Reconciliation Week 2020 at the Carillon. Photo: Michelle Kroll.
Things feel pretty tough lately. The world is a frightening place, filled with conflicts exploited by those seeking money and power.
Personally, I am finding events in Gaza exceptionally distressing, while there seems no end to the war in Ukraine. Our sense of the world order is increasingly shaky as old certainties, old partnerships and trusted relationships dissolve.
Here in Australia, it’s Reconciliation Week. Why does this matter when there is so much wrong in the world?
This week, I stood in the newly opened Community Services One Childcare Centre at Watson as winter sunlight streamed through the windows. Ngunnawal elder and language custodian Aunty Caroline Hughes shared with us how her ancestors nurtured their booris, or children, on this country.
Children lost in the bush were told to look out for white trunked “ghost gums” and stand near one. They’d be sheltered and protected by the tree until they were found. The eucalypt would be a clear beacon for worried parents.
People are people the world over. They love their children, they care for their neighbours, they want to live in safe communities, strong in culture.
Families at the new centre come from many different backgrounds, but their children will grow up knowing this is Ngunnawal country, lived on and loved for millennia by its first custodians. That is reconciliation – and respect – in action.
In this country, general decency, a robust electoral system and an inherent sense of the fair go have defeated attempts to play the deadly politics of division. We’ve been the lucky country compared to other nations where political leaders harvest hatred for their own gains.
We’re far from perfect, but we’re a successful multicultural democracy. We work hard to achieve inclusiveness and fairness for all, regardless of our skin colour, religious beliefs, gender or place of birth. Our own individual worth is not diminished by giving others dignity and respect.
Attempts to question the Welcome to Country ceremony and the Aboriginal flag didn’t get much traction during the recent election campaign, although they caused plenty of distress. But the division didn’t resonate with ordinary Australian voters, more concerned with housing and power bills.
The 2023 Voice referendum loss does not mean the reconciliation movement is over. It means that particular path won’t work at this particular time. The journey goes on, reflected in this year’s theme of “bridging now to next”.
Reconciliation Week gives us a chance to sit down and listen, to share stories. It means understanding some hard truths about past and present injustice, but finding a way forward together.
It’s not just Aboriginal business, it’s everyone’s business. If you’re lucky enough to live here, step up.
And if you give it a chance, those ordinary human emotions of empathy and friendship can flourish. Several years ago, as co-chair of the ACT Reconciliation Council, I was involved in lighting up the carillon with images for Reconciliation Week.
Among them were Ngunnawal words, from a language and a people once thought forgotten. We stood on the lake shore with older women, traditional owners, who had been taken from their families and treated as second-class humans, not even citizens of their ancestral home.
It was magical to see their words, the culture they had fought to keep alive, on the side of a building given to the nation by Queen Elizabeth. As the lights flickered and washed over the carillon tower, the tears flowed too. It was a simple but powerful symbol.
Reconciliation Week is a time to pause with grace. To listen and share with honesty. To understand each other better, no matter who we are or where we come from. To seek justice and healing.
In a world filled with fear and anger, let’s use this week to build bridges instead.
Genevieve Jacobs is the CEO of Hands Across Canberra, the ACT’s community foundation.
