(Please boost for reach, and try to CW your answers)
In October 1983 the “Church of the New Faith” argued in the Supreme Court of Victoria that they should be exempt from that state’s payroll tax, because they were a religion.
The Supreme Court examined the history of the “Church of the New Faith” concluding the Church of the New Faith were NOT a religion, and did not qualify for the payroll tax exemption.
In December 1983 The Church of the New Faith appealed to the High Court of Australia.
All three judges in the case found that the Church of the New Faith WAS a religion.
Justices Mason and Brennan said:
“Charlatanism is a necessary price of religious freedom, and if a self-proclaimed teacher persuades others to believe in a religion which he propounds, lack of sincerity or integrity on his part is not incompatible with the religious character of the beliefs, practices and observances accepted by his followers”
but that:
“The question to which the evidence was directed was not whether the beliefs, practices and observances of the persons in ultimate command of the organization constituted a religion but whether those of the general group of adherents constituted a religion. The question which the parties resolved to litigate must be taken to be whether the beliefs, practices and observances which the general group of adherents accept is a religion.”
The High Court's decision, dismissing the earlier judgements, now serves as the current precedent for defining religious groups
…the Court went on to state that a religion did not have to be theistic, and that a religion involved both belief and behavior
by what name is the “Church of the New Faith" more commonly known?