Article October 7, 2002 Issue

A step toward reconciliation

By Peter Julian

Reconciliation Between The Indigenous peoples of Australia and the white settlers who arrived in 1788 is catching the interest of more and more people. Wanting to make our own contribution to the effort, my colleague Deidre Carkeek and I, both secondary teachers at Huntingtower, Melbourne, decided to have a special day for the students, with a focus on bringing more goodwill and understanding to relations between them and the indigenous Aboriginals.

Our plans were going well until a few weeks prior to the event—which had been expanded to include the whole school. I completely lost contact with Robert, the main Aboriginal facilitator. Robert was a key contributor who was going to organize and run some important workshops. Unable to confirm plans with him, I felt more and more anxious as each day passed. For me, it was time to pray about this.

Deidre agreed with me. We decided we needed to pray very specifically to ensure that everybody—including, of course, the Aboriginal students we had invited to join us—would feel safe from any threat of racism, and from the fear and ignorance associated with it.

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