Dr Diedre Palmer, President of the Uniting Church, takes part in a panel discussion on the latest draft of the Religious Freedom Bill on the ABC’s national radio program, "Niightlife".
You can listen back to this interesting and informative discussion at https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/nightlife/religious-discrimination...
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President Dr Deidre Palmer has voiced the Uniting Church’s concerns about the latest draft of the Religious Freedom Bills on the ABC’s national radio program Nightlife.
“We have concerns that this Bills may establish a hierarchy of rights so that religious expression is privileged over other human rights,” Dr Palmer told Nightlife host Philip Clark.
“The Uniting Church believes in the protection of people’s freedom to express their religious faith. So where this legislation seeks to strengthen and protect that we support it, but we don’t support a bill which may undermine the human rights of other people.”
Dr Palmer said that while Christians were not persecuted in pursuing their faith in Australia, the experience of religious minorities particularly in the Muslim and Jewish communities could be better protected.
She went on to warn against “narratives of harm” in certain interpretations of scripture that had marginalised women, the LGBTIQ community and First Peoples.
(from Uniting Church in Australia Assembly news item, https://assembly.uca.org.au/news/item/3134-rights-and-wrongs-and-religio..., accessed 29/02/2020)
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