First 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.  

Continue reading “2022 COLLOQUIUM RESTROSPECTIVE“ →

This 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 anchor in Sydney.  I should apologize, by the way, for appropriating the term ‘Athens of the South’ for little old Hobart.  I’ve since been reminded that Adelaide has long claimed it for its own.  I guess I’m guilty of cultural appropriation – never a good look when an old white geezer does it. 

Once in a while Providence throws up a splendid synchronicity of famous births.  The second-last decade of the fifth century (480-490 AD) was one of those special times.  What other period and place in history has produced three people whose influence on the centuries to come has been as potent and far-reaching as St Benedict, Boethius and Cassiodorus?  

Continue reading “Reclaiming the Christian Intellectual Tradition “ →

13 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 of her community who were refugees from the Islamic State. ² 

Continue reading “Freedom for me, but not for thee” →