Archbishop Anthony Fisher OP has called for NSW lawmakers to reconsider whether repeated political protests should be allowed to repeatedly disrupt religious worship, arguing freedom of political communication should not become a “super right” overriding other fundamental freedoms.
Addressing the Samuel Griffith Society conference in Sydney on 22 August, the archbishop questioned whether authorities had struck the right balance after almost three years of regular pro-Palestinian demonstrations in Hyde Park near St Mary’s Cathedral, the Great Synagogue and St James’ Anglican Church.
The protests began amid the war in Gaza, whose human cost Archbishop Fisher has repeatedly acknowledged.
In 2024, he described the cost of conflicts including Gaza in “lives lost, bodies and minds damaged, livelihoods destroyed and persons displaced” as a reality that “disfigures all humanity.”
In January 2025, he joined Sydney’s Anglican archbishop and Australia’s Greek Orthodox archbishop welcoming an Israel-Hamas ceasefire and praying it would lead to sustained peace in the Holy Land.
But the archbishop has also previously expressed concern about some Sydney protests.
At the weekend’s lecture, Archbishop Fisher said many people shared concern for the Palestinians who are suffering in Gaza. But he said slogans, speeches and placards at the weekly Hyde Park demonstrations had “regularly strayed into attacks on “all Israelis, all Jews, or all Western nations for their supposed complicity or shared guilt.”
He said some worshippers and visitors had reported feeling intimidated by a “hateful mood” in the park and had changed when they approached the cathedral or diverted their route.
However, “if someone has to bear this inconvenience, I would prefer it was Catholics on Sunday rather than Jews on Saturday,” he added, pointing to rising antisemitism experienced by Sydney’s Jewish community.
Following the December 2025 terrorist attack on a Jewish Hanukkah celebration at Bondi Beach Archbishop Fisher said an atmosphere of public antisemitism had “festered” for more than two years and referred specifically to inflammatory rhetoric at demonstrations opposite the cathedral.
His latest comments come amid a legal debate over protest rights in NSW.
Archbishop Fisher noted the NSW Supreme Court had struck down an earlier attempt to give police move-on powers around places of worship, although the law was subsequently amended.
He also pointed to the NSW Court of Appeal’s decision in April striking down restrictions introduced after the Bondi terrorist attack because they overly restricted the implied freedom of political communication.
Archbishop Fisher stressed he was not calling for protest to be suppressed.
He described peaceful protest as a proper freedom of liberal democracy and “a critical safeguard against tyranny”. But he argued that protests occur in shared civic spaces where other people also have legitimate rights.
His concern is the cumulative effect of a demonstration that might be lawful and peaceful when considered individually but is repeated in the same place week after week.
He contrasted NSW’s approach with laws protecting safe-access zones around abortion facilities, which the High Court has upheld despite their burden on political communication.
The archbishop also pointed to recent British reforms allowing police to consider the cumulative impact of frequent protests and impose conditions where demonstrations near places of worship could intimidate or deter worshippers.
He asked whether Australian lawmakers should similarly give police greater scope to impose reasonable conditions on repeated demonstrations near places of worship.
“The goal should not be to make freedom to worship a super-right that trumps political protest, nor vice versa,” Archbishop Fisher said.
Rather, he argued, the law should recognise that political expression, religious worship, association and security are all goods required for individuals and communities to flourish.
“This conversation, after three years of loudhailers, is well overdue.”
