Lyle Shelton - Australian Christian Lobby:
On Saturday, "suffer the little children"
At election times, many Christians leaders exhort us to cast our vote for others - not for self-interest. I agree.
Like never before, Christians are concerned about their freedom to preach the gospel in its entirety and to live out their beliefs in public.
We should be concerned about these things because they are under threat in ways not seen for hundreds of years in the Anglosphere.
Who would ever have thought a Catholic Archbishop would spend six months tied up in a legal process simply for teaching about marriage and the rights of children to their mum and dad?
Labor and Green election pledges promise more, not less of this.
But the most important issue at this election is not our freedom of religion or freedom of speech.
It is hard to rank injustice because injustice is injustice.
Christians can agree to disagree on the most just ways to treat asylum seekers and to stop drownings at sea. While "whatever it takes" is never the answer, I am glad there are no children left in immigration detention.
But I think the biggest promised policy injustice of this election still relates to how we treat children.
Labor has made an election promise to use $6 million of taxpayers' money to teach children as young as four that their gender is fluid. The Greens also back this unequivocally while the Coalition promises to defund "Safe Schools" next year.
The "Safe Schools" program gives children information about sex change surgery and suggests this can happen with or without parental consent.
It encourages schools to let young men identifying as girls to be in the girls' toilets and change rooms.
As former Labor leader Mark Latham says, this ideology is anti-biology and anti-science. Many feminists agree.
Children struggling with gender identity issues should of course receive our utmost compassion and should never, ever be bullied. But meeting this aim should not mean inducting the rest of the class into contested gender theory.
It is hard to go past the injustice inherent in another of Labor and the Greens' signature policies. Legislating same-sex marriage also legislates the lie that mothers and fathers don't matter to children.
Causing children to miss out on their mother or father - not through tragedy or desertion, but through government policy - tramples children's most basic human right.
Only elites are so blind that they cannot see this.
The Greens have long advocated policy not in the best interests of children. They have long been against tolerance and religious freedom. But for one of the two major parties to have crossed this Rubicon is a big deal for Australian politics. It could take years to nudge Labor back to the centre on social policy.
Most major and minor parties have responded to ACL's 26 election questions. Please take the time to study these before you vote. It is clear which parties took our questions seriously and which parties sent us spin. You can be the judge and I hope this informs your vote.
Our election guide is another important resource and it was even mentioned on the ABC's Insiders program last Sunday.
The children who will be affected by gender theory and family structure experimentation do not have a vote on Saturday.
In the silence between the cardboard dividers of the voting booth, we must press our pencils and speak for them.
Ends