Miranda Devine: ‘Australian Rugby will rue the day it sacked Folau’

Australian Rugby will rue the day that it sacked its best player Israel Folau for quoting a bible verse on Instagram, writes Miranda Devine.

Australian Rugby will rue the day that it sacked its best player Israel Folau for quoting a bible verse on Instagram.

While sportspeople like tennis star Nick Kyrgios can throw chairs around the court and behave disgracefully yet keep their careers, Folau must be eliminated because he has committed the only sin worthy of punishment today: causing offence to rainbow totalitarians.

Liars, fornicators, thieves, atheists and idolaters (aka Catholics) didn’t take umbrage at being told to repent to avoid Hell.

Folau’s bible quote on his private Instagram account would have gone unnoticed if it weren’t for activists on the hunt for offence who pretend to speak for all homosexual people, most of whom just wish they’d just shut up and leave well enough alone.

It’s laughable that rugby boss Raelene Castle justifies her craven, bungling by citing “inclusiveness”.

“When we say rugby is a game for all, we mean it,” she said at her press conference this afternoon.

Wallabies star Israel Folau has had his $4m contract with Rugby Australia torn up. Picture: Joel Carrett

Only if “all” excludes fundamentalist Christians like Folau.

Castle kept mouthing the words “the values of Rugby Australia” but what are those values?

The only value evident in this sorry saga is her willingness to destroy the career of her best player to mollify woke sponsors like Qantas.

Her press conference was a master class in cluelessness. She uses politically correct euphemisms as a shield to protect herself from the enormity of what she has done.

“We understood that the posts Israel made did create some concern among a portion of our community and did create some harm.”

What about the harm done to young Christians seeing how Folau has been crucified for expressing his beliefs, and how their loving religion has been besmirched as homophobic after she decided to make a mountain out of a molehill.

Rugby Australia chief executive Raelene Castle speaks to the media on Friday after revealing Folau’s contract has been terminated. Picture: Don Arnold

Folau had no idea he’d done anything wrong. He wrote his post with love. There was no effort to understand his point of view, just zero tolerance from the tolerance police.

The court which found against Folau was always going to back RA’s dreadful decision. But there is disquiet across Australia which will grow after today’s decision, whether you are Christian or atheist, gay or straight, left or right. People can see that this is just the beginning of a repressive new dark age.

Christians in rugby now know they live under a cloud, despite Castle’s pathetic attempt to reassure them under questioning yesterday: “We had a prayer circle on the ground between players after the game last weekend and Rugby Australia and the Waratahs are

completely supportive of that”.

That’s big of them. So prayer circles aren’t yet grounds for dismissal. Good to know.

Perhaps the most telling moment of Castle’s media statement came when she thanked, “all of those people from across rugby, from across other sports, both here and overseas, and all those people in the community for their support during what has been a very difficult period.”

Newsflash, Raelene, you’re not the victim here.