The Religion and Ethics Report

Businessman Andrew Thorburn has quit as CEO of the Essendon football club, less than 30 hours into the job. Thorburn says he had to choose between a prestigious role in Australian sport or an honorary position in his church. There's many issues to unpack in this case. 

This year, the politics of France, Sweden and Italy have all been swept up in the tide of right-wing nationalism across Europe. When, or even will, this tide peak?

Now here's a question you might not expect in an increasingly secular west — is the social justice movement becoming another form of religion? With British writer Helen Lewis.

Australia has 20 percent of the world's poker machines and half of those are in just one state – New South Wales. Two leading clergy have begun a campaign to introduce tighter restrictions on an industry they describe as parasitic, taking money from the poor.

The recent death in custody of young woman Mahsa Amini, for wearing her headscarf in a way that showed too much hair, has thrust Iran back a generation. Since a controversial election brought President Ebrahim Raisi to power a year ago, social progress has stalled. 

Kenya's new president William Ruto is the country's first evangelical Christian to become head of state. How does faith play a role in his politics?

How does religion play into the politics of the far-right in Italy? The party that's leading in the polls is the 'Brothers of Italy,' and its origins lie in a post-war neo-fascist movement. Their leader is Giorgia Meloni.

Charles believes nature and the environment are the best expressions of God and religion. And to the extent that any monarch is allowed to have a political worldview, this is his. But now as King, he must also deal with the violent history of Britain's imperial era. 

In his first speech as monarch, Charles III went out of his way to emphasise his loyalty to the Church of England. But why does the man who is the so-called Defender of the Faith need to reassure people?

One of the late Queen's chaplains remembers a sincerely religious monarch, and wonders if the new King Charles can resist the secular tide that is sweeping Europe.