Nation Celebration

(Yes I do realise it is Tuesday - just taking a wee break to blog ...)
Yesterday we celebrated Australia Day. As still new Aussies, we headed for the city and enjoyed all the offerings on display, watched the tall boat race in the harbour, rode in Dennis - the 71 year old omnibus and soaked up the sun and the rain that fell late in the day.

Yet it struck me that we were 'celebrating' colonisation. New Zealand commemorates recognition of indigenous people by the Crown (and acknowledges breaches of that Treaty throughout history), the USA celebrate emancipation from British rule. And we celebrate invasion by the British and genocide of the inhabitants and guardians of the land for millennia.

Then on the TV news I heard an item that resonated with my ponderings through the day. This day is known by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as Survival Day or Invasion Day. Our new Australian of the Year, Mick Dodson, has called for a national discussion about the best day to commemorate our nationhood.

To which the Prime Minister has said no. Just like that. A "simple, respectful, but straightforward no"

I hope and pray that the conversation does not end here, but continues.

And in 2010 I will seek out a survival day event to participate in.

How long O Lord ...

People of faith please join in prayer with our brothers and sisters who are part of the United Church of Christ in the Philippines (UCCP) and others who are standing in solidarity with the oppressed. Following a march on the Court of Appeal last week, the case of Reverend Berlin Guerrero was finally assigned after he has been incarcerated for over a year. UCCP has opened a school to serve the children of the 1000 families who live on the Smokey Mountain city rubbish dump. Much more is needed to uphold human rights and develop communities where all can live in safety and freedom.

Big hearted Godde

Over the past weekend I was among 40+ leaders in our local church at the Naamaroo Conference Centre - a great venue surrounded by National Park land with plenty of opportunity for bushwalking and reflection. As I wandered on Sunday morning I was reading the Oremus office for the previous day and kept coming back to these words from Micah7 (vv 14 and 18):

Shepherd your people with your staff, the flock that belongs to you, which lives alone in a forest in the midst of a garden land; let them feed in Bashan and Gilead as in the days of old... Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of your possession? He does not retain his anger forever, because he delights in showing clemency.

I had with me Te Paipera Tapu - the Bible in Te Reo Maori - the language of the indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand. As far as I know this is basically the translation made by predominantly British missionaries in the 19th Century - as there is no notation of revisions in the frontispiece. I find benefit in reading scripture in a language I don't know (especially a phonetic one like Maori) as it somehow reaches through my intellect and connects at a gut level.

The last part of verse 18 reads: ... no te mea e ngakau nui ana ia ki te tohu tangata. In this case I know enough Maori to know that ngakau nui is big heart. And tohu tangata is a subject people. I think this means that Godde has a big heart toward the people of Godde.

Ngakau nui will be my updated mobile phone banner for the next while (I noted the other day it is still Lent for Life but we are well past that season of the church year). As I delight to know that Godde delights in showing clemency. That word is so precious.

Cultural complexities

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples make up a high proportion of the Northern Territory population and are very visible in the community. On my morning walk along the esplanade on Sunday I met the artist above, who invited me to see her work at the Mindil Beach Sunset market that evening. Later in the week we met artists selling their work directly to the public at Wangi Falls. They spoke with significant feeling about the way they are treated by galleries, who pay the artist $100 for a work then marketed to tourists for several thousand dollars. Many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists are allegedly signed up to a gallery and are unable to sell their work independently. At the Sunset market the music was playing and some members of the audience dancing in a display of culture of a different kind.

Our outing on Tuesday of last week started with a drive almost to the edge of Litchfield National Park, and a visit to the tin mine. Fully operational for only a few years, and wreaking serious health damage to those who spent their days breathing in silicon in while mining the underground seams of tin, this mine also seemed to operate as a multi-cultural workplace with both colonists and traditional owners of the land working in collegial, and in several cases conjugal, partnerships. The mine site was well laid out, with a short walking track and well-written interpretive signs giving a good impression of the lifestyle of those early miners and their families.

Our luxurious historic retreat in Batchelor was just along the road from the Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education . The hospitable library staff allowed me to use their internet connection to liaise with colleagues back in Sydney regarding public health education matters. Graduates from the Institute are working in many places in Australia, including many in their communities of origin. Exciting to see such a worthwhile enterprise doing well. In a further twist of history and culture, the guest house was the home of the manager for the uranium mine in the 1950s. The material mainly sold to the US of course.

On Wednesday we visited Adelaide River and learnt more about the relentless bombing experienced in the whole top end of Australia during World War 2. The War Commission Cemetery was sobering, as such sites always are. We walked to dinner that evening at the Butterfly Farm - literally capturing something of the beautiful fauna of the region and run by an Englishman.

WE concluded our trip to the top end with further exploration in Darwin on the Thursday. We concluded our trip with a visit to the excellent Museum and Art Gallery of the Northern Territory where we saw not only the current exhibition, but the outstanding collections of Aboriginal Art with excellent explanatory captions. Such art was originally very sacred and could only be viewed by specific people or groups of people. Much thought and effort has gone into adapting styles of work to make them available to a wider audience. For this I am glad, as the art is awe-inspiring.

All in all an eclectic interwoven set of experiences of history and culture within a relatively limited geographical area. And now I see there is a job advertised in Katherine - further south and allegedly with the lowest petrol prices in the Territory (according to my bus driver cousin who should know!) I am tempted by the climate and the opportunity to make a real difference in addressing the health disparities of the traditional owners and occupiers of this country. But a 5 hour plane commute from Sydney is not really very friendly to the planet. I do have some other opportunities closer to home that I will explore first.

And to conclude: a random trivial fact. Left-handed people are over-represented among USA Presidents, and both the current contenders are left handed. Trivial? YES. Useful? NO. Interesting? MAYBE

Haliaeetus leucocephalus

Christine at Abbey of the Arts posted this picture as an invitation to her 20th Poetry Party! For these parties Christine selects an image and suggests a title and invites us to respond with poems, words, reflections, quotes, song lyrics, etc. On Saturday she draws a name at random and sends the winner a beautiful zine.
Christine photographed the image below last summer on Vancouver Island at a Raptor Sanctuary. There is something so powerful about eagles and they are known for strength and vision. What in your life do you feel this kind of clarity about? Or is there something for which you would like a clearer vision?

My response to this magnificent creature:

Knowing nothing about you I visited around the vast world wide web and found out a few facts. Here I learnt that you and your kind were formerly distributed across North America, but you are now limited to breeding in Alaska, Canada, the northern Great Lakes states, Florida, and the Pacific Northwest. You are an amazing construction worker, building large stick nests (sometimes weighing over a ton) that are usually about six feet in diameter and more than six feet tall near the top of the largest trees near a river or lake. You eat fish that you catch yourself, or find dead, or pirate from other birds. Road-killed deer is a special delicacy that puts you at risk of being hit by motor vehicles. On July 9 last year (2007) you were removed from the endangered species list.

And from here I learnt that you have a big family and a long whakapapa. Birds with names like Kite or Hawk are relatives of yours. Your family is found in the fossil record 30-50 million years ago. Members of your family live all over the globe, yet you have no obvious relatives among the other birds; and scientists don’t even agree that all members of your family are closely related to each other. Maybe you have just grown to look alike because you need similar characteristics to survive in similar habitats.

And then I found this brilliant video clip of your distant cousin Kahu

And so I write

Bald Eagle

Haliaeetus leucocephalus

I’d like to know:

How does it feel

to be removed

from the endangered list?

Is it a relief?

Do you rejoice in your resilience,

that you have overcome

the powers of destruction?

Are vulnerable children

easier to protect than endangered ones?

Do you worry less

when you leave them in their treetop mansion

and go fishing for their breakfast?

Does it restore to you

the land that was yours for millennia?

Or make it any easier

to live within the confines

enforced by the invaders

who destroy your way of being?

Bald Eagle

Haliaeetus leucocephalus

Congratulations!

You have turned around the forces

gathered against you.

You have found a mate

and continued your line.

You have done well.

Bald Eagle

Haliaeetus leucocephalus

Remind us please

that we cannot fully congratulate ourselves

for this minute step

in the right direction.

We cannot ever restore

your true entitlement.

We have gone too far for that.

Please accept our contrition

as we come to realise

that our way of life

has so limited yours.

We rejoice in your presence

above, beyond and beside us

Inspiring us to persist

in the face of all that would overwhelm.

To make a home in the highest places

To find strength for ourselves

To secure a future for our young

To catch and find and even to scavenge

The things that will sustain

To fly high

and see our shadow

rest lightly

on earth below.

Rain of the Children

Attended the premier of Vincent Ward's new movie Rain of the Children here in Sydney last night. It is a brilliant work. A docu-drama where Ward goes back to the subject of one of his first works. The images of Puhi (the special/chosen one) and the story of her life will be with me for weeks. I recommend that you ask for this remarkable movie at your film festivals, and if you have the chance go to see it. Read more about it following the link above and here.

Interesting juxtapositions

Mothers' Day and Pentecost coincide this year. According to my friend Jenny this last happened in 1913 and will not happen again until the year 2228. It also happened in 1818 and will happen again in 2285 (when Easter was/will be even a day earlier than this year). So what a momentous occasion!!?? (one thing you will find about me is that I do love these kind of trivial facts and they will appear on my blog from time to time).

This super-early Easter season has brought other 'co-incidences' that are particularly relevant down-under. Ash Wednesday fell on Waitangi Day - the day when the people of Aotearoa New Zealand remember Te Tiriti or the Treaty signed between Maori and Queen Victoria in 1840. And less than a week later the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, made a formal apology to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples of this country for actions of the government that tore families apart and deeply wounded communities. The sorry speech was watched by millions nationwide, many workplaces made provision for employees to watch the broadcast, and this Kiwi living in Australia found it extremely moving to see the generous acceptance of the initiative by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander elders and especially by those most affected by past government intervention.

It seemed so appropriate in the season of Lent, when Christians intentionally focus on Jesus' journey to Jerusalem, that the two nations I identify with marked significant milestones in nationhood and in relationship with indigenous people. Colonisation causes such ongoing pain - and as part of the Anglo tradition I sometimes find it hard to know how to be part of the change that is necessary. I can rejoice though in these miniscule steps to repentance - turning around and challenging the often entrenched presumption of privilege. And I am engaged in developing a professional education activity which may help myself and colleagues to hone our skills in critiquing policy from an indigenous perspective.

And circling back to the start - Mothers' Day and Pentecost. The blog from Sally (on her journey) on exclusivism and Mothering Sunday has helped me enter this 'once-in-a-lifetime' liturgical/social coincidence with eyes open to see things differently. And there have been glimpses of that wonderful Spirit of Godde at work in my world. First at Mothers' Day Mass at my daughter's school. The music was excellent and the students' prayers and reflections demonstrated an inclusive valuing of women in their lives, mothers, and aunties, teachers, grandmothers and sisters and friends. Then in our Uniting Church this morning the liturgist prayed for all who struggle with parenthood, for those for whom this day is painful, and for families missing a loved mother or grandmother.

For me this is the first year without a mother to telephone and it has been a day of juxtapositions. Delighting in the attention from my three wonderful children - all living at home at the moment - and in breakfast out with my husband early in the day. Yet missing my own Mum who died on March 17. Then phoning my sister who is enjoying her first Mothers' Day as a grandmother, and hearing what a special day my niece is having with her precious seven-week-old son. Walking along the Parramatta foreshore gave an opportunity to somehow hold all these experiences and feelings and thoughts together and to treasure them deep within my heart.

Indeed - a day and a season of juxtapositions.