The Hindu Festival of Chariots, celebrated with an annual parade of more than 300 people, might seem unusual for the streets of Florey, but for the community clustered around the suburb's temple, they could not be more at home.
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Hindu people make up 4 per cent of the population in the division of Fenner, Canberra's northern electorate, an analysis of 2016 census data by the Parliamentary Library has shown.
It is the third-largest religious grouping in the electorate and the largest group of Hindu people in any of the ACT electorates.
The temple's president, Basu Banka, said anyone was welcome at the temple, where construction works were underway to expand.
When the temple's foundation stone was laid in 1993, there were about 1000 Hindus in Canberra. Now there are about 15,000, Mr Banka said.
Mr Banka said the Hindu community was not concerned about religious freedoms. "It doesn't bother us at all," he said.
"We are a welcoming community. Our belief is to never turn anyone anyway. I think the community is becoming more tolerant of us."
Mr Banka said there was some concern about the temple's security but Hindu people felt free to practice their religion and share their temple with the wider community.
Bean, which covers the ACT's southern areas and suburbs in Weston Creek, is the only electorate in the ACT with a majority of people identifying as Christian. More than 51 per cent of people in the seat identified with a Christian denomination in the 2016 census.
At the last federal election, the strongest first-preference vote for the Liberal party was recorded in Bean, where Liberal candidate Ed Cocks got 31.44 per cent of first preference votes.
While more people in Canberra identify as religious than not, the central seat of Canberra is home to more people who say they have no religion than people who identify as Christian.
In the division, which covers the city's central suburbs, 42.2 per cent of the adult population said they had no religion.
Judaism is the smallest religion overall in the ACT, with the majority of its population centered in the seat of Canberra. In the census, 440 people in Canberra selected Judaism as their religion, while only 73 people in Fenner did the same.
Although the majority of people with a religious belief identified as Christian, there were many small clusters of Christian denominations throughout the ACT.
Justin Lawman, the senior pastor at the Canberra National Seventh-day Adventist Church in Turner, said there were about 420 active members in his congregation, which was more than double the number of self-identifying Seventh-day Adventists in the church's electorate.
Only 156 people living in the seat of Canberra identified as Seventh-day Adventist in 2016.
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Mr Lawman said he was skeptical about the figures as he could see the congregation was growing.
Religious freedoms were being regularly discussed among church members, whose faith encouraged religious liberty.
"But there is a deep level of intolerance to Christianity in society," Mr Lawman said.
"We believe very strongly in a separate church and state. Secular society is by far the most harmonious in history."
Mr Lawman said the division between secular and religious society was often portrayed as divisive, but there was greater cohesion between people. "There is division in a 30 second soundbite that isn't there when there's a lot more tolerance between friends, even when they have different beliefs," he said.
Jasper Lindell
Jasper Lindell joined The Canberra Times in 2018. He is a Legislative Assembly reporter, covering ACT politics and government. He also writes about development, transport, heritage, local history, literature and the arts, as well as contributing to the Times' Panorama magazine. He was previously a Sunday Canberra Times reporter.
Jasper Lindell joined The Canberra Times in 2018. He is a Legislative Assembly reporter, covering ACT politics and government. He also writes about development, transport, heritage, local history, literature and the arts, as well as contributing to the Times' Panorama magazine. He was previously a Sunday Canberra Times reporter.
