‘It is true that Christianity is not bound up with any particular race or culture. It is neither of the East or of the West, but has a universal mission to the human race as a whole…’
– Christopher Dawson
- DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – DECEMBER 2025by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesIt was a great night on Wednesday 12 November for the Dawson Centre’s Melbourne Launch, with the event at capacity. I am very grateful to Fr Dean Mathieson for hosting us at St Peter’s Parish Centre in Toorak. Archbishop Julian Porteous delivered an engaging address on the importance of the Christian faith for arresting the decline of western civilisation and in particular the need to defend religious freedom. Declining birthrate in the West One particular contemporary issue that very clearly and tangibly demonstrates this decline and which is starting to receive some limited attention in the mainstream media is that of collapsing … Continue reading DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – DECEMBER 2025 →
- DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – NOVEMBER 2025by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesIn this newsletter I want to draw your attention to continuing efforts to undermine religious freedom in Australia. The Allan Labor Government in Victoria has recently introduced a Bill into parliament to significantly lessen the supposed ‘safeguards’ around the so-called Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017, which legalised assisted suicide and direct killing of those meeting certain medical criteria. The proposed Allan Government amendments seek to make what was fundamentally bad legislation even worse. These amendments would allow ‘registered health practitioners’ to initiate discussions about assisted suicide or direct killing with those suffering significant illness, which is currently prohibited primarily because … Continue reading DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – NOVEMBER 2025 →
- DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – SEPTEMBER 2025by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesA BLAST FROM THE PAST Dear Reader, I’m grateful to the new Director, Alex Sidhu, for offering me a curtain call by appointing me guest editor of the September newsletter! After eight months of retirement, it’s pleasant to be engaged once again in the Dawson Centre’s business before returning to the equally pleasant joys of being master of my own time. I shall remain a member of the committee however, and greatly value that ongoing connection. I begin this newsletter by paying a compliment to Alex. He has had a very difficult year. His principal and challenging goal has been to find funding to enable … Continue reading DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – SEPTEMBER 2025 →
- DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – 4 August 2025 by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesDear Readers, I want to thank you again for your patience over the last six months as attempts were made to secure the future of the Dawson Centre. There are still many challenges ahead but I am pleased that we are now moving to resume the regular operations of the Centre. In particular I am pleased to announce that we are currently working on finalising dates for the next Colloquium to be held in Melbourne in 2026, (details will follow in the coming weeks). In my first newsletter as the Director of the Dawson Centre I wanted to share with … Continue reading DIRECTOR’S NEWSLETTER – 4 August 2025 →
- ‘Wokery’ its Origins and Objectives – a Work in Progress by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies6 November 2023 Dr Ian McFarlane Introduction – Define Woke As this study is essentially a journey from the real to the unreal in an attempt to make sense out of the nonsense this illustration taken from Hesse’s Steppenwolf is an appropriate motif for the paper. Although I refer to Wokery as an Ideology throughout this paper, this is just for convenience as given the deep inconsistencies within the propositions we are presented with one should properly describe Wokery simply as a Phenomenon of our era. At times their reasoning is so obscure and riddled with meaningless jargon I am … Continue reading ‘Wokery’ its Origins and Objectives – a Work in Progress →
- The Voice Campaign and our loss of trust in institutionsby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies26 September 2023 Philip Crisp The Voice referendum to be held on 14 October would make the most significant change to our Constitution in its history. It is timely to remind ourselves of the principles of liberal democracy articulated in the west during the Enlightenment period, as well as the roles of institutions supporting those principles. The principles remain sound, but the institutions are failing us because they have lost focus on their proper purposes.
- After the Referendumby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies13 September 2023 Professor Matthew Ogilvie When goodwill and unity prevail, the best people will have the most prominent voices. When ill will and divisiveness prevail, the loudest voices will be those who seek division and revenge. I fear that the ‘Voice’ campaign has divided our nation. Whichever way the referendum goes, if we can heal from the divisive experience (and I emphasise ‘if’) it will take years.
- 2022 COLLOQUIUM RESTROSPECTIVEby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesFirst published in the Christopher Dawson Centre Newsletter, July 2022. To subscribe, please fill out this form. We don’t send too many newsletters, rather fewer with content rich, thought pieces intended to spark conversation and community. Last Saturday’s Colloquium was the big event of our year. It lived up to our expectations and indeed soared beyond: all papers were well and evenly matched in their force and relevance.
- Reclaiming the Christian Intellectual Tradition by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesThis talk was delivered by Christopher Dawson Centre‘s Director, Dr David Daintree, at the first official Sydney dinner held on 27th October 2022 at The Royal Automobile Club of Australia. Lovely of you all to turn up tonight at what is the Dawson Centre’s first official venture beyond Tasmania and ‘the Athens of the South’. I thank you all from my heart, but my warmest thanks must go to Sophie York and Naomi Spinks. Sophie for her precious friendship and passionate energy on behalf of Christian civilisation; Naomi, as assistant director of the Centre, for her loyal dedication as our … Continue reading Reclaiming the Christian Intellectual Tradition →
- Freedom for me, but not for theeby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies13 October 2022 Professor Matthew Ogilvie This week, the Federal Labor government announced that it would expend significant resources to repatriating members of the Islamic State. While these IS members are presumed to be noncombatants by virtue of their sex and ages, they have been part of an evil organization that raped, tortured and murdered its way through the Middle East. Its victims included Yazidis, Christians and homosexual people. The situation is so serious that Opposition Leader, Peter Dutton expressed grave concerns after an ASIO briefing,1 and local MP Dai Le spoke of the hurt the repatriation would cause members … Continue reading Freedom for me, but not for thee →
- Christopher Dawson and the Intellectual Roots of Campion College Australia by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studiesby Karl Schmude This article appeared as a Guest Editorial on 6 October 2022, in the Christopher Dawson Centre Newsletter. To subscribe, please fill out this form. We don’t send too many newsletters, rather fewer with content rich, thought pieces intended to spark conversation and community. As one of the world’s foremost historians of culture, Christopher Dawson saw the centrality of education to the process of cultural transmission – the ways in which a society passes on its inheritance of learning and memory as an expression of its cultural identity.
- WHY CATHOLICS ARE SUITED TO POLITICS by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies31 August, 2022 Professor Matthew Ogilvie Recently, a friend involved in politics spoke about an unpleasant situation. I shared my advice, which I thought would be midway between Machiavelli and Mother Teresa. My friend’s face lit up in amazement. He said that he ‘was given the exact same advice in the same words by [a former government minister who is Catholic]!’ Then he asked, ‘What is it with you Catholics and politics?’
- RESTORING TERRITORY RIGHTS BILL 2022 by The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesMr Julian Leeser (Berowra), 2 August, 2022: This is not the first time I’ve risen in this place to speak on this matter. Every few years, the old arguments are dusted off and freshened up and someone wants to raise the flag on this issue or thinks the numbers might finally be in their favour to turn the tables. In the last parliament I said that I rose with a heavy heart; today the weight is doubled. I’m sad that we are fighting what I sense will be a losing battle. I think that, in time, we will look upon … Continue reading RESTORING TERRITORY RIGHTS BILL 2022 →
- Letter to the Editorby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesRe: Article: ‘Exposing the ‘modern green religion’Catherine Sullivan Note that all references and links in this article were viewed on 23rd May, 2022 or 18th June, 2022. I am writing to express my shock and unease at an article published on the website of the Catholic Archdiocese of Tasmanian describing a presentation from Professor Ian Plimer to the Christopher Dawson Centre. I did not attend the presentation but trust that the article was an accurate summary of the presentation.
- PRO-ABORTION REACTIONS – NO SURPRISESby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesBY PETER FLEMINGJune 2022 At the time of writing, it has only been twenty-four hours since the Supreme Court of the United States overturned the Roe v Wade determination of 1973, and two predictable consequences have come to pass.
- The Australian Catholic Church, the Bishops, the Catholic Weekly and Russia and Ukraineby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesDr Robert Tilley, Catholic Institute of Sydney 30 May 2022 DisclaimerI want to make it clear that though I work at the Catholic Institute of Sydney, the opinions expressed herein are mine and not, as far as I know, shared by the Institute or for that matter anyone else who works at the Institute. The opinions and arguments are mine and mine alone.
- The Feminine Genius in The Lord of the Ringsby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesCatherine SheehanFebruary 2022 The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien is a story all about “fair love”. It is a story about the beauty, goodness, and grandeur of sacrificial love. In this presentation I will examine the three main female characters in LOTR in light of what St John Paull II called the feminine genius.
- Psychopathy and the Origins of Totalitarianismby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesDecember 25, 2020, James Lindsay Many of the greatest horrors of the history of humanity owe their occurrence solely to the establishment and social enforcement of a false reality. With gratitude to the Catholic philosopher Josef Pieper and his important 1970 essay “Abuse of Language, Abuse of Power” for the term and idea, we can refer to these alternative realities as ideological pseudo-realities.
- The Case Against Abortionby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural StudiesThe New York TimesOPINIONROSS DOUTHATThe Case Against AbortionNov. 30, 2021 A striking thing about the American abortion debate is how little abortion itself is actually debated. The sensitivity and intimacy of the issue, the mixed feelings of so many Americans, mean that most politicians and even many pundits really don’t like to talk about it.
- On Zoe’s Lawby The Christopher Dawson Centre for Cultural Studies10 December, 2021By Peter Fleming The Crimes Amendment (Zoe’s Law) Bill 2019 in New South Wales is seen by some in the Pro-Life movement as a pathway to the recognition of the human rights of aborted foetuses. Let us hope so.