Vince Zankin
Here is some of Vince Zankin's editorial writing:
Sorry situation
Pope John Paul's unreserved apology to Aboriginal people for
the Church's part in forcibly separating children from their
families renders Australia's absolute refusal to offer a national
apology as shamefully immoral.
Rev Vincent Zankin
Rivett, ACT
http://bulletin.ninemsn.com.au/bulletin/EdDesk.nsf/0/07adfe671423a248ca256b0f008197a9?OpenDocument
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Opportunistic appointment
Is it any wonder that Prime Minister John Howard should choose a "war hero" at a time when the political stakes of his own Government are so intricately tied to the present debate about the legality or otherwise of, or whether, the Australian people were misled in having our troops join the US-led invasion of Iraq?
And how on earth can the new G-G expect to be "apolitical" with respect to the Government's brazenly immoral record on refugees, Aboriginal reconciliation and the continuing debate on Iraq in which an estimated 5540 innocent Iraqi civilians lost their lives?
What this all serves to highlight is that the office of governor-general is outdated and it is one that can clearly be subject to abuse by a politically opportunistic prime minister - such as the incumbent.
I hope this will be the very last appointee to the office of
governor-general, for in the future we should all be voting for a
president of a newly constituted Australian republic whose office
will not vicariously operate under the token jurisdiction of a
foreign and distant monarch.
Reverend Vincent Zankin,
Rivett, ACT
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/06/24/1056220598883.html
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We need to build bridges with Islam
After Bali, we are no longer free to take sides in this global war of terror between Islam and Christendom.
There is, however, only one true way out of this potentially frightful dilemma: we must build bridges between the Muslim and Christian faiths instead of walls of suspicion and derision that will never bring us the prospect of peace.
But how can we build bridges when we so gleefully and so deliberately deprive Muslim asylum seekers of their humanity and their dignity?
And how can we build bridges when we blatantly support Christian East Timor at the total expense of our relations with a predominantly Muslim Indonesia?
We owe it to all the victims and their families to put a stop
to the senseless and politically opportunistic racism that this
nation has openly inflicted on Muslims.
Reverend Vincent Zankin, Rivett, ACT
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/10/14/1034561094987.html
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Date: October 28 2002
After the latest Islamic terrorist attack by Chechen rebels in Moscow against what is historically a Christian nation, human history is fast approaching a point where staunchly absolutist positions among the world's major religions must be seriously challenged in the name of God and humanity.
According to the United Nations Universal Declaration on Human Rights, every human has the right to be free from religion, but they also have the inalienable right to be free for religion.
Consequently, all religions carry a great responsibility in ensuring that humanity will no longer be held ransom to whatever religious affiliation a person may freely choose.
Islamic terrorism and the US-declared war on terrorism are instead taking humanity back into the pre-modern period in which a ruthless and relentless religious bigotry determined whether a person would ultimately live or die.
This is definitely not a time for Christian and Islamic nations to again stubbornly declare war on each other. This is a time for every Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu and Buddhist to jointly declare that we all share in the one human and divine consciousness and that taking human life in the name of God will never be justified.
Rev Dr Vincent Zankin, Rivett (ACT), October 27.
http://www.smh.com.au/text/articles/2002/10/27/1035683303056.htm
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Archbishop George Pell's assertion that abortion is a greater moral evil than child sexual abuse by clergy contradicts the pronouncement made recently by Pope John Paul II that such clergy are engaged in "the worst form of evil".
Does Archbishop Pell hope to make all offending male clergy feel better about their misdemeanours at the expense of women who decided to have an abortion? And how often has the church blackmailed women into having an abortion when a priest fathered the child?
Dr Pell's comments are also reminiscent of another well-known former archbishop who was forced to later apologise for stating that the sexual abuse of a 14-year-old girl by a married clergyman was "rather the other way round".
Many of the church's male clergy consistently perpetrate the lie - embodied in the biblical myth that attributes Adam's fall to Eve, his temptress - that women are morally inferior to men.
Fortunately, the Pope is beginning to break ranks with these stubborn male clergy.
Rev Dr Vincent Zankin, Rivett (ACT), August 5.
http://www.smh.com.au/letters/2002/08/05/
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It is time for the United States to proceed with Oslo II in the Middle East to prevent the bombing campaign in Afghanistan from plunging the region towards a more dangerous and radical anti-Israel and anti-US posture.
Iraq's Saddam Hussein is rapidly gaining power and prestige from the counter-terrorist campaign as a champion of the Palestinians and the whole Muslim world in contrast to moderate Arab leaders who are not standing up to Israel and its US benefactor.
Oslo I failed to bring about a negotiated separation because Israel built peace with one hand and greedily built settlements with the other, while Palestinians built peace with one hand and built hatred of Jews in mosques, schools and textbooks with the other.
For Oslo II to succeed, the US must address what is at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict: Jewish and Muslim devotion to the historic and sacred Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Otherwise, the world will continue to be held hostage to one of the most intractable religious conflicts in human history.
The Rev Dr Vincent Zankin, Rivett (ACT), October 8.
http://old.smh.com.au/news/0110/10/html/letters.html
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The terrorist bombing of the US World Trade Centre and the Pentagon is a shocking signal of global proportion to awaken humanity to the fact that differences between the world's major religions must be reconciled if humanity is going to live in peace.
The Jewish Torah, the Christian Bible and the Koran of the Muslims contain many irreconcilable differences that have effectively kept these religions apart for centuries. A protracted full-scale Middle East war involving US and NATO forces now unfortunately seems the only option left for the Christian West to finally come to terms with Islam. Ever since the Gulf War against Iraq in 1991, the religious divide between these two vast historic civilisations has remained chillingly intractable.
There is now, however, only one other option: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights must become the absolute and non-negotiable core value of each of the world's religions. Otherwise, without a global revolution in fundamental religious belief, the US war on terrorism will ultimately fail to eradicate what is undoubtedly humanity's most grave and divisive historical legacy.
The Rev Dr Vincent Zankin, Rivett (ACT), September 12.
http://old.smh.com.au/news/0109/14/html/letters.html