To be a refugee is to have suffered trauma. We can see it in the eyes of people who have fled from Ukraine and Afghanistan. They have suddenly lost home, lost security, lost employment, lost neighbourhood. Many have also suffered from physical and mental illness as a result of this trauma and because of harsh treatment in the nations in which they have sought protection.
Trauma results from abruptly broken connections. Healing comes from the gentle re-making of connections. For refugees it comes from hospitality, from welcome, from friendship, from assurance of food, housing and medical care, from the possibility of return to one’s home or to find a new home, from the possibility of beginning a new life. Trauma arises when we are treated as things of no value, fit only to be broken and discarded. Healing comes when we are treated as persons with a unique value, as brothers and sisters.
For refugees to find healing they must find hospitality in the places to which they flee. Unfortunately, they often meet further trauma. Those who have come to Australia in recent years to seek protection are not seen as refugees but as criminals and are treated so by our governments. They have languished in gaols for years, have been dumped off-shore, moved around the nation like chess pieces, have been left resourceless in the community and denied the permanent protection that they need to build a new life. Like eagles pinned to the fences of ignorant farmers they have been made an example of so that their treatment might deter others.
Many other nations have been equally cruel to refugees. They have built walls and fences to keep them out, imprisoned them and put them in squalid camps if they find their way in and even followed the Australian example of deporting them to nations with a history of discrimination against strangers.
If refugees are to find healing in such a world, it also needs healing. Our own nation must recognise refugees as human beings like ourselves, as brothers and sisters, as people who have much to offer to our society. For that to happen attitudes that are sick need to be healed.
In Australia the soil in which a better response to refugees will grow needs careful tending. Plants do not grow if sown in stone. We need to hoe and fertilise the ground through compassion and conversation.
We can do that by coming to know refugees and sharing their life stories with our friends, by questioning the sad and politically motivated arguments for locking them up and removing from them access to the rule of law. We can write to our politicians to demand a better policy and support candidates who advocate for refugees. The Catholic Alliance for People Seeking Asylum (CAPSA) brings together people who want to make a difference to Australian policy.
If we do these things we can be part of the healing for refugees and for our society. We can build hope that the hearts and minds of our people will change and that eventually the world will move to prevent the making of refugees and to care for people who need protection. Like all world celebrations International Refugee Week begins at home.
When is Refugee Week?
Refugee Week in Australia is always held from Sunday to Saturday of the week which includes 20 June (World Refugee Day). For 2022, it will be held from Sunday 19 June to Saturday 25 June.
In coming years, Refugee Week will be celebrated on the following dates:
Refugee Week 2023: Sunday 18 June to Saturday 24 June
Refugee Week 2024: Sunday 16 June to Saturday 22 June
Refugee Week 2025: Sunday 15 June to Saturday 21 June
Online Prayer Service for Refugee Week
A prayer service will be held on Monday 20 June 2022 at 6pm AEST – The World Day of Refugees. Register at: https://bit.ly/RefugeeWeek2022Prayers.
For more Catholic Resources for Refugee Week, see 'Praying for refugees'.