We produce a free weekly Social Issues briefing. Each briefing is about two pages long, and gives some background information on an issue that has recently been in the news. It will offer some ways of thinking about it, and perhaps acting on it, as Christians.

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In a society where abortion is so common and enjoys such extensive legal and political protection, we suggested that Christian resistance might aim to create a child- and woman-friendly culture, where pregnant women under adverse circumstances really can become mothers. We wanted to see churches become ‘oases of welcome’ for women and their babies. But we have to admit that our suggestion has remained merely theoretical... until now

The Australian Human Rights Commission has begun a ‘Freedom of Religion and Belief in the 21st Century Project’ to map the state-of-play for freedom of religion and belief in Australia. The project seeks to address the experiences and place in civil society of every religious belief (including ‘secular belief’), and especially that of Muslim communities. This project is extremely important to Christians...

We can be very glad that this society does not support abandoning people with disabilities to street begging, or killing off the elderly and frail, or allowing the very ill to expire alone in some corner. But the problem with this fine sentiment is what we fail to see. In some ways our society does allow these practices to occur, and when they don’t occur it is precisely because there are carers who care.

As we approach the anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it seems fitting to move into unusual terrain and spend some time thinking about the place of nuclear weapons in today's world.

In early May NSW Attorney General John Hatzistergos introduced the Miscellaneous Acts Amendment (Same Sex Relationships) Bill 2008 into the Legislative Council of the NSW parliament. (This NSW State Bill is not to be confused with a recent Federal Bill introduced by the Federal Attorney General, Senator Robert McClelland; see link below.) John Hatzistergos described how the Amendment Bill is a further step in a long process of NSW legislative reform.

As the opening of the Olympic Games on 8 August approaches, world attention is on China, and this attention is persistently on issues other than sport. Human rights abuses and environmental concerns are top of the list. All of this begs the question: should Christians be more active on these moral issues?

Archbishop Jensen has recently decided not to take his Sydney bishops to the Archbishop of Canterbury’s forthcoming conference in Lambeth, London. Do the grounds for the boycott—in this case, differing views over the place of homosexuality in our fellowship—mean that conservative Christians and Anglicans are ‘homophobic’? Are they obsessed with sex? Has the Anglican church now split?

Why was an expression of regret so inadequate for many indigenous people? What makes it seem imperative for them to hear the word ‘sorry’? What is so important about this word? In this extended briefing, we will try to understand why it seems so important for ‘sorry’ to be heard from the lips of the nation’s leader, and we will consider the sticking-points against saying it. We will confine our attention to the issue of the Stolen Generation, although some of what follows may apply to other ways in which white colonials harmed indigenous people.

The Queen's celebration of sixty years of marriage is bound to become increasingly unusual as people marry later and as more marriages dissolve in separation and divorce, despite increasing life-spans.

The General Synod of the Anglican Church in Australia recently passed a number of resolutions relating to climate change. One of them ‘requests all organisational units within the Anglican Church of Australia to reduce their environmental footprint through best practice energy use, water use, and waste disposal.’ But what is the value of such resolutions? In this briefing, we will argue that they are realistic and helpful. We will also consider what makes people sometimes respond cynically or negatively to resolutions such as these.

We guess APEC does not top your list of interesting topics. Some people are annoyed at the disruption to life in Sydney. Most will just stay well away and enjoy the public holiday. But perhaps the following two opposing opinions will help you glimpse the great issues at stake:

Everyone has been stretched over the past few weeks by the Commonwealth Government’s intervention into the affairs of remote Northern Territory (NT) indigenous communities... So many complex issues have emerged that this briefing will have the limited aim of summarising the details, listing some opinions for and against the Government’s action, and offering some provisional suggestions. As always, these suggestions invite further thoughtful reflection together, along with indigenous people, in light of the Scriptures.

Being able to freely cast your vote is not a privilege enjoyed in every part of the world. With a Federal election on the way, Australians become more aware of our ability to participate in the democratic process.

Assume we have passed the point where half the planetary oil has been used. With billions of people now using oil, the remaining half will last nowhere near as long as the 150 years it took to use the first half.

This briefing on climate change will be the last in our series for the time being. It will outline the directions that some future community discussions will take. It will also suggest a discussion that we may need to have with the most voiceless members of our community—our children.

The amount written on climate-change presents us with a difficult knowledge-problem. Some knowledge-problems are to do with too little information: some datum is missing that will unlock the puzzle. This knowledge-problem is the opposite: there is too much information, and the mystery resides in how to meaningfully stitch it together.

Rather than thinking about a particular social issue in this briefing, we pause to consider—why bother at all? Why attempt to think Christianly about issues like euthanasia, pornography or gambling?

Whereas colonial slaves were treated as a valuable investment, like an ox, the treatment of these modern slaves is even more demeaning. There is a worldwide glut of displaced people, and modern people-trafficking is cheap. Legal slavery may have been abolished, but we now face an era of ‘disposable people’.

‘You can’t change the weather,’ we all used to say with a shrug, to make the point that some actions are well beyond the powers of puny humans. But a disagreement has opened up among U.S. evangelicals about the extent to which we can, or cannot, change the weather.

It is difficult to obtain good measures of the extent of domestic violence. Violence between intimate partners and other family members was (and sometimes still is) regarded in many countries and cultures as a normal and acceptable part of life that should not be disclosed outside the family.

Few of us have much grasp of the scientific details of the case for climate change; we cannot easily follow the spin-off arguments about emissions trading schemes, alternative energy sources, and the economic consequences of making changes; and we have little power over the solutions. We can easily feel helpless and a little depressed over the whole of the subject of climate change. Therefore we aim to produce several briefings on it throughout the year.

Until last week, most of Australians would not have heard of Dr John Elliott. Last Thursday, Dr Elliott took his life. He was 79 years old, suffering a terminal condition called multiple myeloma, was experiencing severe pain, and had been cared for by his wife for the previous seven years.