Having written books and articles dealing with sectarianism in early twentieth-century Australia, I have been intrigued by the fact that Western Australia seems to have escaped its worst excesses. A conference in Perth under the auspices of the Archdiocesan Archives Office gave me an opportunity to explore whether that was true and, if so, why.

The conference was held on Holy Thursday 18 April 2019 in collaboration with the Centre for Faith Enrichment to celebrate World Heritage Day. It included a three-part lecture series on “Catholicism on the Margins” featuring papers by Dr Catherine Kovesi of the University of Melbourne on the Hungarian poor sisters in Perth, independent researcher Dr Christine Choo on the first order of indigenous nuns in Australia and myself. My paper was entitled ‘Absence or Amnesia: Was the Golden West really free from ‘the noxious weed of sectarianism’ that blighted early twentieth-century Australia?‘.

Here is a summary of my paper:
In early twentieth-century Australia sectarianism was chronic, mostly smouldering but at times erupting into a roaring blaze over issues such as home rule for Ireland, state aid for Catholic schools and conscription for overseas service in World War I. Much has been written on the subject but most of the literature concentrates on the eastern states with scant reference to instances of sectarianism in Western Australia, reflecting contemporary claims that the West did not suffer from sectarian strife. This paper discusses sectarianism as it existed in early twentieth-century Australia and examines whether Western Australia escaped it or whether the state’s sectarian past has been ignored, forgotten or downplayed.