18 Mar: A Satanic group’s plan for a so-called “black mass” in the Kansas Statehouse in the state’s capital Topeka on March 28 has garnered widespread Catholic condemnation. In a March 6 post on Facebook, the Kansas Catholic Conference said such “a sacrilegious event” would be an “explicit demonstration of anti-Catholic bigotry”. Read the full article

17 Mar: A West Australian Wheatbelt council has been given a suspended fine for breaching the state's Aboriginal Heritage Act after failing to gain approval to work on culturally significant land and disrupting a local mythological figure. Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage prosecutor Lorraine Allen said the works in the Avon River catchment disrupted the Waugul, a rainbow serpent central to Noongar mythology. Read the full article

17 Mar: New South Wales Health is refusing to detail what work it is doing to improve access to abortion services at public hospitals across the state. The department is reviewing its policies governing termination of pregnancy, after its own report specifically recommended that ways to balance the rights of conscientiously objecting health practitioners with a woman's entitlement to receive timely care be examined. Read the full article

14 Mar: The Queensland government is facing criticism after announcing an indefinite delay to the implementation of anti-discrimination laws developed after a three-and-a-half year consultation process conducted by Queensland’s Human Rights Commission, sparked by a scandal at Brisbane’s Citipointe Christian College. Read the full article

14 Mar: Church leaders have welcomed the Crisafulli Government’s decision to pause the implementation of Labor’s changes to the Anti-Discrimination Act 1991 to allow “further consultation and policy work”. A government statement said the changes were “pushed through Parliament in the dying days of the former Miles Government” and due to come into effect on July 1. Read the full article

Opinion / Analysis

John Quiggin: Coal has had its day as Australia’s key energy source — regardless of what politicians driving an energy debate full of distractions tell you over the next few months — and the suggestion that nuclear energy is a viable replacement is a red herring. Coal-fired power is more expensive than renewable alternatives, more polluting and the power stations that use it now are old, generally obsolete and unreliable. They won’t be rebuilt. Read the full article

Elizabeth Dangerfield: It is a pity that many people give up their resolutions so easily, as they can provide a fork in the road leading to better outcomes. Why is it that we don’t choose to do what we know is good for us? I think we all know the answer to that – it is all too difficult! It is easy to succumb to short-term gratification and give in to our basic human nature. Read the full article

John Donnelly: At a time where religious intolerance appears to be on the rise here in NSW, a shining example of religious harmony and collaboration can be seen in Special Religious Education (SRE) in public schools. SRE in public schools offer families with a faith-based worldview the unique opportunity for their children to be educated in their religion during school time. Read the full article

Australia’s High Court recently upheld a long-standing law that says priests are not employees of their churches. They are “office holders”. So where does this  leave the large majority of clergy, denied the rights of employees? The Reverend Chris Bedding is an Anglican priest in Perth and the Faith Workers Alliance executive officer. Listen to the episode

Adis Duderija: In recent years, public and political discussions of Muslim identity have become increasingly polarised, not least because those discussions often framed by two extremes: Islamophobes and Islamic fundamentalists. Both groups, despite their apparent opposition, share a fundamental misunderstanding of what it means to be Muslim. Read the full article

Christopher Warren: Not long ago, in the wake of Trump’s first presidential win, we thought we could fact-check our way out of the misinformation crisis. Trump’s return has quashed that hope: turns out fake news is just part of the “disordered discourse” of truth-free narratives now running wild across online media, from news to comedy to sport. Read the full article

Linda Jacobson: In 2020, when Amy Coney Barrett came before the Senate for confirmation to the US supreme court, one of her closest friends, Nicole Stelle Garnett, told a story on TV about their year together working as law clerks in the nation’s capital. Fast forward another five years. Garnett, now a law professor at the University of Notre Dame, is about to have her own supreme court moment. On 30 April, the court will consider a legal question that has defined her career: can explicitly religious organizations operate charter schools? Read the full article

Fred L. Pincus: The executive order reflects many recommendations from the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, a conservative political initiative to revamp the federal government. But it’s worth noting that the foundation’s attempt to abolish the Education Department goes back more than 40 years. Read the full article

Samuel McKee: The modern architect of the ‘evil-god challenge’ and a notable advocate of humanism in the 21st century, Dr Stephen Law has contended for unbelief against some of the biggest defenders of religion and the best theism has to offer. Read the full article