Christianity got off lightly on ABC’s Q&A

Your spiritual belief system is an authoritative part of your internal architecture, embedded in the conscience.

Your spiritual belief system is a quietly authoritative part of your internal architecture, seemingly embedded in the conscience. It probably permeates most of what you think and do. From whence it comes, when and how it gets to grow itself into your mental fabric, is a bit of a mystery.

When Julia Baird was facing daunting cancer surgery in the middle of last year, she prayed. She subsequently wrote in The New York Times: “In the days before the operation I turned off my phone and shut my computer. I prayed so hard I grew unnaturally calm. I felt like a flower shutting in on itself, bracing, preparing for the night, closing to a quiet stillness.”

Later in the column she said: “Stillness and faith can give you extraordinary strength. Commotion drains. The brave warrior talk that so often surrounds cancer rang false to me. I didn’t want war, tumult or battle. Instead, I just prayed to God. And I think what I found is much like what Greek philosophers called ata­raxia, a suspended kind of calm in which you can find a surprising strength.”

The brave and — thankfully — fit-looking Julia may just have hoped someone on her panel during last week’s Q&A special on Christianity would similarly infuse the discussion with something as poignant, profound and arresting as her NYT column.

What we got was “progressive” Christianity, whatever that may be, and a kind of academic overview. You found yourself awaiting a profundity, which must surely emerge, but which remained stubbornly dormant.

Perhaps we shouldn’t await profundity. Perhaps, like happiness and butterflies settling on your shoulder, it just happens — more likely when it’s not anticipated. Everybody tried to make Q&A work, not least Julia (NSW Premier Mike Baird’s sister, frequently the presenter of ABC television’s The Drum and a columnist for The­ ­Sydney Morning Herald).

Not least an old friend from her Radio National days, Julie McCrossin, and not least the managing director of the Australian Christian Lobby, Lyle Shelton. Perhaps the questions were a problem. Not one of them sought understanding or explanation for the mud the church has been dragged through, and splashed with, via numerous child abuse sex scandals. And why hasn’t this affected the popularity of a rock star Pope?

Nobody wanted to know why Catholic priests still can’t marry. No one was asked to define their own ideal Christian template. Nobody was even asked why they were Christian, whether it affected what they did and how they did it. From such probing, profundity might have come. Or not.

We should, in truth, concede that profundity is in the eye of the beholder; thus should we record that a panellist, John Haldane (a visiting Catholic philosopher at the University of Notre Dame), did say this, right at the end: “One difference Christianity makes (is that) ... it recognises our fallibility. And I think that should induce a kind of humility about the human endeavour.”

Anyway, we’ll leave it there so as to have enough space to say cheerio to one Leonie Judith ­Kramer, who passed away on April 20. Kramer, 91, was the first female chair of the ABC (1982-83), having been first appointed to the board in 1977.

A prominent academic, she could be a polarising figure, though the scribe must speak as he found and record that he pretty well always found her kind, accessible and even supportive and encouraging. Few who were/are aware of all the details will easily forget the part Kramer played in the decision to screen the sobering, startling Four Corners episode of April 30, 1983, titled The Big League.

Briefly: the then NSW premier, Neville Wran, was accused of trying to influence a court case involving the then chairman of the NSW and Australian rugby leagues, Kevin Humphreys, who had been accused of illegally “borrowing” about $50,000 from the Balmain leagues club. The story was dug out by the executive producer of Four Corners, Jonathan Holmes, Chris Masters (the reporter) and Peter Manning (producer).

And it hit the Australian political and legal fraternities like a particularly destructive missile. It resulted, directly or indirectly, in Wran stepping down from the premiership and undergoing the indignities of a royal commission (which eventually cleared him).

But then NSW chief magistrate, Murray Farquhar — whom Wran had allegedly tried to influence — received a notional (not fully served) four-year jail sentence for attempting to pervert the course of justice. Not many knew at the time that a preview screening of the story had sent tremors throughABC senior management, who were aware that if too many of a number of serious misconduct claims proved unfounded the ABC could find itself in serious political, financial and reputational strife.

So, the broadcaster’s managing director (referred to back in those days as the general manager), Keith Jennings, took the unusual — probably unique — step of inviting Kramer, the chair, to view the film, then proffer an opinion on whether the ABC should chance its arm and put it to air. Kramer decided to give the program the go-ahead, her decision contradicting that of her deputy, Laurie Short, who believed the story needed additional checking.

Masters is recorded in Ken Inglis’ s excellent 2006 book, Whose ABC?, as saying the entire FC staff gathered together for a drink or two as they waited to hear ­ Kra­mer’s verdict. Masters later wrote: “The secretaries, transcription typists, reporters, sound recordists and editors who had waited back, allowing their evening meals to go cold, all cheered (Kramer’s decision). One more glass of wine was squeezed from the cardboard cask before they headed for the bus.”

It’s fair to say that not all ­Kramer’s decisions found favour with ABC staff. Possessed of a considerable intellect, she could be formidable and singular. She undoubtedly made mistakes.

But she got the FC decision right; such extraordinary allegations required some sunlight. Wran was testy. But he survived. Many who clashed with her — not least the prominent journalist and author, Robert Manne — would not agree, but we’d argue Leonie Kramer was a fundamentally decent, well-intentioned person as, incidentally, was Laurie Short.