I hope we catholics haven’t flown so high, either socially or economically, or both, that we’ve forgotten our roots.

For a long time from the landing of the First Fleet until World War 2 (1939 – 1945 for younger readers) catholics, especially Irish catholics, were vilified as disloyal dissidents.

That was the popular perception, fuelled by the press, but not the reality.

We, of all Aussie sub-cultures, should be the first to lend a hand to today’s vilified dissidents, be they Lebanese, Indians or Africans.

Here’s a quote to remember: “Industrial unrest, the response to the British suppression of the 1916 Easter Day uprising in Dublin, in particular the “profanities of the ‘Rasputin of Australia’, Daniel Mannix, the Catholic Archbishop of Melbourne, the antics of the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW),the upset accompanying the two conscription referenda”, all of these seemed to be the harbingers of a doleful future, which, leading citizens conceived of at an irrevocable slide towards social collapse.” (‘The Secret Army and the Premier’, Andrew Moore, page 17.)

I raise this nasty business of our own relegation to the level of “sin bin” in Australian society not to open old wounds but to challenge catholics to take advantage of their redeemed positioning in society to advocate publically, care, communication and concern for Lebanese, African and Indian recent migrants.

Instead of closing parishes of whatever denomination, we need to keep them open as multipurpose precincts at the service of the latest beleaguered migrant group.

Mr. Rudd’s generous funding of schools to provide halls, libraries and other facilities carries an expectation/legal requirement that these new facilities be shared with the neighbourhood without fear or favour.

Instead of waiting for an aforementioned group to approach a local church, could we not be proactive and approach them?

We need to exert in this volatile matter as much resource and energy as we’re presently investing in anti-terrorist operations and, in Victoria, anti-bushfire planning.

Bills of Rights, Anti-discrimination and vilification legislation have an important place at another level of social interaction.

There’s no getting away, I believe, from an urgent review, at local council level, of resources held by local religious groups which could be offered as ready response centres for the treatment of social alienation.

Resentment among teenagers leads to all kinds of unhappy outcomes for
all parties concerned.

Resentment within a migrant group, for whatever perceived grievance has led, historically in Australia, to a whole generation or two or three feeling alienated in the Australia we all want them to call “home”.

Intercultural, interreligious peace is not just the absence of war. It has to be worked at long and hard to develop into a commonwealth

One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind!

RJM