by 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. 

31 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?’ 

Mr 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 this as a huge mistake, but even if the Restoring Territory Rights Bill 2022 is passed I will not regret standing here today and being counted. There are times in your life when doing so is important, and today for me is absolutely one of those days.