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To use an old Labor slogan, ‘It’s Time’. It’s time that all of the MPs in NSW who claim to be religious, but support the killing of unborn children, should be asked to leave the church they claim membership in.

They’re obviously not going to go of their own accord, so it’s especially beholden upon the likes of Anthony Fisher, the Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, to excommunicate them. Yes, it really is that serious.

The My Community Partnership grants will be released this week. And there will be dozens of photo opportunities for proud MPs to have their pictures taken outside many a gothic sandstone church building. However, if religious leaders—of all persuasions—are serious about the sanctity of human life, then they need to disinvite them. But sadly, they almost definitely won’t. Because, as Karl Marx (of all people) is reported to have said:

The Established Church will more readily pardon an attack on thirty-eight of its thirty-nine articles than on one-thirty-ninth of its income.

Just in case you’re still unsure as to where I might be coming from, let me be even clearer. You cannot be a follower of Jesus Christ and also legislate the ongoing practice of murder. It just cannot be done.

Especially when it involves babies still in their mother’s womb before the day of their birth. For this is precisely what the bill currently before the NSW parliament does.

Every Christian denomination down throughout church history has affirmed this basic moral truth. Indeed, you don’t even have to be religious to realise that abortion is ethically wrong. Don’t believe me? Then check out the following link here.

Unfortunately, when it comes to holding people to account, the Roman Catholic Church in particular has failed miserably. Just think of how they responded to clergy who had sexually abused children. But sadly, they are not alone.

For example, Gladys Berejiklian, also claims to be a woman of faith and is a member of the socially conservative Armenian Church. I actually heard her Archbishop speak the other week in Martin Place, and he was excellent. But it’s time for him to explain to the Premier of NSW what the ecclesiastical consequences will be if she continues to support this so-called, ‘reproductive rights’ bill. An Orwellian phrase if ever there was one.

Maybe the reason why religious communities are so reluctant to hold their congregants—who deny the teaching of the Bible—to account, is because they fear that this will only exacerbate their declining ‘market share’.

After all, each successive census confirms that in Australia the Christian religion is, for the most part, on the wane. Although, significantly, it also demonstrates that the more conservative denominations are actually growing. But that’s an article for another day…

But this is one of the main reasons why Christianity is often received with so much derision and contempt. For its failure to uphold its core values and doctrines.

I mean, is there anything more pathetic than someone who claims to believe one thing privately, but then acts another way in public? Psychologists call that kind of mental condition schizophrenia. Whereas Jesus simply labelled it: spiritual hypocrisy. (See Matthew 23 and Mark 7:6-8)

However, whatever illness or label you want to attach to it, what is crystal-clear is that it is completely inconsistent with being a Christian. And as such, the leaders of the various churches—Armenian, Catholic and yes, even Protestant—need to hold these schizophrenic religious politicians to account.

What has become clear is they’re no longer listening to the quiet (conservatively religious) Australians who voted for them. And so, we’re at the point where the leaders of our respective churches need to step in and act.

There’s no place for hypocrisy in politics or — especially — the church. And so, if they’re not willing to repent and act consistently with the religious faith they profess, then they need to be lovingly shown the door.

It’s time.

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Photo: AAP Image/Joel Carrett