Refugee
and Migrant Sunday 2003
Refugee and Migrant Sunday will be observed in most dioceses throughout Australia
on Sunday August 31st 2003 (in Melbourne on 17th August). Many schools will
hold an observance in the week preceding or following August 31st. With this
letter I enclose:
a) Pope John Paul II’s message for 2003;
b) A message from Bishop
Joseph Grech *, Chairman of the Committee
for Migrants and Refugees of the Australian Catholic Bishops’ Conference;
c) Theological Reflections on Refugees by Fr
Andrew Hamilton SJ;
d) A poster for display in your church or school, resulting from
a competition in Secondary schools.
e) Liturgy notes based on
the texts of the 22nd Sunday of Ordinary Time (August 31st). *
*You will need Adobe
Acrobat Reader to view these files.
I hope that the material provided assists you to celebrate Refugee
and Migrant Sunday in a fitting way.
Yours sincerely in Christ,
(Rev) John J. Murphy
Director.
Theological Reflection on Refugees by Fr Andrew Hamilton SJ.
(for the observance of Refugee and Migrant Sunday).
“
The Scriptures begin with the story of creation. And by the end of that story,
all that needs to be said about refugees has been said. We learn these things:
the world is God’s gift, given to us all; God loves each human being
who is ever to come into the world; therefore all human beings matter. And
so refugees matter. We are all made in God’s image. So, when another
human being is exiled or abused, God’s image is not treated with
due respect.
Because God loves of each of us personally, what we share as human
beings is much more important than our differences. The communities
to which we belong - our families, towns, states and nations -
help shape who we are. But we also have responsibility to strangers
who do not belong to those communities. When someone who is starving
or at risk of their life knocks on the door of our family house
or of our nation, we may not simply ignore their plight. They may
not belong to our family or our nation, but they are our fellow
human beings also loved by God.
We find this insight enshrined in the laws given to the people
if Israel. They are instructed to welcome strangers. For God had
been with them when they wandered as strangers through Canaan.
Because God had chosen them as friends, they were to befriend other
strangers who were also God’s friends.
In his teaching, Jesus also insisted on hospitality to strangers.
He shocked the Pharisees by welcoming people whom they excluded
from their meals: Romans, tax collectors and prostitutes. He also
saw the heart of Israel to lie in the great exhortation to love
God with our whole heart, whole mind and whole soul, and to love
our neighbour as ourselves. But when Jesus was asked who is our
neighbour, he told a story about a Samaritan, a member of a despised
group. In his story the Samaritan was the one who showed neighbourly
love.
Jesus also died as a stranger to reconcile strangers. He was taken
outside the city to be killed, and his brutal killing was designed
to strip him of his humanity. His death shows what sin is like.
In it we take our eyes off God and our common humanity, and concentrate
on our own interests and those of our group. As Caiphas said of
Jesus, it was convenient to kill one man for the sake of the nation.
This self-centredness is the attitude that makes refugees and pushes
them away from our homes and nation.
When he rose from the dead, Jesus proved that God’s love
is stronger than our self-centredness. He also gave us hope that
our world could be different. Instead of pushing away and punishing
the stranger, we can imagine a world in which the differences between
people are a source of life and where we share our resources with
those most in need. This is a world in which refugees are not made,
and when they come they are made welcome. The church, where Paul
says there is to be no difference made between Jew and Greek, between
men and women is called to be the kind of community we would like
to find made between nations. It is one where asylum seekers and
refugees should find a welcome.
So in Christian faith, refugees and asylum seekers are important
because in them we welcome Christ who comes to us in the stranger.
We live out our faith in our face to face meeting with asylum seekers.
Nothing is more encouraging than to meet someone who will walk
with you and look you in the eye.
We also live out our faith in making some of the energy and resources
of our church communities available to refugees and asylum seekers.
This is a very practical way of respecting the image of God in
our brothers and sisters.
We also live out our faith by working with others to make our
nation more hospitable. In forming a refugee policy, government
leaders have to take into account the needs of asylum seekers and
the capacity of the nation to accept new arrivals. But it is the
responsibility of citizens to see that our government policies
are not brutally excluding. In times of insecurity and fear, refugees
act as scapegoats. It is our responsibility to press for a better
and more welcoming policy”.
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