JourneyOnline
Christmas Island Detention Centre is a fascinating place to reflect about Easter! I have recently returned from a Church leaders’ delegation to this remote island where all asylum seekers arriving by boat are housed whilst awaiting refugee and security status checks. Many of them carry great anxiety not to mention the trauma that many have experienced before embarking on their journey of hope.
It occurred to me that these asylum seekers inhabit a sort of ‘Easter Saturday’ space. Many of them have experienced darkness, persecution, death of family members and friends. All are sustained by the hope that new life awaits them in this country. In the meantime they exist in an anxious, fearful space.
Pray for the asylum seekers, for the staff of the Detention Centre and for our government to implement policies and practices that are humane and hopeful.
And may each of us turn to God for hope, strength, courage and joy – the God who in Jesus lived our human life, shared our suffering and who rose again to reassure us in the words of St Paul: ‘I am certain there is nothing in life or in death, nothing in all of creation, that can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord’.
You can view the video of the President’s Easter message here
Photo : President of the Uniting Church in Australia Rev Alistair Macrae. Photo by Paddy Macrae and courtesy of Crosslight
