Cash and chaplains: the continuing seduction of the church

The announcement of the Federal Government’s $90 million “God Squad” (National Schools Chaplaincy Program), and the response by the churches, was depressingly predictable.

For the Howard Government, there is no separation between church and state. While the treasurer lectures the Muslim community about their need to accept “the separation of church and state in Australia”, he is propping up the religious establishment by pouring millions of dollars into their pockets.

The God Squad is but the latest program which ensures, in the eyes of government, the rightful role and place of religion, and especifically, churches in Australian society.

And the response was equally predictable. Take the money and run according to a leading Sydney Anglican. Not only should churches be applying “for any funding that’s around”, but also churches should be writing “to the government to thank them”.

This is a seduction, which in the end leaves everyone very satisfied. The government gets to extend its “soft theocracy”, and the churches, fast losing members, balance yet another budget. Evangelical entrepreneurs and astute religious financial managers tapping into the market fundamentalism of the Federal Government, now keep the churches in business.

Never have so few Christians been paid so much from the Federal Treasury to survive.

A stroll through the government’s budget shows the degree to which the Howard Government is funding religious big business.

More than $10 billion has gone into church schools and it’s increasing. Since 1997, “Christian affiliated independent schools enrolments have risen 450 per cent”. The Christian Community Schools, a network of Bible-believing, evangelical schools (“all staff must agree that the Bible is infallible and inerrant”) are mobilising for increased funding. For the cost of a postage stamp, the God Squad program will deliver another $20,000 into the budget of every church school in Australia.

The integration of church schools into the market economy was complete when one church school, in its goal to be the brightest and best and richest, poached “the entire Year 10 championship volley ball team” from a neighbouring government school. No church school is going to make headlines with its scholarship program for 100 children with disabilities from the western suburbs.

Churches actively participated in the destruction of the Commonwealth Employment Service, and were rewarded with job network contracts running into millions of dollars. Churches are set to receive some $20 million every year, “to provide abortion counselling services”. Another $20 million will go to the Catholic Church for “the 2008 World Youth Day to be attended by the Pope”.

The Howard Government’s education loan scheme not only funds the training of the nation’s clergy, but has enabled the dramatic expansion of the training colleges of every charismatic Christian education group. Hundreds of thousands of Australian Defence Forces' dollars go to army chaplains, all holding officer rank

However, it’s in the aged care area where the church may get its first glimpse of its own vulnerability and the market forces, which it has so strongly supported. Millions have been poured into religion-based aged care services, by the government. But aged care is also the most lucrative of all services, and the global financial institutions are beginning to move. It is reported that Macquarie Bank, following deals done with Salvation Army, is targeting the aged care assets of Uniting Care, Anglicare and Baptist Community services (The Australian, July 22, 2006). Watch carefully how the churches respond to these approaches.