Theorizing Religion as Politics in Postsecular International Relations

Abstract

This article reconsiders the political dimensions of religious activity in light of a supposedly emerging post-secular society. I argue that limited understandings of both religion and politics restrict the capacity of scholars and faith-based actors alike to perceive the significant influence that religious actions and rituals can have in the political realm. The article outlines the dimensions of a post-secular society, drawing on the work of Jürgen Habermas, alongside recent critiques of his work by International Relations scholars. It then investigates existing approaches to understanding religion and politics within International Relations, putting forward an alternative framework for analysing the religious and the political in a post-secular society, before turning to an exploration of the activities of faith-based actors in the asylum sector in Australia. The article highlights the ways in which predominantly religious activities, such as prayer, charity and hospitality to the stranger, can have significant political implications, both in the immediate and in the long-term. Scholars, policy makers and faith-based actors themselves need to develop more nuanced understandings of how religious actions take on political meaning, intended and unintended, in order to appreciate the growing influence of faith-based actors in post-secular societies.

Acknowledgements

I would also like to thank Claudia Baumgart-Ochse, Samantha May, Faiz Sheikh, Luca Mavelli and two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and feedback on earlier drafts of this article. All errors remain my own.

Notes on Contributor

Erin K. Wilson is the Director of the Centre for Religion, Conflict and the Public Domain, Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies, University of Groningen. Her research focuses on the intersection of religion with various dimensions of politics and public life, including displacement, development, human rights and conflict and peacebuilding. Her books include After Secularism: Rethinking Religion in Global Politics, and Justice Globalism: Ideology, Crises, Policy, co-authored with Manfred B. Steger and James Goodman.

Notes

¹L. Bretherton, Christianity and Contemporary Politics (Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), p. 15; J. Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, European Journal of Philosophy (2006), 14:1, pp. 1–25; J. Habermas, ‘Notes on a Postsecular Society’, New Perspectives Quarterly (2008), 25:4, pp. 17–29. It should be noted that the term ‘society’ in these discussions refers predominantly to the Western context. This is largely because it is assumed the West went through a process of secularization and thus now the re-emergence of religion as a prominent feature of public debate is leading some to argue that the West is now, or is becoming, postsecular.

²Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, pp. 3–4.

³E. Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, ‘Faith-Based Humanitarianism in Contexts of Forced Migration’, Journal of Refugee Studies, 24:3 (2011), pp. 429–439; J. Haynes, Religion and Development: Conflict or Cooperation? (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan 2007); D. Johnson, ‘Sri Lanka – A Divided Church in a Divided Polity: The Brokerage of a Struggling Institution’, Contemporary South Asia, 20:1 (2012), pp. 77–90; A. Williams, P. Cloke and S. Thomas, ‘Co-constituting Neoliberalism: Faith-based Organisations, Co-option and Resistance in the UK’, Environment and Planning A, 44:6 (2012), pp. 1479–1501; E.K. Wilson, ‘Much to be Proud of, Much to be Done: Faith-based Organisations and the Politics of Asylum in Australia’, Journal of Refugee Studies, 24:3 (2011), pp. 548–564.

⁴T. Asad. ‘The Construction of Religion as an Anthropological Category’ in M. Lambek (ed.) A Reader in the Anthropology of Religion (London: Blackwell, 2002), p. 116; Kocku von Stuckrad, ‘Reflections on the Limits of Reflection: An Invitation to the Discursive Study of Religion’, Method & Theory in Study of Religion 22 (2010), p. 156.

⁵E.K. Wilson, After Secularism: Rethinking Religion in Global Politics (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012).

⁶J. Casanova, ‘The Secular, Secularizations, Secularisms’ in C. Calhoun, M. Juergensmeyer and J. van Antwerpen (eds) Rethinking Secularism (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2011), p. 55; E. Hurd, The Politics of Secularism in International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008), p. 16.

⁷B. Berger, ‘Law's Religion: Rendering Culture’, Osgoode Hall Law Journal, 45:2 (2007), p. 284.

⁸Wilson, After Secularism, Ch. 2.

⁹Asad, op. cit., p. 116.

¹⁰L.G. Beaman, ‘Battles over Symbols: The “Religion” of the Minority versus the “Culture” of the Majority’, Journal of Law and Religion, 28:1 (2012); Stuckrad, op. cit.; B. Meyer, ‘Religious Sensations: Why Media, Aesthetics and Power Matter in the Study of Contemporary Religion’, Oratietekst Amsterdam, Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen. Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, 2006. Available at http://www.vu.nl/nl/Images/Oratietekst%20Birgit%20Meyer_tcm9-44560.pdf [Accessed 31 March 2014].

¹¹Asad, op. cit., p. 116.

¹²S. Sassen, ‘Globalization or Denationalization?’ Review of International Political Economy, 10:1 (2003), p. 7.

¹³J. Camilleri, ‘Postsecularist Discourse in an Age of Transition’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), pp. 1019–1039.

¹⁴E. Gentile, ‘Political Religion: A Concept and its Critics – A critical Survey’, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, 6:1 (2005), p. 30.

¹⁵Gentile, ‘Political Religion’, p. 30.

¹⁶H. Arendt, The Human Condition (1958). Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press.

¹⁷M. Foucault, Security, Territory, Population: Lectures at the Colleges du France 1977–78 (New York: Picador, [1978] 2007), pp. 2, 44–45.

¹⁸Arendt, op. cit.; Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, op. cit.; J. Rawls, ‘The Idea of Public Reason Revisited’ in The Law of the Peoples and The Idea of Public Reason Revisited (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1999).

¹⁹M. Green, ‘Confronting Categorical Assumptions about the Power of Religion in Africa’, Review of African Political Economy 33:110 (2006), pp. 635–650; R. Marshall, Political Spiritualties (2009), Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press; E. Obadare, ‘Religious NGO's, Civil Society and the Quest for a Public Sphere in Nigeria’, African Identities, 5:1 (2007), pp. 135–153.

²⁰L.H.M. Ling and C.M. Pinheiro, ‘New World Making: Yin/Yang Pacha’ in L.H.M. Ling (ed.) The Dao of World Politics (London; New York: Routledge, 2013), p. 144.

²¹A. Pabst, ‘The Secularism of Post-Secularity’, Review of International Studies 38:5 (2012), p. 1011.

²²Examples of such scholarship include M.B. Steger and E.K. Wilson, ‘Anti- or Alter-Globalization? Mapping the Political Ideology of the Global Justice Movement’ International Studies Quarterly (2012), 56:3, pp. 439–454; M.B. Steger, J. Goodman and E. K. Wilson, Justice Globalism: Ideology, Crises, Policy (London; Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2013).

²³W. Connolly, Why I Am Not a Secularist (2000) (Minneapolis; London: Minnesota University Press); Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, op. cit.; L. Mavelli and F. Petito, ‘The Postsecular in International Politics: An Overview’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), p. 931.

²⁴Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, op. cit., p. 15.

²⁵J. Casanova, Public Religions in the Modern World (Chicago, IL: Chicago University Press, 1994); E.S. Hurd, The Politics of Secularism in International Relations (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008); M. Juergensmeyer, The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State (Berkeley; Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1994); L. Leustean and J. Madeley, ‘Introduction: Religion, Politics and Law in the European Union’ in L. Leustean and J. Madeley (eds.) Religion, Politics and Law in the European Union (London: Routledge, 2009), pp. 1–16; D. Philpott, ‘The Challenge of September 11 to Secularism in International Relations’, World Politics, 55:1 (2002), pp. 66–95.

²⁶Habermas, ‘Religion and the Public Sphere’, op. cit., pp. 8–9.

²⁷Ibid., p. 10.

²⁸Ibid.

²⁹For more on this, see R. Bleiker, Aesthetics and World Politics (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

³⁰Mavelli and Petito, ‘The Postsecular in International Relations’, op. cit., p. 931.

³¹Bleiker, op. cit., p. 29.

³²Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, op. cit., p. 10.

³³Bretherton, Christianity and Contemporary Politics, op. cit., p. 15.

³⁴Bleiker, op. cit., p. 29.

³⁵Mavelli and Petito, ‘The Postsecular in International Relations’, op. cit., p. 936; A. Pabst, ‘The Secularism of Postsecularity: Religion, Realism and the Revival of Grand Theory in IR’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), pp. 1003–1004.

³⁶Habermas, ‘Religion in the Public Sphere’, op. cit., p. 10.

³⁷J. Rawls, ‘The Idea of Public Reason Revisited’, in J. Rawls (ed.) The Law of Peoples and ‘The Idea of Public Reason Revisited’ (Cambridge, MA; London: Harvard University Press), (1999) pp. 121–180.

³⁸F. Dallmayr, ‘Postsecularity and (Global) Politics: A Need for Radical Redefinition’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), p. 968.

³⁹Ibid.

⁴⁰Ibid.

⁴¹C. Taylor, A Secular Age (Harvard, MA: Belknap Press, 2007), p. 3.

⁴²C. Eberle, Religious Conviction in Liberal Politics (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002), pp. 313–314.

⁴³Taylor, op. cit., p. 13.

⁴⁴Again, it should be emphasized that Taylor's comments and consequently my own remarks in response are primarily focused on the Western context. I acknowledge that there are a wide variety of ‘default positions’ regarding belief and non-belief across different cultural contexts, including within the so-called ‘secular West’ itself. I am grateful to Claudia Baumgart-Ochse for highlighting this point.

⁴⁵S. Chambers, ‘How Religion Speaks to the Agnostic: Habermas on the Persistent Value of Religion’. Constellations, 14:2 (2007), p. 210.

⁴⁶M. Barbato, ‘Postsecular Revolution: Religion after the End of History’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), pp. 1081–1082, 1096.

⁴⁷E.S. Hurd, ‘The Specific Order of Difficulty of Religion’, The Immanent Frame, 30 May 2014. Available at http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2014/05/30/the-specific-order-of-difficulty-of-religion/ [Accessed 2 July 2014].

⁴⁸Ibid.

⁴⁹Wilson, After Secularism, Chapters 1 and 2.

⁵⁰Such definitions are often implicit rather than explicit. Consider, for example, the tendency to classify religion as simply another kind of ideology, akin to fascism or communism, as seen in Morgenthau's Politics Among Nations (p. 258). As Laustsen and Waever have pointed out, ‘ideology is quasi-religion, not religion per se’ and the classification of religion simply as ideology is a securitized and impoverished understanding of a complex socio-political phenomenon (C. Bagge Laustsen and O. Waever, ‘In Defence of Religion: Sacred Referent Objects for Securitization’, Millennium Journal of International Studies, 20:3 (2000), p. 726). Morgenthau also makes implicit assumptions about religion's irrationality when he says, ‘The passions of the religious wars yielded to the rationalism and the sceptical moderation of the Enlightenment’ (H.J. Morgenthau and K.W. Thompson. Politics Among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace. (New York: Knopf, 1985), p. 240). For additional examples, see Wilson, After Secularism, esp. Chapter 2.

⁵¹G. Davie, ‘Is Europe the Exceptional Case?’ The Hedgehog Review, 8:1–2 (2006), p. 29; I. Strenski, Why Politics Can't Be Freed from Religion (Chichester: Wiley Blackwell), pp. 12 (2010), 30–33; L. Mavelli, ‘Postsecular Resistance, the Body and the 2011 Egyptian Revolution’, Review of International Studies, 38:5 (2012), pp. 1059, 1062–1063.

⁵²Eberle, op. cit., pp. 313–314; For a more extensive discussion of this argument, see Wilson, After Secularism, op. cit., pp. 18, 140–145.

⁵³Eberle, Religious Conviction, op. cit., pp. 313–314; L.H.M. Ling, ‘Worlds beyond Westphalia: Daoist Dialectics and the “China Threat”’, Review of International Studies, Available at doi: 10.1017/S026021051200054X

⁵⁴For a consideration of the political dimensions of prayer, see M. Tan, this volume.

⁵⁵See, for example, the discussion by Markus and Taylor of the work of Faith-Based Organisations (FBOs) working with asylum seekers in Australia. A. Markus and J. Taylor, ‘No Work, No Income, No Medicare – The Bridging Visa E Regime’, People and Place, 14:1 (2006), pp. 43–52; Bretherton also highlights this tendency in his analysis – see L. Bretherton, ‘Religion and the Salvation of Urban Politics: Beyond Cooption, Competition and Commodification’ in A. Molendijk, C. Jedan and J. Beaumont (eds) Exploring the Postsecular (Leiden: Brill, 2010), p. 214.

⁵⁶J. Beaumont and P. Cloke, ‘Introduction’ in J. Beaumont and P. Cloke (eds) Faith-based Organisations and Exclusion in European Cities (Bristol: Policy Press, 2012).

⁵⁷See, for example, R. Bellah, ‘Civil Religion in America’, Daedalus, 134:4 (2005), pp. 40–55; M. Burleigh, Sacred Causes: The Clash of Religion and Politics from the Great War to the War on Terror (New York: Harper Collins, 2007); C. Cherry, ‘Introduction’, in Conrad Cherry (ed.) Religious Interpretations of American Destiny (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1971), pp. 1–24; R. Coles, ‘Manifest Destiny Adapted for 1990s War Discourse: Mission and Destiny Intertwined’, Sociology of Religion, 63:4 (2002), pp. 403–426; A. Smith, ‘The Sacred Dimension of Nationalism’, Millennium Journal of International Studies, 29:3 (2000), pp. 791–814.

⁵⁸G. Clarke, ‘Faith Matters: Faith-Based Organisations, Civil Society and International Development’, Journal of International Development, 18:2 (2006), pp. 835–848.

⁵⁹K. Marshall, ‘Religion and Global Development: Intersecting Paths’ in T. Banchoff (ed.) Religious Pluralism, Globalization and World Politics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), pp. 195–226.

⁶⁰J.A. Rees, Religion in International Politics and Development: The World Bank and Faith Institutions (Cheltenham, UK; Northampton, USA: Edward Elgar, 2011).

⁶¹Haynes, Religion and Development, op. cit.; J. Haynes, Transnational Religions and Soft Power (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2012)

⁶²Clarke, ‘Faith Matters’, p. 840.

⁶³See, for example, G. Kepel, The War for Muslim Minds: Islam and the West (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004); P. Mandaville, Global Political Islam (London; New York: Routledge, 2007); M. Steger, Globalisms: The Great Ideological Struggle of the Twenty-first Century, 3rd edition (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2009).

⁶⁴Clarke, ‘Faith Matters’, p. 840. The specific categories that Clarke uses are: faith-based representative organizations or apex bodies, faith-based charitable or development organizations, faith-based socio-political organizations (the only explicitly political category he includes) and faith-based missionary organizations. For reasons I explain above, while the typologies are useful, I do not think such clear lines can be drawn between the different types of FBOs.

⁶⁵See, for example, C. Baumgart-Ochse, ‘Religious Non-State Actors in Global Governance: Confrontation or Co-operation?’ Paper presented at the International Studies Association Annual Convention, 3–6 April 2013, San Francisco, USA.

⁶⁶E.K. Wilson. ‘Faith-based Organisations and Postsecularism in Contemporary International Relations’ in L. Mavelli and F. Petito (eds) Towards a Postsecular International Politics: New Forms of Community, Identity and Power (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), p. 236.

⁶⁷Interview with Sr Brigit Arthur, Brigidine Asylum Seeker Project, 10 September 2010.

⁶⁸Arendt, op. cit.

⁶⁹L. Mavelli and F. Petito, ‘The postsecular in International Relations: an overview’, Review of International Studies 38:5 (2012), pp. 931–942.

⁷⁰A. Pelligrini, ‘Religion, Secularism and a Democratic Politics of “As If”’, Social Research, 76:4 (2009), pp. 1345–1350.

⁷¹Consider the rise of Geert Wilders in the Netherlands, the Swedish Democratic Party in Sweden, Bob Katter's Australia Party and prior to that Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party; falling voter turnout in the recent US Presidential election (CNN Wire, ‘Election Results 2012: Voter Turnout Lower than 2008, 2004, Report Says’. Available at http://www.abc15.com/dpp/news/national/election-results-2012-voter-turnout-lower-than-2008-and-2004-report-says [Accessed 1 February 2013]); the highest number of informal votes recorded in the 2010 Australian federal election since 1984 (Australian Electoral Commission, ‘Analysis of Informal Voting, House of Representatives 2010 Federal Election’, Research Report Number 12, 29 March 2011. Available at http://www.aec.gov.au/about_aec/Publications/Strategy_Research_Analysis/paper12/files/informality-e2010.pdf [Accessed 1 February 2013]), just 15% of eligible voters turning out in the 2012 Police and Crime Commissioner elections in the UK (The Guardian, ‘UK Elections historic turnout since 1918'. Available at http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/nov/16/uk-election-turnouts-historic [Accessed 1 February 2013]), and falling voter turnout in Canada and France (Elections Canada, ‘Explaining the Turn-out Decline in Canadian Federal Elections’. Available at http://www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&dir=rec/part/tud&document=trends&lang=e [Accessed 1 February 2013]).

⁷²Sassen, op. cit.

⁷³W.E. Connolly, Pluralism (Durham; London: Duke University Press, 2005); C. Lynch, ‘Religious Humanitarianism and the Global Politics of Secularism’ in C. Calhoun, M. Juergensmeyer and J. VanAntwerpen (eds) Rethinking Secularism (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2011); Mavelli and Petito, op. cit.

⁷⁴Interview with C. Coleman, then Director of Hotham Mission Asylum Seeker Project, Melbourne, 6 September 2010.

⁷⁵Interview with B. Arthur, Brigidine Asylum Seeker Project, Melbourne, 10 September 2010.

⁷⁶For further details on the Pacific Solution, see, for example, Markus and Taylor, op. cit. For details of the Pacific Solution see R. Devetak, ‘In fear of refugees: The politics of border protection in Australia’, The International Journal of Human Rights, 8:1 (2004), pp. 101–109; M. Dimasi and L. Briskman, ‘Let them Land: Christmas Islander Responses to Tampa’, Journal of Refugee Studies, 23:2 (2010), pp. 199–218; X. La Canna and I. Gridneff, ‘“Pacific Solution” to end Friday’, The Sydney Morning Herald, 6 February 2008. Available at http://news.smh.com.au/world/pacific-solution-to-end-on-friday-20080206-1qkv.html, [Accessed 28 April 2010]; G. Nicholls, ‘Unsettling Admissions: Asylum Seekers in Australia’, Journal of Refugee Studies, 11:1 (1998), pp. 61–79; K. Von Strokirch, ‘The region in review: International Issues and Events, 2003’, The Contemporary Pacific, 16:3 (2004), pp. 370–381.

⁷⁷For further details of these events, see Refugee Council of Australia, ‘Timeline of Major Events in the History of Australia's Refugee and Humanitarian Program’, 2014. Available at http://www.refugeecouncil.org.au/f/rhp-time.php [Accessed 3 July 2014].

⁷⁸Despite a brief respite from these policies under the Rudd government, Australia returned to its harsh asylum policies under the leadership of Julia Gillard, with the return of bridging visas and most recently the excision of the Australian mainland from the migration zone, meaning that it is now not possible to claim asylum in Australia if one arrives by boat. For more on this, see K. Barlow and staff, ‘Parliament Excises Mainland from Migration Zone’, ABC News, 16 May 2013. Available at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-05-16/parliament-excises-mainland-from-migration-zone/4693940 [Accessed 16 May 2013].

⁷⁹Interview with J. Knight, Ecumenical Migration Centre, Brotherhood of St Laurence, Melbourne, 10 September 2010.

⁸⁰Interview with Coleman, 6 September 2010.

⁸¹Amnesty International Australia, ‘What we Found on Nauru’, 2012. Available at http://www.amnesty.org.au/refugees/comments/30726/ [Accessed December 2012]; UNHCR, ‘Mission to the Republic of Nauru 3–5 December 2012', 2012. Available at http://unhcr.org.au/unhcr/images/Amended%20footnote%202012-12-14%20nauru%20monitoring%20report%20final_2.pdf [Accessed July 2014]; UNHCR, ‘Mission to Manus Island, Papua New Guinea’, 2013. Available at http://unhcr.org.au/unhcr/images/2013-02-04%20Manus%20Island%20Report%20Final.pdf [Accessed July 2014].

⁸²O. Laughland and S.K. Dehghan, ‘Australia Accused of Breaking Law after Returning Asylum Seekers to Sri Lanka’, The Guardian Australia, 7 July 2014. Available at http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/07/australia-accused-breaking-law-returning-asylum-seekers-sri-lanka?CMP=soc_568 [Accessed 8 July 2014].

⁸³Devetak, ‘In Fear of Refugees’, pp. 101–102.

⁸⁴Prime Minister Tony Abbott, Press Conference in Melbourne, 23 June 2014. Available at http://www.pm.gov.au/media/2014-06-23/press-conference-melbourne [Accessed 24 June 2014].

⁸⁵See, for example, the public commentary of Gosford Anglican Church that has attracted substantial media and social media attention – D. Murphy, ‘Gosford Anglican Church's Father Rod Bower and His Signs of the Times’, Sydney Morning Herald, 7 July 2014. Available at http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/gosford-anglican-churchs-father-rod-bower-and-his-signs-of-the-times-20140707-zsz5z.html [Accessed 10 July 2014]; social media campaigns engaged with on Facebook and Twitter on the issue of asylum show a blurring of boundaries between ‘secular’ and ‘religious’ organizations and discourse. Self-identified ‘faith’ or ‘religious’ organizations and movements make use of materials and information from ‘secular’ organizations to support their campaigns, which in itself is not all that new. Yet increasingly, nominally ‘secular’ organizations, such as the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, are utilizing photographs and images from ‘religious’ campaigns that refer to Bible verses, the idea of Jesus as a refugee, and disseminating information about the pray-ins held by the Love Makes A Way movement, discussed in further detail below. This suggests that such ‘secular’ organizations that would previously have been uncomfortable with references to explicitly religious material are engaging more and more with ‘religion’ as a form of politics.

⁸⁶P. Sherlock, ‘Asylum Seekers: Praying for Change’, The Conversation, 20 May 2014. Available at http://theconversation.com/asylum-seekers-praying-for-change-26953 [Accessed 21 May 2014]; Love Makes A Way, ‘About’, 2014. Available at https://www.facebook.com/LoveMakesAWayForAsylumSeekers/info [Accessed April 2014].

⁸⁷C. Bedding, ‘Cranky Christians against Asylum Seeker Cruelty’, The Drum, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 20 May 2014. Available at http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-20/bedding-love-makes-a-way/5465300 [Accessed 20 May 2014]; M. Farr, ‘Eight Church Leaders Detained for Refusing to Leave Tony Abbott's Electoral Office’, News.com.au, 19 May 2014. Available at http://www.news.com.au/national/eight-church-leaders-detained-for-refusing-to-leave-tony-abbotts-electoral-office/story-fncynjr2-1226922778876 [Accessed 20 May 2014].

⁸⁸B. Hyde, ‘Nine Adelaide Religious Leaders Arrested Over Protest at Office of Federal MP Jamie Briggs’, 24 June 2014. Available at http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/nine-adelaide-religious-leaders-arrested-over-protest-at-office-of-federal-mp-jamie-briggs/story-fni6uo1 m-1226965180365?nk=3157eb91639193895668de8ffd8b4893

⁸⁹Bedding, op. cit.; K. Leaney, Kate, ‘Double Victory: “Winning Over the Cops Who Had to Arrest Us”’, Sojourners: Faith in Action for Social Justice, 27 June 2014. Available at http://sojo.net/blogs/2014/06/27/double-victory-winning-over-cops-who-had-arrest-us [Accessed 28 June 2014].

⁹⁰J. McKenna, Jarrod, ‘Holy Week is a Good Time to Get Arrested with Jesus’, Red Letter Christians, 10 April 2014. Available at http://www.redletterchristians.org/holy-week-good-time-get-arrested-jesus/ [Accessed 11 April 2014].

⁹¹Love Makes A Way. Available at https://www.facebook.com/LoveMakesAWayForAsylumSeekers

⁹²Australian Government Department of Immigration and Citizenship, ‘Factsheet 83a – Community Detention’, 2012. Available at http://www.immi.gov.au/media/fact-sheets/83acommunity-detention.htm [Accessed 2 February 2013]; Hotham Mission Asylum Seeker Project, Finding Shelter: A History of the Hotham Mission Asylum Seeker Project (Melbourne: Brougham Press, 2009), pp. 102–107; International Detention Coalition, Case Management as an Alternative to Immigration Detention: The Australian Experience (International Detention Coalition, June 2009). Available at http://idcoalition.org/idc-report-case-management-as-an-alternative-to-detention-the-australian-experience/ [Accessed 8 September 2010], p. 6; G. Mitchell and S. Kirsner, ‘Asylum Seekers Living in the Australian Community: A Casework and Reception Approach, Asylum Seeker Project, Hotham Mission, Melbourne’, Refuge, 22:1 (2004), pp. 119–128; Wilson, ‘Much to be Proud of, Much to be Done’, op. cit., p. 550.

⁹³Interview with Vichie, 17 September 2010; Interview with Coleman, 6 September 2010.

⁹⁴Hotham Mission, op. cit., p. 102; International Detention Coalition, op. cit., pp. 11, 13; Mitchell and Kirsner, op. cit., p. 127.

⁹⁵Jesuit Refugee Services, ‘Australia: Calling For an End to Detention of Children’, Jesuit Refugee Services International Office Newsroom, 13 June 2014. Available at http://www.jrs.net/news_detail?TN=NEWS-20140612024301 [Accessed 2 July 2014].

⁹⁶Interview with Sister Brigid Arthur, 10 September 2010; Interview with Sister Rosemary Baker, 16 September 2010.

⁹⁷Interview with Coleman, 6 September 2010; Asylum Seeker Resource Centre 2014. https://www.facebook.com/Asylum.Seeker.Resource.Centre.ASRC?hc_location=timeline

⁹⁸Bretherton, Christianity and Contemporary Politics, op. cit., p. 15.

⁹⁹Interviews with Coleman, 6 September 2010; 1 November 2010.