Dear Powdies

In case you missed this one from England's Guardian newspaper:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/australia/story/0,,2219509,00.html

And as to the lead singer of Peter G's new band:

Subject: Changes Down Under - by Jim Wallis, 'Sojourners' (U.S.
magazine)

In the news you might have missed over the Thanksgiving weekend, Labor
Party leader Kevin Rudd decisively defeated Prime Minister John Howard
in an important Australian election. Howard has long been one of the
strongest supporters of President Bush's policies. Rudd, on the other
hand, has already made it clear that he has different priorities. In his
first news conference, he committed to making climate change a priority,
promising to sign the Kyoto Protocol. Rudd also announced he will
withdraw Australia's troops from Iraq.

...In the fall of 2006, Rudd wrote an essay, titled "Faith in Politics,"
for an Australian magazine, The Monthly. He began by saying,

[Dietrich] Bonhoeffer is, without doubt, the man I admire most in the
history of the twentieth century. …This essay seeks both to honour
Bonhoeffer and to examine what his life, example and writings might have
to say to us, 60 years after his death, on the proper relationship
between Christianity and politics in the modern world.

Rudd pointed to the core principle that, "Bonhoeffer's political
theology is therefore one of a dissenting church that speaks truth to
the state, and does so by giving voice to the voiceless. Its domain is
the village, not the interior life of the chapel. Its core principle is
to stand in defence of the defenceless or, in Bonhoeffer's terms, of
those who are "below". … Christianity, consistent with Bonhoeffer's
critique in the '30s, must always take the side of the marginalised, the
vulnerable and the oppressed".

It is unusual for a prime minister to cite Bonhoeffer as his model, but
it is that principle that Rudd will bring to his new position as prime
minister. Along with British prime minister Gordon Brown, he is a new
kind of political leader who seeks to practice moral politics.