Owners? No, ‘custodians’

Sir: Upon the publication of my article “The Politically Correct Pulpit” (March 2017), I was contacted by Anglicans about a major theological problem the piece touched upon. As I wrote, the Melbourne diocese has produced a sign which runs, “We are proud to acknowledge the Wurrundjeri people as the traditional owners of this land”. After pressure from Archbishop Freier, this sign is now displayed outside many parish churches.

I am very reliably informed that in the 1960s and early 1970s, when Aboriginal land rights were being intensely debated, Anglican theologians determined that humans do not “own” land: instead, they have “custody” of it. So it was determined that Aboriginal peoples are traditional “custodians” of this land, not its “owners”. The doctrine commission enshrined this as the national church’s position, and it was taught in theological schools for decades.

So, the Archbishop’s new sign is contrary to doctrine; indeed, for firm theological reasons some clergy are very disturbed by the political signs and Aboriginal flags now imposed on church property.

Christopher Heathcote
Keilor, Vic

Sir: The phenomenon of people apparently living on two different planets alluded to by Alex McDermott (March 2017) is indeed apposite. I do not recognise the split between classical liberals and conservatives in our polity at all. I see a party led by Cory Bernardi and containing only one member which is recognisably conservative, and a larger one led by Malcolm Turnbull which is statist, big-government, against free speech, intrusive and shows not a trace of either classical conservatism or liberalism, social or economic. Where McDermott sees liberals, I see loony lefties. Where he sees conservatives, I see snouts in troughs.

It will be interesting to discover what other voters see. And which planet the majority live on.

Michael Alder
Crawley, WA

Sir: Thank you for publishing Joe Dolce’s astute review (March 2017) of Sarah Holland-Batt’s edition of Best Australian Poems 2016.

Dolce’s careful and detailed analysis of both the editor’s choice of poems published and the editorial guidelines which she laid down but then ignored (to the detriment of those submitting poems for consideration) is invaluable now and will be in the future. Literary historians, too, may well appreciate the convenience thereby provided.

Perhaps even Black Inc, the collection’s publisher, may note the substantial points Dolce raises; this firm has, after all, published recent books by Les Murray, Quadrant’s literary editor. Dolce found that no poem accepted by Murray for your magazine last year was included in BAP 2016.

Suzanne Edgar
Garran, ACT

Sir: I very much enjoyed and was gratified by Joe Dolce’s piece about Best Australian Poems 2016.

I also was invited, on the basis of a poem in BAP 2014, to submit some poems for consideration in the 2016 collection and duly sent in three. One had been published in Quadrant and the other two were new. Joe did not include my name among Quadrant-published poets, but I forgive him as I have appeared there only a few (seven, if you must know) times.

Gratified, because of being one of the number of excellent poets who did not make the cut. I had not known there were so many. This may explain why a respected poet once warned me not to become identified as a Quadrant poet.

I also want to thank Joe Dolce for his judicious and balanced (oh all right, brilliant) article on Bob Dylan’s Nobel Prize in a previous issue.

Peter Jeffrey
Griffith, ACT

SIR: In his otherwise excellent resume of Marlon Brando’s films (March 2017), Neil McDonald made no mention of Julius Caesar—Joseph Mankiewicz’s lean and hungry adaptation of Shakespeare’s tragedy, in which Brando played Marc Antony. It was a film with no frills, no updating, no arty digressions, no gender-mixing, no “reimagining”, and a more or less uncut text. For those of us who love Shakespeare even more than movies, it is perhaps the best Shakespeare film of all—Welles, Olivier et al notwithstanding. John Gielgud (who played Cassius) was so impressed by Brando’s performance that he invited him to go to London to appear on the English stage (in Hamlet, among other things), and who knows where this might have led?

The critic David Thomson, no great fan of the film, nevertheless had this to say: “Marlon Brando’s Antony has always been the star attraction, if only because at the time his shift from mumbling to full-scale Elizabethan verse came as a surprise.” According to Thomson, the film’s producer, John Houseman, who had worked with Orson Welles, “had seen the benefits in a very plain way of doing things”. One can only hope that today’s egocentric directors and self-indulgent theatrical auteurs will heed his words.

Evan Williams
Killara, NSW

Sir: The most disturbing article I have ever read about Islam would have to be Victoria Kincaid’s article “Islamic State, Child Soldiers and Intolerable Islamic Schools” (January-February 2017).

It is obvious to non-Muslims that Islam is encompassed by a legacy of death as laid down in the Koran and related texts. Victoria Kincaid’s article should be taken seriously by all governments, not just democratic governments; and measures put in place to curb and even nullify the teachings of Islam. Muslims who adhere to the teachings derived from the Koran, Hadith and related texts and wish for the introduction of sharia law into democratic countries are potential quislings who will try to destroy democratic societies from within, using our legal systems to achieve their aims.

We in Australia have become acutely aware of the insidious nature of Islam, yet there are apologists on the extreme Left and in Green-leaning groups that seem hell-bent on enabling the spread of Islamic teaching in our schools and universities which is totally counter-productive to the democratic mores of our Australian populace. Why?

John R. Bicknell
Bargo, NSW

Sir: Eric Hendriks’s article “The Eternal Centre: Why China is Not a Model” (January-February 2017) has to rank as one of the more learned and sensible (and sensitive) articles on China that we have seen in recent times. On almost every point he is careful and well-informed.

However, there is one issue on which he does not comment, on which it is difficult to be didactic, yet which may well be at the core of current Chinese politics and policy.

It has to do with the unity—or factionalism—of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). As Hendriks has acknowledged, the CCP now appears to have some 89 million members. At the same time, President Xi has personally chosen to lead or supervise, or at least keep close tabs on, not just the Party but government, foreign relations, the military, the security apparatus, economics generally and Chinese fiscal and monetary policy, not to mention keeping an eye on major construction projects of cities, transport and so forth. In addition, he has set up a powerful and detailed supervision and domestic management apparatus to look, among other things, after the CCP itself, for whose senior ranks he is clearly planning a major reshuffle.

It is beyond belief that a party of such a vast (and, even now, growing) membership, of divergent local interests, peoples and even local languages, would for long remain truly unified, except perhaps in following the national ambitions that have so strongly succeeded the large-scale disappearance of Maoism.

It is true that solid evidence of domestic disagreement is hard to find, let alone to document, given that details of government planning have always been kept most secret until the emperor was ready to reveal them. There may, however, be two things to keep in mind. The first is the question of what issue, or issues, might be powerful enough to keep President Xi himself in charge of so many posts of quite divergent interests and needs, many more than anyone since Chairman Mao has done.

A second and even more pointed issue is why and how President Xi has handled the court cases of Bo Xilai and Zhou Yongkang, both members of the highest ranks of the CCP. The younger man, Bo, had become a member of the Politburo and Secretary of the Communist Party branch at Chongqing, in China’s south-west, where he governed over 30 million people. He was even rumoured to be a likely candidate for membership of China’s supreme governing body, the Standing Committee of the Politburo. From that basis he came to promote strongly Maoist principles and the “red culture” of the Cultural Revolution era of 1966 to 1976. His dismissal in 2012 marked his disagreement with the more moderate and market-based principles of his seniors. That dismissal followed the fall and arrest of his wife, Gu Kailai, who had amassed millions in hidden and often illegal ways. She was even held responsible for the murder of a British merchant who may have threatened to expose her dealings.

Her trial and conviction inevitably cast a shadow over her husband, which allowed his political enemies to end his career. Not only that, but the trial of Bo cast an even more important light on the position of Bo’s mentor, Zhou Yongkang. Here was unquestionably one of the most senior officials of the CCP, the security chief for all of China and Secretary of the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission of the entire CCP. Since he was a supporter of Bo, Bo’s fall made it easier for Zhou’s opponents to unseat him too.

Those opponents clearly included the cautious and relatively obscure Mr Xi, whose final ascent to presidential power may well have stemmed, at least in part, from the anti-Zhong affair. It could also explain the care with which the new President has managed extensions of his power in several directions, ranging from support for nationalist and military affairs, the extension of Chinese power, as well as the assembling of so many and varied posts in his own hands. The entire story might even be consistent with the hyper-active way in which President Xi seems to be preventing the appearance of any kind of non-Xi faction within the CCP.

If that interpretation is at all correct, it could also explain both the ways in which China has secured political advantages around south and south-east China, and the way in which differences with the US and Japan have been left, for the foreseeable future, to the realm of words.

Harry Gelber
via e-mail

Sir: Whilst enjoying Peter Murphy’s puncturing of EU pretensions in “The Anglosphere’s Quiet Revolution” (January-February 2017) I find his statement that the “The modern world exists because the Calvinists found ways of sublimating aggression in work, companionate marriage and self-education” implausible.

This statement seems to be an updated variant of Max Weber’s thesis that “Protestantism gave birth to a unique work ethic that spawned capitalism, and thus it is that modernity is a direct result of the Reformation.” This notion, and much other anti-Catholic propaganda that still circulates today, has been thoroughly debunked in Rodney Stark’s recent book Bearing False Witness: Debunking Centuries of Anti-Catholic History (2016).

To paraphrase a quote in Stark’s book from British historian Hugh Trevor-Roper about large-scale industrial capitalism: the idea that sublimating aggression in work, companionate marriage and self-education was ideologically impossible before the Reformation is exploded by the simple fact that it existed. For example, St Benedict’s rule from the fifth century emphasising the virtue of work, medieval romance writing, and the monastic commitment to study.

Stark’s book is an eye-opener, even for a Catholic such as myself who was already aware that much historical distortion and exaggeration arose out of the Reformation and Enlightenment. It is an indispensable reference, highlighting the need for caution in accepting many secondary sources concerning Protestantism, Catholicism and their impacts.

Chris Hilder
Queanbeyan, NSW