G’day! Pastor David Robertson on Australians.

Posted on by Ark

A comment I left on the Wee Flea blog in reply to comments between John Z and Robertson will most likely not see the light of day.

But it is worth a post.

Now here’s a surprise.

The bulk of John Z’s comments concern the general Australian view regarding religion which is … in his words … In Australia, in case you haven’t already realised, religion is a private affair.

He also asked ….
What makes you think they want to learn about your church?

To which you replied …
The intelligent ones do.

Ouch!

You have been at pains to dismiss John’s view in one form or another on practically every reply,

And yet, on the very site you linked – 3rd Space – we find this comment on a post by one of the other main contributors , Stephen Mcalpine ;-

Annabel Crabb’s article points out that while most Australians, 71 per cent, think that “occasionally” or “most often” religious discrimination occurs in their country, a majority also believe that religious people should keep their religion views to themselves.

Crabb also points out that religious leaders are held in low esteem by the vast majority of Australians. 

So, this would appear to support John’s initial assertion.

What is of concern, of course, is there you are in Australia, enjoying the hospitality of the locals when meanwhile you have the gall to state in a open forum that you consider the vast majority of Australians are not intelligent enough to ask you about your church.

Well, isn’t that just bonzer!

I haven’t taken a screen shot, so in case he takes the post down, be my guest and go read. HERE

Oh, and HERE’S the 3rd Space Article that, contrary to what Robertson believes,  does appear to support John’s assertion about Aussies and religion.

 

Ah! Gotta love them Christians, right?

Ark.

91 thoughts on “G’day! Pastor David Robertson on Australians.”

  1. I should think “intelligence” has nothing to do with wanting to know about someone else’s religion. Discretion, yes, or “I don’t care”, but intelligence?

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    1. He truly is amazing … for all the wrong reasons.
      As I mentioned, the 3rd Space site is one Robertson and his religious pals set up!
      And right there,on the site, is an article affirming exactly what John pointed out to him!

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  2. Our daughter, who has lived there since 2007, says that in general people don’t mention religion. The times it does come up in conversation, she says, it’s a little embarrassing. . In that, most people’s reaction is that they are uncomfortable in the presence of a spouting evangelist. When I’m there (I’ve been going for two-three months at a time since 2010) it’s hardly given a mention. In fact, even among religious people (and I know some there, as I’ve made some friends through the years) it’s almost a taboo subject. I have met some keenly intelligent people there, believe me.

    Methinks Robertson is full of shit.

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    1. I was somewhat gobsmacked when I read : the intelligent ones do.
      In fact, I re-read that part of the dialogue to be sure I was not misinterpreting anything.
      I reckon his remark would not be well received by the majority of Aussies.

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      2. Dead right Ark this man is kangaroo bait. The last discussion anyone would have either drunk or sober is about religion. NZ has been confirmed as having an atheist majority, Australia is not far behind.

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          1. Yep the church up the road is occationally sending their devotees out to knock on doors and drop flyers in letter boxes.
            Big Church with very small congregation, would be bankrupt if they had to pay taxes.

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    2. So right Carmen, there are churches but most have pathetic numbers and only exist due to donations and of course the tax free status. I am pretty sure they only exist on a wing and a prayer.

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      1. I’ve just returned from there and for whatever reason, my ipad believes I live there now. Many ads that pop up are from there and – just recently – a new religious group has materialized in Melbourne, so I’m getting peppered with those. . . I’m sure the average Australian pays as much attention to those as I do. 🙂

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  3. Took a walk over, and left two posts, none of which will, I suspect, last long.
    Had to post my website, which these days is an exercise in trust, since it no longer works the way it should. Sadly.

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      1. I don’t know, hon. I can post, but can’t respond to anyone who answers. I click on ‘respond” and I get a snarky thing from Google that tells me I have to use my google account, and then refuses to let me.
        It’s a mess, and I may just have to start a new one. Sans google.

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          1. this was two days ago. It’s been a null game ever since. I even went so far as to ask Blogger for help, and all I got was ‘this sounds like the same problem you have last spring. have a nice day!” I even dug into Google to see if there was a way to rout them away from the blog, and nothing works. I think this one’s dead. Oh, I can post, but that’s about all. These things are a two way street, and when that stops working, you might’s well put up the for sale sign. It also appears that my two posts have disappeared (are we surprised) and he has closed out ‘responses’ for earlier posts. Y’all can read, but you can’t comment.

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          2. If you check your history and click on the first time you visited the (Robertson’s) post your comment may still be visible, as he does not usually visit his blog directly.

            As for your own dilemma …. I’m as much in the dark as you, Judy.
            Looks like you will have to come over to the Dark Side and open a Word Press account.
            Oh, the horror!
            🙂

            Liked by 2 people

          3. I looked at your last post, and there were still comments. But that may have been from cache. I tried in a different browser, and there were no comments.

            Have you tried a different browser? I keep one browser for all things google (and very little else). And I use a different browser for almost everything else.

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    2. Your comment does not show on his blog as everything goes into moderation.( only you can see it at the moment)
      You can post it here if you think it won’t see the light of day.

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  4. What a complete tool. He is just flat out abusive to anybody who disagrees with him. It always makes me laugh when guys like that attack critics with their lack of empirical evidence. As if the truth of any religion was rife with empirical evidence.

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  5. That was quite funny. I kept posting excerpts from articles stating over and over again the general attitude of Australians to religion (to paraphrase: “keep it to yourself, please”), but he kept dismissing it all… while presenting absolutely nothing to counter. He even trashed the immigration group whose very mission is to help educate foreigners (LIKE HIM!) on Australian culture so as to avoid cultural misunderstandings.

    The man is an assclown.

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    1. You said:

      “the general attitude of Australians to religion (to paraphrase) “keep it to yourself, please”)”

      —which is a bit unrealistic when big bucks are involved. Especially unrealistic for someone not to the manner born.

      IF YOU have a product for sale and you didn’t get out there selling, you’d be doing yourself a disfavour, no? Especially for a non-Australian, especially for someone whose income and/or eternity depends on harvesting souls. (Aaah, souls~!)

      Could it be that the nice man is (in his opinion, Sir, not mine) (ouch …) literally “bringing civilisation to the savages”?

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    2. JZ: humble apologies, I missed this at first glance … “Australian” and “culture” … isn’t that a contradiction in terms?

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    1. Seen this before! Perfect example.

      I just can’t get over the fact he is running you into the ground when on the 3rd space site one of his flunkies has a post up corroborating exactly what you told him.
      Does he not pay attention to anything?

      On the video How good is The Good Book on 3rd Space there is another Pastor – Ed Shaw – who is gay and Robertson addresses him as someone ”… who experiences same sex attraction …” and he’s polite and apparently tolerant towards and yet … on his latest post we find this:

      The biblical teaching is quite clear. Sex is sacred and is to be kept within marriage – and marriage is between a man and a woman. Sex outside marriage whether heterosexual or homosexual is wrong.

      I mentioned the hypocrisy but he ignored it.

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    2. OMG, imagine being that full of yourself that you genuinely believe others want to hear you preaching on a train. . . Jesus H. I was embarrassed for him. Good to hear that Aussie-accented bit of sense, too! Good on him, mate. . . Eh? 🙂

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          2. They were filming it and Number One Knob turned to the camera and said something like:
            ”This appears to be private property ( they were at the V&A Waterfront) so we are going to such and such and carry on there.”

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          4. Their leader was, another speaker (sic) sounded like a local.

            BTW, Ems wants to know if you went to watch the Grand Prix yesterday?

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          7. I lived there for 6 years, but it’s a colossus. The restaurant scene is the best I’ve seen anywhere in the world, by far. Theatre/music/bars/nightclubs also the best I’ve ever experienced. The shopping is incredible. More private helicopters than anywhere else in the world… 12-times NYC. It truly is a GREAT city, but it hardens you. PT (political party) made a real mess of things, too, so getting out was an easy decision to make.

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    3. I was hoping they’d all join together and start singing John Lennon’s song, Imagine. Or that they’d just let him go on an nauseum and someone time him and then say, *Ding Dong your 3 minutes is up.*

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    5. I managed 44 seconds. Once I’d have let him bleat on, but (if The Spouse isn’t there to drag me off) these days I’d invoke what’s left of a parade ground bellow and take him on, point for point. He looks like fun … and I missed him. Damn. (I put it down to an act of God …)

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        1. A muted ‘full on’ … I’d have enjoyed him, volume for volume (until The Spouse dragged me off—she’s a bit like that, believes in peace and stuff).

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        2. World needs more grey-haired guys … you know, blokes who’ve done the distance and are entitled to Freedom from bellowing anuses (ani?) (damn—arseholes).

          I’d love to know how that hero Yank would have got on in Mecca, or Iran … “Play it again, Sam”

          “No wucking fay, Dude. I’m staying here and playing it safe!” (Meaning: let theother guy get nailed to a cross for spreading the word.)

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          1. I think trains in general should be places of peace and quiet. The local (Bay Area California) social justice warriors, however, think that a crowded train travelling in a tube under the Bay is the PERFECT PLACE for FREEZE PEACH, which is defined as local teenagers contorting themselves to awful rap music and then cadging their audience/victims for change. “Art” we are told this be. I guess I am not liberal enough anymore.

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  8. While I think people would greatly benefit by visiting/considering my blog, it would be outright foolish to say people are not intelligent if they do not.

    But the greater issue is: define intelligence.

    Takes intelligence to tie your shoes, wash a window, play chess, insert an IV, read an x-ray, or a million other things.

    To be fair, the god pastor must lack intelligence himself by not posting my comments, which enlighten, and generate interest and response, but who am I to say…..

    (And I know certain believers that I have very little in common with, and of course atheists I know who are friends, and while having not much in common re spiritual things, we still enjoy each other’s company.

    There is equal blame to go around when people can’t be sociable because of this it that.

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    1. “… can’t be sociable”?

      That guy was a rowdy intrusion—rather than lauded he should have been dragged off the train and charged with disturbing the peace; perhaps even with trying to incite a riot.

      Define intelligence? Simple … anyone who agrees with me. No?

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      1. I commented on THAT before Argus. Not my point today-

        Anyway, yes, it would be equally impropriety to start preaching to a crowd who had no option to go away- about macrame, fishing, guns, or politics.

        Very few people are wise today.

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        2. Didn’t yet see your comment—but that guy was an automaton, no? An organic robot programmed to go out and intrusively bellow at people innocently going about their business. Not good.

          I think good ground could be made for having him arrested as a public health hazard. (And I still love that movie “The Man Who Sued God”)

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  9. and disagreeing with someone does not equate with stupidity.
    Thank you, CS, for ‘getting it”.

    Intelligence also allows for making personal choices, regardless of what someone else may
    think of it. And minding your own business about someone else’s religion is not stupidity,
    it’s discretion.

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  10. Well, I’ve read that 96% of Australians worship tree bears and kangaroos as gods; so it’s hard for me to take anything about those people seriously. Also, they talk funny and don’t speak ‘Murican correctly. Never a good thing. 🙂

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    1. LOL. define Murican correctly. Which state? Which region? It’s so diferent from region to region some folks from Florida have trouble understanding Northern Maine which is half scots and half French Canadian, as well as two thirds Yankee…

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      1. From the Dictionary of ‘Murican English: “Real ‘Murican is the American English spoken by anyone who is not a leftist, socialist or raging SJW libtard, i.e. English spoken by MAGA-hat wearers.”

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    2. Insp:

      Worship bears and roos?
      At least these things are real and can be demonstrated.
      But when we think of it, the guys who came up with the concept of worshipping an invisible intangible god was actually quite clever. Brilliant, even—just look at the fortunes he and his mates have made.

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      1. I’ve been trying to get rich by selling Tree Bear traps to the Aussies for years now. Perhaps I’d make more $$ if I said they were invisible and dropped onto them from trees located in a timeless, invisible magical realm. Thanks! You’ve given me a great idea!

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        1. INSP—

          don’t forget, halfies … (each! From memory most Aussies will want at least two halfs …).

          As for selling to the Aussies, they may be easy but not quite that easy. While we’re here they tell me they have a bridge in Seedney Harbour going cheap … you may be able to do a straight swap?

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    3. Which, as I pointed out over at Maka’s place, means they are indeed fools.

      “That is not dead which can eternal lie,
      And with strange aeons even death may die.”

      I’ah, I’ah

      [O]utside the ordered universe [is] that amorphous blight of nethermost confusion which blasphemes and bubbles at the center of all infinity—the boundless daemon sultan Azathoth, whose name no lips dare speak aloud, and who gnaws hungrily in inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond time and space amidst the muffled, maddening beating of vile drums and the thin monotonous whine of accursed flutes.[9]

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  11. I could quote you regarding me “I see you’re still talking with that nob”. Have you no shame?
    I would comment over there but certain it would never see daylight. I heard the words “your done” on his other trash blog.

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  12. Dammit … can’t find my Bible. I know I have one here somewhere. (Sheesh! How am I gonna scare off the draculas when they come calling?)

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  13. Well Ark, I left a reply at David’s blog. Here is how it went. He is like many of the zealous christian control freak pastors who blog. 1.) They have to moderate everyone’s comments first. 2.) They are quick to try and humiliate you. 3.) They accuse you of behaving as they really do. 4.) When they start to lose the argument, poof you are banned.

    It would be quite funny if it didn’t reveal their true nature . Very sad. And unfortunately, they have an influence on many people and how they think.

    in response to David, Ken writes: “The intelligent ones do.” I am not an Atheist nor do I associate with “Organized Religion” anymore because of statements like the one above made by you. Though I don’t have data to back this up, I don’t think it’s a stretch to say you’ve already turned off many of the people you are trying reach.

    in response to Ken, David writes: – of your reason for not believing in Jesus or what you somewhat sneeringly call ‘Organised Religion’ is a light hearted humourous response, then there is not much I can do to help you. You would really have struggled with Elijah’s mockery of the prophets of Baal, or Jesus’s description of the Pharisees as ‘white washed tombs – twice dead!’. And of course you don’t have data – you go by your feelings and on that basis feel quite happy to condemn others and make judgements about the effect of their actions…

    in response to David, Ken writes: Isn’t this “The Pot calling the Kettle black” ?

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    1. I read the exchange.
      I doubt your final comment will see the light of day.
      He really can’t see how arrogant and ignorant he truly is.
      Condescending to the last comma and full stop.
      I wonder what issues he had as a kid?

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      2. It seems as though the ones who had issues as a kid growing up , say when they are adults, ” I think I’ll become a Pastor” Jim Jones, David Koresh, Ted Haggard, Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, Fred Phelps, Mark Driscoll just to name a few………….

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        1. Maybe there is a correlation?
          Wasn’t it tradition in the ”olden days” that the gentry sent their first son to the army and the second to the church?

          I seem to recall reading that, Robertson’s son is / becoming a pastor.

          Just what the world needs, right?
          SMH

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          1. “…Robertson’s son is/ becoming a pastor.”

            The family that preaches BS together, stays together.

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    2. KC:

      Hey … if you were God, wouldn’t you censor anything that might reduce the following(s) you’ve build up over the millennia? (In all your many and varied guises …)

      Ol’ God went to a lot of effort for you ungrateful-swine flocks.
      But don’t fret, when it comes time for the lions to lay down with the lambs, yea verily, them lions will be protectively surrounding them lambs —in all dimensions …

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  14. I posted to Robertson’s site, endorsing John Z’s comments re Oz attitudes to religion, and questioning the preacher’s anecdotal “evidence” over those of us born and bred there. Needless to say, the Gatekeeper denied me entry.

    How is it Robertson was allowed into the country, damnit! He should have been impounded by customs, and put into quarantine, like all the other weird live and taxidermied exotica that visitors try to bring here.

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    1. If it were moi (meaning: if I could even be bothered) I’d leave a message advising them to find my response to their efforts on my own blog, where they are free to demolish anything I say … on MY blog, of course.

      If someone won’t humour you with allowing a response on his own blog, the least you can do is give him some publicity on yours? (You know … the old “turn the other cheek” thing?) And post links so that no-body could say any underhand deviousness was involved. Flip a rock over in the swamp and all sorts of horrible slimy bottom feeders scamper ….

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    2. CHRIS:

      You spelled ‘erotica’ wrong …

      (you know, things that f— people up). In this case their minds—control their mind and it matters not who controls their body, no? (‘Cos you do—I think it was one of the great popes said that first, and he was right. It explains a lot, to those with eyes to see and ears etc)

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  15. I don’t understand Robertson’s position. Is he trying to lecture an Australian on Australian social customs? Y’all were doing him a favor by pointing out he’s going to have a bad time. Oh well, no good deed goes unpunished, I guess.

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    1. Weren’t you aware? Robertson is God’s Gift to … well, just about everybody, I guess.
      He’s busy saving Aussies in their droves as we speak.

      Before long, even John Z will preface every future post with the Lord’s Prayer and a heads up to Jesus David Robertson.

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  18. I just provided this comment but I doubt it will see the light of day.

    How many millions of people prayed for the two world wars to not start and for their men and women to come back alive as it is estimated 110 million people died in those wars and how many prayed for food and medicines from the third world and still do pray but do not receive because 20,000 children continue to die every day? Why also does your God allow mass shootings in such a Christian country as the USA where in 2019 517 were killed and 1648 were wounded?

    So the obvious question is why would your God listen to people praying about bush fires and the loss of mostly property but only a hand full of lives?

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