In recent weeks I have been doing a deep drive into local history. Rapidly it went from how did British settlement start in this area?: to what can be discovered about them?: to horror at how the native peoples were treated: to what was the unwritten side of the story?

The British had lived for centuries under an accepted cultural system.

The native peoples had lived for millennia under a completely different accepted cultural system; in fact you could say it was a road untraveled by any other culture.

The British and most other cultures worked on a notion of private property, and understood that this system accepted violence as a cost of civilisation. If you had something, you had to be prepared to defend it; and if you wanted to grow in importance then you had to usurp the property of others either by violence or coercion.

The native peoples came up with a completely different solution.

Instead of regular patterns of group vs group violence they chose mutual benevolence. Admittedly being human, disputes over mating rights did occur. However that is observable behaviour in the animal kingdom. What they chose was mutual survival. Part of this was choosing hospitality towards strangers to diffuse any possible violent intent.

Even now it is a difficult concept for Western minds to grasp.

The native people used what they needed from the land, and then moved on to a new location. They never depleted an area of resources. Tribes consisted of a number of family groups. Estimates for this location have a minimum number of 10 family groups, but there could have been 15 family groups, or even 20 family groups as part of one tribe. Survival depended on being part of a family group.

At certain times during the year and at agreed locations the whole tribe would gather together to conduct necessary tribal business including dispute resolution. When children neared the age of becoming an eligible mating partner, the men took the boys for initiation rites and the women took the girls for initiation rites. There were complicated rules to prevent relationships between close blood lines.

Picture an area of some 240 km2 and that would be a tribal area or country. Within it the various family groups are moving independently. Place names within country either describe geographical features, or the specific flora and fauna of a sub area, or the tribal purpose of the area. Therefore the next family group to pass where your family group has had a sojourn is most likely to be another family group within the tribe. Making sure your family group didn’t deplete the resources of a sub-area meant that the next family group to stay in that sub-area would have enough to survive.

You could think of this locality as a submerged mountain range. Which means getting anywhere other than along the waterline is going to be up hill and down dale, over rocks and timbered terrain with an occasional cave or hard rock surface. Therefore it made a lot of sense to leave tools made of natural materials where the next family group could find and use them than to carry them from place to place. In hospitality to each other on hard rock surfaces simple images of the safe game to hunt were painstakingly carved, or sometimes simple images conveying other messages to the initiated.

The other thing about this locality was the threat of flood, bushfire and drought. Anything built would either get washed away or burned away, so it truly was pointless to build anything permanent. But what was possible was working with the seasons and the locations of flora and fauna to obtain the best outcomes for everyone.

Here’s an example: In most places the tree line came down to the waterline. But there were areas that were flat, having been built up by natural sand deposits from the beach. These places were covered with native grasses due to specific cultivation. At the right time of year when the wind was in the necessary direction this flat land would be set on fire in such a way that the fire went towards the beach and burnt itself out for lack of fuel. The fire did two things: it dissuaded trees from growing and the fresh shoots of grasses after the fire would attract game animals. What this meant was that when the tribe gathered annually in that location to be together there was a plentiful food supply.

If someone was guilty of grave misdemeanor there was effective punishment. The miscreant was obliged to become the ‘first taster’ of the family group. Until a new miscreant emerged, the current miscreant became the go-to person to test whether a food stuff was poisonous or not, and if a food stuff was sufficiently ripe or not. The rest of the group would wait a day or two to see what happened to the first taster before sampling the food stuff themselves. As both a deterrent strategy and as a way of safeguarding the group from toxins it is quite brilliant.

What we often fail to appreciate is that this way of life was so successful that it didn’t need to change. It had remained a successful way of life through long stretches of drought and through long stretches of rain, through hail, storm and bushfire. It was a way of life sufficiently adaptable that paradigm change wasn’t necessary.

What this culture did do was to closely observe the natural environment. They studied the plants, the animals, the weather patterns and the landscape patterns. It wasn’t for interest, it was for survival. If you studied the life cycle and the migration patterns and eating patterns of the kangaroo then the hunt would be more successful. Not only did they study, but they used what they had learned in dancing in imitation of kangaroo and emu and through that medium passed knowledge to the younger members.

Stories were passed down from generation to generation which contained not only knowledge of the local animals but also moral lessons. On the surface they were simple and entertaining stories, but they had multiple layers of meaning. The deeper layers of meaning were only taught when a member was considered ready to learn them. This is not dissimilar to memory by association techniques.

These patterns of listening and observing the created world, and the stillness necessary for successful observation meant that this ancient culture was also in tune with the spiritual realms. Most tribes would be in tune with the good, the true and the beautiful, but some tribes would align with the darker elements in the spirit world. Not everything in the dreamtime is safe. Human beings wherever they reside are capable of both cruelty and gentleness; they thrive under good leadership and they suffer under poor leadership.

When the explorers arrived in 1770 with their western eyes they saw a natural landscape bereft of built structures; no stone structures like the Aztecs, no tents like the native Americans, no huts like the Polynesians. What they didn’t have eyes to see was a respectfully and minimally cultivated native landscape with everything needed for the survival of an ancient culture.
The description of the land as terra nullius was incorrect and wrong, yet convenient for a small island nation with dense population and many persons convicted of crime to punish. It was the first injustice upon which other injustices were perpetrated.

If not for help the native peoples gave to these strange idiots who were beginning to starve due to lack of local knowledge, the fledgling colony would not have survived. This pattern of help was repeated as explorations and new settlements began. When a convict absconded into the woods, or when someone got lost or shipwrecked, native tribes enabled them to survive.

Due to terra nullius the governor of the colony felt free to award large areas of land firstly to non-convicts, and later to convicts who had either proved themselves useful or who had served their time. No consideration was given to the what the native tribes had used these tracts of land for. The more important the ancient land use, the more likely native retaliation would be, and ancient weapons - lethal though they could be - were no match for guns.

The native population only had naturally occurring sugars in their diet from honey and berry-like fruit. Therefore the introduction of complex sugars and especially alcohol had severe effects including addiction and diabetes. Neither were they immune to the diseases that the settlers brought with them. Due to this many lives were lost prematurely.

When settlers began looking further afield than the Sydney colony there were two motives; one to find farm land with which to feed the colony and the other to exploit any other resources they found to the best of their ability. Hence the deforestation of cedar trees in the Brisbane Water area, and the commercial harvesting of seafood, particularly crayfish. No consideration was given to the impact of these exploitive activities upon the stable ecosystems and the well-trodden hunting and gathering routes of the native tribes. Local resistance was met with violence, written complaints to colonial authority, and with imprisonment and deportation. Some natives were tried for snatching the equivalent of a cigar out of a local colonial bigwig’s hands, and sentenced to deportation to Tasmania. It was commuted to two years’ hard labour in iron chains quarrying rock on a rocky outcrop island near Newcastle.

The net effect over several decades of occupation was the genocide of some native tribes and the decimation of other tribes. Since the early settlers had a very high male to female ratio of inhabitants many of the local tribeswomen were impregnated against their will and the resulting children suffered from not fully belonging to either culture. Such practices broke down the kinship bonds designed to transmit culture from one generation to the next.

The losses sustained by the native tribes are incalculable.

Sadly it has taken almost 235 years for us to begin to understand those immense losses.

This cannot have been God’s original plan.

Only the evil one is known for robbing, killing and destroying.
The losses of the early decades were followed up by the White Australia policy, and the systematic destruction of families by taking the children of native tribes to be raised in anglo-celtic families, and continued with other government policies which ultimately harmed more than helped.

So what could have been God’s original plan, and what’s behind this implacable hatred of the evil one for the native peoples of this land?

God’s plan must have been that we should learn the best from each other in order to build a completely new society based on respect for God, respect for creation, the cherishing of family life and the mutually beneficial sharing and conserving of resources.

Why the evil one’s hatred? Because this ancient culture was remarkably resilient against temptation to sin. Because it had so much good to teach and bequeath to humanity. Consider that greed, the root of all evil, did not have a foothold in this culture. Sloth is deadly in a survival culture, so it didn’t have much of a foothold either. That’s why the vehement desire for it to be snuffed out, disfigured and destroyed as quickly as possible.

Yet despite that hatred, despite the areas of genocide, the threads of that ancient culture are being slowly put back together with each artefact return, with each rediscovery of the wisdom in ancient practices and in ancient stories, and with each discovery of the gentle imprints upon the land by the ancient cultures. The deposit of good is beginning to be treasured as it should have been from the beginning.

What can we do to co-operate with God’s Plan?
​
We can ask God’s pardon and mercy upon all the sins and crimes perpetrated against the native peoples of this land.
We can ask God’s blessing upon the descendants of the native peoples of this land.
We can ask God to recompence the native peoples for all the losses and injustice they have suffered.
We can ask for God’s perfect will to be accomplished in this land.
We can work on eradicating greed and sloth from our own lives.

The second and final assembly of the 5th Plenary Council of Australia is now at its last full day of deliberations, with many contentious issues still at large. Since the last blog-post I have watched the Mass for the Memorial of Blessed Peter To Rot from last night, and the votive Mass this morning in honour of Mary, mother of the Church, and the Plenary tracker episode from last night, as well as some religious blogs from 7 July and 8 July, the press briefing from last night, and the livestreamed morning session. I have viewed the revised draft for motion 4 on women, and I looked at the voting outcomes released yesterday. I have not yet gone looking for any voting results released today.
 
I was pleasantly surprised at the revision of motion 4. There was nothing in it which raised my hackles. Certainly it is a much better motion than the one presented to the assembly on Tuesday.
 
Daniel Ang’s input released 6 July and Sandy Wallace’s input released today have caused me to look deeper at the disconnect between what’s been going on in the Plenary Council Masses in the Cathedral and what’s been going on in the Plenary Council from a plenary tracker perspective – for lack of a better descriptor.
 
Last night’s plenary tracker portrayed a bubble of reality that was quite alien to me. How come there is such enthusiasm about ecological conversion? Could it be that it’s because ‘Repent, for the kingdom of God is close at hand’ is far more demanding? I doubt that the name of Jesus was mentioned more than once at last night’s plenary tracker. That really bothers me. The way I heard the panel of women enthuse was uncomfortably like having an alternate religion proposed. Perhaps the troubling thing was a placement of the human person as a cog within the ecosystem of creation – which is very different to God’s command, ‘Be masters of the fish of the sea, the birds of heaven and all living animals on the earth’. It was couched in either/or terms, not in both/and terms, and that is very troubling.
 
But when I look at the number of federal votes for the Greens party and for teal candidates, perhaps I should not be surprised at this green-washing of the life of the Church in Australia.
 
I keep returning to the notion that if plenary members were more steeped in scripture, in theology, in living the liturgical year, and in frequent and regular use of the sacrament of penance then so many hot button issues would have had minimal support. Daniel’s observation of the tale of two councils is ringing true. How can lives more infected with worldliness than with apostolic levels of conversion truly discern? Strangely, I’m now finding myself in sympathy with the previous way of conducting plenary councils – bishops only – because at least they are all coming together with a strong baseline of shared knowledge and practice.
 
Deeply I fear that the members got it wrong yesterday. Two topics stick in my craw. The first one was making diocesan pastoral councils mandatory for all dioceses, and the second one was signing up all dioceses, parishes, schools, hospitals etc to the Laudato Si program and demanding that it happen by 2024.
 
My experience of any kind of committee is that ineffective chairmanship is rampant and that effective chairmanship is rare. Chairpersonship was just too much of a mouthful to consider using. Very few parish councils ever accomplish anything worthwhile. Witness the number of parish council members who haven’t read the minutes of the last meeting prior to the current meeting. Witness how many accountabilities are treated as suggestions subject to a better offer rather than ‘serving as if it was done at God’s orders’. Now if instead there had been a motion to invest in widespread training for effective chairmanship – that would be useful. Let’s also refresh our memories that if a parish priest doesn’t want a parish council and if a bishop doesn’t want a diocesan pastoral council, all efforts are doomed to failure. Recall also that it is usually volunteers that are sought for pastoral council positions and that very little effort is usually expended to make sure that there’s a variety of gifts among members so that it’s not top heavy with dreamers and deficient in doers.
 
Where or where do you think the limited resources of a parish are going to go if implementing the Laudato Si program has to happen by 2024? How much will be left over for the primary mission of the Church: making disciples of Jesus? Matt 28: 18-20
 
And so much for not making decisions without the input of stakeholders! According to the approved motion all parishes have to do this, and parishes certainly weren’t consulted about the Laudato Si mandate. That’s a very different thing to a bishop saying Yes, we will start a few pilot programmes in interested parishes and see how it goes before extending it further.
 
Were you gobsmacked that one of the ecology motions was unanimous among bishops? I was. Maybe they were tired and didn’t fully comprehend the implications of the Yes vote to that motion.
 
Generally there has been a relatively consistent voting pattern from the bishops with an average of 30 Yes votes and 10 No votes. Only God knows if it has been the same bishops in each voting bucket or whether it has been more fluid. But there was a strange thing happening with motions 7.4 and 7.5 where the No vote was significant and the motions barely passed. That lack of unanimity should have sent both motions 7.4 and 7.5 back to the drawing board, time pressure or no time pressure.
 
The media briefing was again instructive, answering three important questions.
 
The first was about the general content of the Rome response to the Light from the Southern Cross document, viz too horizontal and not balanced enough with vertical and a reminder that the Church decision making is very different to the ways businesses and governments do things. The same criticism could be levelled at the plenary council process, yes?
 
The second was about the risk, due to new research groups, diocesan pastoral councils, and this new three yearly roundtable, of too much new bureaucracy in an already swamped experience of meetings upon meetings upon meetings (Here’s looking at you Bishop Umbers). Since if you are tied up in meetings all the time, a pastor or bishop has nothing left in the tank to do pastoral visits to families or to be supportive to a struggling priest. The answer given was that the risk of increasing bureaucracy is always present, and it is the price paid for the chance of some of these new meeting types to actually assist in moving the mission of the Church forward. To which I want to respond, surely there must be other long-shot ventures with more chance of success that we could invest our time, energy and scarce resources in!
 
The third was a response to the general deflation experienced when reading the framework for motions for the first time, viz after all these years couldn’t we have come up with something less bland, less general and more specific? The answer was that since implementation will be across very different circumstances, city, regional, rural, remote, that anything one-size-fits-all doesn’t provide enough wiggle room to implement motions creatively according to specific diocesan situations. Additionally members had come to acceptance about the need to have less prescriptive motions.
 
This morning Bishop Bird widened our concept of Mary as mother of the Church, because we think too readily that church means only the rite we celebrate liturgy with. So Bishop Bird took us through the richness of liturgical prayers in the Latin rite, the Maronite rite, the Chaldean rite, the Melkite rite, the Ukrainian rite and the Syro-Malabar rite. Sincere apologies if I missed any Eastern rite out. The love of Mary as mother and model is deep throughout dioceses as evinced by the numbers of parishes with Marian names, and throughout all the liturgical rites of the Church.
 
Last night at Mass there was an incredibly bad use of inclusive language in the responsorial psalm, Psalm 33(34). This is the accepted translation: ‘This poor man called; the Lord heard him and rescued him from all his distress’ – which was on screen. The translation used: ‘When the poor cry out the Lord hears and rescues them from all their distress’ – which was sung. Any student of language knows that there is a vast difference between singular and plural eg. est and sunt. The former encourages the individual to seek the Lord’s help. The latter could be interpreted that God only hears when a group of poor call out to Him, and that being united in prayer is a prerequisite for the prayers being answered. These are vastly different interpretations caused by inclusive language that the literal Hebrew translation cannot support. Shouldn’t our fidelity to what the original text of God’s Word says take priority over any ideological overlay?
 
A bright point on Thursday morning was the presentation of a message stick from the Kimberley region of Western Australia, and the explanation of the symbolism of each part of it. Both the forethought to prepare such a gift and visible token of solidarity and the deep understanding of the plenary council process it portrayed were amazing.
 
Similarly amazing was the explanation by Erica of how much the smoking ceremony meant to her, and why, viz (paraphrased) ‘together we acknowledge the Gadigal people of the Eora nation who have welcomed us so warmly with the smoking ceremony when we gathered together to begin this meeting on their country. That smoke made me feel safe. It gave me courage and it encouraged me to take part in sharing, especially sharing about our first nations culture’.
 
Last night Cardinal Dew from Wellington, New Zealand was the homilist at Mass. He has been one of the official observers, and he is adamant that he hasn’t been bored during his observation of the plenary council process. Among his many observations two stood out: increase in faith of the community, increase in communion of the community: and that increase in mission of the community is the responsibility borne by each baptised person: discernment is integral to synodality.
 
When I looked at the plenary council website a little while ago, the results of the voting from today’s deliberations were not yet published.
 
Stay tuned for a response to that, and to the Mass tomorrow morning, and the wrap up press briefings and plenary tracker episode – although it is likely to be Sunday before that response can be completed.