Visit by the Sudanese Community
Aboriginal Elder Prays for Reconciliation
Parish Treasure Reaches 97
Winter Concert Series 2007
Ecumenical start to Palm Sunday
Visit by Prominent Aboriginal Leader
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| CONTACT |
CONTACT is the Parish Pew Sheet with the latest news and events arounds the Parish.
Sunday by Sunday, it is a "must read" for those who want to keep in touch.
Each week CONTACT is published on the web site enabling Parishioners and the local community to keep abreast of Parish events.
CONTACT is now available on the Parishioners' Web Site.
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| Rev. Joseph Arou reading the Gospel |
We were delighted to welcome recently, Sudanese members of St Peter’s Box Hill congregation. The Reverend Abraham Maluk was the Preacher at the 10am Eucharist on Sunday 16th September, and the Reverend Joseph Arou assisted at the Liturgy. We were also glad to welcome the Venerable Graham Reynolds, Vicar of St Peter’s Box Hill, and Archdeacon with special responsibility to the Sudanese community. The Sudanese choir sang some very beautiful traditional songs during the reception of Communion. The Service was followed by an opportunity to meet and speak with our guests, and to hear some harrowing stories of violence, grief and dispossession from generous, faithful, Christian people.
There are now over 7,000 Refugees from the Southern Sudan resident in Victoria. The main concentrations of them are in the western suburbs and the Dandenong area. However there is a significant group in the Box Hill – Ringwood corridor. Many are Anglican and there are congregations worshipping in Dandenong, Noble Park, Heathmont, Box Hill, Preston Footscray and Sunshine. There are now over 15 Sudanese Clergy in the Diocese. Many of the refugees have left behind the experience of many years of civil war, long stays in Refugee camps and the loss of members of their families through genocide and tragedies associated with civil war. The southern Sudan has experienced civil war since independence in 1955. The Sudan has an estimated population of over 33 million. The northern Sudan is predominantly Muslim (90%) and the South is predominantly Christian (80%). The North controls the government and wants the whole country to be Muslim. The civil war revolves around religion, land and oil reserves. In Melbourne our Diocese provides a range of support services and programmes for the Sudanese. This includes E.S.L. , Sewing classes and homework clubs. A number of Sudanese are involved in theological education at Trinity College. In April the Archbishop appointed Graham Reynolds as Archdeacon with “Special Responsibility to the Sudanese Community” to support our work with this important part of our Diocese.
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| Vicar, Mrs Rosalie Kunoth-Monks and Amelia |
We welcomed to our Services today Mrs. Rosalie Kunoth-Monks AM, a distinguished leader from the Utopia Aboriginal
Community in Central Australia, and her granddaughter, Amelia – who are known to most of us from a previous visit.
They visit us again, at the invitation of the Vicar, in order to share something of the local reaction to recent
Government initiatives in remote Aboriginal communities.
An actor and Aboriginal activist Rosalie was born in 1973 at Utopia. Until the age of nine, she lived on that
remote Station where she learnt the language and Aboriginal laws of her tribe, the Amatjere people. In 1953
she was discovered by filmmakers Charles and Elsa Chauvel and won the lead role in Jedda, a film that became
an Australian classic. Later, Rosalie spent ten fulfilling years as an Anglican nun in a Melbourne convent
before leaving to set up the first Aboriginal hostel in Victoria. She has continued to be active in social
work and politics and as a campaigners for her people.
Rosalie and Amelia will talk at our Services this morning and at an ecumenical gathering, in the Rutherford
Room commencing at 7.30 pm on Tuesday 17th July. All are welcome.
Rosalie will also talk at a “Women’s Business” lunch at 12.30 pm on Wednesday 18th July in the Rutherford Room.
Lunch will be provided. This event will follow the usual 11.30 am Eucharist in the Chapel.
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| Diana and Dorothy |
One of the most treasured parishioners, Dorothy Howard turned 97 this week.
The parish celebrated with a special morning tea and a birthday cake baked by her daughter, Diana.
The Vicar congratulated her on behalf of the whole parish and expressed the love and affection in which she is held by all who know her.
Surrounded by family and friends she told those present that this was her best birthday ever and that she
only had three more to go before she turned the big 100.
The St John's Winter Concert Series 2007 will be held on the second Sunday of June, July, August and September.
Download a copy of the Brochure here
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| Palm Sunday 2007 |
This year the three neighbouring parishes of St John's, the Camberwell Uniting Church and Our Lady of Victories Catholic Parish commenced Holy Week with a joint 'Blessing of the Palms' in the grounds of the OLV Bascilica. After the short service attended by the joint choirs of the three parishes, the congregations processed to their respective parishes for the regular Palm Sunday Services.
View the complete slide show 
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| Rosalie Kunoth-Monks |
Aboriginal leader Rosalie Kunoth-Monks has a simple message for white Australians, born out of both her Christian faith and her Indigenous culture – “do not accumulate!” Jesus left a very simple code of conduct, one that is not far from Indigenous values, she told TMA, quoting from Matthew 6:26, “Look at the birds of the air…”
The accumulation of material possessions was destructive both for society and for the environment, she continued: “Look at the natural resources being swallowed up!” Christians – and all Australian adults for that matter – needed to take more responsibility for what was happening in Australian society, she said. “We all have to look outside of ourselves,” she said. “We have to ask questions, to query things. We can’t just sit comfortable in our lounge rooms and let the boat people drown out there.”
Mrs Monks, from the Utopia Aboriginal community 250
kilometres north-east of Alice Springs, visited
A high profile leader of her people over many decades, Mrs Kunoth-Monks first came to prominence as a teenager when she played the lead role in the iconic 1955 Australian film, Jedda. That experience is still a burden for her, she said. Though there have been many significant milestones in her life since, it is as Jedda that she is most remembered.
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She remembers the filmmaker, Charles Chauvel, with deep respect. A man who loved his country, he insisted that the film be authentically Australian, and bravely touched on the “stolen generation” theme years before it came to general public awareness. Even then loathing celebrity hype, she refused to become a starlet, and returned to her home on what was then Utopia Station for a time. Shortly after, she joined the Melbourne-based Anglican religious order, the Community of the Holy Name, for 10 years. She later married and once more returned to her people.
She had become committed to Christianity when, as a schoolgirl, she was living in St Mary’s Children’s Hostel, Alice Springs, then led by the legendary deaconess, Sister Eileen Heath. Mrs Kunoth-Monks identifies her Christian faith as the core of her life. “It is not the framework or structures of churches, it is Christ, God, that I embraced and that I do not intend to let go of,” she explained. “I have become more and more convinced that life is very temporary indeed, and if you want to be a person of worth, you have to follow Jesus.” Jesus, like Aboriginal men and women “of very high degree”, embraces people warts and all. Even white people whom she held in great awe wanted to re-shape and change her. Jesus “became the Saviour in that cross-cultural experience”, she said.
Though she acknowledges that her life has at times been very hard, her faith is nevertheless expressed in overwhelming gratitude - for food, for health, for the “joys money can’t buy”, and for the rituals of her people that “acknowledge those joys to the Creator”.