Waleed Aly has defended former prime minister Scott Morrison’s speech which he says has been misinterpreted.
Morrison delivered a sermon to Margaret Court’s Victory Life Centre church in Perth where he urged people to put their faith in God and not the government.
“We trust in Him. We don’t trust in governments. We don’t trust in the United Nations, thank goodness,” he said.
“We don’t trust in all these things, fine as they may be and as important as the role that they play. Believe me, I’ve worked in it and they are important.”
The Project co-host however said that the speech was misinterpreted and that what Morrison meant is to trust God and not “earthly institutions”.
“The criticism here is that he’s saying ‘don’t trust the government’. I think that’s a bad faith reading of what he’s saying. That’s a misinterpretation,” he said on Thursday’s episode.
“All he’s saying is ‘we don’t trust earthly institutions the way that we trust God’.
“If you’re a Christian, and not just a Christian by the way, I reckon just about any mainstream perspective from any mainstream faith would say the same thing.
“That’s a completely uncontroversial thing to say. What’s controversial is the way that it’s been taken out of that context, the context of a sermon, and placed in the context of a news cycle and then turned into a comment about the government like he’s whipping up some kind of anti-government movement.
“That’s just not what he’s doing”.
The controversial speech also caught the attention of current Prime Minister Anthony Albanese who called out Morrison saying he was surprised that he was in a position of leading the country.
“I just thought, wow. This guy was the prime minister of Australia and had the great honour of leading the government. I found it quite astonishing,” he told ABC radio.
“It provides some explanation perhaps of why, in my view, he clearly didn’t lead a government that was worthy of the Australian people – he said he doesn’t believe in government.”
Images: Instagram/The Project
This article first appeared on OverSixty.