“THE GREAT SURGE”

   

Oops! Sorry I missed last issue. “Mea Culpa”. I was abducted by medical staff who ordered an angiogram while I was at RNS Hospital having a peritoneal infection attended to, so I was out of action for a week. My article this time is now being written while in respite for several weeks in Kamilaroi where I can concentrate on my dialysis exchanges without having to look after the rest of myself in between.

I was feeling very sorry for myself when I saw her on the nightly TV news. She was a teenaged girl being lifted from a dodgy looking boat that had made it to Europe, one of many getting as far away as possible from what was home in war-torn Syria. The girl was in a wheelchair and I recognised all too well the condition of cerebral palsy. Her chair was pushed by her elder sister along the endless bumpy gravel road from despair to freedom as they determined to join their brother who had already made it up to Germany.

Like so many others these sisters would be camping where they could along the way dependent upon the unpredictable grace of others. At least I would have a welcoming roof over my head for respite, food provided on the table, laundry done plus the little unexpected kindnesses within a secure environment. Unfamiliar as my pillow may be, I am not in a strange country fleeing a dangerous space. And I can still walk.

There are too many who can well appreciate those words of Jesus when he told his first disciples that “the Son of Man has no place he can lay his head”. The number of displaced people surging on the move now exceeds that of the population of Australia. Europe and Australia have great difficulty in getting an act together to address this critical need.

There is a prayer by Michel Quoist which describes that helpless experience of being flooded with relentless overwhelming demanding need that tests one’s resources to the limit. The older (and sometimes sicker) we grow the more we feel our own powerlessness. Quoist prays to our Lord for relief from this never-ending burden of pressing needs and the Lord answers him, “While all these people have been streaming in, I have slipped in among them.”

Yes, need is bearing down upon us and will always be with us. The refugees today represent all of history’s displaced people over millennia, among whom we may find some of our own ancestors. We and our governments will have to factor in this inevitable displacement of many persons fleeing unsafe places to places of refuge. These places were factored in by the people of God in ancient Israel within their own communities and not swept under some offshore carpet.

Yes, we can step up if we seek strength from the ever living Christ who has slipped in among us. He advocates of behalf of those who cannot yet advocate for themselves so that they can have that opportunity to share our strength and compassion among those who will come after them.