Christianity has just been declared to be illegal in Victoria:
I have said it often enough: Victoria under Dan Andrews and the Labor government is becoming the Antichrist State. And a vote in the Victorian Upper House last night was the final nail in the coffin. There we had politicians formally voting to turn Christians and other concerned citizens into criminals.
Only nine brave and principled MPs voted against this diabolical bill. One media report said this about the vote, and it informs us of these courageous nine MPs:
Gay conversion therapy has been outlawed in Victoria following a marathon debate in the upper house on Thursday. The bill passed the Victorian Parliament 27 votes to nine after a 12-hour sitting in the Legislative Council, where Liberal MPs Bev McArthur and Bernie Finn defied their party’s position and crossed the floor to vote against the government’s legislation.
Crossbench MPs Jeff Bourman, Clifford Hayes, Stuart Grimley, Tania Maxwell, David Limbrick, Tim Quilty and Catherine Cumming also voted against the bill. Under the reforms, anyone found trying to suppress or change another person’s sexuality or gender identity faces up to 10 years’ jail or fines of almost $10,000 if it can be proved beyond reasonable doubt that their actions caused serious injury.
The Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission will also get new powers to deal with complaints that do not meet the criminal threshold, and to launch own-motion investigations into systemic issues as part of a new civil scheme for victims. The Family Violence Protection Act will also be amended to make gay conversion therapy a form of domestic violence.
The Change or Suppression (Conversion) Practices Prohibition Bill is the latest in a series of contentious progressive social reforms introduced under the Andrews government, and drew the ire of religious, medical and legal groups. The Law Institute of Victoria raised concerns on behalf of lawyers that the bill was overly broad and could prevent parents or caregivers from having conversations with their children about gender identity or sexual orientation.
The article continues:
Liberal MP Bernie Finn had described the proposed law as an “attack on basic freedoms” and described elements of the bill as “social engineering”. “None of us support some of the practices that have been used on gay men and lesbians, what can only be described as torture, in the past—just appalling, inhumane and, as I say, just straight-out barbaric,” Mr Finn said.
“We know that gender dysphoria is a condition that is dealt with very effectively by the medical fraternity. We do not need the sort of social engineering that this bill brings about. We have already seen a great number of children go to the children’s hospital, for example, confused about their gender … It has gone from half-a-dozen a year to well over 1000, as I understand it. That in itself is a worry. This bill is just going to add to that.”
Law Institute president Tania Wolff and chief executive Adam Awty wrote in a letter to the Justice Department that it had received “concerned feedback” the bill was “overly broad” and could prevent parents or caregivers from having conversations with their children about their gender identity or sexual orientation. https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/gay-conversion-therapy-banned-in-victoria-after-marathon-debate-20210204-p56zls.html
I and others have written often in the past about just how dangerous this sort of legislation is. See these past articles for more on this: https://billmuehlenberg.com/category/law-and-legal-issues/conversion-therapy/
What should be done?
The real question that remains now is how should we respond? Now that potentially hundreds of thousands of Victorians have been proclaimed to be criminals overnight, we are living in the darkest days since Australian federation. As former Deputy PM John Anderson put it late last year, this bill “is the biggest threat to our democratic freedoms in Australia’s entire legislative history.”
Indeed, if politicians wanted to officially ban freedom, democracy and Christianity, this is about as good a way as any of achieving that result. Cover it all in sweet-sounding words: compassion, fairness, equality, tolerance. Of course, there is no fairness or tolerance for Bible-believing Christians.
And there is no compassion or fairness for those struggling with unwanted sexual attraction. This is all about one thing: the criminalisation of Christianity, and an all-out war on heterosexuality. Now in Victoria you MUST support and endorse the radical homosexual and trans agendas – or else. That is the bottom line.
So which way do we go from here? Simply consider the political reality in Victoria. For all intents and purposes, it seems that the Liberal and National Parties are now dead – dead at least to real conservative and Christian concerns. Except for a handful of brave warriors such as Bernie Finn, these parties are now hardly any different from Labor and the Greens in far too many areas.
Many more questions remain. I have been writing numerous articles of late on anti-Christian bigotry and persecution. In one such piece I spoke about the doctrine of “the lesser magistrate” which deals with the matter of if and when we have an obligation to resist corrupt government: https://billmuehlenberg.com/2021/02/02/runaway-government-and-the-lust-for-power/
One astute commentator just sent in this remark, which we all need to ponder. It features the same sort of questions that I have. We all need to think carefully and prayerfully as we now proceed in the most demonic Antichrist state in Australia, if not the West:
I agree with what you have written above, and I would also add how the Huguenots in France also developed their very similar theory of resistance, following the great massacre of Huguenots in 1572. An anonymous Huguenot published a treatise, “Vindiciae contra Tyrannos” (A Defence of Liberty against Tyrants, 1579), which inter alia asserted not only the right but the duty of the lesser magistrate to lead resistance against a tyrant who usurped the laws of God and oppressed church and state. The ideas of this treatise influenced Samuel Rutherford in his treatise “Lex Rex” (1644), and in turn the treatises, sermons, and pamphlets which circulated in the American colonies prior to their revolt in the 1770s.
My question is this: what form should resistance take in our present situation? We have a premier (or premiers) who violate God’s laws, make laws (such as the one passed last night in the Victorian Upper house) for the benefit of homosexuals and “gay” activists, for abortionists, for unscrupulous medicos, etc., but penalise the righteous in every way possible. My own view is that Andrews’ government has lost all—and I mean all—legitimacy and must be resisted outright, not merely disobeyed in this or that point. However, unlike the Huguenots and Scottish Covenanters (and the American patriots for that matter), who took up arms in their resistance, we should resist in ways other than armed conflict. But in what ways? I propose this as a point for urgent discussion, as this tyrant will soon be coming after us, and I fear that you and your website will be near the top of the hit list.
Quite right Murray Adamthwaite. These are no longer mere theoretical questions. We are now living in an anti-Christian police state run by the most power-drunk political leader in the nation. The Rona has just been one excuse for this man to seek to become dictator for life. And as long as true Christians still exist, he will keep going after them until they are all silenced – whether by being imprisoned or wiped out of all their assets.
That is exactly how serious things have now become. What the prophet Isaiah warned about two and a half millennia ago is now fully upon us: “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter” (Is 5:20).
As Fr. Dwight Longenecker put it a year or two ago: “First we overlook evil. Then we permit evil. Then we legalize evil. Then we promote evil. Then we celebrate evil. Then we persecute those who still call it evil.” Yep, that is exactly where we are now at.
And Victoria is leading the way under the new Nero, Andrews. Heaven help us all as we seek to remain faithful to what is right and what is true while we live in a culture that celebrates what is wrong and what is false.
Declaration of intent
Here’s the scoop Dan: If troubled folks come to me to discuss their sexuality, and if they ask me for prayer, I will discuss these matters and I will pray. So crucify me already. Here I stand, I can do no other.
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