The wish to pray is a prayer in itself.
— Georges Bernanos, born in 1888
God wants you to prosper, God wants you to be successful, God wants you to be rich …
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Roxburgh, playing Cal Quinn, a charismatic pastor and head of Sydney-based megachurch U Star, is calling these questions to a sound technician in an auditorium during a routine mic check. But, by episode’s end, his world is crashing down and he is asking them to a higher power. Adored by U Star’s thousands of followers, and seen as the personification of faith, love and acceptance, Quinn has faltered with secret drug use and the mishandling of a vulnerable parishioner.
“Are you there? Can you hear me? Say something.” ..
The church’s success and reputation are jeopardised and Quinn is losing his connection with God. “How does the saying go?” Roxburgh says on-set between filming scenes for Prosper in a Sydney CBD office building. “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”
“The power of this family and the church that they’ve built has become more like an absolute power. Like any kind of dictatorship or totalitarian organisation that has to shield itself, has to build its turrets and walls to protect itself.
“And, that’s when the rot always happens. That’s what’s exciting in terms of the dramatic possibilities in this series.”
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Cousins are disappearing. Is this reshaping the experience of childhood?
“Noelene Lancastle grew up surrounded by 27 cousins and 10 second cousins. They were a range of ages and had what seemed like a world of experiences, always ready to teach her to skateboard or swim, help carry heavy boxes, play with her on camping trips or have her back in school in North Delta, B.C.
“There were always lots of kids around. You know how your parents dragged you around to houses? There were always some kids for us to play with that were somehow related to us,” Lancastle, 46, said from Vancouver. It’s something her own children won’t experience. Lancastle’s older brother and sister don’t have children and her husband is an only child. So Nicholas, 9, and Charlie, 7, don’t have any cousins at all — a growing trend as the decreasing fertility rate causes extended families to narrow over time, sociologists and demographers say.
Worldwide, families are shrinking, according to a kinship study published in December in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. That study, using international demographic data for every country in the world, projected a 38 per cent global decline in living relatives for individuals aged 65 by the year 2095, compared to 1950. The composition of family networks is also expected to change, with grandparents and great-grandparents living longer, but the number of cousins, nieces and nephews declining, the authors noted…”
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