National Week of Prayer and Action – Journeying Together
Reflections by Sister Brigid Arthur
“We humans are at our best when we have empathy and walk in the shoes of another.”
The experience of being a refugee is unique.
Only refugees themselves actually know what it is like to suffer displacement by persecution, war, or extreme discrimination.
However, we who have not suffered this pain can imagine something of:
- Not being able to see family … maybe forever
- A total lack of knowing what will happen in the future
- Lack of respect and having your dignity disregarded
- Your career at best put on hold … often forever
- Having little or no money to buy ordinary things
- Having to ask for basic necessities
- Being a mother who wants her children to be safe but unable to pay for swimming lessons
- Always missing what has been familiar and comforting
After World War II Australia, with 120 other countries, signed the Refugee Convention to ensure safety and basic human rights for those in our community who were frightened and needed to find sanctuary.
What has gone wrong when Australia is now a leader in determining ways to move asylum seekers on, lock them up, dehumanise them and basically refuse to give them any hope for a safe and secure future?
How can we engage more people in our community to shift public policy to decency and love and extend care to all those who are marginalised and suffering because no country will accept them as refugees?
We become used to the Christian teaching that every person is precious – none more than another. If we actually lived by that belief, we would have a revolution. We would certainly have a community that was a kinder, fairer place that puts people over corporate profits.
There was a beautiful segment on TV a while ago where an indigenous man in the Beagle Bay area explained how a group of asylum seekers just turned up in his area.
He said:
I am proud (my heart stopped – is he going to say we helped the AFP to come and get them) but no he said I am proud of how well we looked after them – they had a shower and food – they are just human beings …
Why is the issue of asylum seekers in this country such an intractable one?
Australia has come to define asylum seekers as a problem of security, rather than a humanitarian challenge. Public discussions rarely highlight rights and responsibilities and justice or the dignity of each person – no matter who they are. There is a kind of strange dislocation between what we know of the history of the trouble spots of the world and the people who flee those places. Indeed, in Australia we get a discourse that usually seems to see our country as an island quarantined from any responsibility.
We can talk numbers of 140 million people displaced from their own homes and many of those have sought protection in another country but behind every number is a human face …a real person with hopes and dreams, people who are basically just like us.
A young woman who is seeking protection in Australia said sadly, ‘Maybe we should not have come to Australia’. She was referring to herself and her small son. When reassured that those of us who knew her wanted her to be here, she replied sadly, ‘No, but the Australian government does not want us’ and after a moment she added ‘And my government doesn’t want us either’.
How does one respond to such a comment from a very defenceless woman and child?
A lot of people are asking questions about the direction our leaders are taking this country.
How have we become the oppressors?
How did we become the people who break hearts?
How can we have got to the stage when we imprison people without justification?
How did protection of Australia’s borders become so important that we should do anything to protect it,
even if this means turning away people who are fleeing for their lives?
As we awaken as a nation from what feels like an evil night into the mystery of a new day, perhaps we will be able to say, “We will repair the damage of what has happened by working as a community to extend empathy and understanding to all who seek our help”.
Those treated very badly here in Australia can show us what compassion means.
Ali was in detention for many years and was released a couple of months ago. He was accused of people smuggling and that makes us think of a lucrative business with hundreds of boats and making millions of dollars. In truth, Ali organized for one person to get on a boat that brought him to Australia.
For this he was detained in immigration detention for twelve years. Ali’s wife and 2 sons managed to get here and lived in the community longing to be with Ali. His other two sons had been on another boat that sank in the attempt to get to this country. It was an overcrowded boat, and I remember being in the Melbourne Immigration Detention Centre (MIDC) when the news of the boat sinking came through – many people detained there had family or friends on that boat.
Meantime, there was another very mentally ill man in detention in the same area as Ali. Ali looked after him in all sorts of ways, including cooking for him. This man would say to Ali “Uncle I’m hungry” and Ali would say “Your meal is on the shelf – put it in the microwave”.
Justice and peace can never be imposed; it can only be something we all believe in enough to provide what it will take to achieve it.
At the Brigidine Asylum Seeker Project we believe we should take steps to give some hope to refugees – even if what we can do is no way near enough. Practically, we house people who get little or no income, give food, help people with money to buy Myki cards, phone money and so on.
We advocate for reform of the oppressive and unjust system determining the fate of asylum seekers and continually try to educate the community about the reality of people’s lives – people who are only asking for protection. Many people in the community enable us to give this help.
Many of us don’t think of immigration as a biblical issue. Perhaps most think of it as a political or economic issue. Yet Scripture speaks repeatedly on how we are to treat the immigrants in our midst. The Hebrew word, ger, is translated “foreigner” or “immigrant” and appears 92 separate times in the Old Testament.
Within the New Testament, which Christians read in continuity with the Hebrew Bible, the most often cited passage dealing with welcoming the stranger is from Matthew 25: 31-40. “I was hungry, and you gave me food, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink, I was a stranger, and you welcomed me.”
Inspired by these challenges, we pray that our hearts will be open, and we will think kindly of all those who have fled persecution and discrimination.
We ask for mercy for people who are the victims of a visa system that is unfair and for safety for those seeking a secure future.
May we be steadfast in continuing to do whatever is in our power to keep working towards this happening.
Sister Brigid Arthur is a long-time advocate for refugees and people seeking asylum, and for vulnerable members of the community. Sister Brigid has been an educator and is part of the Brigidine order of Nuns. She is founding member of the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project, a former long-term board member of the Asylum Seeker Resource Centre, and current Coordinator of the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project in Melbourne.
If you would like to support Sister Brigid and the valuable work of the Brigidine Asylum Seekers Project, visit their website to volunteer, donate or follow their activities here.
National Week of Prayer and Action 16-18 September 2024