The Revd David Gill

1.  The American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr observed that the only time the Church is really sufferable is when it is at prayer, for when it talks the Church invariably claims too much for itself. The same no doubt holds true for councils of churches and, especially, for reports perpetrated by their general secretaries. I must preface what follows, then, with an acknowledgement  – using the well known line from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer -   that “we have left undone those things which we ought to have done;  and we have done those things which we ought not to have done”. But I am not prepared to utter the next phrase: “And there is no health in us”. Our frailties and shortcomings notwithstanding, there is I believe quite a bit of health in the National Council of Churches in Australia and what it represents.

2.  Seven important convictions undergirded the transition from the old Australian Council of Churches to the NCCA. They remain fundamental to how this council understands itself and tries to do its job. Recall them for a moment.

2.1  Humanly speaking, the primary actors in the ecumenical movement are  the churches.

2.2  Ecumenical structures must be seen as interim, provisional, flexible and responsive to the churches that comprise them.

2.3  A council of churches has to respect the differing convictions of member churches, not least in the way it spells out the ecclesiological implications of membership.

2.4  Membership implies sustained commitment by the member churches -- to the council, yes, but more importantly to one another through the council.

2.5  Decision-makers in ecumenical bodies should be genuinely and authoritatively representative of the churches that comprise them.

2.6  Councils are to focus on fostering trust and deepening mutual understanding, and the reconciled koinonia for which we yearn must find expression in how we deal with each other in ecumenical decision-making even now.

2.7  Ecumenism does not start and stop at the national frontier, so other councils of churches -- world, regional and national -- are essential partners in what we are attempting to be and to do.

3.  The first of these convictions inspires the rest and requires unpacking further. The Basis of the NCCA says it well. The council, it states, “gathers together in pilgrimage (note the language of movement) those churches and Christian communities (note who is doing the moving) which confess the Lord Jesus Christ as God and Saviour according to the scriptures (note who gives the movers their distinctive identity)  and commit themselves

i)  to deepen their relationship with each other in order to express more visibly the unity willed by Christ for his Church, and

ii)  to work together towards the fulfilment of their mission of common witness, proclamation and service,

to the glory of the one God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”

4.  “Churches ... which confess ... and commit themselves...”. The NCCA’s Basis is, in effect, the undertaking entered into by each member church on joining the council; a solemn vow made to other member churches, and to God. A National Forum is the right setting to reflect on how Australia’s churches are going at keeping these solemn undertakings, and on how this council is going as the instrument they have created to help them.

5.  But first let us underline yet again the identity of the pilgrims. We are not talking about the officers, staff, committees and assorted activities of the NCCA, not principally anyway. In an important sense the NCCA as such is of no significance. An interim report from the Special Commission on Orthodox Participation in the World Council of Churches, presented to last February’s meeting of the World Council’s Central Committee, makes the point eloquently:

* The member churches are the subject of the quest for visible unity,  not the council.
* The member churches teach and make doctrinal and ethical decisions, not the council.
* The member churches proclaim doctrinal consensus, not the council.
* The member churches commit themselves to pray for unity ...
* and the member churches are responsible for developing the sensitivities to sustain their dialogue.

6. Seven years and four days after the NCCA’s inauguration, we must acknowledge gratefully the early steps the churches have taken through and around the council. The ecclesial communities that came together in that new mix in July 1994 were right to give priority to building relationships rather than running programmes, deepening their companionship rather than organising activities. As the late Jean Tillard remarked some years ago, trying to broaden the celebrated Lund principle of maximum inter-church cooperation: “It is not enough
to do everything together that we can do together. We must also be everything together that we can be together.” Without always being fully aware of it, your representatives have been developing ways of praying together, thinking together, arguing together, making decisions together, laughing together, being together, that enshrine gratitude for each other’s gifts and respect for each other’s sensitivities as well as a healthy appreciation of each other’s human frailties.

7.  But more. The working papers before this meeting, reflecting the work of the member churches’ representatives on our assortment of commissions and networks, offer some exciting possibilities for helping our churches move forward together towards the fulfilment of the vows they have made. For example:

• the covenanting process, developed through our Faith and Unity Commission, which invites churches to use some sanctified imagination and find ways of giving more visible expression to the real albeit incomplete communion they already share;
• the efforts we are making through Christian World Service to encourage greater inter-church cooperation  in the area of international relief and development;
• the Social Justice Network’s initiatives to help us understand why our churches severally speak as they do on social issues and how they might with more integrity speak ecumenically; 
• the solid homework done by our Aboriginal and Islander Commission to help churches find their place alongside all who yearn for the nation’s healing;
• and more.

8.  Such reports and proposals, it must be remembered, represent only a series of institutional tips on the ecumenical iceberg. The ecumenical movement, thank God, is much vaster than the structures we set up to serve it and the programmes we adopt to advance it. During these days we will be reminded, not least in the joint report of our working partners the state ecumenical bodies, of how much is happening in the wider scene. Some people, sadly, fail to recognise the strength and creativity of the continuing drive towards Christian unity. Some persist in referring to our time as “an ecumenical winter” -- a depiction which is doubly misleading, because it implies a sunny past, which never was, as well as a bleak present, which certainly is not. On the evidence, it would be more accurate to speak of a continuing ecumenical spring, with of course occasional showers and every so often a storm to make things interesting.

9.  In any case, we are on this pilgrimage together not because of the climate of the moment but because unity is the will of God, because a gospel of reconciliation demands a manifestly reconciled and reconciling community, and because -- to use the memorable image of Lesslie Newbigin -- a divided Christianity has about as much credibility as a temperance society the members of which are perpetually drunk.

10.  Note, however, the danger that is lurking for would-be pilgrims: the temptation to stop, put their feet up and relax. Too many councils of churches have begun with a clear ecumenical vision, only to become bureaucracies behind which the churches have sunk back into the torpor of denominational business-as-usual. It can happen so easily, and when it does the council in question has ceased to be an “ecumenical instrument” and become an “ecumenical alibi”  –  a device that gives all concerned the comfortable illusion of journeying towards unity while permitting the status quo of denominational immobility to continue unchallenged.

11.  With this in mind, and noting that 2004 will mark a decade from the NCCA’s inauguration, I wonder if this National Forum might do well to ask your new Executive, assisted by the fresh eyes and as yet uncorrupted mind of your new General Secretary, to undertake a review of how the council is measuring up to the objectives set for it. Let me push my luck a bit further and suggest several concerns such a review would need to include within its field of vision.

12.  First, a deficiency of the NCCA is that some members of the family still feel unable to gather under its roof. Yes, it is more inclusive than the old Australian Council of Churches, but the Serbian Orthodox Church, several Protestant churches like the Baptists and the Presbyterians and the whole Pentecostal stream, remain outside. When any church is absent from the growing fellowship of Christ’s people, that fellowship must be considered sadly incomplete.

13.  A second challenge is that our council finds itself operating in working relationships that are seriously unbalanced. Most of our key ecumenical partners -- the WCC, the Christian Conference of Asia and most NCCs in the Asia region -- comprise only Protestant, Anglican and in some cases Orthodox churches. While trying to foster a comprehensive ecumenism at home, we find ourselves having to draw insights from and work together with a largely Protestant ecumenism elsewhere. One consequence is that we need to remain ready to share the experience we have gleaned from our privileged ecumenical mix in this country with less inclusive partners elsewhere. Another is that we must continue to take special care to ensure that the ecumenical imbalance abroad does not lead, by default, to a similar imbalance of substance and style developing in the NCCA.

14.  Third, through these years your efforts through the NCCA have been hamstrung by a lack of resources. As the Finance Committee recalls in its report, the task group responsible for planning the new body had alerted prospective member churches to the anticipated requirements, in staff and program costs, of the objectives they were setting for the council: $400,000 a year, in 1993 dollars. Member church contributions to the council have never reached even half that figure. My hope had been that the churches’ greater sense of ownership of the council would translate into a matching financial responsibility for it. In that, clearly, I was naive.

15.  The result is that some of the council’s key objectives remain pious hopes, with little prospect of much being done about them in the foreseeable future. Our Commission on Mission, Social Justice Network and Network on Women and Gender Relations struggle to operate with no staff support at all. The Faith and Unity Commission and Youth Network have minimal, very part-time staff support. Budgets of most commissions and networks have no provision for travel, which makes the “national” in our title at least questionable. A further consequence is that committees and staff are, by default, having to seek funding from sources other than member churches. To the extent that they succeed, their very success must start to call in question the emphasis on the organisation being a council of churches and introduce the risk -- which our Christian World Service commission is already grappling with -- of funding sources subtly influencing the NCCA’s policies and priorities. More than churches perhaps have realised, a council’s self-understanding and its sources of income go hand in hand.
 
16.  Fourth, the NCCA has not yet discovered an effective way of bringing the churches’ views into the public forum, when matters of national or international importance are up for debate. This is partly because the council has no staff capacity for media work, so what is done happens in someone’s spare time using whatever amateur skills he or she can muster. But it is partly too because constitutional constraints on the making of public statements, devised to ensure that what the council says truly echoes the convictions of its member churches, require consultation and therefore time. The media does not work that way, however, with the result that --  as the report of the Aboriginal and Islander Commission observes -- the churches’ voice at times may have been muted. Our intention -- that the NCCA should express what the churches think, not what a commission or a general secretary thinks the churches ought to think -- is absolutely correct. But a viable way of achieving this laudable goal has yet to be found.

17.  Fifth, the challenge in Australia today is to discover an ecumenism for a time of stress. Our churches are in trouble, like those in Europe and North America. Numbers are down or at best static, in many denominations. Budgets are tightening. We feel less significant, more peripheral to the nation’s life. There are conflicts in a number of churches, not least over questions of authority. Morale is suffering. At such times, introversion is an all-too-natural response, with ecumenical commitments put on hold until what seem to be more urgent issues can be sorted out. But of course ecumenism is not an item that can be moved up or down an agenda. It is a way, it is the New Testament way, of being Church. It is the gospel-inspired set of relationships and commitments within which, severally and together, we wrestle with the question of what obedience to Jesus Christ requires of us, in good times and in bad.

18.   Finally, let no one underestimate the wonderful opportunity that stands before us. Tim Winton, in his novel The Riders, has his lead character, an expatriate Australian, pondering the countryside in Ireland. “It was a small, tooled, and crosshatched country,” he muses. “Every field had a name, every path a style. Everything imaginable had been done or tried out there.” But his homeland, he remembers, felt different. “In Australia you looked out and saw the possible, the spaces, the maybes”. Other countries may have long histories behind them. Modern Australia’s history has barely begun. The national identities of others may be set in concrete. Ours continues to evolve. Those dramatic possibilities, those spaces, those maybes, combine to make Australia an extraordinarily exciting nation to be part of right now.

19  They also make this, as Hugh Mackay told us yesterday, an extraordinarily exciting context in which to try to serve Jesus Christ. A society in flux, a national identity under construction, a nation whose history lies before us not behind, offers our churches untold possibilities for redefining their imported relationships, reconciling their separated memories and reworking ecclesial identities that were shaped for times and places far from here. My hope for this council, in these days and in the years ahead, is that it may become an increasingly significant sacred space from which Australia’s churches together are inspired to look out and glimpse what are for us “the possible, the spaces, the maybes”.

The Revd Dr Lance Steicke

Archbishop Keith Rayner and I were guest speakers at the March meeting of the South Australia Council of Churches. The topic: Is Ecumenism still an Issue: Where to in the Future?

Is Ecumenism still an issue? I said it has waned as an issue for interest and excitement, and as a priority in people’s thinking and activity. If the question were, should ecumenism still be an issue, my answer would be a strong and definite YES.

Archbishop Keith said: ‘young people are not particularly concerned about Christian unity’.     ‘The question for most young people’, he said, ‘is no longer, Which religious tradition is best? Or does church unity matter? The question among most young people is, Does religion matter at all? Does Christianity matter at all? Does God matter?’

We’ve come a long way. But that journey hasn’t always been easy and straightforward.

Joseph A. Burgess in In Search of Christian Unity (P. 11) says, ‘Ecumenism in recent years has been an anomaly of progress and frustration’.

It’s very interesting to report evidences of that same progress and frustration very close to home. Both the Lutheran-Anglican and Lutheran-Uniting dialogue are currently in a state of progress with considerable excitement. Some light seems to be shining at the end of the tunnel. But only a few years ago both dialogues were in frustration. The Lutheran-Anglican went into recess because it was felt nothing more could be done. The Lutheran-Uniting floundered and threatened to totter altogether.

It’s difficult to understand this anomaly of progress and frustration. Is it due to institutional inertia and/or the self-interest of church leaders?  I daren’t try to answer the question. I simply let it hang.

I would not have predicted 50, 40, 30, even 20 years ago that we would be where we are today. The development has exceeded all expectations.

What is my vision for the future?

1. Restoring the Centre. Already something of that is happening - a concern for the centre, the essence, the heart and core of what we’re on about as church. If you think about it, it’s this that has divided us to a fairly great extent. Most, if not all, movements within the church and sectarian groups, arose because of a deficiency within orthodox or established Christendom. But with the emergence of these movements, denominations and sects, the emphasis was often off-centre. How easy it is for us, and how tempting, to devote our time and effort to what is peripheral and off-centre. My vision for the future is one whereby the churches will give themselves more fully to core issues, to the centre. And, of course, that centre, those core issues, focus on the  common confession of Jesus Christ on the basis of the Holy Scriptures and the interpretation of the early Christian Creeds.

2. Rediscovery of the gospel. This, of course, is not unrelated to the previous point. In fact, it’s very closely allied to it. I probably betray my Lutheran roots in this. The essence of the Lutheran Reformation was the rediscovery of the gospel. This is seen clearly in the emphasis on grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone. We are saved alone by the grace of God solely through faith in the atoning work of Jesus Christ. This, the gospel, was important to Martin Luther. It’s important to me. I believe it should be important to all of us. Every generation is in danger of losing the gospel. How can we help each other rediscover it, preserve it, stand on it, proclaim it? Does the NCCA have a role in this regard? And, if so, what is it?

3. Serving each other in a mission context. Jesus said to the church, ’Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you’. And then he breathed on his disciples. And he continues to breath on us and on the church to this day. The breath of Jesus. The Spirit of God. The sound of a rushing mighty wind, a breath. On Pentecost Sunday I told the congregation that I was serving at the time that I had thought of getting into the pulpit, going BREATH, and then sitting down and letting them ponder on that. There’s life in breath. Mouth-to-mouth resuscitation is evidence of that as one person breathes life into someone no longer breathing. Jesus breathed the breath of the Spirit into his disciples. The early church, filled with that breath of Jesus, that Spirit, went out and they turned the world upside down. They witnessed to Jesus, as he had told them to do. Witness, mission, evangelism is crucial. Bring two or three or more Christians together and what should they immediately want to do? Worship and evangelize. We are probably not ready to do a great amount of mission work together as churches, but what about:
a) common approaches and strategies
b) research into Australian culture, the context for mission. Friday’s Seminar is a good example of this.
c) Working together as at Seaford
d) Planning together: You go here, we’ll go there. Rather than set up side by side

4. Helping the churches be the church.  How can the NCCA better serve its member churches and the cause of church cooperation, covenanting and collaboration in Australia?

Karl Barth (Thielicke I BELIEVE P. 235) says, ‘The church lives from her function as herald, she is God’s company. Where the church is alive, she must face the question of whether she serves this function or whether she is an end in herself. If the latter is the case, the church usually begins to taste “sacral”, to act pious, to become priestly, and to taste sour. Anyone with a sensitive nose will smell and find it dreadful.’

Is the NCCA serving member churches and helping them in their function as ‘herald’? Because of particular and different confessions the task of being ‘herald’ is no doubt denominational, but resourcing for the task, sharing homework, providing challenges, motivation, mutual encouragement, prayer – this can come from a common pool.

How can the NCCA better serve its member churches?
This is a key question. And a key issue. The Constitution asks it of us.

The first two of the four Objectives of the Constitution say that the NCCA is to encourage and enable the member churches to do this and that. That’s where the emphasis lies – the NCCA serving the member churches - ‘through prayer, dialogue and shared engagement in mission’. It is to include ‘the areas of spirituality, liturgy, theology, history, sociology and culture.’

How can the NCCA better serve its member churches?
Dare I suggest that we need to work a lot more and a lot harder at such things as:

1. The affirmation of each other. We have been good at condemning each other, not so good at affirming.
2. Allied to this is the removal of condemnations. Lutherans and Roman Catholics took a giant step forward when they did this in the Joint Declaration on Justification. But we have a long way to go.
3. Are member churches open to admonition about the limitations of their own traditions? I know I’m very sensitive in this area. And I suspect we all are, some more so than others. Now we must defend our own traditions and our convictions, our confessional position. But what about that which is not an essential part of our confession?
4. How can there be interchange of clergy (and acceptance of each other’s ministry) given our different standards for the ordination and calling of clergy and our different stands on ministry. Lutheran-Anglican dialogue has been working hard on this.
5. Are we working on the right agenda? Or are there are other issues and agenda items before us which we should be tackling?

5. A greater sense of belonging.

Konrad Raiser in To Be the Church says, (P.5)’ An initial general – and sobering – observation is that for many member churches, particularly in the southern hemisphere, the World Council of Churches is a distant organization about which they know very little’.

This applies within denominations. Congregations often know very little about the work of the wider denomination. Denominations know little about the NCCA. It is a ‘distant organization’.

My visit to WA last year  made it clear to me that those in the West see the NCCA as something in the east, far removed from them, not interested in them. How can the West own the NCCA? What can we do to create a sense of belonging, of ownership, of commitment?

How do we deal with the communication gap? Getting the message to the churches and from the churches into its various parts.

Konrad Raiser, (P. 12) ‘None of the churches can face these challenges alone’. He had been talking about such things as evangelism, education, church-state relationships, church-to-church relationships on the national level, denominational defensiveness, training capable ecumenical leadership, involvement of youth in the ecumenical movement, etc. What evidences are there of the churches in Australia  facing the challenges before us together? How can we do so? What is the role of the  NCCA in this? What can the NCCA do to help churches face the challenges of   the day together?

6.   An evaluation of structure.   I realize that the NCCA is only seven years old. But that does not preclude us from considering an evaluation of our structures. You will gather from the above that I have focused on essence, identity, purpose, vision. But structure cannot be omitted or by-passed entirely.

The Executive recently debated our premises. Do they serve us adequately? Would we be better off outside of down-town Sydney? What are the implications of a change – to the churches, to the staff, to the work?

The Executive has also discussed earnestly from time to time finances and resourcing. It should be no secret that income is not what it ought to be from the member churches and that income is hardly keeping pace with requirements and expenditure.
What are the options?

· Increase income. Efforts have been made, but reality is different.
· Decrease expenditure.
· Streamline for greater efficiency and more effective ministry.
· Take up the even greater (and, of course, harder) question, are we over-ecumenicalized ( ! ) in Australia? Do we need the two tiers we have now – full and complete State organizations and administrations, dependent to varying degrees on assistance from the national body especially so far as CWS is concerned, and a full-blown national structure with all that goes with it?

7.   The scope of the ecumenical movement.

I have basically spoken only of the wider ecumenical scene. I have not touched the local or grassroots level. Is there any co-relation between what happens at the local level and on the state or national level? Can we be quite out of kilter with each other’s thinking? Can the leaders of the church be way out there with their thinking while the grassroots is still wondering whether a Catholic boy and a Lutheran girl can hold hands with each other without committing ecumenical sin?

Or is it the other way round? The grassroots is way out ahead with their thinking and practice leaving the leadership lagging behind.

The disparity between local and other levels varies from time to time, place to place, and issue to issue. Let me really stick my neck out and say that I’m not too convinced that the NCCA or its predecessor ACC has done too much to alter or influence the thinking of grassroots Australian Christians to any great extent. Nor am I convinced that grassroots Australian Christians have contributed anything vital to the NCCA. I am not pronouncing judgment. I am not saying whether this is good or bad. I believe it’s a fact.

Lack of resources may force all of us, national, state and local to look at greater streamlining and more efficiency of administration for the future.

8.   The need to rekindle the ecumenical vision.

Konrad Raiser talks about ‘the need to rekindle the ecumenical vision’. TO BE THE CHURCH,  P. X.    The last millennium, he says, was  ‘the millennium of Christian division’ with 1054 and 1517 being the outstanding dates.

I might add that the first  millennium wasn’t all that crash hot either.

Is it a utopian dream to think this new millennium will be any different?

The twentieth century could be classified as the century of the quest for Christian unity. At varying stages in the century the ecumenical vision was very much to the fore.

But what is the ecumenical vision?

· Is it rooted in WCC, NCCA, denominations, local churches, dialogue?
· Is it a leadership or a laity issue? Bishops or grass roots?
· Is it to do away with differences? I would never want to deprive the world of Orthodox worship, but I don’t want a world where Orthodox worship is the only option either.
· Is it visible unity, as most Catholics would want and expect and many others would aspire to as well?
· Is it full fellowship, altar and pulpit fellowship, even though structures and denominations might remain?

I don’t believe we would have consensus for one moment on what the ‘ecumenical vision’ is that we would want to rekindle.

And perhaps that is a good place to conclude this address. Not only because I’m probably over time, but also because I leave up in the air the very issue that brings us together, the question, why? Why have we come together? Why have we formed an NCCA? What for us is the ecumenical vision? What are the issues we should work on? What is central?

May God bless us richly as we tackle the agenda and the issues we do do together in the name of and on behalf of our respective churches.

“MISSION AT A TURNING POINT”

“DISCIPLESHIP”
Mark 3:13-35

INTRODUCTION
It never ceases to amaze me that Mark made it into the canon of the New Testament. It speaks of such failure on the part of the disciples, more crass and blatant than in the other three gospels. It is a quite incredible statement of the sense of power of the grace of God and the Holy Spirit’s guidance that Mark and I and II Corinthians were included, for they are documents of human failure too.

MARK 3: 13-35
Let us look at the main lines of the passage:
13-19: Jesus goes to an uninhabited place in which to set apart the nucleus of the New Israel, the Twelve (cf.Mt.19: 28; Lk.22:30). They are

(a)  to be with him;
(b)  to proclaim the Good News Event, and
(c) to interact with the forces of evil (casting out devils). Then they are named. Many we do not know of. However, the sociological work on Galilee of Jerome Murphy-O’Connor and Sean Freyne (e.g. S. Freyne, Galilee, Jesus and the Gospels) is important here. Fishing in the Sea of Galilee in the economic circumstances of the First Century was big business. Galilean fishing syndicates were raising credit a thousand kilometres from their operations. Although fishing is not explicitly mentioned here, the name of one of the syndicates (“Sons of Zebedee”) is given. These were no lakeside bumpkins; they were major operators. The name “Peter” (“Rocky”: Kephas) is a dig at subsequent failure. So is “Sons of Thunder” (“Boanerges”). Simon is a Zealot, a member of a fairly radical nationalist movement. We are dealing with an influential group of competent operators.

20-21: Two factors are significant here: Jesus’ immense popularity and therefore opportunity to influence the people; and the way in which he unnerves the people with his exousia (“authority”).

22-27: In the Mt./Lk.version (Q/Mt.12:22-26; Lk.11:14-18) this Beelzebub controversy follows from an exorcism. There is academic discussion over the spelling of Beelzebub vs Beelzebul. Beelzebub was the god of Ekron (IIKg.1:2). The point is: Jesus is seen from the side of Jerusalem (regarded in Mark as the place of evil) as an Evil Force. Therefore, his controversy with Judaism is seen in terms of a fight of spirits. Verse 27 reminds us of Isaiah 49: 24-25. All this is “parable”, i.e. a story presenting an existential crisis for the hearers.

28-30: The central point of the section. What is this sin against the Holy Spirit? It has to do with Jesus’ very being.

31-35: A whole new understanding of community and even of existence is represented here. One’s very being is related to one’s relatives; so the sociological studies of Galilee reinforce.

It seems fairly certain that Mark was put together in Rome around 70 CE/AD. Its connections with Galilee too are very important.

Let us imagine its situation.

The Neronian persecution has taken place. Tacitus sets out for us the appalling record of what happened to members of the Roman Church:

“They were not only put to death but put to death with  insult, in that they were dressed up in the skins of beasts to perish either by the worrying of dogs  or on crosses or by fire or, when the daylight failed, they were burnt to serve as lights by night.” (Gwatkin’s translation, Vol 1, p78)

Tradition, accepted by the church in the absence of other evidence, records that the two leading apostles, Peter and Paul, perished in this onslaught. This would be devastating for the mixed Gentile/Jewish church. It would not be surprising if the number of apostates was high. How many would be able to face up to the prospect of an agonising death by fire or crucifixion or being torn apart by dogs, deliberately starved to make them more vicious? It should be noted that, from very early days, the concept of the believer being identified with his Lord in suffering and death appears to have loomed large. Paul seeks a share e.g. in the sufferings of Chris (Phil 3:10); he seeks to fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ as an “example to the members of the church to follow his steps” (2.21f). The passage on fasting is an example. It has to do with the death of Jesus and the fasting expressive of sorrow that belongs to that time. The present time with Jesus present is the time of joy. It is also the time of the presence of Peter, and the period of a wedding celebration: “Can the wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?. The days will come when the groom is taken away from them. And then on that day they will fast” (2.19f). The verb apairo can imply a use of force. Jesus was “torn away” from the twelve and the church by the crucifixion. Similarly Peter (and Paul) shared this experience of being “torn away” by hostile authorities and martyred. The church in the aftermath of the persecution of 64AD knew something of the distress expressed at the time of the violent death of Jesus and it could take comfort in this identification.

The believing community at Rome we can surmise had its own considerable portion of defectors. It may have been expressed in all sorts of ways, giving up membership of the community and so not being brought before the authorities; keeping their identify secret; clearing out altogether in an act of sheer panic and yet wanting back; under the strain of torture and its physical agony reaching breaking point and willy-nilly denying Christ; perhaps there were those within the community who betrayed others to the authorities for gain, a pagan son his Christian father or a pagan mother her converted daughter, utterly resentful of her leaving the pagan gods. The list of failures could be multiplied. The unit on sin without forgiveness could meet such a situation” “All sins and transgressions will be forgiven” – what a sweeping statement! Then the salutary finish: “but the sin against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven” (28-30). Many of those who had failed had never lost their faith in Christ. If in a moment of agony and stress, they lost their true identify in an involuntary denial; they had never in their hearts lost touch with Christ.  Perhaps there were those who thought that there was no acceptance for them. Their sin was too great, too heinous.

MARK 8: 27-38

This section is the beginning of the second major part of Mark's Gospel.  The first part, up until 8: 26, is crammed full of activity on the part of Jesus.  He heals, he teaches, he moves from one place to another.  Crowds are drawn to him; Jewish leaders begin to show their opposition.  Two impressions, among others, are left: the furious activity of Jesus. and in addition a strange inability on the part of his closest followers to understand what he is about.

From our passage (i.e. from 8:27) it is of a different kind altogether. It moves more leisurely. We are now made to think about Jesus and what he is about. The structure is that of a journey. It begins with Jesus as far away from his own area as possible, out in pagan Caesarea Philippi. Caesarea Philippi, the ancient Paneas, on the slopes of Mount Hermon, was rebuilt by Herod Philip, whose name it bears to distinguish it from Caesarea on the coast, the seal of the Roman government.  Mark traces a journey which Jesus makes as he moves south from there through Galilee, along the Jordan through Jericho and up to Jerusalem.  On this journey Jesus teaches his disciples about himself and about how they are to be disciples.  It is no chance that this takes place on a journey, it is a kind of pilgrimage.  Mark draws this out by continually referring to Jesus as being on the way or on the road at the head of his disciples.

Although he begins in pagan Caesarea Philippi, strangely he enters deeper and deeper into the area of estrangement from God as he reaches the so-called Holy City of Jerusalem.  We know from earlier, in Chapter 3, that the struggle between him and the authorities from Jerusalem begins in Galilee.  He is associated with Galilee, they are associated with Jerusalem.  Each side points to the power of evil spirits in the other.  For Jerusalem stands over against God's apocalyptic act in Jesus.

But what does Jesus teach his disciples about himself on this pilgrimage to the estranged city? - this anti-pilgrimage?  Chiefly what is going to happen to him; he says it on three different occasions: "I am going to be delivered into the hands of men/people who will kill me; and when 1 am killed, after three days 1 will rise".  This is to happen in Jerusalem; hence the journey is a journey to that place. We can see by now how the end of the story is beginning to dominate what precedes it.  The three predictions that Jesus makes of what is going to happen to him are brief.  They do not need to be lengthy.  Mark's readers already know the full story and what is going to happen when Jesus reaches Jerusalem.

However, each time Mark gives one of the predictions he goes on immediately to drive home its implications for the disciples.  If he is about to take up his cross, then they must take up theirs.  If he is not about to demand his rights as a true leader of the Jewish people and so be saved by God from humiliation, then they too must learn what in fact it means to be humble, and he sets before them a child and tells them that their behaviour should resemble the child's.  If he is king of the Jews and does not assert his kingship with worldly authority, then they must learn that the ideal for them is not ruling over people but serving others as a slave does.

If the religious centre of Judaism is to demonstrate that it is, in fact, the centre of estrangement and alienation from God, the Jesus' way of pilgrimage is the opposite. it is God's anti-pilgrimage, over against Jewish pilgrimages.  God in Christ becomes totally alienated from religiosity, from playing religion, by hanging on a gibbet close to a Holy Feast.  God in Christ enters into full humiliation in religious terms, if religiosity, playing religion, means demonstrating religious rights.  God in Christ becomes the slave of all, if civil religiosity, playing civil religion, means asserting that he behave in Jerusalem's terms as to how that estranged place thinks a king of the Jews should behave.

Those, like Peter, who do not see that, are indeed Satan, standing, like Jerusalem, against the way of the presence of God in Jesus Christ.  So Jesus links his fate to the way of discipleship.  In that way Mark makes our understanding of Christian life depend on our understanding of God's action in Christ.  It should be noted that, from the earliest days of Christianity in Rome, the concept of the believer being identified with his or her Lord in suffering, death and resurrection appears to have loomed large.  Paul seeks a share, e.g., in the sufferings of Christ (Phil. 3: 10).  He asks to fill up what is lacking in the sufferings of Christ (Col. 1: 24).  Peter, in 1 Peter (2: 21 - 22), talks of the vicarious suffering of Christ as an "Example to the members of the church to follow his steps".

So Christian discipleship is comprehensible only in Christ.  This stands in stark contrast to the outwardly successful activities of the Pharisees.  They most successfully in first century Judaism were able to combine sectarian movements and mainline aspirations.  They were outstanding experts in propagating religious comprehensiveness.  However, Christian discipleship stands over against successes.  For Christian discipleship is only comprehended in God's strange actions in Jesus' anti-religiosity pilgrimage.  Our identity in him comes from God; it is given to us by God's grace.  It stands over against all self-conscious discipleships, all posings, all self-validated pilgrimages with predetermined outcomes, and optimal results.  Despite ourselves, it is given to us.  For Jesus, in his resurrection message speaks first to Peter, the one who has gone further than the other disciples in denying Jesus, the one who goes against God's will, and says that he is going before him into Galilee, the place not estranged by religiosity.  There he will see him, as he told him.  Discipleship is not self-justification; it is gift.

CONCLUSIONS
The following factors need to be noted:
1. Those called to be disciples are confrontational to religious institutions.
2. The situation in Rome was a re-run of Passion Week. So it is for all Christian life and existence.

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APOSTLESHIP
Acts 9: 1-19

“Damascus Road”

INTRODUCTION
There is a phrase which is sometimes used : a Damascus road experience.  What is such an experience? Acts contains three accounts of what happened to Paul: 9:1-19, 22:4-16, 26:9-18. There has been much discussion whether these describe a conversion or a commission or something else. The account occurs three times in Acts, apart from the references to it in the Pauline letters. Why was it given so much significance? Who was this Paul, about whom it is written, anyway? The Acts of Paul and Thecla, Section 3, describe him as follows: “A sturdy little bald-headed, bow-legged man, with meeting eyebrows and a rather prominent nose.”

He was a very major problem to the Early Church. First, the ablest arch-enemy of Christianity had become its most articulate evangelist. Second, and perhaps even more problematic, was Paul already a missionary before his conversion, taking part in a Jewish proselytising campaign? (Schoeps and Bornkamm). The evidence is somewhat elusive. In part it consists of the unspoken presumption that the Christian Paul could not have taken such an overwhelming interest in the Gentiles if, before he met with Christ, he had not also been concerned about their fate. More substantial evidence may be found in Gal. 5:11 where Paul asks, “And I, my friends, if I am still advocating circumcision, why is it I am still persecuted?” From this it has been assumed that before his Christian baptism Paul had practised the calling of a Jewish preacher of circumcision. However, the juxtaposition of two “stills” means that this interpretation is not necessarily implied. We might draw a picture of Paul being heavily involved before his conversion in a Jewish proselytising campaign. This would certainly help us to see his later struggles in a new light.

ACTS 9: 1-19
Against this background we have a picture of a number of events occurring for Paul: the call–vision is the tradition of Jeremiah, the reception of the Holy Spirit, and baptism. The conversion is separated by three days from the reception of the Spirit and baptism.

Let us overview the passage:
1-9: Paul, the arch-enemy of the Christians, is presented, armed with letters presumably from the Jerusalem Sanhedrin to the synagogues of the Jewish community in Damascus, a major Jewish colony. It may have had close connections with the Qumran community. The right to arrest Jewish fugitives is mentioned in 1 Mac.15:21. The three accounts differ in detail but agree on the central conversation between Jesus and Paul:
“Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” “Tell me, Lord”, he said, “who are you.” The voice answered, “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting.”

It is not clear whether Paul alone heard Jesus (22.9) or also those journeying with him (9:7), whether he alone saw the light (20:11) or whether those also with him (22:9; 26:13 – strangely unlike Paul they are not made blind by the light). These variations seem not significant, for there is no indication that anyone other than Paul saw Jesus. We can safely conclude that Paul’s experience was quite different from that of any of his fellow travellers.

10-19: A number of factors indicate that Paul’s three-day experience was a unified crisis, extending from his conversion and re-orienting right through to this reception of the Spirit and his baptism. First, in the three accounts there is no distinction between the commissioning he receives on the road and that which he receives from Ananias. In ch.9 the commissioning comes solely through Ananias; in Ch.26 the whole commission is received outside Damascus. Paul, it appears, did not distinguish the means and the times of God’s dealings with him. It was all the one event and experience, and it was impossible to disentangle the various elements in it.

Second, Paul’s blindness lasts for three days. From the background above we can see that his entire world-view had been shaken, especially if he had been a Jewish proselytiser. He was not converted in an instant. That is what the blindness means. He was shattered.He had to let the pieces of his shattered life re-assemble themselves round the new fact which had broken in upon him. It was only when this was done, and this faith had been re-created from it deepest levels, that he was ready to take that step of commitment after which he could not go back.

Third, in ch.22, Ananias has to persuade him to take the final step of baptism. It all runs together: conversion, a sense of commissioning, re-orientation, receiving the Holy Spirit and baptism.
Note: in verse 5, Paul calls Jesus “Lord” (kurie); this could equally be “sir” or “the one who clearly is putting me in subjection”. Again: in verse 17 Ananias calls Paul “brother” (adelphe); it is used 19 times in Acts to mean “fellow Jew”.

CALL-VISION AND THE HOLY SPIRIT
A number of factors need to be borne in mind here:

First, there is the very important phrase in 1 Cor. 15:8. Within I Cor.15:8, there are two expressions which require a little further examination. Of the first of these, “last of all”, could be taken to mean “least in importance”, and this would agree with verse 9. “Extromati” has been variously translated into English. It probably means something like “an abortion”. This can hardly be taken in a strictly literal sense but might signify that he had been born before his time or without the preparation necessary, the preparation which the other apostles had through their earthly fellowship with Jesus. It is likely that the term was not his own choice but had been used about him by his critics “that he was as much an ugly parody of a true apostle as an abortion is of a healthy infant born at the proper time,” Paul uses it against himself. Yet he went through the call-vision, gift of the Spirit and baptism experience. This was the miracle.

Second, the coming of the Spirit overcame the Evil Inclination, or “yeser harã” in him. In popular Judaism the Evil Inclination was in all people, for Jews it could be partially controlled by strict adherence to the Law. It is referred to in the Damascus Document (CD) 19:20-23:

“Each man did what was good in his eyes, and each one chose the stubbornness of his heart, and they kept not themselves from the people and its sin but lived in license deliberately, walking in the ways of the wicked, of whom God said, “Their wine is the poison of serpents and the head of asps is cruel” (Deut 32:33). The serpents are the kings of the peoples and their wine is their ways”.

At Qumran, the “stubbornness of his heart” (sryrwt lbw) is synonymous with “the thought of his yeser,: as the Manual of Discipline 5:4-5 shows. The Torah, for them, would be the antidote to rabbinic traditions. Paul, however, discerns an antinomy between being “led by the spirit” and being “under the Law” (Gal 5:18).  For him the Spirit alone, sundered from the Torah, is the antidote to the yeser, and in Gal 5:17, Paul goes on to describe the battle between the yeser and the Spirit. For Paul, the change to his life comes from the outpouring of the Spirit of God, and the recreation of humanity.

A Global Dilemma, A Challenge for Christians
Elizabeth G. Ferris
World Council of Churches

No government in the world wants refugees who turn up unannounced on their border, in search of protection and assistance.  Even countries such as Australia and the United States, which have long traditions of refugee resettlement, devise ways to prevent the arrival of asylum-seekers and to make life uncomfortable for those who do manage to get in.  Why is this?  Why would a government which devotes considerable energy and expense to resettling refugees in a country with a rich multi-cultural heritage be developing draconian policies to keep other refugees out?  Some politicians would argue that the people arriving now aren’t really refugees or if they are fleeing persecution, they are somehow “jumping the queue.”  Others would argue that they have used criminal means or falsified documents to gain entry to Australia and therefore can’t be “genuine.”  There is a confusion in public opinion, sometimes exacerbated by politicians, between refugees, migrants, victims of trafficking and asylum-seekers.

The issues are complex and messy.  Sometimes we get so caught up in our procedures and processes that we forget the human side of the dilemma of people forced to flee for their lives. Desperate people do desperate things.  The conflicts that uproot people are not neat, orderly processes.  Sometimes people seize the chance they have to escape and can’t wait in the resettlement queue (although the term ‘queue’ itself is misleading.) Sometimes the only way to reach safety is to lie or to buy a false passport.  Does that mean that individuals who do so are less worthy than those who come through “established channels?”  We need to remember that when Jesus Christ urged his followers to “welcome the stranger,” he didn’t limit this to people whose documents are in order and who follow the procedures followed by our governments.

Today, on every continent, Christians are being challenged in unprecedented ways by the politics of international migration.  While much of the public debate focuses on policies, procedures and numbers, the questions raised by migration are ultimately ethical, moral and theological issues.  How do we define the “other?”  Where do we draw the line to exclude others?  What are we afraid of?  What is our responsibility for suffering in other parts of the world?  What is our responsibility as Christians and as human beings to those who arrive on our doorsteps after having been forced to abandon their homes and flee their communities?

You can’t understand what’s happening in the area of refugees without considering the broader question of migration.  And migration is too important an issue to leave to the politicians.  It is also not a new issue.  Since the time of the Old Testament, people have fled their homes because of persecution, war, famine and poverty.   The Bible has been called the “ultimate immigration handbook” and is filled with admonitions to do justice to the stranger and “to show hospitality because in doing so you may have welcomed angels unawares.” But the stories of the Old Testament also reflect their historical context in the tales of backlash and scapegoating of foreigners.  Those of us working with immigrants and refugees don’t often quote the texts from Ezra and Nehemiah, but those stories remind us of the ageless tendency to exclude those who are different.  It is Christ’s message of inclusion that transcends these Old Testament stories. “From his parables and his actions, it is clear that Jesus not only challenged those individuals (e.g. the Pharisees) who maintained the barriers that marginalized whole groups within his society, but was prepared to confront any system of thought or practice that created those barriers…It is this challenge to the dominant, and dominating religious system which provides the basis for the church’s obligation to call into question any system which leads to or justifies discrimination, regardless of the form that discrimination might take: economic (hunger, thirst nakedness), national loyalty (foreigners), physical (sick), or social (in prison.)”   Christ himself identifies with the migrant when he tells us that in welcoming the stranger we are welcoming him (Matthew 25).

Migration issues are complicated and (given limitations of time this afternoon), I will risk over-simplifying complex issues and confine myself to making 4 short points, raising questions about Christian responsibility “for such a time is this.” This phrase comes, of course, from the story of Esther, but for me, it evokes memories of the last time I was in Australia where this was the theme of the Pre-assembly Women’s meeting in Canberra in 1991.

1. INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION IS A FACT OF LIFE AND WILL INCREASE IN THE FUTURE.

We live in a world where people cross national borders for many reasons.  Some are forced to flee their communities because of persecution and violence.  Others are forced to leave because they can no longer survive at home because of economic or environmental disasters.  Still others migrate because they hope for better economic prospects or to reunite with family members.  While the cornerstone of globalization has been the increased international flow of trade, capital, information and services, the right to freedom of movement for many people – especially refugees, asylum-seekers and non-wealthy migrants – has been severely curtailed.  Governments in both North and south have become more active in trying to limit the movement of people into their territories.  Control of borders is perhaps the last bastion of sovereignty at a time when governments are no longer able to control the movement of money, information or jobs from their countries. But in spite of governmental efforts to control migration, international migration – particularly irregular migration – continues to rise.  Indications are that in our globalizing world, the pressures for migration will further increase in the years to come.  The causes of migration are rooted in the dozens of conflicts around the world as well as the underside of globalization – the growing disparity between rich and poor resulting from the inequitable distribution of resources.  Until the international community is prepared to tackle the fundamental causes of violence and inequality, migration will continue.

One of the characteristics of today’s globalization is that the world’s conflicts and suffering enter most of our homes every day by television, newspapers and the web.  As one of the CCIA youth commissioners said at our Commission meeting last month, “we can choose not to act, but we cannot choose not to know.”    The presence of refugees and migrants among us, invited or not, serves as a bridge across borders, enabling us to interact with other parts of the world in unique ways.  For example, you can read a dozen newspaper articles about Afghanistan, but your view of the Afghan situation and perhaps of that region of the world will be inalterably shaped by coming to know an Afghan refugee.   Refugees and migrants offer us a different way of knowing the world.

I invite you to think about Christian responsibility in a world of people on the move. In such a time as this, what is the appropriate response?  What is our responsibility towards refugees, asylum-seekers and migrants? Do people fleeing persecution have a greater claim on the churches’ compassion than those trying to escape poverty?  Does this imply that violations of civil and political rights are worse than violations of economic, social or cultural rights?  Should everyone fleeing violence or poverty be allowed to enter any country of the world?   How should governments set limits and what role should Christians play in the policy debate?

2. REFUGEE PROTECTION IS BEING ERODED IN EVERY REGION OF THE WORLD.
 
Fifty years ago, the international community developed a particular regime to respond to one group of forced migrants:  refugees.  This international refugee regime includes a common definition of the people of concern, proscribes certain standards for their treatment through an international convention, and recognizes an international agency, UNHCR, to protect and assist refugees.  Undergirding this international refugee regime was a consensus that individuals fleeing persecution (as defined by the Convention) required protection. 

This system has been far from perfect and the present UNHCR Global Consultations on Refugee Protection are intended to identify gaps in the 1951 Convention and to move towards common interpretation of the convention as well as to reaffirm the convention.  This international system of refugee protection, and particularly the institution of asylum, need to be upheld and strengthened to ensure that all those in need of international protection are able to find it.  The reality is that there are still many people in the world in need of protection from persecution and war who are not able to find safety.

In the past decade, the right to seek and enjoy asylum has been eroded in many countries.  Governments have made it more difficult for people fleeing persecution to even reach their borders and access asylum procedures through interdiction, visa requirements, carrier sanctions, immigration controls in airports of departure and other measures.  In many cases, it is impossible for people fearing persecution from their governments to obtain a passport from that government or to approach embassies in search of a visa.  Once asylum-seekers enter a country, they often find the procedures confusing and intimidating.  If they arrive without documentation, they are often treated with suspicion.  Moreover, they may be detained and lack legal counsel to present their cases in the best possible way.

The acceptance rates of asylum applications have plummeted in most Western countries over the past 15 years.  While governments argue that this is due to the fact that many “bogus asylum-seekers” are abusing the system, many refugee advocates assert that people with genuine asylum claims are being denied.  And many people with reasons to fear persecution in their home country choose not to enter the asylum process because they perceive that the personal costs are greater than their chance of success.

What is the particular responsibility of Christians to those forced to flee violence?  Most fundamentally, Christians are called to struggle for justice and to overcome violence in order to make ours a world where people aren’t forced to abandon their homes and flee their communities.   Churches and their organizations have been in the forefront of the struggle to protect the basic human right of every person “to seek and enjoy asylum.”   On the national level, this means urging that the benefit of the doubt must always be given to those who say they fear persecution back home.

3. DEVELOPMENTS IN AUSTRALIA ARE SHAPED BY AND CONTRIBUTE TO THE WEAKENING OF THE INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM OF REFUGEE PROTECTION.

Australia has a wonderful history and tradition of welcoming immigrants and refugees.  The treatment of aboriginal people is a dark side of the story in your country (as in mine) which must be acknowledged and redressed.  But your immigrant tradition is a tradition to protect, to be proud of, to uphold.  There is something very special about being a country of immigrants – something that sets Australia apart from most countries of the world.   Your country has meant freedom, safety, and opportunity for hundreds of thousands of people who could not stay in their country of origin. And your country has been transformed by the presence of immigrants.  While it’s not perfect, your model of a multi-cultural society has been a shining example to the world.   When it comes to refugees and immigrants, Australia has a wonderful international reputation.
 
It is this reputation which makes current policy developments so troubling.   For example, there is something profoundly disturbing about Australia putting asylum-seekers in isolated detention centers.  This isn’t a new or unique trend; many governments followed these kinds of policies, reflecting a global trend of isolating asylum-seekers from the general public.  It’s easier to deport people when no one in the country knows them, when they have no friends or advocates.  But it is new to see Australia doing it.  It is new to see Australia leading the critics of UN human rights instruments.  It’s shocking to see the government react to a few boatloads of asylum-seekers with draconian measures which undercut decades of generous policies.  A few months ago, UNHCR’s Executive Committee considered how the international community should respond to situations of mass influx.  What’s the appropriate response when a million Rwandans flee the genocide in their country?  How should the international community respond to the exodus of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo where hundreds of thousands of people flooded into neighboring countries in a few days?  Most of the interventions came from governments of countries that had experienced large-scale mass influxes – governments like Tanzania, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Iran.  And then the Australian representative said something like “well, small numbers of people arriving over time can have the same impact as a sudden mass influx.”  The reaction in the room was one of amazement – surely Australia isn’t claiming that the boats arriving on its shores are comparable to mass influxes of hundreds of thousands of refugees arriving in poor countries.  Unfortunately, the impact of these Australian policy changes and the tenor of the public debate goes far beyond your country’s borders. 

Negative public opinion towards asylum-seekers is obviously growing in Australia.  There is a backlash. But backlashes are like pendulums – they come and they go. It is sad to see Australia apparently willing to abandon basic standards in its treatment of asylum-seekers because of what is probably a transient phenomenon.  In my country, the United States, there was a horrible backlash against immigrants in the mid-1990s. Politicians railed against the “illegal aliens” taking Americans’ jobs and many restrictive laws were passed.  But now the pendulum has swung in the other direction and politicians are trying to undo some of the most egregious laws passed five years ago.
 
How are Australian churches and individual Christians responding at such a time as this?  I know that many churches are involved with these issues -- churches are speaking out against politically unpopular policies, advocating for changes in policies, organizing hearings and writing letters, visiting detention centres and assisting individual asylum-seekers and migrants in many ways.   Like Christians in many parts of the world, speaking out on behalf of uprooted people can be very difficult and very lonely.  You may sometimes think that no one is listening when you speak out and policies can be frustratingly difficult to change.  But you are not alone.   At church gatherings – like this one – in South Africa and Argentina, in Norway and Thailand, Christians are coming together to pray, to share experiences, to educate each other and to develop means of translating the Gospel imperative to welcome the stranger into concrete actions.

4. THERE ARE NO EASY ANSWERS. 

As long as we live in a world plagued by war and poverty, people will try to escape their conditions by migration.  They will bypass governmental efforts at border control and their journeys will become more dangerous and more costly.  The causes and inter-relationships of migratory flows are complex.  Governmental efforts to stop smugglers and traffickers can make it more difficult, more expensive, and sometimes impossible for people fleeing persecution to find safety.   We know that refugees frequently use routes used by traditional migrants when war forces them to leave their homes.  In a world where there are limits to the number of refugees and migrants who will be admitted into rich countries, the questions of whom to admit are difficult.  What should be the balance between admitting immigrants who meet Australia’s labour needs and accepting refugees for humanitarian reasons? 

Similarly there are no easy answers to questions about Christian responsibility in such a time as this. Like the Good Samaritan, we have a responsibility to the victims on the road -- to patch them up, to care for them, to help them.  This is noble work.  Even as we in the churches complain about the inadequacy of the international system of refugee protection, we recognize that millions of people every year are safe because of this system.  While we urge governments of resettlement countries to accept more refugees because the numbers are never enough, we know that hundreds of thousands of individual human beings are being given a chance to start new lives because of these policies.  We need to affirm the positive aspects of our present system – even as we advocate for changes which would make the systems more responsive to the needs of uprooted people.

For churches in Australia, reaching out to the strangers in our midst or advocating with the government in an increasingly difficult climate is not easy.  Sometimes the people in our churches are confused or even hostile to refugees.  The backlash isn’t something that is happening “out there.”  It is also happening in our own communities.  It can be very tiring to always be explaining why refugees sometimes can’t enter through  established channels. Nevertheless, if we are to be faithful to the Gospel –- to welcome the stranger and work for justice – we have no choice.  It must be our task and responsibility to open our eyes to the uprooted among us.  Let us take to heart the words in the book of Hebrews that it is our privilege and duty as Christians to welcome strangers, for by doing so we may unknowingly have entertained angels in our midst