Michael Chamberlain, New Zealand-born Australian pastor, Died at 72

  Religion

Michael Leigh Chamberlain was born on February 27, 1944, in Christchurch, New Zealand, and died on January 9, 2017.

He was a New Zealand-born Australian writer, teacher and pastor.

He was best known due to the August 1980 death of his missing daughter Azaria as the result of a dingo attack while camping near Uluru (known then as Ayers Rock) in the Northern Territory, Australia.

His then-wife Lindy was falsely convicted of the baby’s murder in 1982 and Michael was convicted of being an accessory after the fact.

The case findings of a 1987 royal commission ultimately exonerated the couple, but not before they were subjected to sensationalist reporting and intense public scrutiny.

Chamberlain received his educated at Lincoln High School and Christchurch Boys’ High School, Chamberlain commenced studies at the University of Canterbury but after converting to the Seventh-day Adventist Church in 1965, left and migrated to Australia, and later on in 1980 they had one more daughter.

When had graduated, Chamberlain worked as a Seventh-day Adventist minister in Tasmania, where Lindy Chamberlain gave birth to two children.

During the years 1977 the family moved to Queensland, where Chamberlain produced and presented a radio program called The Good Life, a commentary on lifestyle and culture throughout the northern parts of the state.

During 2002, he attained a Doctor of Philosophy (education) degree from the University of Newcastle for his thesis entitled “The changing role of Ellen White in Seventh-Day Adventism with reference to sociocultural standards at Avondale College”.

He died at Gosford Hospital, on the New South Wales central coast, from complications of acute leukaemia.

Michael Chamberlain passed away at 72 years old.