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What’s coming up
National Carers Week
Do you know someone who is a carer? Someone who provides unpaid care and support to family members and friends who have a disability, mental illness, chronic condition, terminal illness, an alcohol or other drug issue or who is frail and aged. Many don’t identify as carers, and don’t realise that there are many helpful supports available. This Carers Week find an event near you or organise your own. There are resources here including posters and information about being a carer and making workplaces carer-friendly.
Day of Lament – National Apology
President of the Uniting Church in Australia, Dr Deidre Palmer has written to members ahead of the National Apology to Victims and Survivors of Institutional Child Sexual Abuse on Monday 22 October.
On the preceding Sunday 21 October, all congregations are asked to use the special National Apology Prayer in their worship services. All church members are urged to listen to the apology, which will be broadcast live.
Also helpful might be “Healing and Hope: Resources for Prayer and Worship”, released by Assembly in early 2018 to encourage the church to engage in lament and to honour our commitment to be the safest church we can be for children in our care.
Inspired Disciples
Inspired Disciples is a week of experiences to inspire your discipleship journey. The event will be held from 22-27 October 2018.
Based in the surrounds of the Queensland Synod office in Auchenflower, this festival will include a number of workshops, forums and training events which focus on growing, building and inspiring disciples. With learning opportunities for both ministry agents and lay people, Inspired Disciples promises to inspire and reinvigorate the meaning of discipleship.
Week in review
New charity kitchen largest in Southern Hemisphere
Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk has released a statement congratulating Foodbank and FareShare for joining forces for a $4.5 million charity kitchen to fight hunger and address food waste.
The FareShare Charity Kitchen, the largest in the Southern Hemisphere, will use excess fresh food that was unnecessarily destined for the bin, as well as donated products from farmers, to produce meals for people in need. The new production kitchen is capable of cooking five million meals per year.
A travel show with a twist
Going Places with Ernie Dingo, a series now screening on SBS, features one of the country’s most recognised television personalities as he explores Australia’s iconic destinations.
This is not the typical travel show as Ernie introduces viewers to the traditional owners and other people who live, breathe and work amongst these incredible places.
Suicide intervention programs in Aboriginal communities
Indigenous adults are more than twice as likely than non-Indigenous Australians to commit suicide. It is also the biggest killer of Indigenous children, accounting for 40 per cent of all deaths of Aboriginal youth.
According to the ABC, in quiet country towns, families, police and community leaders are being trained to hold suicide interventions in a bid to reduce the tragically high rate of Indigenous people who have taken their own life.
Saving the Barrier Reef
In an article published by the ABC, the world’s most authoritative climate science body has warned that Australia and the rest of the world must virtually eliminate the use of coal for electricity within 22 years if there is to be a chance to save even some of the Great Barrier Reef.
In a report authored by more than 90 scientists for the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, global emissions of greenhouse gas must reach zero by about 2050 in order to stop global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius. At current rates, the report indicates that 1.5 degrees Celsius would be reached as early as 2040, and 2 degrees Celsius would be reached in the 2060s.
Compassion fatigue about domestic violence
Jane Gilmore reflects in an article for Fairfax media on a recent increase in domestic violence incidents which has caused compassion fatigue. There is no outpouring of national grief and rage, just a blip in the news cycle.
According to the article, our compassion is fatigued by the daily drain of women being beaten, raped, assaulted, ignored, dismissed, blamed, ridiculed and murdered. “How exhausted we all are by the violence women live and die with.”
Call to action
Kids off Nauru
Doctors without Borders (MSF) have spoken about the impact of stopping mental health services on Nauru. They describe the mental health situation of men, women and children seeking asylum on Nauru as “beyond desperate”.
Despite this, the Australian government continues to detain 85 children and their families on Nauru. Many of the children have witnessed or experienced self-harm. Some are attempting suicide. At least a further 30 are suffering from Traumatic Withdrawal Syndrome. This includes the inability to walk, talk, eat, drink or interact.
A group of young Aussie kids have appeared in an Advertising Campaign launched today asking the Prime Minister of Australia to save more than 100 young children in desperate trouble on Nauru. Doctors who have visited the children are saying they will start dying if the government doesn’t save them, and bring them to Australia. The former Head of Mental Services on Nauru called their treatment a “form of torture.”
Members of Parliament returned to Canberra on 15 October. Please email your MP urging them to evacuate the 85 children and their families detained on Nauru for urgent medical treatment in Australia.
