Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Worthy of Worship

"If God were not angry at injustice and deception and did not make a final end to violence—that God would not be worthy of worship…. The only means of prohibiting all recourse to violence by ourselves is to insist that violence is legitimate only it comes from God… My thesis that the practice of non-violence requires a belief in divine vengeance will be unpopular with many… in the West…. [But] it takes the quiet of a suburban home for the birth of the thesis that human non-violence [results from the belief in] God’s refusal to judge. In a sun-scorched land, soaked in the blood of the innocent, it will invariably die… [with] other pleasant captivities of the liberal mind." - Miroslav Volf

Saturday, August 07, 2010

My Country, Your Country

As we approach the first anniversary of Peter Adam's Australia: Whose Land? lecture, Alison has coincidentally finished her three part series: My Country, Your Country. It's worth checking out, particulary for the final post in the series. Here's an excert:
One quote made me stop in my tracks. It was a woman talking about how she had never really understood who she was because she had never been able to be with her own family in their own place. I wanted to be sick on the spot. Only fifteen minutes beforehand, I had been lost in my own memories of family, and the place that my family felt it belonged to. At what cost were these memories created!? Which Aborignal people were removed from Ebeneezer so that white people could farm? Which indigenous families were torn apart so that I could grow up safely with my own?

Under John Howard, people said that the stolen generation was not this generation's fault. Maybe that is true. I personally can't take any direct responsiblity for destoying countless Aborignal families.

But I was blind to the way that I personally have benefitted from the pain that many many others have suffered. That afternoon at Reconciliation Place, I realised. I am truly sorry.
You'll find the series here:

  1. Thought 1
  2. Thought 2
  3. Hard Hitting Thoughts