Church Act 1836

The Church Act, also known as the Church Building Act, was a 1836 law in the Colony of New South Wales. It was drafted by John Plunkett and enacted by the Governor, Sir Richard Bourke.^[2] It was subtitled "An Act to promote the building of Churches and Chapels and to provide for the maintenance of Ministers of Religion in New South Wales."^[3]

The Act established equitable funding for Church of England, Church of Scotland, and Roman Catholic churches. It thus led to the effective disestablishment of the Church of England.^[4][5] Bourke later extended the provisions of the Act to Methodist and Baptist churches. However, the law did not extend to Jews and other non-Christian religions, and so actually introduced a form of discrimination, by precluding government assistance for building synagogues and other non-Christian houses of worship. It took until August 1854 to extend government assistance to the Jewish community, an object advocated in the Legislative Council by William Wentworth and George Nichols.^[6][7]