Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Australians to take the emphasis off religion in a new attempt to integrate Muslims

"The new Australian Government, led by Kevin Rudd, has decided that it will try to engage with a wider Muslim community in the country rather than allowing the dialogue to be always mediated through religious leaders.
This is a departure from the approach of the previous Howard government, which had created a Muslim Advisory Board consisting of the usual imams and clerics who were more interested in promoting religion than bringing Muslims into the mainstream.
Now a new attempt will be made to recast the image of Muslims in Australia as overly-religious. The Government wants to recruit sporting figures, academics, business people and others who represent a broader face of the communities.

[...]

Mr Ferguson said a broader body would be considered. "We would always seek to have the broadest representation in any national committees established," he said. "There's a belief that, per se, Muslims are always more religious than other groups. But I know a lot of Muslim youth in my electorate that are totally irreligious, or it's marginal to their existence and they don't spend a lot of time thinking about the Koran.""

National Secular Society, 14 March 2008
This should be noted. In Norway a year ago, or something, the Police announced that they wanted more Muslims to join the Police, and their solution was to go recruiting in the mosques. Only.
But as you can see from the chart below, that is hardly a representative part of the immigrant population. (Church/Mosque attendance to the left)

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