9^th January 2017

Therein lies the ABC

Few know that the word ‘broadcasting’ in the ABC is from the BBC depicted on a plaque at BBC London  headquarters showing that it it comes originally from the parable of the sower ‘broadcasting’ his seed.

Remember those days when ministers would do their pastoral rounds in the country to coincide with Blue Hills? Most cockies would be in for lunch to tune in to the Gwen Meredith ABC serial. It was also the days when we trusted the reporting and comment of our ABC. Those days are mostly gone. It’s not our ABC, it’s an alien propaganda machine and many of us trust it with few exceptions no longer. The gap widens ever more!

The ABC Four Corners program on marriage was mostly a lie to the Australian public. Our billion dollar taxpayer funded broadcaster treats us as simpletons as it rages on with its arrogant propaganda of homosexual marriage. Q&A leads the charge. Leigh Sales treats same-sex marriage (SSM) as a moral truism. The Four Corners program was actually One Corner of the debate.

On the program, those speaking for natural, real marriage which incidentally is currently enshrined in Australian law are ‘anti-marriage equality’. Their people are always ‘the conservatives’. At no time were the pro-homosexual lobbyists described as ‘progressive leftists’. The children being raised by homosexuals all presented one viewpoint in the interviews and it all sounded much rehearsed. Nowhere was a child or adult of same sex parents with a testimony of lament for a mother and a father brought on, even though there are plenty to select from.

And then there was the hate factor. Given ready access to politicians appearing to be fearful of being called homophobes heavy activist Rodney Croome showed his hate-filled stance, declaring that those who oppose him have ‘hearts full of hate’.  Those who hold to real marriage were described as ‘hard-line anti-gay campaigners’ running ‘sophisticated’ campaigns against SSM.

Nowhere was a substantive argument presented for SSM except ‘love’. And at no time were the real marriage spokespersons allowed to develop the case on the rights of children, divisiveness in society over anti-freedom of religion exemptions, or the devastating results of re-configuring society on a totally different primal foundation, or indeed the negative social effects of changing the law in other counties. Twenty countries have done so we were didactically informed. What about the 172 that haven’t?

I exhort our ACC congregations: keep reflecting and preaching the beauty and mysterious wonder of the meaning of marriage from Ephesians and the Gospels. Check Resources on the ACC website, on our YouTube site (the DVD series on the Mystery of Marriage) and articles in our magazine ACCatalyst and the ACC resources website: Unitingviews.com.

You are guardians not only of that which is the eternal best, but that which sources and sustains a democratic society.

The ABC listening? I should note in fairness, that after my last column on the ‘Clueless Media’, about the failure of the media to report on the persecuted church,  on Monday Oct 10^th ABC news ran a report on the persecution of Christians in China; here was a story on the church’s courage and growth under vigorous opposition. Other than audio reports on the Religion and Ethics program this is an almost unprecedented report. The ABC’s integrity on this will be demonstrated only by regular weekly reports.

Ian Clarkson is a UCA minister in SA,

This article was also published in the December 2016 ACCatalyst magazine.