This is Father Dave Smith, AKA Fighting Father Dave.

It's a Thursday night and he's blowing off some steam at his boxing academy, just across the street from the Anglican church he's led for almost 30 years.

What he's angry about is Australia's treatment of refugees.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) 57-YEAR-OLD FATHER DAVE SMITH SAYING: "For God's sake, if we've reached the stage where we are talking about the danger of compassion we've really lost our moral compass." His frustration is echoed by many in Australia's Christian community, especially ahead of the federal election this month.

According to a recent census more than half of Australians call themselves Christians.

But Christians here are a little different from their equivalents elsewhere like the U.S. As Reuters' Jonathan Barrett explains, they're not exactly 'conservative' - when it comes to policy.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) REUTERS CORRESPONDENT JONATHAN BARRETT SAYING: "There are some things that tie all Australian Christians together and this is mainly around their faith and theology- but they do have despairing views on economic and social policy.

So this makes the Australian Christian vote quite different from the US where you have quite a powerful evangelical right - or religious right - which do tend to vote along conservative lines." So it's not easy to sway their votes on faith alone, unlike in America.

What do Christian Australians care about?

It varies in degrees, but many of them are concerned about issues like climate change and Australia's treatment of asylum seekers.

That might become crucial for the upcoming election that's just over a week away.

Many Christians are critical of Australia's offshore detention centres for refugees, but when it comes to that issue, both - the governing liberal-national coalition and the main opposition labor party are more or less aligned.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) REUTERS CORRESPONDENT JONATHAN BARRETT SAYING: "The refugee and asylum seeker policies of the major parties are very similar in this election and this is one of the reasons that Christians don't seem to be combining or likely to vote as a bloc in this election.

Now certainly in past elections where one party has offered a far more humanitarian view than the others - then Christians do tend to follow that party but given there's only very nuanced differences in the policies on this election it is unlikely they will vote as one." For people like Father Dave, that means he has to keep fighting for something he believes major parties are not.

(SOUNDBITE) (English) 57-YEAR-OLD FATHER DAVE SMITH SAYING: "I think we'll look back on this in days to come in being a very dark part of Australian history."