Popular Religion in New South Wales and Van Diemen's Land from 1788 to the 1850s

Abstract

It is the task of the historian to make the past intelligible to contemporary society. The investigation and reflection on the past must be a contribution to the understanding of significant contemporary issues and debates. Religious history in Australia has been dominated by the issues of denominationalism and sectarianism. For contemporary Australian society these issues are of diminishing significance. Australians today are less likely than ever to identify themselves with the particular denomination into which they may have been born. For regular church attenders or Christians looking for a church in a new location, issues such as the style of the service, the personality of the priest, minister or pastor and the broader designations of evangelical, charismatic, conservative or socially committed are likely to be of more significance than the traditional denominational labels. Sectarianism has largely disappeared as an issue in Australian society. The "publics" no longer shout, "Conny-wackers stink like crackers on a Sunday morning", as they pass the local Catholic parish school. Even when the Moslem community wishes to build a mosque in the local area, the objections are couched in terms of noise pollution and traffic problems rather than religion. ..... By examining issues such as the influence of Deism, the significance of providential language, the concepts of natural religion, natural justice and civil religion, the significance of personal religion and the rites of passage, and ideas of moral improvement, it is possible to demonstrate that there was a coherent religious world view which can provide a meaningful interpretation of Australian colonial culture. The thesis will demonstrate the existence of a popular religious culture which acted as a viable alternative to the formal doctrines of the denominations. However it should be stressed that this popular religious culture was not of a uniform nature. It was not a hitherto undiscovered denomination which sought to evoke a general consensus of opinion. Rather it was a set of ideas on which both "traditional Christians" and supposed "practical atheists" could draw in the hope of making sense of human experience in a new environment. The thesis thus offers an approach to the religious history of Australia which is meant to provide an escape from the intellectual dead end which has been the result of the conflict between the evangelicals on one side and the secularists on the other, and which has characterised our understanding of the early colonial period.