 Photo courtesy of The West Australian. |
DOING SORRY BUSINESS
WORDS Kate Stowell
The death of Pope John Paul II has devastated members of the Aboriginal community, says Aboriginal Catholic Ministry president, Vicki Walker.
'They were very saddened’, she says. ‘This is sometimes called "sorry business" in our community. There was a great feeling of loss of a great friend, a great liberator.’
Vicki comments that while there have always been Catholic devotees loyal to the Pope, John Paul II’s 1986 visit and speech in Alice Springs strengthened the role of Aborigines in the Australian Catholic Church.
‘Just the initial fact that the Holy Father wanted to come to Australia and meet the Aboriginal people came as a shock at first’, she says. ‘They never had a leader ask them to be who they really are and who challenged the Catholic Church to joyfully receive the Aboriginal people.’
In Pope John Paul II’s memorable speech in Alice Springs nearly twenty years ago he told the Aboriginal people, ‘You do not have to be people divided into two parts, as though an Aboriginal had to borrow the faith and life of Christianity, like a hat or a pair of shoes ... Jesus calls you to accept his words and his values into your own culture. To develop in this way will make you more than ever truly Aboriginal.’
Vicki remembers fondly the awe and amazement that spread immediately after Pope John Paul II delivered this address.
‘It injected so much life into the Aboriginal people because they were given something by the Holy Father to actually challenge the bureaucracy of the church with’, she says. ‘It left everyone dazed and dumbfounded.’
‘He challenged Aboriginal people to make their contribution to the church as Aboriginal people. We no longer had to take the foreign ways of our culture and heritage and adapt them. He encouraged us to live out our Aboriginality.’
Celebrations are being planned for October next year to mark the 20th anniversary of the Pope’s address. The Aboriginal Catholic Ministry is organising a host of festivities including the unveiling of a Pope John Paul II statue in Alice Springs and a series of public seminars to revisit the landmark speech.
‘The Pope’s speech is a living document; it will never die’, Vicki reflects.
The Aboriginal community also admired John Paul II because of his 1999 apology for the stolen generation. Vicki says while the apology came as a surprise, it seems characteristic of a man she held in such high regard.
‘No it wasn’t expected ... but then again, he’s a spiritual man who has travelled the world and seen many things ... Why wouldn’t he apologise to the Aboriginal people? It definitely strengthened their admiration for him.’
But Vicki laments the small amount of media coverage the Pope’s statements received.
‘If you went out into the street and said to an Aboriginal person, "Do you remember the time when the Pope said sorry?" some would say, "I didn’t know he did".’
When asked what John Paul II meant to the Aboriginal community, Vicki replies simply:
‘He was a man of hope–it don’t get much better than that.’
The full text of Pope John Paul II's 1986 address is at:
http://www.natsicc.org.au/Pope_speech.htm
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