Dr Paul Roe is a historian with a foot either side of Australia’s Great Dividing Range. One foot planted in suburban Sydney – the other in the outback town of Bourke. In a community on a large-scale farm, he taught students how to bring the ancient Biblical narratives to life. At the same time, he was listening to the stories of outback people and transferring them on local radio. 

This experience of learning Australia’s heart-music shaped him as ‘The Outback Historian’. On the red soil plains, he tracked the doings of an amazing array of men and women who have shaped modern Australia.

The historian in him was grieved to see the footprints of those, both Aboriginal and white, who have carried vital Christianity all across this country, being scuffed over and the formative story of Jesus left lying, neglected. He’s convinced that their extensive practical service alone, has earned these Australians the right to have their stories recovered and broadcast.

This book is a call to gather this extensive faith-narrative and set it to work in public spaces. Paul wants to stir creative storytellers to relay it to the new generations who are plotting our multi-cultured future. He says, ‘It’s not a matter of pushing religion – it’s cultivating the kind of honest history that teaches us our spiritual DNA. There’s another story we need to know if we’re going to really understand ourselves.’

‘What a heart-warming, enriching, ennobling, cleansing, inspiring read this is…It helps that this passionate advocate of the art of storytelling knows how to tell a story. When you get to the end, you will exclaim, ‘Paul, tell us another one’, and he will reply, ‘No, it’s your turn to tell stories now.’ – Associate Professor Stuart Piggin,
Director, Centre for the History of Christian Thought and Experience,
Macquarie University.