Please Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood

Illawarra Mercury

Saturday February 26, 2005

with BILL SIMPSON

WHEN a young male homosexual AIDS victim living in North Queensland needed emergency treatment in Sydney, controversial morals campaigner Fred Nile paid the airfare.

Unbelievable as it may seem to his many detractors, Mr Nile, a Gerroa-based retired church pastor and long-serving NSW MP, says he provided the funding because the young man's family could not afford it.

Mr Nile disclosed his involvement for the first time publicly in a conversation this week. It was proof, he says, his anti-homosexuality crusade was often misrepresented and misunderstood - just as he believes all of his morals campaigning has been.

Is Fred Nile mellowing? "I hope not," he says. "But I have been quite wrongly portrayed.

"I love these (homosexual) people. Whenever I see them, I tell them that I love them. I remember at Channel 9 in Sydney one day I had a debate with a couple of homosexuals who had AIDS.

"One of the guys in the studio said to me that I needed to be careful because these guys had AIDS. I think he meant that I shouldn't touch them. I went straight up to the guys and shook hands with them.

"I don't have any fear, I don't have any revulsion of them as men; as human beings. I love them. But, I can't compromise on the lifestyle; on the behaviour. I try to separate the lifestyle from the person."

Mr Nile says a young man telephoned him one day to say he had taken part in Mardi Gras parades in Sydney, but had become a Christian and was seeking his support.

"His twin brother had AIDS. He told me in a telephone call that his brother was living in (North Queensland) and needed to come to Sydney for some emergency blood treatment, but the family couldn't afford the fare.

"So, I paid it. There was a surprise in the hospital AIDS unit when people asked how (brother's name) got to Sydney and that Fred Nile had paid the fare. I'm told they fell out of their beds.

"You see, it's a false image that I have been given. They (homosexuals) thought that all I did was attack them. But I wanted to help this young man. The medical treatment, I have been told, worked, which is something of a miracle."

In possibly one of his most intimate explanations about his morals campaigning over the past 30 years, Mr Nile says he has no doubt it was part of his Christian "calling", just as he sees Parliament as "his parish".

"I saw in my mind many years ago a basket with names written on paper sitting in the basket. I don't know whether God was showing (the vision) to me.

"Anyway, there was this basket. It had all these names in it. God was trying to get somebody to be like a prophet and speak out about all of these (moral) issues. He was pulling out all the names.

"Professor Bloggs wasn't available ... Reverend so and so wasn't available either. And so it went - on and on. God got to the bottom of the basket and there were no more names there.

"At the very bottom, he saw a piece of paper. It had Fred Nile's name on it. So, God says: 'It looks like I'm stuck with you, Fred Nile'. And I am happy if he thinks that about me."

And, so, the campaign has been on since the early 1970s, when, as a young Congregational Church pastor at Bexley, in Sydney, Nile teamed with an Anglican pastor, now Bishop of North Sydney Paul Barnett, to publicly protest about a controversial musical, O Calcutta!.

Although originally an Anglican, Nile had switched to the Congregational Church as a young man because there were more young people at the local church in his suburb.

Ironically, Nile was born in Kings Cross, the son of a taxi-driver father and waitress mother.The church is where he met and married his wife, Elaine. They have four children and six grandchildren.

"My association with the Congregational Church way back there is interesting because I found out I had a lot of sympathy with it because the original Congregationalists were the puritans.

"I always said that I was a (war-like) Christian, so maybe I was meant to be a Congregational puritan. I wasn't really fiery. I'm actually very shy and bashful. But when you're a minister - a leader - you've got to lead."

Nile was concerned about what he saw as a moral decline in the 1960s. It frustrated him nobody, including the Christian church, seemed to be doing anything about it.

"I often said then that somebody should do something about it. God said: 'Look, Fred, you're pointing with one finger in that direction, but three fingers are pointing back at you. Why don't you do something?' So, I did."

He was invited to become director of the Festival of Light. That is where his main media-created reputation as a no-compromise campaigner really started. His no-nonsense style invited hatred.

If the media wanted a comment on any moral issue, Nile was their man. "People would say: 'Gee, you're clever at getting headlines, Fred'. But I never got a headline in my life. The media would decide on an angle and say: 'Let's call Fred Nile'.

"I remember one year, (deceased singer) John Denver came to Australia. The (newspaper) rang and said John Denver had just admitted at a media conference that he smokes marijuana.

"The reporter asked me what I thought of that. I said that's a shame because I admire John Denver; I like his singing. The reporter asked me what I thought should be done.

"I said he has to obey our laws in Australia. The next day, the paper came out and on the front page was the headline: 'Cleric says deport John Denver'.

"I wondered who the cleric was - until I read the story and found out the cleric was me. There were a lot of stories like that."

There were constant death threats - on the phone, in the mail and even on his car windscreen. "I found a note on the windscreen of my car. It said there was a bomb in my car. What do I do? I just pulled the paper off the windscreen, got in the car and drove off. You can't allow yourself to be intimidated."

His views, he says, are based on his understanding of what the Christian Bible says.

"My belief is that if I am going to be a Christian, then I should be a fair dinkum one - not half a one. So, I take the Bible teaching on morals.

"I have a strong belief that God gives life. So I can't support abortion and I can't support euthanasia. If God gave us our sexuality, I believe God created Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve. Therefore, I can't accept homosexuality.

"God gave us our health, so I don't accept illegal drugs. I don't support some legal drugs. I don't drink (alcohol) or smoke. I have put up bills in the Parliament to prohibit tobacco advertising (and) smoking in public places.

"I have put up bills to prohibit alcohol and gambling advertising, but they were soundly defeated. A lot of politicians agree with me, but don't have the courage to do anything about it.

"In the Parliament, I opposed legalisation of prostitution. They tried to make out I hated prostitutes (and) wanted them in jail. But I saw the prostitutes as the victims. That's why I was against brothels. These girls are being abused.

"It's the same with homosexuals. They're the ones hurt in this lifestyle. I want to dig them out of it."

Fred Nile has been a Member of the NSW Parliament for almost 24 years, longer than anybody else currently there. He represents the Christian Democratic Party in the Legislative Council. His wife also spent 15 years in the Parliament, sitting beside him, for 15 years until 2002.

He took a couple of weeks off last year to contest - unsuccessfully - the Federal Senate. His term in NSW expires in 2007. He will be 72 by then.

But there are no thoughts of retiring.

Right now, he is organising another "prayer protest" for the Sydney Mardi Gras. He and supporters have been doing it for the past 20 years. They gather at the head of the parade and pray that God will reach out to the participants.

Sadly, he suggests, morals protests are on the decline in this country. Churches appear unconcerned. The general Australian public has also mellowed.

So, how does he think he will be remembered? "Some will say he was a prophet. Some will say he was too radical for his time. Liberal Christians will say he was a handicap; that he misrepresented the church. They will say the church should have been ordaining homosexuals, but he opposed it."

How would he like to be remembered? "As a fair dinkum Christian."

© 2005 Illawarra Mercury

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