “Religion” question on the census has been constructed.

Government and Law

Structure

Australia has three levels of government: National, State and Local, and they are broadly responsible for the following areas:

  • Federal (national)
    • National defense: Managing the military and protecting the country.
    • Foreign policy: Handling international relations and foreign affairs.
    • Immigration and citizenship: Controlling borders, visas, and naturalization.
    • National economy: Managing currency, trade, and federal taxation.
    • Social welfare: Funding pensions, family support, and Medicare.
  • State and Territory
    • Schools and education: Operating public primary and high schools. Australian universities are established under state and territory legislation, but are heavily funded and regulated at the federal level.
    • Hospitals and health: Managing public health services and medical facilities.
    • Emergency services: Running police, fire, and ambulance operations.
    • Public transport: Overseeing trains, buses, and main regional roads.
    • Justice and law: Maintaining courts and correctional facilities/prisons.
  • Local
    • Waste management: Collecting household rubbish and recycling.
    • Local infrastructure: Maintaining local streets, footpaths, and street lighting.
    • Community spaces: Managing local parks, sports fields, and swimming pools.
    • Town planning: Approving local building applications and zoning.
    • Animal control: Registering pets and managing domestic animals.

The Constitution

The constitution of Australia (a Wikipedia link) does not explicitly use the word “secular”.

The section 116 of the Australian Constitution (a Wikipedia link) states:

The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion, or for imposing any religious observance, or for prohibiting the free exercise of any religion, and no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth.

Australia does not have an explicit (in law) separation of church and state; instead, it relies on state neutrality, non-establishment pluralism, and the protection of religious freedom. Rather than banning religion from official public life, the system allows cooperation between the government and faith groups.

The Constitution can only be amended via a public referendum that is supported by both a majority of voters (across the country) and a majority of states (resulting from the votes within each state). The Australian constitution is notoriously difficult to change via a referendum so there is essentially no chance that it will ever be updated to include more specific rules pertaining to religion.

Public holidays

Australian public holidays are defined at the state/territory level, however all observe the Christianity-based public holidays of: Christmas Day, Good Friday and Easter Monday. There are no public holidays based on days specific to non-Christian religions. All other public holidays have a secular basis.

There is restriction on some business trading hours and the sale of alcohol on public holidays with a religious basis. For example, the sale of bottled alcohol is prohibited on Good Friday and Christmas day.

Prayer in government

Interestingly, the Australian federal parliament recites a short parliamentary prayer and the lord’s prayer at the start of every sitting day. This practice is mandated by the official rules, known as the “standing orders”, in both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

All Australian state and territory parliaments except the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) recite the lord’s prayer. The ACT uses a secular moment of reflection instead of prayer.

There is a growing movement that is questioning the practice of praying before government sessions (see the Issues section on this page, below).

Tax exemption for non-profit organisations

Tax exemption for religious organisations in Australia works by treating the advancement of religion as a charitable purpose, granting exemptions from income tax, specific fringe benefits tax (FBT) concessions, and Goods and Services Tax (GST) reliefs through the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) and the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC).

Australia restricts tax-exempt organisations from engaging in certain political activities, specifically prohibiting them from promoting or opposing a political party or candidate for political office. However, they are permitted to campaign and give advice on public policy and law reform as long as it directly furthers their core exempt purpose. That obviously becomes a grey area.

The really difficult part for most people when it comes to the tax-exempt status of religious organisations is to reconcile the not-for-profit claim with the often extravagant display of wealth by religious organisations.

The census

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) conducts a census of the Australian population every five years. For more information, see abs.gov.au/census (link to a government site).

For many years, there has been a debate regarding problems with the “What is the person’s religion?” question in the census. Here is how the question was formed in 2021:

One issue is that the “No religion” response can become diluted if the person gets confused and responds by entering text into the “Other” field with something like “ATHEISM” or “HUMANIST” or “JEDI”. Those are clearly responses that indicate “No religion”, however they don’t immediately add to the total of those who count the “No religion” response (at the top of the response options).

It’s incredulous that, despite wide debate, the ABS can’t/won’t fix this glaring problem. To fix the most obvious issue, the question could be split into two questions, e.g.:

A variation of the above is to provide a follow-up question for the “No” response. For instance, in the above example, Q21 could be (something like): “With what non-religion type does the person identify?” and then provide the following choices:

  • Atheist
  • Agnosticist
  • Humanist
  • Rationalist
  • Other – please specify: _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

The argument against change (given by the ABS) is that such a change would mean that it is difficult to compare responses from census to census. That’s a hopelessly archaic argument that translates as: “we did it wrong in the past so we have to do it wrong in the future”.

It is clearly possible to dissect the responses to make commensurate measurements across censuses, and there will always be censuses, so in the decades to come, the more accurate questions (should they change) will provide more meaningful responses to those who need to use the data gathered. In other words, in 50 years, will anyone care that they changed methodology 50 years ago?

The people who focus on the past (to suggest that change should not occur) are ignoring the main point of the census, namely that it has a major function of assisting decisions that lead to change for the future.

The other problem is that the census question makes no attempt to address the issue of how religious a person is. There are many people who were brought up in a religious faith, however they no longer make any attempt to practice that faith. Some of those people still find it hard to mark the “No religion” option.

For example, someone who: had an Anglican parent, went to Sunday School, takes no interest in religion on a day-to-day basis, and only steps into a church when there is a wedding or a funeral (or perhaps occasionally at Easter) might still feel a vague responsibility to mark the “Anglican” response on the census. If they do, the fact that they are basically non-religious is not being captured by the census.

To give a more accurate insight into Australia’s religiosity, there could be a question related to how a person practices their religion, e.g. how often they attend a venue traditionally associated with their religion.

Since it is estimated that under 10% (and falling) of Australians attend a place of worship on a weekly basis, the religious lobby are likely to push back very hard on any census question that points that out.

Royal Commissions

Australia has a tradition of performing Royal Commission investigations into difficult or complicated issues of public importance. A royal commission is an independent public inquiry that generally results in a list of recommendations. They are the highest form of enquiry on matters of public importance and are only established in rare and exceptional circumstances. To find out more about them, see Royal Commission (a link to a government site).

There have been two royal commissions in recent times that relate to religious issues. The following links are to the official government sites for those royal commissions.

Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse

This investigation turned out to be quite damning towards the way that religious organisations abused children and covered up that abuse.

Antisemitism and Social Cohesion

This investigation was in response to the antisemitic and Islamic-State-inspired terrorist shooting attack at Bondi Beach on 14 December 2025 that claimed the lives of 15 people. Many of the victims were Jewish, however there were also non-Jewish victims who attempted to shield victims or who attempted to thwart the two gunmen. The incident was tragic, however such events are extremely rare in Australia.

Education

Australia maintains one of the highest concentrations of religious schools compared to other OECD countries. Approximately 30% of all schools in Australia are affiliated with a religion, and that extends to about 94% of private schools.

Public and secular education

  • Government Schools: Run by state and territory governments, public schools provide a general curriculum free from the promotion of any specific religious denomination.
  • Special Religious Education (SRE): Many public school systems allow approved volunteers from religious groups to run optional, faith-specific classes during designated school hours.
  • Alternatives: Families who prefer non-religious options can usually opt out of SRE, choosing alternative activities like general supervision, values education, or special ethics classes.

Religious and faith-based (usually “private”) education

  • Denominational Schools: A significant portion of Australian students attend private non-government schools, predominantly Catholic, as well as Anglican, Islamic, Jewish, and various other Christian or minority faith institutions.
  • Government Funding: Both state and federal governments provide recurrent financial support to private and religious schools based on student enrollments and community need.
  • Faith Integration: Unlike public schools, private religious schools embed distinct religious teachings, values, daily prayer, and worship directly into their regular daily routines and core curricula.

At first glance, it seems unfair for the government to use public money to fund private schools. The argument for the funding is that there is a component of a child’s education that is not religious (despite being at a religious institution) and therefore the government should provide funding commensurate with the same component experienced by a student in a public school.

There are issues with that idea. It’s extremely difficult to figure out the allocation of funds appropriate for the non-religious component of a student at a private school. Also, there is a perception problem because private (religious) schools always have a appearance of having far better school grounds, facilities, opportunities, and resources than do public schools. The question arises as to whether the government should be funding schools that can afford to look like Hogwarts?

There are five explicitly religious universities in Australia (out of 42 universities).

The fundamental issue with religion getting involved with education is a question of why? If education is about teaching material to students, then the obvious point is that religion would have to be, at best, pointless, and at worst, detrimental to the act of teaching that material.

For example, is there any need to involve religion to teach subjects such as: mathematics, chemistry, physics, biology, geography, etc.? The programs for those subjects are pretty full and the students are expected to cover a curriculum, so there really isn’t the time to introduce religious material into those subjects. To be sure, religious aspects could be introduced into subjects such as art and history, but again, a certain core curriculum has to be covered, so there isn’t much time to extend the subjects to encompass a religious narrative.

It’s also questionable how teachers with a forced religious bias teach subjects like biology – in which they have to deal with topics like evolution. At what point in the course are they expected to say “You know all that evolutionary biology I taught you? Well, ignore that because god dunnit“?

If religious aspects aren’t that big of a deal when it comes to the material being taught, then what’s the point of wrapping a religious institution around the lessons? If it’s about having a church/chapel/mosque/synagogue on the premises and making sure that students use them, as well as having one or more religious classes per week, then why couldn’t that be organised as an adjunct to the activities of a non-religious school? Why couldn’t that be funded privately by parents and practiced outside of normal school hours?

Religion in the private sector

The private sector is a place that is increasingly being used by religions to increase their reach and influence, and to sustain and grow their organisations.

The obvious question about religions using the private sector is: do they pay appropriate tax? Also, do they get an unfair advantage over non-religious organisations in the same sector if they don’t have to pay appropriate tax?

It’s not clear why religions need to be involved in any of the areas presented in this section? As Christopher Hitchens used to challenge: show an example of a thing that religious people do that non-religious people can’t? It’s never been proven that religious people are more empathetic and are therefore better suited to some of the areas presented in this section.

On the flip side, it is easy to appreciate that religious organisations want to be involved in everyday industries because it gives them an opportunity to increase their (hidden) profits, grow their organisations, and proselytise to a wider and wider audience. As their churches collapse around them (due to declining attendance), their organisations can continue due to their private-sector activities.

The real danger is that, long after the visible face of their traditional religious activities cease (due to the collapse of their places of worship), religious organisations will be able to continue due to their entrenchment in society via their private-sector activities.

There are many sectors into which religious organisations have injected themselves in Australia. The rest of this section covers some of those.

Hospitals

Religious hospitals in Australia are non-government health providers run by faith-based organisations.

Example of religiously-based hospitals include:

  • Catholic Health Australia
  • St Vincent’s Health Australia
  • Sydney Adventist Hospital.

At least these are better than examples in some other sectors because their underlying brand is not really hidden. E.g. if you choose to attend the “Catholic Health Australia” organisation then you shouldn’t be too surprised to find out that the Catholic church is going to benefit from your visit.

Aged-care

In Australia, aged care is regulated by the federal government. See MyAgedCare for more information.

There is a case for religion to be involved in aged care – to a limited extent. That case is based on the immobility of residents, and involves providing (to some extent) the religious practices (e.g. ceremonies such as services and masses) that residents, who are no longer able to leave their facility, can no longer attend.

Of course, it’s all a bit academic because the average religious aged-care facility usually doesn’t have the facilities required to tend to their residents’ previous requirements. E.g. they don’t always have a chapel or a visiting minister or priest.

Beyond that, how is religion a benefit to the average aged-care resident? There’s not a particular religious way of presenting average facilities such as: a bed, a television, activities, food, medical care, outings, etc.

When using the government MyAgedCare site, watch out for institutions that have the any of the following in their names because they have a religious basis:

  • Uniting
  • Catholic
  • Holy Cross
  • Anglicare
  • BaptistCare
  • CCS
  • Saint or St.
  • Southern Cross Care (a Catholic organisation).

Note that this page is not saying that religious aged-care organisations are necessarily bad or inferior. The warning to people who are not religious is to be careful that you don’t end up giving your money to a religious organisation. Also, if you end up in a religious facility, be careful that you don’t end up at a disadvantage if your stance against religion becomes known at that facility. It might be very difficult to extricate yourself from a difficult situation when you get older.

Education

See the major section above about issues to do with religious education in Australia.

The following is a site that might assist if you wish to avoid religious education: Australian Schools Directory (religious schools).

Funerals

Funeral services is an area where there is a case for religious involvement. Obviously some people would like certain religious words or ceremonies to occur during a funeral, and an appropriate religious organisation may be best placed to achieve that.

Surprisingly, most funeral-service organisations in Australia are not owned by underlying religious organisations. However some are, so it’s worth checking who you are paying your money towards if you are after a non-religious service. Remember that a religious organisation may still be involved if you have ordered a non-religious service.

Charity

If you do not wish to send even a little of your hard-earned charitable donation towards a religious organisation, then you have to be very careful. The following are some (but not all) examples of charities that have a religious basis:

  • The Salvation Army. This includes “giving a fiver” at the pub or train station on a Friday.
  • World Vision Australia
  • St Vincent de Paul (St Vinnies). This includes their op-shops.
  • Mission Australia
  • Caritas Australia
  • Mercy Ships Australia

Note that this site is not saying that religiously-based charities don’t do some good things. It is saying that you should be aware that if you use religiously-based charities then at least some of your donation is going towards supporting an organisation that is promoting religion. That will of course end up: inflating the importance of those organisations, increase their corporate size and influence, and assist their proselytising activities.

If you are looking for non-religious ways to donate your time, expertise, goods or money, consider the following (links are to the organisations’ web sites):

Note that the above list is not exhaustive and there are many fine non-religious charities that have not (yet) been listed above. If you are in doubt about whether a charity has a religious underpinning, investigate their “History” or “Mission” or “About us” pages on their web site.

Brands

If you are not keen to send your money towards religion, then you should avoid products from the Sanitarium Health Food Company. They are wholly owned by the Seventh-day Adventist Church. Their brands include:

Weet-Bix
Up & Go

Marmite

Issues

Australia does face issues to do with religion in its society. This section is a bit of a grab-bag of issues, with some being general/global and some being local. Issues here that require more elaboration lead to a sub-page.

Lack of a church-state separation

The lack of a specific (in law) statement about the separation of church and state is a concern. While not providing many day-to-day issues, the lack of a formal separation does introduce wiggle room when religious advocates begin to argue a case for greater involvement of religion in everyday life. E.g. it’s not possible to simply shut down debate with “we have separation of church and state in this country”, because there isn’t a formal separation.

One reason for the lack of day-to-day issues is that the horse has pretty much bolted on the desire of the average Australian to insert more religion into government. Religious numbers in Australia have been falling for decades and show no signs of slowing their decline, so there is little chance of any religious zealot injecting more religious control into government.

Unfortunately, there is also little chance of introducing a formal law about the separation of church and state, and therefore any insidious creep of religion into government has to be monitored. Surprisingly, section 116 of the Australian Constitution does not apply to the states and therefore the states are theoretically able to establish their own religion(s). That must also be monitored for creep.

For more details, see Separation of church and state in Australia (a Wikipedia link).

Parliamentary prayer

As noted earlier on the page, the federal government and all of the states and territories (except the Australian Capital Territory) employ some sort of religious prayer to begin sessions of parliament.

A 2023 petition (a link to a government page) received 3,085 signatures but was rejected by the speaker of the federal House of Representatives on 29 Jan 2024. The rejection was made on flimsy historical grounds and did not address the points made in the petition. The main point that was ignored was that Christians are in a minority in the country, so the reciting of the Christian “lord’s prayer” does not fairly represent or apply to the population covered by parliament (which is everyone).

The problem with on-line petitions is that they are unknown to almost all of the population. What is probably needed is a much broader physical petition whereby actual signatures, e.g. gathered in shopping centres for an extended period of time is undertaken.

The next national census (due in 2026) will be interesting because it is likely to confirm that there are more non-religious people in Australia than there are religious people. In the years to come it will be harder and harder for certain people to continue with the “historical” argument for maintaining the archaic practice of praying to a fictitious and non-representative iron-age deity as a necessary start to a day of deciding matters that affect the people of Australia. The greatly diversifying nature of Australian society will also make it much more difficult for proponents of iron-age prayer to maintain the “cultural” argument for its continuation.

Hidden religion

Hidden religion is a much more insidious issue because, with their obvious falling numbers, religions have been forced to diversify into areas not traditionally, reasonably, or fairly associated with religion. The days of religions surviving from tithing or donations from the collection plate have long gone, so they have found a way to generate considerable revenue from other areas and activities.

Religion has found a way to integrate into industries and areas such as: hospitals, aged-care, superannuation, schooling, funerals, weddings, etc. Most of those were addressed in the “private sector” section (above, on this page), so look there for specific examples of entities and brands to avoid if you don’t want to send your hard-earned money towards religious institutions.

One serious issue to do with religion that is hidden behind organisations is that, due to their tax-exempt status, they can gain an unfair advantage when they compete with commercial organisations who are expected to pay tax on profits.

Restriction to trading

Despite the Australian Constitution (see above) stating “The Commonwealth shall not make any law for establishing any religion“, there are still restrictions to trading on public holidays that have a religious basis.

For example, bottle shops are forced to be closed on Good Friday and Xmas day. That would certainly appear to “establish” Christianity as part of the law of the country.

Many large businesses, e.g. department stores and supermarkets also close on religious public holidays, however that is more to do with economics.

One argument for the closure is that it would be unfair to make regular staff work on days that they would be required to set aside to observe practices to do with their religion.

That argument is of course nonsense in our modern society because there are plenty of staff available (especially with extended notice) who are not Christian and would be willing to work on those days. There are also a large number of industries who do remain open and find a way to manage the religious requirements of their staff, e.g. public transport, aged-care, hospitality, food and beverage, entertainment, and emergency services.

The other argument is that it is respectful to those who find those days to be “holy”. That’s another ridiculous argument because no one is forcing those people to go to a bottle shop and purchase alcohol, or to go to a supermarket and purchase something. The people who think that days like Good Friday and Xmas should be sacrosanct are more than welcome to stay home and do so. It’s not a slap in the face to those religious people should an atheist or Jew or Hindu decide to buy a bottle of beer on (say) Good Friday.

The restrictions to trade on religious public holidays are nothing but archaic practices favoured by those who believe the whole world should be just like themselves (despite the fact that they are now in the minority).

Proselytising in public

Proselytising is the act of trying to change someone’s religious (or non religious) views to match the views of the person or organisation doing the proselytising. In Australia that is usually attempted by groups setting up positions in areas of high pedestrian traffic, e.g. usually in shopping centers and/or near the entry points for public transport such as railway stations and bus stops.

Some groups simply set up stands with brochures and wait for people to come to them, however others forcibly pass on brochures (and advice) to passersby. There are even some obnoxious groups who use amplification equipment to (loudly) broadcast their beliefs to anyone in a greater surrounding area.

Local councils are in charge of the use of footpaths in their area and usually have rules pertaining to the setting up of tables, stands or display structures. Non-commercial organisations (such as religious organisations purport to be) generally get more relaxed rules or fee waivers, though registration or notification with the council might still be mandatory.

The casual, small-scale hand-to-hand distribution of printed material by a few individuals may be permitted without a fee in certain zones, setting up physical structures such as a card table, stand, or marquee will probably trigger a formal permit requirement with the council.

In terms of a secular society, the following are points that are worth pursuing regarding more reasonable proselytising activities in public:

  • Broadcasting or amplification equipment must not be used.
  • Structures such as brochure stands and tables must have achieved council approval (where required) and that approval must be displayed on the structure being used (so that it can easily be verified by law-enforcement personnel).
  • The brand being proselytisied (e.g. the religion name and usual marketing symbols) must be clearly visible on any structure, garment or printed material being used as part of the proselytising activity.
  • Bait-and-switch tactics must not be used. E.g. the organisation and brand must be introduced at the start of the proselytising interaction. E.g. “My name is Roger and I represent the XYZ church …“.
  • Set up location must not be within a certain distance (say 20 meters) of the normal pedestrian access to public transport (e.g. the entry to a railway station or bus stop) or other public amenity.
  • Communication or interaction (via verbal or printed material) must not be made towards a minor who is not accompanied by their legal parent or guardian.
  • Rules that normally apply to commercial activities on public thoroughfares should not be relaxed or waived for non-commercial organisations or individuals. Non-profits should require the same things that profits require, e.g. they should have the same requirements for public insurance if they carrying out similar activities as do commercial organisations.
  • Permission must be obtained from the owner of private property before proselytising activities can be carried out. For example, it is not appropriate for a religious person (without permission) to enter a shopping mall or arcade and start to approach people to impart the “good word” (as they see it).

(More – coming soon …)

Secular and atheist groups

The following is a list of societies, groups, and on-line organisations who have motivations and philosophies that are not based on religion. The links are to the organisations’ web sites.

(This list will be added to as becomes available.)

Forum

Forums
Secular issues by c…
Secular Australia
 
Notifications
Clear all

Secular Australia

RSS

No topics were found here

Share:

Back