THE DAILY TELEGRAPH (AUSTRALIA): A DECISION to use politically correct terms - which do not mention Jesus Christ - for dates BC and AD in the new national history curriculum was an act of Christian cleansing, church leaders said yesterday.
BCE (Before Common Era), BP (Before Present) and CE (Common Era) are the new neutral terms to replace the historical terms BC (Before Christ) and AD (Anno Domini).
Removing BC and AD from the curriculum was an "intellectually absurd attempt to write Christ out of human history", Anglican Archbishop Peter Jensen said yesterday.
"It is absurd because the coming of Christ remains the centre point of dating and because the phrase 'common era' is meaningless and misleading," he said.
It was akin to calling Christmas the festive season, Archbishop Jensen said.
The Reverend Fred Nile said the deletion was "an absolute disgrace ... the direction of the national curriculum is towards almost a Christian cleansing to remove from our history any references to the role Christianity had in the formation of Australia and still has today".
"This is the final insult to remove BC and AD which are still recognised around the world," he said. Read on and comment » | Miranda Devine | Friday, September 02, 2011
