MELBOURNE, Victoria (ChurchMilitant.com) – Victoria’s fake-Catholic premier is forcing the faithful to hire homosexuals and transgenders.
Dan Andrews
Dan Andrews announced new “anti-discrimination” laws, on Friday, that affect the hiring and firing authority of religious institutions.
“Religious organizations and schools will no longer be able to sack or refuse to hire people based on protected attributes such as sexuality, gender identity or marital status,” the premier’s statement reads. “Religious organizations and schools will only be able to make employment decisions based on an employee’s religious beliefs where these are inherent to the job, such as a religious studies teacher or a principal.”
In other words, the Equal Opportunity (Religious Exceptions) Amendment Bill will force Catholic institutions — most notably schools — to hire homosexuals and the severely gender-confused, even those in so-called same-sex marriages. Catholic institutions will also be prohibited from firing those individuals.
This will force Catholic employers to violate their sincerely held religious convictions and abandon the teachings of the Church. The Church’s doctrinal office, under then-cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, wrote in 2003 that in “situations where homosexual unions have been legally recognized or have been given the legal status and rights belonging to marriage, clear and emphatic opposition is a duty. … One must refrain from any kind of formal cooperation in the enactment or application of such gravely unjust laws.”
Melbourne Abp. Peter Comensoli
Melbourne archbishop Peter Comensoli lamented the bill’s passage, writing:
The government has imposed an unbalanced law on people of faith, which adds to a steady decline of religious freedom in Victoria. … The legislation is a serious overreach by the Victorian government into the rightful freedoms of faith-based organizations. It unfairly targets and undermines the ability of faith organizations to confidently manage employment matters according to their mission.
However, Comensoli has rarely opposed the pro-abortion, pro-gay premier. In fact, as recently as last month, Comensoli permitted Andrews to desecrate the Blessed Sacrament at a funeral Mass the archbishop celebrated.
Andrews recently passed a pandemic management bill granting himself totalitarian authority and circumventing the checks and balances of the parliamentary system. Among other dictatorial provisions, the bill permits the premier to arrest citizens as a public health threat on the basis of their religious beliefs. Comensoli remained deafeningly silent on the subject.
Although he lobbied the government earlier this year to permit the unvaccinated at Mass, Comensoli recently introduced segregation into Masses in Melbourne, dividing congregations according to their vaccination status. The archbishop’s new guidelines for Mass attendance state, “If a person can show evidence of [receiving the vaccine], they can enter as fully vaccinated. If they cannot show evidence of any of the above, they are not considered as fully vaccinated and may only participate in groups allowing for ‘unknown vaccination status.'”
Comensoli also forbade priests in his archdiocese from attending the popular freedom rallies or publicly praying for an end to lockdowns.
Parishes will also now require China-virus “check-in marshals” to police their countrymen’s vaccination status.
In order to pass his Hitlerian pandemic bill, Andrews and his Labour Party brokered deals with crossbenchers (independents) in the upper house of Parliament, promising to back fringe legislation in exchange for votes. One of those crossbenchers was Fiona Patten of the Reason Party (a merger between the Australian Sex Party and the Voluntary Euthanasia Party). Patten sold her vote to Andrews in exchange for his support for anti-discrimination laws like the one just passed — as well as decriminalizing prostitution and banning the Our Father prayer from Parliament.
Andrews and his government have consistently opposed the Church. Bill Muehlenberg, secretary of the Family Council of Victoria, declared Andrews to be “Australia’s most shameless Christophobe.”
In 2008, while he was serving as minister for health, Andrews voted unilaterally for the most pro-abortion legislation the nation had yet seen. When Catholic officials questioned his vote, he responded, “I did not intend to be a Catholic health minister.”
Dan Andrews voted unilaterally for the most pro-abortion legislation
More recently, in 2017, Andrews’ office worked hard to legalize euthanasia. Victoria became the first state in the country to permit so-called assisted dying.
He has also rabidly promoted the LGBTQ agenda, even apologizing for Australian laws outlawing homosexuality — over 30 years after those laws had been repealed. In 2014, Andrews was the first Australian premier to march in a “pride parade,” and in 2015, he appointed a full-time “gender and sexuality commissioner” to push sexually deviant propaganda.
Andrews campaigned in 2017 for the legalization of gay “marriage,” tritely professing, “Love is love, fair is fair and equality is not negotiable.” Early in 2021, the Andrews government passed a bill to outlaw conversion therapy. The bill classifies parents as criminals unless they condone their child’s homosexuality or gender confusion.
The Equal Opportunity (Religious Exceptions) Amendment Bill demonstrates that Andrews is far more committed to the LGBT creed than to the creed of the Church.
