Church caught in crossfire of public's unholy war

This week I started a blog on the Herald's online site. As a columnist you're usually happy to see a couple of letters published about something you've written, but life is clearly more hectic in cyberspace: Wednesday's blog received 550 responses. The subject was World Youth Day, and it strikes me that this is an interesting snapshot of how Sydneysiders feel about the event.

So what did they say?

The sample was, of course, not representative of the entire community. Not the least reason for this was that readers were responding to an article criticising the Iemma Government's regulation banning behaviour that might annoy pilgrims at World Youth Day events. They had been asked, tongue in cheek, to suggest creative ways of annoying pilgrims. (You might have seen some of their innovative T-shirt slogan suggestions in the Herald on Thursday.) So presumably it mainly attracted people who disagree with the regulation.

Even so, I was surprised by the small number who came to defend it. Some were pungent: "You should be ashamed of yourself for prompting a blog that promotes blasphemy, prejudice and downright disrespect." But of the 25 comments disagreeing with the general tone of the blog, many were not about the new regulation - they were defending the Catholic Church from general criticism (for example, of its views on homosexuality) contained in other comments.

Indeed, compared with the number explicitly defending the regulation, there were almost as many people who made the point they were Catholics and yet disagreed with it.

This generally hostile response to the regulation is in line with the results of the Herald's online poll. As of Friday morning, 10,695 people had given their opinion, with only 10 per cent supporting the ban on annoying pilgrims.

Although there was a lot of general bad feeling about the Catholic Church and World Youth Day in the blog responses, most of the critics who expressed a view on the matter were clear that the regulation is the work of the Government rather than the church. Indeed, I was struck by the bitterness expressed towards the Iemma Government, with the Premier's name mentioned negatively in almost 10 per cent of responses, and generally linked to broader concerns about his Government.

Ten per cent might not sound like a lot, but don't forget this was not an opinion poll on Morris Iemma, whose name had not been mentioned in the article prompting the responses.

The criticisms of Iemma were spontaneous - and often virulent. "Honestly," wrote one reader, "if someone is wearing an annoying or offensive T-shirt no one has the right to arrest them. It's an absolute joke, just like the NSW Premier." Another said, "Iemma has to go!", while one suggestion for annoying T-shirt was "Don't blame me, I voted Liberal".

Some of these comments might have been Liberal plants, but judging by the sometimes obscene anti-Christian sentiments accompanying many, I suspect most weren't.

Although the anti-Iemma comments were by far the largest single category of negative opinions (more than double the next contender), there were also many others criticising the Government more generally, on grounds such as the separation of church and state, freedom of speech, civil liberties, and the fact that this Government is pretty annoying itself (congestion of public transport being the single biggest gripe here). A lot of people were upset about the cost of the event to taxpayers and many referred to the APEC meeting, clearly still resentful of the police action at that event.

Although this was in no way a scientific exercise, the 550 comments plus the large number of respondents to the Herald's online poll indicate this new regulation has become something of a lightning rod for discontent with the Iemma Government. It will be fascinating to see how things go during World Youth Week (for it is almost a week) itself, especially if the folk from The Chaser rise to the challenge. It's a fact of politics that once a government is on the nose, actions and events that would have passed unnoticed just a few months earlier can acquire huge symbolic importance.

One respondent to the blog wrote: "It's the Government which should get a serve on this one. However, unless the Catholic Church dissociates itself from this latest nonsense, it will deserve the consequences. What is happening is that the State Government is using the Catholic Church to legitimate its grab for power and prestige. The downside for the Catholics (and there will be a knock-on effect for other Christians) is that the state will be able to blame the Catholic Church for any negative consequences of this grab."

I think there's a lot of truth in this. I didn't set out to attack the Catholic Church. Although not a Christian, I have a great deal of respect for Christians. I think they do an enormous amount, in terms of keeping certain values alive and in the help they provide to others, to make this the sort of society I want to live in.

Another reason I respect the Catholic Church is because it's an independent institution and I believe it's good for a society to have lots of such institutions. That independence could be at risk once the church gets into bed with government. Particularly a government such as this one.

The new blog is at: blogs.smh.com.au/urbanjungle. This weekend the issue is the relative merits of Sydney suburbs.