Tui Motu InterIslands monthly independent Catholic magazine May 2015 | $7

Pentecost . editorial the irrepressible Spirit

oey often pops in on his walks only partly expresses the experience and Richards describes his experience of around the city, for tea and a mission of the Spirit . We find ourselves work in his first jobs out of school . Jchat about life and religion . Mid- pushed towards awe, surprise, delight, The second issue is the Trans- afternoon he caught me revelling in dancing, colour, music and poetry in Pacific Partnership agreement which the May design, the hot pink cover Spirited choreography . New Zealand, Australia and 10 other and everything fitting in . He began We learnt to recite the seven gifts of countries are negotiating . While the describing his experiences of God, the Spirit over our porridge as children goals were to relate in a neighbourly scrambling for words in his pentecos- but as catechism answers they never held way around trade, the secrecy now tal vocabulary before succumbing to the allure of the night sky, the abandon surrounding the negotiations and images, gestures, and finally the silence of ecstasy or the desolation of absence . the details being leaked are causes for of a mystic — there weren’t enough Nor did they have the feel of kindness, alarm . Joshua Freeman outlines how words . His telling tingled with his the support of advice or the generosity TPP would allow drug companies to memory of “thick presence”, “fantastic of faithfulness . They changed from hamstring the Government’s decision light” and “of being caught up” into a cardboard to real through experiences for our health system . Cecily McNeill oneness of goodness and love . Those like Joey’s, through attentiveness in the persuades that this agreement is no moments had erupted through his day-to-day, through relationships and good for our country . What would illness and still carry him through his through starkness and suffering . Every happen if we didn’t sign the agreement? ups and downs . aspects of our lives is grist for the Spirit Jane Kelsey, Professor of Law at The This is the living Spirit pouring out, as Joy Cowley writes in “Breath, Fire, University of Auckland responded to energising as differentiation, autopoiesis Love” and we are connected to every that question recently saying: “Nothing and communion in the evolving uni- living thing in the cosmic web of love as would happen to us . We would be free verse, as Teilhard de Chardin discovered, Ilia Delio suggests in “Mango” . to pursue trade and to make our own and breathing in the variety, uniqueness Two issues invite our attention in decisions as now ”. and community of our domestic part of this Pentecost edition . The first is the This is a taste of the Pentecost edi- the world . As Joey found when run- issue of wages . John Ryall explains why tion . Enjoy reading it through to our ning out of words to portray his expe- a living wage rather than a minimum Team’s last words of blessing . n riences, as Mike Riddell reminds us in wage is necessary and outlines the his article “The Dangerous God” and work of the Living Wage Movement in as our hot pink cover shows — prose New Zealand and elsewhere . And Ted

Editorial...... 2 An ecological reading of the gospel of Mark (part four) Guest editorial: Inspired by our young . . . . . 3 ...... 20–21 Elaine Wainwright contents Rob Ritchie TPP not good for us Letters to the editor ...... 4 ...... 22–23 Cecily McNeill Closure of Mana Recovery ...... 5 TPP and our health system Trish McBride ...... 24–25 Joshua Freeman The dangerous God ...... 6–7 Spirit – poured out in living water ...... 26–27 Mike Riddell Kathleen Rushton Brother Mango and eternal life ...... 8–9 Book and film reviews ...... 28–29 Ilia Delio Crosscurrents ...... 30 Breath, fire, love! ...... 10–11 Jim Elliston Joy Cowley Blood, sweat and teardrops ...... 31 Interview: The right thing to do ...... 12-13 Cavaan Wild Michael Fitzsimons A mother’s journal ...... 32 My gap year ...... 14–15 Kaaren Mathias Ted Richards

Poem: The sea question ...... 16–17 Cover illustration: Pentecost, watercolour by Elizabeth Smither Glenda Dietrich Moore. [Used with permission of the Feral music and the Spirit ...... 18–19 artist. www.glendadietrich.com] Peter Murnane

2 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 . guest editorial

inspired by our young Rob Ritchie

spent a week with a group The movement towards our Pākehā chefs and volunteers and a of young people “wwoofing” bicultural future seems hopeful . This concert by professional and amateur (volunteer work — associated group of young people represents a musicians and dance performers . Iwith the world wide organic farming generation well acquainted with the For some Pākehā who had lived in movement) on a whānau, extended Treaty of Waitangi — something the area for 25 years and longer it was family, initiative focussed on restor- unheard of half a century ago . Thanks their first visit to the marae and their ing an old hospital facility built on to the schools, families and church first event hosted by Māori . For some whānau land . As kaitiaki, guardians of the land, their dream is to create a “puna”, a spring, where whānau (Māori and Pākehā) can gather, rest a while and “drink some good water” . At the end of the week the young people offered me a ride home, some four hours away . It was an unfor- gettable trip . We discussed most of the things which communities in which they were Māori it was the first time Pākehā really matter: music, comedy, faith, raised, their familiarity with Māori had catered for them on their marae . culture and identity . culture was obvious to everyone shar- Surely such expressions of Reflecting on how they’d lived ing in the community venture . relationship and partnership are and worked alongside the whānau I The same whānau hosted a welcomed and needed . Then those believe I witnessed a Treaty partner- Matariki celebration (Māori New on both sides of the Treaty will move ship that really begins with the idea of Year) on their local marae . It included comfortably in each other’s worlds . n whanaungatanga, manaaki and awhi . pōwhiri a traditional welcome, an This simply means a mutual sense explanation of the marae, a display of Rob Ritchie is retired at Hokitika of belonging, sharing and caring for traditional artefacts and crafts, a twelve and trying to renovate his home to each other on life’s journey . course finger-food dinner provided by conform to tikanga Māori.

address: Independent Catholic Magazine Ltd, Tui Motu – InterIslands is an independent, 52 Union Street, Dunedin North, 9054 Catholic, monthly magazine. It invites its P O Box 6404, Dunedin North, 9059 readers to question, challenge and contrib- phone: (03) 477 1449 ute to its discussion of spiritual and social email: [email protected] issues in the light of gospel values, and in email for subscriptions: [email protected] the interests of a more just and peaceful website: www.tuimotu.org society. Inter-church and inter-faith dialogue is welcomed. TuiMotuInterIslands

editor: Ann L Gilroy rsj

The name Tui Motu was given by Pa Henare Tate. assistant editor: Elizabeth Mackie op It literally means “stitching the islands together...”, illustrator: Donald Moorhead bringing the different races and peoples and faiths directors: Rita Cahill rsj, Philip Casey (chair), Neil Darragh, together to create one Pacific people of God. Paul Ferris, Elizabeth Mackie op and David Mullin

Divergence of opinion is expected and will normally honorary directors: Pauline O’Regan rsm, Frank Hoffmann be published, although that does not necessarily ISSM 1174-8931 typesetting and layout: Greg Hings imply editorial commitment to the viewpoint Issue number 193 printers: Southern Colour Print, 1 Turakina Road, expressed. Dunedin South, 9012

3 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 letters to the editor

God-image could exclude who have enthusiastically embraced letters to the editor people the gospel challenge of making an We welcome comment, I read with interest Fr Max Palmer’s option for the poor . discussion, argument, debate. letter re attitude changes for the Wendy’s thoughtful article coin- But please keep letters under better (March, 2015) . cided with the news that former El I note he did not mention his neigh- Salvadorian general, Eugenio Vides 200 words. The editor reserves bour’s (Australia’s) attitude to the dig- Casanova, has been deported from the right to abridge, while not nity of their human people . Certainly the United States to El Salvador . The changing the meaning. in 1967 Australian Aboriginals were general has been linked to the murder of We do not publish anonymous at last regarded as “people” and had three American Catholic sisters and one letters except in exceptional to assume the human mantle of being Catholic laywoman in December 1980, circumstances. Response considered as being created and fash- and although El Salvadorian amnesty articles (up to a page) are ioned in the image and likeness of God! laws mean that he will not be tried for welcome — but please, by (Bit hard to do immediately when you his crimes against the people, it is good negotiation. have never been considered a “person”!) that the Obama administration is revers- I wonder if our attitude that we are ing the protection afforded such men by created in the image and likeness of previous American governments . God, (i e. . usually white, middle class, Susan Smith, Onerahi, Whangarei clean, literate and generally “nice” ), has contributed to the way we have and are getting out of poverty treating people who don’t come up to Pope Francis — Anna Speaking was a our image of God? Perhaps we have time to act on the message wonderful, open honest letter to Pope made God into our image and likeness . Francis . On the paragraph “ques- Elizabeth Mackie’s guest editorial in the Margaret White, Yandina, QLD tionable biology” I was reminded of April issue I found to be a splendid one hopeful yearnings Melinda Gates, one of the world’s great focusing poignantly on the plight of the philanthropists, who has started clinics homeless in Iraq . The fourfold message In appreciation of the Thomas for women all over the world on birth from the Iraqi people is without doubt Merton and peace articles in the control . She thinks, and I totally agree a sad and plaintive cry from the collec- recent Tui Motu: with her, that too many people cause tive hearts of these displaced persons If just half the people problems on planet Earth . The main who are living in shocking conditions who said one being poverty! Poverty is extreme which are so foreign to us who live in a “I will” — did . for the poorest people — those in stable and peaceful country that enjoys The world Africa being among the worst . Yet they a high standard of living . As the edito- A paradise have leaders who send their children to rial says we should listen attentively indeed schools in England and America and to these voices of the displaced which T’would be have holiday homes in Switzerland . is the first step on the way to helping compassion What are they doing to help their own them . The next step is to take up in kindness people? They have plenty of money! part, or in whole, the suggestions set a living force of goodness The western world is always being asked out in their message . One’s heart goes to envelop the globe to give more . Everyone I know is giving out to these suffering people who are & rain from heaven as much as they can in their time and so deserving of our assistance . The peace without end . money, and then some . Unfortunately, challenge is there to our consciences to Amen unless we break through very old reli- do something, however small, to ease Bronwen Muir, Waiheke Island gious and patriarchal cultural dogma the plight of our brothers and sisters general deported and the shocking treatment of women in Christ . Thank you Elizabeth for in over half the world, nothing is going drawing our attention to the suffering Tui Motu readers will have been heart- to change . It is always the women and of those innocent victims in Iraq . The ened by news that the beatification of children who suffer most . ball is now clearly in our court! Archbishop Oscar Romero, murdered Susan Lawrence, Auckland John N. Vincent, Dunedin in El Salvador in 1980 by right-wing government agents, is progressing . A bit lost in France Wendy Kissel (TM, April 2015) is Thank you Roger Collins, Dunedin, for noting the geographical slips in Colleen not alone in recognising how impor- O’Sullivan’s article (March 2015). Yes, Thomas Merton was born in Prades, tant this will be for the church in El almost 1000 km from Picardy. — Editor Salvador and indeed for all Catholics

4 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 comment closure of mana recovery Trish McBride ast year new mental health strategies led there was a death, we would have a karakia, to Capital and Coast District Health prayer time, for that person and the others Board axing their funding to a number who’d gone before and for comfort for those ofL mental health-related agencies including who were left . They’d wonder who would be Mana Recovery, an award-winning charitable next . They knew they were vulnerable . They trust . Mana Recovery has supported the reha- probably didn’t know that NZ statistics indi- bilitation of people with mental health issues cate mental health clients have 15 years lower since 1996 . During Passiontide this year I life expectancy than the general population . accompanied people who were living the way Requests for a karakia time grew more of the Cross knowing that their work-place, regular till we met weekly . After my brief Mana Recovery, was going out of existence . prayer focussing on God’s unconditional Mana Recovery began when the long-stay love for each one, they could speak their wards at Porirua Psychiatric Hospital closed . own prayers . It was always moving . Prayers It developed a work-skills programme around for basic and deep needs, for families, for light assembly work and recycling of plastic “people worse off than us” . A short discussion and paper . There were also literacy, life-skills followed, on topics like how having friends and art lessons which culminated in an amaz- helped, and what having Jesus for a friend ing exhibition in 2011 . Some trainees recov- might mean . Bonds grew between those who ered slowly and moved on to independent attended . It could be challenging: “My pastor employment . Many couldn’t . Some recovered says I have a demon of schizophrenia . Will sufficiently to become supported staff in paid you exorcise me?” My reply: “I can’t do that, jobs within the organisation . They were then sorry, but I can pray for peace and healing for “off the benefit”, “normal”, and freed from you ”. “I want to say the Catholic prayers, not the hassles of dealing with WINZ . the Protestant prayers … Hail Mary, full of As workplace chaplain to Mana Recovery grace …” That took ecumenical tact! I became accepted as someone who would Now the training and the lawn-mowing listen, which proved useful for staff and train- units have closed for good .Trash Palace, Mana ees . I had the easy job . The skilled staff man- Recovery’s recycling shop where more of the aged the day-to-day wellbeing of the clients, people are employed, closed in April . There including any challenging behaviours . Mine may be some good-hearted employers out has been a profound journey of discovering there who can give supported employment to the wisdom, courage, generosity, community people who can work hard but have variable and compassion that the trainees and sup- health . There is a future, but it’s uncertain and ported staff have amongst themselves . Some unforeseeable . I’d spoken of Easter hope for people have been “in the system” for 30 years . the new, the unexpected, emphasising that They know one another as whānau, family . I people are never redundant, only positions . recognised that the horrific childhood experi- A letter in the Dominion Post in response ences of many had triggered their illness, to the closure announcement made the point: violence, and devastating marginalisation . “Another blow for the people on struggle street One told me he’d been introduced to glue who deserve as much support as possible . sniffing aged seven, and since then he’d called How many ‘golden handshakes’ to departing his glue bag “my mummy” . Another worked health board CEOs could have been better hard on the recycling, because “it keeps the directed to helping the real people in our soci- sea cleaner and saves the fishes” . Others, ety . The ‘hard knocks’ these people experience sent as intellectually disabled little boys to a through life just keep on knocking ”. Catholic institution, were sexually abused Ongoing discussions with Porirua City there . They were still having nightmares 40 Council and other agencies now offer a years later . Some of the women had been glimmer of hope that a new operator can sexually abused too — in and out of hospital . be found for Trash Palace, but if, when, and And many more . with jobs for how many affected staff, are Specifically spiritual conversations hap- all still unknown . May these discussions be pened only if initiated by a trainee . When Spirit-fired! n

5 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 pentecost the dangerous God

Mike Riddell suggests Pentecost is an invitation to be awake to the Spirit in the “entire crescendo of creation”. Mike Riddell

When we are alone on a starlit night, when we hear an old frog land in a quiet pond with a by chance we see the migrating birds in autumn solitary splash — at such times the awakening, descending on a grove of junipers to rest and eat; the turning inside out of all values, the “newness,” whenhis we paean see children from in Thomas a moment every when corner they are of thethe known emptiness world and theThe purity child’s of visionwonder that within make us — the Merton reveals the gift of who see and hear . While the church ability to truly see, hear, feel — is so really“ children, when we know love in our own themselves evident, all these provide a glimpse of the the Spirit to humanity . In may seek to constrain the Spirit, we soon extinguished by the accumula- PentecostThearts; we celebrateor when, the like miracu the Japanese- know poet, that Basho, she blowscosmic “inside dance. and tionThomas of cares Merton . Our senses become lous opening of eyes (to see tongues outside the fences / you blow where numb, our hearts leathery, our of fire) and ears (they heard in their you wish to blow” . Given human imaginations barren . Practicality own language) . It is the consumma- attentiveness, we discover with smothers wonder, timetables rob us tion of a long wooing of humanity; Hopkins that “the world is charged of focus, duty excludes awareness . the unveiling of the constantly crea- with the grandeur of God” . ” –So easily we find ourselves outside tive and transformative presence of creation, staring through a grimy the divine within the world we all window at a world subdued . inhabit . God is not distant . God Poets and mystics is in our midst — “Heaven is with teach us to recover withdrawing us when you are with us” (James K . the innocence that How do we recover the gift of Baxter’s Song to the Holy Spirit) . reveals beauty. Pentecost? One strategy is with- As John V . Taylor surmises in drawal . It was, after all, when the his wonderful book The Go Between disciples had drawn aside that God: “All faith in God is basically a Pentecost is not so much a time they experienced the Spirit . In our way of ‘seeing the ordinary’ in the to consult theologians or preachers, complex contemporary lives, it light of certain moments of disclo- as to turn to poets and mystics . becomes necessary to tune out the sure which have been the gift of the They teach us anew to recover the static of entertainment in order to Holy Spirit ”. The Spirit — undoubt- innocence that reveals beauty . With hear the pure music of the spheres . edly the unitive feminine anima of Hopkins we can appreciate that The clamouring voices of television, the Trinity — opens before us the “nature is never spent … because the seductive advertising, propaganda, grace-charged splendour of creation . Holy Ghost over the bent / world talk-back radio — these asphyxiate Under her touch, we discover there is broods with warm breast and with any responsiveness within us . We are nothing mundane: our eyes and ears ah! bright wings ”. Dylan Thomas indeed “amusing ourselves to death” . and hearts are opened to encounter leads us to understand that “the In the bright city, it is difficult to the divine chorus that never ceases . force that drives the water through see the stars . Light pollution from This pouring out is neither the rocks / drives my red blood” . all our sources of artificial illumina- partisan nor restrained . It is a gift It is also a season to contemplate tion washes out the night sky . But I to humanity, not one controlled by how this gift is tarnished and trod- recall staggering outside in the hills the church . In reading the story of den in our midst: “all is seared with beside the upper Taieri River, beaten Pentecost, it is the observers from trade; bleared, smeared with toil” . down almost to the ground by the

6 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 Reflect by Mark Gee. [Used with permission. www.theartofnight.com] weight of the stars overhead . There examine the structure of a leaf; the never demanding it . Throughout all was a heaviness of awe that pressed listening to a fragile morsel of bird- of our world, all of our history, all down, an unbearable majesty that song; the time to sit with a dying of our humanity, the Spirit dances . invited surrender . The cause of this friend; the mischievous sparkle She teases us into life, love, wonder . encounter was simply that for this in a child’s eye . These things are There is no compulsion to be aware time, there was nothing between us neither rare nor expensive . That is of her; only the opportunity . to mask it . the nature of the world — we are Pentecost is a season of enliven- surrounded by gratuitous beauty . ing and renewal . It is an invitation turning toward Our friends here are the artists . to open our eyes and see; to unblock But as well as turning away, there is The best of them — painters, musi- our ears and hear . The entire cre- a turning toward . The turn toward cians, poets, sculptors, dancers — scendo of creation is the womb in contemplation . Merton describes celebrate that beauty in their work, which we have our being . Some of contemplation thus: “It is that life and invite us to look and hear with us may need to be led outside our itself, fully awake, fully active, fully them . They open portals to under- walls to participate in it . Possibly it aware that it is alive . It is spiritual standing, so that we might engage will require those who profess no wonder . It is spontaneous awe at the aesthetic of love . These warriors faith to show us how to embrace the sacredness of life, of being . It of gentle revelation remind us that the cosmic dance . It could poten- is a vivid realization of the fact that any moment, any place, any person, tially lead to ecstasy . God remains life and being in us proceed from can become for us the locus of a dangerous, unable to be contained . an invisible, transcendent, and infi- divine energy that will transform us Blessed be the Spirit, who leads us nitely abundant source ”. and bless us . into life . n Such a turn is not necessarily Our God is one who makes the one of asceticism and monastic first move toward us . But God invites, Mike Riddell is a theologian, isolation . It is the simple renewal of lures, beckons . God does not invade, writer and filmmaker humanity that enables us to notice overwhelm, or compel us . God awaits living in Cambridge NZ. what is around us . The pause to response, longing for encounter but

7 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 pentecost brother mango and eternal life Ilia Delio reflects on the death of her cat and her belief that they will be entangled forever in God’s embrace.

Ilia Delio ofm

e had to put our beloved they say, is history . Once inside the revealed haecceitas, his own “thisness ”. cat, Mango to sleep . His house, Mango had found himself a Scotus placed a great emphasis on the illness erupted suddenly . real home . He was not a lap cat but inherent dignity of each and every WOne day he refused to eat and the a faithful one, almost dog-like . He thing that exists . We often perceive next day the same . It was so unlike answered the door, welcomed people individual things through their acci- him, an orange tabby who loved a inside by rolling over, and showed dental individual characteristics (eg, dish of tuna . I took him to the vet and up like clockwork for his two square size, shape, colour) but Scotus calls was stunned by the news: Mango had meals and midday snack . He liked to our attention to the very “thisness” abdominal cancer and would last only sleep in the chapel and often joined of each thing, the very being of the another week or two . As we watched us for prayer in the evening . Mango object which makes it itself (“this”) our beautiful four-legged compan- was real presence . And it is his pres- and not something else (not-that) . ion become progressively weaker, a ence that is sorely missed . Haecceitas refers to that positive radical life and death decision was dimension of every concrete and con- becoming imminent . On a winter do animals have souls? tingent being which identifies it and Tuesday afternoon, when the sun was Recent trends in ecology and theol- makes it worthy of attention; that setting amidst a cloudy sky, we placed ogy have prompted questions about which can be known only by direct Mango in his carrier and tearfully non-human life such as, do animals acquaintance and not from consid- drove to the Veterinary Clinic . The have souls? Do animals go to heaven? eration of some common nature .

Soul existence is expressed in the language of love. I don’t think that Mango loved me in the same way that I loved him, but his presence touched my soul in a way that, sharing life with Mango enriched all of life. young woman doctor was extremely Theologically, we can address these ques- If haecceitas is that which is known sympathetic to our impending loss tions as intellectual ones, drawing upon by direct contact, then haecceitas best and gave us time to say our “good- various concepts to sustain our ideas . describes “soul ”. Thomas Merton byes” to this white and orange ball of Without becoming entangled in wrote: “God utters each living being fur who stole our hearts . theological discourse, I want to say as a partial thought of himself ”. Each We rescued Mango eight years quite clearly, Mango was ensouled . living being gives glory to God by its ago after we began to notice a small His soul was a core constitutive unique, core constitutive being . Soul white head with two funny ears beingness, a particularity of life that is what God first utters in every incar- bobbing up amidst the ivy in the was completely unique, with his own nation of the divine Word . Divine backyard . One day we put a bowl of personality and mannerisms . To use love pours itself out in otherness milk on the back step and the rest, as the language of Duns Scotus, Mango and comes into space-time existence

8 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 through the life-giving Spirit . To be a creature of God is to be brought into relationship in such a way that the divine mystery is expressed in each concrete existence . Soul is the mirror of creaturely relatedness that reflects the vitality of divine Love . brother mango I did not have to wonder whether or not Mango had a soul; I knew it implicitly by the way he listened to me talk to him, the way he sat on my chair waiting for me to finish writing so he could eat, or simply the way he looked at me — eye to eye — at the start of a day . Soul existence is expressed in the Monte Murphy by Nancy Tichborne, and left On the Watch by language of love . I don’t think Mango Carolee Clark (www.caroleeclark.com). [Both used with permission.] loved me in the same way that I loved him, but his very presence touched heart that can be harder than any entangled forever my soul in a way that, sharing life rock, as Bonaventure wrote . Divine love bending low is what gives with Mango enriched all of life . In the the haecceitas of every creature a mark spirit of St . Francis who called all crea- love makes us something of eternal endurance . Every creature tures “brother” and “sister”, we called The death of Mango has impelled is born out of the love of God, sus- Mango “brother Mango” and included me to reflect on what matters most tained in love and transformed in him as part of our community . in life, what breaks the human heart love . Every sparrow that falls to the and what nurtures the deep, rela- ground is known and loved by God fields of love tional dimension of all life . (cf . Mt 10:29); the Spirit of God Teilhard de Chardin realised that the “If I have prophetic powers, and is present in love to each creature prime energy of the universe is love, understand all mysteries and all knowl- here and now so that all creaturely unitive energy that unites centre to edge, and if I have all faith, so as to life shares in cosmic communion . centre, generating more being and remove mountains, but have not love, I Bonaventure said that Christ has life . Love is not a thought or an idea . am nothing,” St . Paul wrote (1 Cor 13:3) . something in common with all crea- It is the transcendent dimension of Love makes us something; it tures and all things are transformed life itself, that which reaches out to makes us alive and draws us into the in Christ . Heaven is where all tears another, touches the other and is dynamism of life, sustaining life’s and sufferings are wiped away, where touched by the other . When we do flow despite many layers of sufferings each life is opened to the unlimited, not share in the fields of love; when and disappointments . The person divine creative love and a cosmic we do not feel the concrete existence who cannot love cannot suffer, for communion of all created life is real- of another, we can easily abstract the she or he is without grief, without ised in the fullness of Christ . other into a number, a data point, or feeling, and indifferent . As I reflect on Mango’s death, his even a joke . If God is love then the vitality of haecceitas and the mystery of love, When we recounted Mango’s love, even the love of a furry creature, I have no doubt that his core love- rapid decline to a neighbour, the is the dynamic presence of God . Hans energy will endure . His life has been flippant response was: “Hah! Your Urs von Balthasar spoke of the vulner- inscribed on mine; the memory of his first community death!” Without ability of God’s love: “It is God’s going life is entangled with my own . My direct contact of core being, without forth into the danger and the nothing- heart grieves for my little brother, my love, a living soul can disappear into ness of the creation that reveals [God’s] faithful companion, but I believe we the vapours of intellectualism, and heart to be at its origin vulnerable ”. are intertwined forever and shall be we wind up constructing a world Out of the fullness of God’s self-giving reunited in God’s eternal embrace . n of hierarchical ontology, of lesser love, God shares in the pain and suf- beings over greater beings, a ladder of fering of the world . God bends low to Ilia Delio OFM is the Haub Director of existence in which the human alone share our tears out of a heart full of Catholic Studies and Visiting Professor at stands before God . An intellectualis- mercy and love — and we are caught Georgetown University. ing of love can lead to hardness of up in God’s embrace .

9 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 pentecost breath, fire, love!

Joy Cowley

reathe! Be aware of your referring to the end of limitation, Their hearts glowed with it, their breath! Breathe again, filling imprisonment in a cage of flesh? And minds were filled with light, and your lungs, your body, with did his final sighing breath float away when they spoke in the language Blife . Then breathe out into the world . as spirit, growing in freedom until of love, everyone understood and Know that the air you exhale con- it was a wind-storm released in that marvelled at how these people had tains minute particles of you, gift to upper room? changed . They were radiant with new the person sitting next to you . Extend life . that thought! You are sitting on a on fire with love We all know the “before” and crowded bus . Everyone on that bus The timing was exact . On a day that “after” stories . We, who read the is God’s unique creation, a spiritual celebrated the law given to Moses, gospels with the benefit of hindsight, being on a human journey . Everyone the Spirit of Jesus brought the new have experienced frustration with connects by a web of breath whether law of love . We are told of the way those disciples who just didn’t get they are aware of it or not . Our breath people were changed . That the Spirit it during their master’s mission on is actual touch . Our breath makes us of love blew right through them . It earth . Their egoic vision of Jesus belong to one another . set them on fire with love . It was not a made his teachings seem incompre- Now push your thinking further . timid experience . What they felt, was hensible . They were competitive, In both Hebrew ruah and Greek not the sort of love that was needy or judgemental, fearful and generally as pneuma the words for breath and made conditions for itself . This love thick as bricks . When Jesus needed wind also mean spirit . So what do was a freedom without boundaries . them most, they ran away . Yet, in you imagine happened to Jesus’ last breath on the cross? When he said Painting: Illumination by Mary Southard csj. [www.MarySouthardArt.com] to his Father, “It is finished!” was he

10 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 the Acts of the Apostles, we see the within ”. They seem harsh words held in the web of love disciples enduring extraordinary until we realise that this judgement I believe that God does indeed, walk hardship to bring the love of Jesus to was not about the imperfection but behind us, gathering bits of discarded the world . the refusal to acknowledge it . Of the story and giving them back to us . woman who wept while anointing When we accept them as gift, we making space Jesus’ feet, he said: “She loves much discover the truth of forgiveness . The What was the difference? Jesus the because she has been forgiven much ”. woman who anointed Jesus’ feet with Christ was with them in a new way . This woman had not tried to disown her tears was able to give him love He was no longer confined to one her story . She had embraced her because God has shown her how to human body in a set place and time . shadow and it had turned into the forgive herself . His Spirit was free to make a home in light of divine love . All of this is my Pentecost journey . all who made space for him, and he I pray in gratitude for the wind of dramatically transformed lives . claiming our whole story movement and the fire of love, gifts In all who make space for him — When I join my friends at it’s as simple as that, isn’t it? It’s about ongoing Pentecost, I find it being available . The Spirit of God helpful to look beyond specific is transforming lives, and Pentecost personalities, to the principles is ongoing for us . Like those folk involved . After all, the shadow gathered in the upper room, we are and the light, the slayer and present and holding out our lives like the victim, the Pharisee and cups to receive him . I’m aware that the loving giver, are in each of we don’t have to “do” anything . Love us . It seems to me that Jesus replaces the old law . Love doesn’t spent more time talking about demand conditions, nor does it this, than anything else — the demand that I leave a part of myself need for me to claim my whole behind as payment . It took me a long story and bring the entire time to discover this . Knowing Jesus person to the God who made is not about changing myself but me . When that understanding simply making space for his Spirit to moves from my head to my be at home in me . It is just about heart, there is profound relief making room and allowing Christ coupled with a deep sense of Jesus to make that change we call the oneness of Jesus and our “transcendence” . loving Creator . Love does not It has been said that God walks judge . It is I who judge myself . behind us, picking up those parts of If I don’t claim the wholeness our life that we choose to discard . I of my story, I will then project like that image . The imperfection and that judgement onto other failure that I tried to leave behind in people . In my head, I may my desire to live a “good” life, was, even project it onto God . in fact, God’s treasure, the true gold So how do we reclaim Muri Beach by Caz Novak [www.caznovak.co.nz] of my life story . It was precisely that those parts of our story that part of me, and not ideas about my we felt we needed to discard? of Spirit . I pray that my capacity to “goodness”, which was open to divine When I reclaim story, I usually receive will be increased alongside the growth . Carl Jung put it another way: find that what I tried to throw away capacity to give . I give thanks for those “Befriend your shadow” . Embrace as unworthy, actually contains people who have been a presence your darkness and watch it turn into the voice of God . This is apparent of Jesus’ Spirit for me, and I ask for the light . in the recurring patterns in life . greater awareness of the connection Whatever images we use to The lesson that is ignored or put between breath and Spirit, and the describe the process, we come back aside, will come back again and way we are all held in a web of love . n to Jesus who preached the message of again, each time stronger until I love until it made him so unpopular pay attention to it . Whatever that Joy Cowley is an honoured that “good” people killed him . Those particular lesson is, it will be about New Zealand writer and poet. obsessed with their own virtue, he growth and it will involve moving She is now also engaged called “whitened sepulchres, tombs away from the shadow of fear and in retreat work. painted on the outside but corrupt into the light of love .

11 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 living wage the right thing to do Michael Fitzsimons talks to John Ryall about the Living Wage Movement and why it is moral argument rather than legislative force that is critical to its long-term success. Michael Fitzsimons

ohn Ryall, National Secretary of living wage needed governments of different political hues the Service and Food Workers The Living Wage is currently set at have subsidised low-income wages JUnion, is a champion of the Living $19 25. per hour, significantly more through tax and benefits transfers . It’s Wage movement and is impressed with than the minimum rate of $14 75. per an arrangement we have grown accus- how it has evolved . hour . The amount has been calculated tomed to, despite its not working very “I think what is different about by researchers from the Family Centre well . Even with the top-ups, one in the history of this movement from Social Policy Research Unit, and is four children in New Zealand deemed other progressive movements is that it based on the needs (food, transporta- to be living in poverty has a fulltime doesn’t just complain about injustice, tion, housing, childcare etc) of a wage-earner in their household . it doesn’t just say, ‘inequality is bad, symbolic “average” family with two The Living Wage movement is the government should do something children and two adults, one adult about changing that depressing reality . about it’ . It is a way of working posi- working full-time and the other half- The very simple idea that people should tively with employers, introducing a time . It is the income necessary for real be able to live on what they earn is strik- concept and working towards imple- people to lead decent and modest lives ing a chord, here and internationally . mentation . It’s saying that inequality and is broadly applicable to all workers . is bad for everyone, not just the poor Being paid the Living Wage would uptake in UK but the rich too, in terms of the soci- be a big step up for hundreds of thou- In Britain, Citizens UK have mobilised ety we want . sands of New Zealanders who are cur- a large amount of support for the “Let’s start with the concept that rently in the workforce . Figures from Living Wage movement . the wage you get for work should 2013 show that 47 per cent of Maori Says John: “Citizens UK got thou- be enough to give you a standard of workers and 55 per cent of Pacific sands and thousands of people active, living by which you can participate Island workers are on less than the and the London City Council to in society . Participation means not Living Wage . Nearly 230,000 young adopt it . They got the backing of quite having to work 70 hours a week, workers are paid below the minimum conservative politicians — the current being able to attend school functions, wage of $14 75. per hour . mayor Boris Johnson is a big sup- or your church on Sunday . These are In New Zealand it is accepted porter . He goes out every 12 months values we’ve shared a long time in this that the wages hundreds of thousands to announce the Living Wage increase, country, but like the rest of the world of Kiwis earn are insufficient to live surrounded by both corporates and we lost them in the 80s ”. on . To varying degrees, successive community organisations . Even Prime Minister David Cameron commented that the Living Wage was an idea whose time had come . “Another big breakthrough in the UK was the London Olympics . Citizens UK has been active for a long time and around half of UK city councils are Living Wage employers . When the Olympics arrived people said they wouldn’t support the rebuild of East London unless the Olympic Committee agreed that everyone who is contracted to the Olympics was a Living Wage employer . So they agreed, and you had the Hilton Hotel chain, A delegation of Wellington faith, community and union leaders in 2013, Holiday Inn, McDonalds, everyone preparing to present to the Wellington City Council on the need for the who wanted the London Olympics Council to become a living wage employer. sticker in their window, all sign up to

12 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 it . It’s been a struggle to keep some had boards of trustees interested, but of them maintaining it since, like only a couple of them have picked up McDonalds, but it gave the movement the living wage . We ask all boards to a shot in the arm ”. explore the concept . A lot of retirement homes are Catholic, Presbyterian, or movement active in NZ Anglican-run, too, and they struggle to It’s less than three years since the pay the Living Wage because of their movement began in New Zealand government funding . and progress has been encouraging, “But becoming part of the move- says John Ryall . “Overseas movements ment allows them to work closely have taken a long time to get where with other organisations to build up we are at ”. momentum with funders . If you can’t Living Wage Aotearoa New Zealand John Ryall do it now, make it your goal . Get into a has groups in Auckland, Hamilton, moral and ethical discussion with your Palmerston North, Wellington, of business is to pay the market rate funders . Churches should be leaders Christchurch and Dunedin . It has a and create jobs where possible,” says on this issue, and they shouldn’t just be board, with representation from the John . “That’s their only moral obliga- quiet because there’s a Catholic school unions, faith-based groups and com- tion . We think that’s a pretty low bar . that doesn’t pay the Living Wage . munity organisations . The Wellington Overall it has been the church people This issue is a part of Catholic social City Council decided last year to pay and faith-based groups that have been teaching, and even if not all Catholic its directly-employed staff the Living the most active around this issue, with organisations are doing it, the idea is Wage, the Christchurch City Council the Anglicans being particularly active . out there that it’s the right thing to do ”. has asked for a report on the cost of implementing it for their city and the living wage a just wage sharing the value majority of the Auckland city council “The key concept of a Living Wage Right now the big drive is to mobilise boards have endorsed it . corresponds with Catholic ideas a lot of people around the moral argu- Surprisingly perhaps, small busi- about the ‘just wage’, which has been ment that people should be able to earn nesses are leading the way in becoming Catholic social teaching since the a wage that they can live on . The ques- Living Wage employers, says John . Rerum Novarum encyclical in 1891 . tion is whether you want to be a good “Maybe it’s because smaller busi- We’d be pretty happy if the Pope and citizen and a good employer, or not . nesses are closer to the ground, or less the Bishops Conference here in New “The Living Wage movement is not corporately driven, with more family Zealand supported it ”. going to be an industrial arm-wrestle involvement . We have groups like Of course churches can feel chal- because the people mainly affected by Thames publishers in Wellington, lenged by the idea of a Living Wage it have no industrial power at all . The a family printing business, and the because they operate as business purpose of this movement is to create a Mexican restaurant La Boca Loca in organisations too, and in many cases climate where the concept of the Living Miramar, which I think does it because are not Living Wage employers . Wage and its philosophy can become a they like the concept associated with “The Catholic Church runs a whole shared value . their business . There are a number of lot of schools, for example, which are “We are patient . We’ll keep putting other small businesses on the road to not Living Wage employers . We’ve it on the agenda and get more and it — it’s the larger ones we have more more people involved . Our model difficulties with ”. Stages of Involvement here in New Zealand is the anti- Cereal manufacturer Hubbards 1. Organisations sign up to say they nuclear movement . Everyone is proud has agreed to become a Living Wage agree with the concept of the Living that we’re nuclear-free, but we forget employer within three years and the Wage that that started off as active groups of Warehouse, while not an accredited 2. Organisations become an official people persuading councils to become member of the Living Wage living wage employer, can see the ben- movement. This includes a small nuclear-free cities and towns . People efits in adopting part of it . fee and allows you to receive news, might have thought that Nuclear Free Generally, though, businesses don’t notice of meetings and upcoming Wellington sign by the airport was want to be leaders, says John . And campaigns. pretty stupid, but it got people think- neither do the politicians who, though 3. Employers go through a process ing, and its time came pretty quickly ”. n to become accredited Living they can’t argue with the concept, don’t Wage employers. They receive a see it as their priority . registered logo that can be used in Michael Fitzsimons is a project manager, “Phil O’Reilly, the head of Business company promotions. publisher and writer for FitzBeck NZ, has said that the only responsibility Creative.

13 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 young voice my gap year Ted Richards reflects on his gap year experience in the workplace and finds he has developed significant values. Ted Richards

left St Peter’s College, Palmerston North, at the end of 2013 . Then during 2014 I worked in both the IAFFCO freezing works and as a ski lift attendant on Mt Ruapehu earn- ing the money that I needed to go to university in 2015 — and arguably should have earned in a part-time job during high school . The experi- ence gave me a sense of how many other people live . It influenced the way that I believe people of differ- ing socio-economic positions might interact to create a productive and sustainable society and meaningful lives for all citizens . problem with getting a job Ironically, my “working year” started with 3 months of unemployment . My first discovery was that work is increasingly hard to come by and more often than not it really comes down to who you know, rather than what you know . During those three months I applied to work at Higgins Contractors, the Internal Revenue Department, a dentist, all the big chain fast food outlets, several cafés and every supermarket and supermar- ket distribution centre in my city area . Finally, through a family connection Just finished de-icing at Ruapehu I got a job at AFFCO . I found that increasingly, employers require experi- work on the Mt Ruapehu ski fields . that my mates at MacDonald’s ence . To someone who has never had a I spent three months there and pol- could only dream of . But a quick job, this made entering the workforce ished off my year with another three glance at my fellow workers and I incredibly difficult . My colleagues months at the freezing works . knew that life still wasn’t easy for and I found ourselves in a catch 22; those who were receiving a ”living requiring a job to get the experience focus on money wage” . However at RAL (Ruapehu that would get us a job . I noticed two main things during Alpine Lifts), where there was no Having at last found work, my this time . First and foremost was union, we received the minimum year finally “began” . I spent three the focus upon money . I quickly wage and two dollars more an hour months at the freezing works before realised how lucky I was to be at if we participated in the de-icing of the season ended, and I was laid off AFFCO, where the base rate sat at lift structures . At AFFCO, because over the winter . I had already organ- around $21 per hour . I acknowl- of the union, there was an obvious ised work for this time so I moved to edge that I was living from home concern for people’s livelihoods, Tongariro National Park and began and so was able to pocket sums whereas this was absent at RAL .

14 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 focus on working conditions their workers as a disposable, replaceable commodity Secondly, there were huge differences in working I found a concern . Yes, it may not be profitable for a conditions . Both were largely physical, tiresome jobs . company to pay workers a higher wage, but in reality, Work at the meat works was tedious and I was injured people are not born for the sole purpose of working several times due to pressures of efficiency and lack of for the benefit of “the company” . experience . I noticed it wasn’t necessarily about danger either . While I actually injured myself more at the what stays with me meat works, I was at much greater risk of death up the My year left me with a distinct sense that something is mountain with the real threats of hypothermia and definitely out of balance in our workplaces . This experi- falling from lift structures . The difference in the work ence left me wondering why we are in a situation where environments was the focus . At RAL, the focus was on the majority willingly allow themselves to be exploited people, creating an atmosphere of fun for customers and find themselves trapped in an abusive system . to have “the best day ever” . In stark contrast, AFFCO’s However, this year has allowed me to experience focus was primarily upon quality and quantity, which how life can be, and is, for many . It has given me created an atmosphere of grim seriousness, or panic, if gratitude for the fact that I have the opportunity to something was out of order . pursue a higher level of education and find an occu- pation which I am truly passionate about . It has also workers and bosses instilled a sense of awareness and from that responsi- However, there were two key things which linked bility . I feel it is my (and our) responsibility to help both jobs . First and foremost were the people . At shift the primary focus of our lives . Should the focus both jobs they were/are amazing, stunning and be money? I have found and feel it should be people . friendly . They were/are what made the boring days bearable and made the great days great . At the base/ He aha te mea nui o te ao? worker level of the organisation it was these inter- He tangata. He tangata. He tangata! actions which held the company together, despite what the supervisors would tell you . At both jobs it What is the greatest thing on the earth? was the people which made it feel like a family . It is people. It is people. It is people! n Secondly, both jobs were similar in the level of regard given to the CEO and board members . Ted Richards is studying Health Sciences at AFFCO is owned by Talley’s, so the fact that they had The University of Auckland. recently finished building a $120 million dollar estate and spent their time flying up and down the country in their helicopter, tended to irritate the workers . Join us in working for a world free from Likewise, the fact that the chairman of the board poverty and injustice who ran RAL got his position by buying large amounts of shares in the company, spent a dispro- portionate amount of time skiing with his wife and company guests and skipping the queues, tended to infuriate the employees there too . It was the dissocia- tion of these leaders from their actual workers which was the real problem . Both the “higher-ups” I encountered were clearly unconcerned with the people who actually ran the company . Join the what mattered for me Finally, this year caused me to reflect on where the focus is, and where it should be in our jobs . In both As a regular donor with our One World Partnership you will be my jobs, the focus was primarily based upon the supporting whole communities – not just individuals – in their monetary success of the company . This led to an struggle against poverty and its causes. atmosphere of neglect of the employees and condi- Contribute any amount at a frequency that suits you. tions that were adverse to the employees’ health . Yes, For more information contact Caritas on 0800 22 10 22 there is always going to be risk when using a knife to or visit www.caritas.org.nz cut up a cow, or when working atop a freezing cold The Catholic Agency for Justice, Peace and Development mountain . But the level to which employers treat

15 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 Pohutukawa16 Tui Motu Evening InterIslands by Harold Coop [www.newzealandpainting.com] May 2015 The sea question The sea asks ‘How is your life now?’ It does so obliquely, changing colour. It is never the same on any two visits.

It is never the same in any particular Only in generalities: tide and such matters Wave height and suction, pebbles that rattle.

It doesn’t presume to wear a white coat But it questions you like a psychologist As you walk beside it on its long couch.

— Elizabeth Smither

17 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 spirituality feral music and the Spirit

Peter Murnane shares how children helped him shed his self-consciouness in making music. Peter Murnane op

ne of my grandmothers was Hanging On The Wall” (its owner was reaching for, then quickly correct a gifted bush musician . She had died) and “Old Shep” (a faithful myself . Worse, my brain was inhib- played piano, violin and dog) . Radio music moved me, but I ited by shame at making mistakes, Oaccordion at many a country dance never saw anyone actually making it, and by imagined criticisms from around Warrnambool, Victoria, but I so was not inspired to want to imitate anyone listening . But I continued to knew her only as a tired but dignified them, as are children brought up play with third-rate skill, relying on old lady and never heard her play . among musicians . Chesterton’s wonderful inversion of In over-crowded primary schools During the 1950s, from the the work-ethic principle: “If a thing is of the baby-boom that followed Sunday night radio I drank in the worth doing, it’s worth doing badly ”. WWII, I was never taught to make mostly trashy songs of the Hit Parade In a little green book I collected music . The two Catholic schools I and could still, should the need arise, alphabetically the best melodies, folk, attended were run by hard-working sing many of them in full . I had classical or pop, that had lodged in Mercy Sisters who taught classes of hardly heard of classical music, let my head over the years and soon had fifty children the basics of grammar alone enjoyed any . At the De La Salle several hundred, without even start- and mathematics, and some history Brothers’ secondary school, talented ing on the hymns . and geography, for all of which I am Brother Gerard shaped us into sing- enormously grateful . They collected ing beautiful multi-part Latin and playing in privacy our sixpences to pay a woman to English church pieces . As older teen- I had splashed out and bought a good teach us a few songs for the end-of- agers a lay-teacher bravely invited us treble recorder, but when travelling year concert, but it was beyond them at lunch-time to hear records from still carried the smaller descant and to give us even basic lessons on the his classical collection and we were played it whenever I could find the octave-scale or how to make music captivated by gems from Mozart, nearest thing to solitude . A friend from it . Beethoven, Grieg and Mahler . noticed the instrument and asked

hearing but not seeing learning to play music It was much the same in the three Fast forward to my thirties, when I State Schools to which my mobile wished, not for the first time, that I childhood exposed me, except for could actually play an instrument the fourth grade in the tiny school at and humorously resolved that before Childers Cove . Headmistress Betty I turned 40 I would learn one, or die Abrahams taught all its thirteen in the attempt . At that time a Sister pupils and I happily remember the was teaching our novices to play the weekly class when she thumped the recorder, so I obtained a cheap plastic old piano and we sang songs from The instrument and joined her classes . School Paper. They included a Welsh I would then borrow her Recorder tune that proclaimed “Wales, Wales, Handbook and retreat to the squash- sweet are thy hills and thy dales”, courts, lock myself away and squeak- The “Ash Grove” which haunted me ily learn a new note every afternoon . and a beautiful Dutch folk melody Even before I was half-fluent, I that concluded: “ . . down the grassy was delighted to find that the tunes pathway that leads to my home” . in my head from primary school and I had already tasted the pleasure earlier would leak out through my of music when, aged five or six, I hesitant fingers, and I could even would hear on the radio songs that echo newly-heard melodies, like we now call, Country and Western . some large, plastic-beaked parrot . Their melancholy could wrench My fingers were quite clumsy: I a child’s heart: “There’s A Bridle would hit the note beside the one I

18 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 where I played it, thinking that I making music for others cars or trucks made from plastic bot- belonged to some classical recorder I was pleased to find that even before tles expertly cut and folded, fitted group . She was amused that I played a growing and appreciative audience with wheels carved from the soles mostly on lonely roads and behind the melodies flowed more freely than of discarded jandals (thongs/ flip- hedges, where nobody would hear . ever before . Despite lack of practice, flops) . Around Melanesia discarded But our habits change through there was new ease and skill . I would jandals are also used to beat rapidly the years . Living in crowded cities, I even find myself improvising, carried on a popular percussion instrument seldom found opportunities to play . I by the music in a mildly ecstatic joy . resembling pan pipes, home-made still carried the recorder out of nostal- Where does this come from? from varied lengths of bamboo or gia, but at the end of a holiday I would My fingers can hardly have become PVC piping . see it lying, unused, at the bottom newly flexible . Has my ageing brain It is astonishing that we have of my case . Even when I moved to shed some of its earlier inhibitions? gifts like music; or hands, lungs, the Solomon Islands, I hesitated to Is it the fruit of deeper peace coming brain and tongue but sad when we resume playing . There was surpris- from meditation? I now play at home don’t respond to inspirations nudg- ingly little solitude and a serious lack more, suspecting that rather than ing us to use them more fully . If we of hedges . As the only white face on annoying people it may even add to ponder for a few moments — or our island I was already exceptional the peace of the community . I was decades — where our gifts come without making myself the local freak moved to hear one student describe from, we might begin to understand who filled the lovely, short evenings it as “beautiful” . a little better the Spirit that guides with extraordinary noises . The blockflöte has taught me that this awesome universe like wind Then one day, 74 years old and stuff we make ourselves brings more moving through a flute . If we love relocated to Honiara I determined joy than mass-produced stuff that using our gifts, how much more to begin again . On one of my regular others foist upon us, not for our that Spirit, boundless Love, must walks along the beach I took the good but for their own profit . On enjoy giving them to us . n recorder, found a spot that I thought the local beach, even while doing my was reasonably far from habitation best to play Grieg’s “Solveig’s Song”, and sat on a rough log seat . I had not or Brahms’s “Lullaby”, or perhaps Peter Murnane OP lives in the completed the first tune before two, the Quaker hymn “How Can I Keep Dominican Friars formation house in five, 10 chocolate-coloured children From Singing”, I would observe the Honiara, Solomon Islands. emerged from nearby bush and stood children around me playing happily [Photos by Emmanuel Kiria] watching, enthralled . with their few home-made toys: little

19 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 reading mark ecologically an ecological reading of the gospel of mark In this fourth part in the series Elaine Wainwright uncovers the subversive message in the parable of the sower in Mark 4:1-9 Elaine Wainwright

Lake and shore of Galilee

t could be easy to think that the listen or barley, the two most common familiar “parable of the sower” Jesus’ opening word: “Listen!” — agricultural products of Galilee in the is simple to read ecologically . alerts our sense of hearing . The dis- first century . An attentive reader will ICertainly it is rich in materiality with ciples in the text and we, the listeners notice how the material and social seeds, birds, soil, a sower and many to the text, are invited to listen/to embedded in the story reveal the eco- other aspects . As readers we will find hear and so engage our bodies in the logical texture of Mark’s gospel . that the finely woven interconnec- act and art of listening . To ensure The seed seems to have been tions of habitat, human, and holy that the listeners are responding by thrown by hand rather than carefully give depth to this parable . bringing their bodies to the hearing planted in rows . This links the sower of Jesus’ parable, the narrator follows to the process of planting in order place – sea and land the imperative, “Listen!” with the to grow grain to feed the family, the Two opening verses before the parable word idou (often translated “behold”) animals and also to have seed for the begins can easily be overlooked but which is the marker of something of following year’s planting . However they weave together the material- importance . Listeners are now doubly the pressure on farmers or tenants to ity and the sociality of the human/ attentive and the parable begins: “A produce abundant harvests for exports other-than-human . Mark 4 begins “in sower went out to sow” . for the Empire also lurks within this place” — Jesus began to teach “beside world that the parable creates . the sea” . However the social nature sower and sowing The parable draws the reader into of “large crowds” gathered around “The sower” in the Markan text may be the ecosystem, or ecocycle, of sower him is firmly linked to this place . The imagined in a number of ways . He or and seed . Birds take up the seeds relationship between text and context she may be a slave or tenant farmer on on the pathway and are fed . Weeds is highlighted further when Jesus gets one of the large Herodian or Roman take up their ground-space so there into “a boat on the sea”, sitting there estates that were becoming more is insufficient room for the sower’s to teach while the crowds are “beside numerous in first century Galilee . She seed in some places . The sun with the sea on the land” . The boat, the sea or he might also be imagined as a self- the wind and the rain, elements not and the land function to create mean- sufficient small farmer, a member of a explicitly named in the text, enable ing . They give relational authority and farming family . Each would have been the seed to grow but if the root is power to Jesus . They both separate intertwined in their social fabric in not deep enough, some plants will him from and yet relate him to the different ways but would have shared wither under the sun . Others will be crowd on the land . As readers we are the understanding of the seasons with choked out by plants which are not drawn into the interconnections in their rhythms of time for planting and useful in the agricultural cycle . The this habitat and we need to attend for harvesting . The sower is engaged in seed that falls on the prepared soil with all our senses to the narrative that the work of sowing . The type of seed produces richly . An ecological reader will unfold . is not specified . It is likely to be wheat will pick up on the network of living

20 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 and non-living materials in the hybrid habitat — from sower, to seed, to bird, sun, earth/soil, weeds and thorns . first century grain farming Stephanie Nelson, a classical scholar, says that “because farming is inescapably a part of human life it may provide a clue to what is most basically human, and so a clue to our place within the cosmos ”. Jesus, the parable teller, and his audience would have been thor- oughly familiar with the agricultural system of first century Galilee . In this teaching by the sea Jesus invites listeners/readers to attend to the processes all around them . They would have known the prolific nature of grain given the right conditions . As well they would realise their need for such abundance in the face of the Roman taxation on a small farmer’s grain or soil . Varro, a first century BCE scholar and agricultur- alist, notes the variety in yields: tenfold in one dis- trict, fifteen in another, even a hundred to one near Gadara in Syria (Varro, On Agriculture 1 .44 .2) . Pliny, the Roman naturalist, proclaims that nothing is more prolific than wheat giving yields of 150, 360 and 400 (Natural History, 18 .21 .94-95) . However, as Pliny’s figures in particular are in the context of impress- ing the emperor, such figures may be exaggerated . Moldenke and Moldenke, who have studied plants of the Bible, suggest that a yield of about 20-fold can be expected of a crop of wheat in the Levant but that good soil and certain strains might produce 60 or The Sower by James Tissot [Brooklyn Museum] even 100 grains each . Many interpreters of this parable view the yields first century audience is embedded in the parable and to be extraordinary — especially at 60 or 100 . proclaims not the basileia/empire of Rome — but the However it seems that these extraordinary yields are basileia of God/the holy (Mark 1:15) . more descriptive when we conside the first century Jesus’ parable draws listeners/readers into the com- agriculture encoded in the text . plex world of the more-than-human in which multiple participants, including the human, are interwoven . God’s abundance Two different cosmologies are implicitly in tension The subversive aspect of the parable lies elsewhere . within the parable and the network of associations Again materiality and its symbolism can assist us to it evokes . First there is that of the emperor and his discover it . On the two-sided coin minted by Agrippa representatives, whether a Herodian king in Galilee or I, the Roman-appointed ruler in landowners supporting the imperial system, who are Galilee 37–44 CE, are three ears claimed to be the source of abundance . On the other of grain containing multiple seeds hand, the parable offers a more complex system of springing from one stalk . Like intertangled elements that intersect in the process of the seeds of the parable, they sowing seed . The surprise is that there is an ecology symbolise the fertility of the land . that can produce abundance . It is, however, hybrid, However on the coin their abun- consisting of multiple participants . Jesus simply invites dance is attributed reflection on, or attentiveness to, the richness of habi- to Agrippa’s reign indicated by tat/human/holy and what such attentiveness will allow the royal umbrella-style canopy us to hear: “Let those who have ears, let them hear ”. n and the inscription on the obverse of the coin, “king/ Elaine Wainwright RSM is an basileus Agrippa” . But the independent biblical scholar. material context of Jesus and a

21 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 tpp agreement TPP not good for us

Cecily McNeill explains why the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement would give too much power to multi-national companies at the expense of government legislation for the well-being of their citizens, cultures and environments.

Cecily McNeill

he biggest free trade deal ever from an earlier version . She pointed Newmont, the goldmining com- seen between New Zealand out the lack of protection of the pany operating in Waihi, recently and 11 other Pacific Rim government’s right to regulate against launched a billion dollar claim against countriesT including the United States attacks from foreign investors . Indonesia for a regulation requiring and Japan is nearing completion . As well there was no provision for the domestic processing of raw mate- If it goes through, the Trans-Pacific restricting capital flows in a financial rials . This forced Indonesia to concede Partnership Agreement (TPP) would crisis, nor any effective exceptions for special exemptions for the corporation cover a trade bloc of some 800 mil- public policy areas such as health, from the new mining law . lion people and control almost 40 per environment or culture . Sean Flynn of the American cent of the global economy . “Such flaws should be fatal to the University Washington College of The negotiations have been deal, especially when US corporations Law said the ISDS chapter should be shrouded in the utmost secrecy but, are responsible for more investment subjected to the most rigorous and thanks to leaked information, a grow- disputes than any other country,” open debate . He wrote in an email: ing number of people, including the Jane Kelsey wrote in the New Zealand “The TPP included a new footnote chief justices of New Zealand and Herald 27 March 2015 . — not previously released as part Australia, are angry about the TPP . She cited a “litany” of recent cases, of any other investment chapter — In March thousands of people took where investor companies sought clarifying that private expropriation to the streets in more than 20 towns hundreds of millions of dollars in actions can be brought to challenge and cities around New Zealand in compensation because a country’s ‘the cancellation or nullification of protest, particularly at the power the own regulations were causing damage such [intellectual property] rights’, as Agreement would give transnational to their profits . This has produced a well as ‘exceptions to such rights’ . companies to sue individual countries . “groundswell of resistance” to ISDS . “Any time a national court — NZCTU Economist Bill Rosenberg “The French and German including in the US — invalidates has called the TPP “anti-free trade” Governments have said they won’t a wrongfully granted patent or and Jane Kelsey, Professor of Law at accept ISDS in the parallel deal other intellectual property right, the Auckland University, has accused the being negotiated between the US affected company could appeal that government of reneging on its promises and the EU . That follows disputes revocation to foreign arbitrators ”. to safeguard regulatory rights and pro- against Germany involving phasing Last September NZ chief justice, tect public policy exceptions . out nuclear power plants and climate Dame Sian Elias warned of the dam- In fact, if the TPP were to go change mitigation measures ”. aging effects of ISDS on sovereignty through, the already yawning gap and democracy: between the haves and have-nots in our investors more protected “It is feared that Investor State society could widen further and faster . than governments Dispute Settlement processes will The website itsourfuture.org.nz undermine capacity to regulate ISDS process flawed outlines the litigious activities in the banking and finance sector or In March the leaking of the Agreement other countries of some companies control environmental impacts . It chapter which dealt with the contro- which operated in New Zealand . For is conceivable that human rights versial investor-state dispute settle- example, Veolia, the company that based determinations of domestic ment (ISDS) process, led Jane Kelsey ran Auckland’s train system, recently courts may similarly give rise to to protest that contentious clauses in sued Egypt for US$80 million for, claims . Quite apart from impact on that chapter concerning special rights among other things, raising its mini- domestic sovereignty and constitu- for foreign investors, were unchanged mum wage . tional issues, these disputes impact

22 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 property and enhancing the monopoly afforded by protections, hence earning Bill Rosenberg’s “anti-free trade” criticism . The US wanted to extend the copyright period from 50 to 70 years and to introduce strict laws governing infringement of copy- right . This would include the length of time medi- cines were protected by patents, which would prevent cheaper “generic” copies from forcing the price down . The rules governing State Owned Enterprises potentially upon the rule of law wine tariffs of 15 per cent immediately were also in contention, with the US within domestic legal systems ”. and the removal in five years of 45 per wanting SOEs to act commercially cent of tariffs on kiwifruit . rather than in the public interest . few benefits for nz trade Bill Rosenberg says the problem Opponents are questioning the gov- with the Government’s goal of signifi- secrecy favours investors ernment’s involvement in the TPP . cant access to the US market for New Despite secrecy surrounding the On signing a free trade agreement Zealand’s dairy products was that negotiations denying information with Korea in March, Trade Minister this access was likely to be restricted to parliament and the public, rep- Tim Groser said improved access to because of US domestic interests . The resentatives of some US companies international markets through free US recognised that NZ could produce have been able to scrutinise the trade agreements was a key compo- at prices considerably lower than its documents for clauses which affect nent of the Government’s Business own producers so the US domestic them . The “regulatory coherence” Growth agenda . market needed protecting . “They’re and “transparency” provisions of “Supporting our exporters is cru- scared of Fonterra, basically ”. the Agreement would give these cial to creating new jobs and boosting On the other hand, the US dairy companies the right to be part of incomes for New Zealanders . industry was becoming a successful the decision-making . They would be “This Agreement secures the exporter in its own right and increas- able to influence decisions and limit long-term future of New Zealand ingly competitive with New Zealand, the degree to which their activities exporters to Korea whose interna- so the value of the US market to New were regulated . This would interfere tional competitors were benefitting Zealand was falling . with governments’ powers to regu- from Korea’s other FTAs . It reduces The same situation would likely late to protect their own people in barriers to trade and investment, apply to any agricultural export public policy areas such as health, provides greater certainty about the access to Japan and Canada as both education and the environment . business environment and ensures are keen to protect their traditional With so many flaws and so much our exporters remain competitive in agricultural sectors . The US has power gifted to ethics-free transna- each other’s market ”. conceded it was unlikely to gain free tional companies, the TPP could But the agreement has scrapped access to the Japanese market . be the biggest deal New Zealanders tariffs on fewer than half of New never wanted . n Zealand’s exports to Korea . While it TPP anti-free trade might progressively phase out tariffs With trade said to be covered in just Cecily McNeill is a free lance writer “on 98 per cent” of the trade, this five of the Agreement’s 29 chapters, and editor and was most recently excludes important New Zealand opponents might well wonder at the editor of Welcom. exports such as milk powder . the vigour of the government’s The Government counted as “par- pursuit of the Agreement . The US Michael Leunig cartoon used with permission. ticular success stories” the removal of was more interested in intellectual

23 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 tpp agreement TPP and our health system

Joshua Freeman outlines how the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement would threaten the health of New Zealanders.

Joshua Freeman

egotiating trade agreements may sound harmless enough but it’s no longer just about tariffs and quotas . Over the last few decades negotiations haveN expanded deeply into domestic policy . The focus is on eliminating “behind the border barriers” or “technical barriers to trade”, which effectively include any labour, environmental or health laws considered onerous by for- eign investors . The problem is that what are considered “barriers” by investors are often also crucial domestic policies needed to protect people from important health threats . For countries like NZ, the risk of compromising health protections during negotiations is high, because where tariffs are already low (as they are in NZ); “technical barriers to trade” are the main bargaining chip .

secret even after signing This alone should make kiwis feel uneasy about the Trans- Pacific Partnership (TPP) — a huge agreement currently under negotiation between NZ and 11 other Pacific-Rim countries . But we really ought to get concerned when we consider the intense secrecy of the negotiations . Rather than negotiations becoming more transparent as their scope has expanded, they have become increasingly secre- tive . This has reached the point where for the TPP, draft negotiation documents must be kept from the public for a The same should be done for the TPP . Particularly further 4 years after the agreement is signed . when we consider its far-reaching consequences . It would Even more alarming is that those same documents — effectively lock in place an enforceable, over-arching legal so carefully guarded from the public — have been pro- framework for all NZ’s future laws and regulations for vided already to hundreds of lobbyists for the world’s most generations to come . In light of this, it seems crazy that the powerful transnational corporations . In contrast, health TPP could come into force with fewer checks and balances and human rights agencies have had to rely on leaks for than we require even for passing regular legislation in NZ . information, reflecting the deep power imbalances inher- ent in the negotiation process . health professionals worried Like all legal documents, the fine print is crucially Health professionals concerned about the TPP have there- important for fair public debate . But for the TPP the final fore had no choice but to join the dots using past agree- text won’t be provided to the public or independent health ments and leaked draft chapters in order to evaluate likely organisations until after it is signed . At that point, regard- health impacts of the TPP . Recently a group of Australian less of public opinion or expert analysis, there will be no researchers published a systematic health impact assessment opportunity to make further changes . In fact, once signed, (HIA) which concluded the TPP would reduce medicine even the NZ Parliament will be powerless to prevent rati- affordability and reduce the ability of government to regu- fication by Cabinet . late tobacco, alcohol and food labelling policies . It is because of these democratic loopholes the EU ombudsman recently ruled that draft texts of the Trans- rise of medicine prices Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) — the They concluded medicine affordability would decrease European equivalent of the TPP between the EU and the due to the massive expansion of patent monopoly rights US — should be released to the public prior to signing . for pharmaceuticals revealed in the leaked Intellectual

24 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 Property Chapter . This would reduce threat of litigation has a “chilling effect” Furthermore, none of the underlying access to medicines, particularly for on government decisions . A striking flaws in the tribunal system have low socioeconomic groups . In NZ this example is right here in NZ — even been addressed . The tribunals con- would be a disaster — exacerbating before the TPP is signed — where tinue to lack transparency, rights of health inequities and slowly squeezing legislation on cigarette plain packaging appeal and the systems of precedent the health budget to breaking point . has been delayed until the outcome of required of our domestic courts . Even But in developing countries where the case against Australia is known . more importantly, they continue to people with conditions like HIV rely The Australian researchers con- be affected by conflicts of interest, on generic medicines for survival, it cluded the TPP would handcuff gov- with adjudicators who sit in judge- would be a matter of life and death . ernments in policy areas like tobacco, ment alternating as paid litigators on For instance, under patent, the price alcohol and food labelling, but the full behalf of corporate clients . of a Hepatitis C drug is $84,000 but range of health risks is much more it can be purchased off patent for just extensive . Effectively the TPP would let’s now act together $300 . The usual argument is that high stifle innovation in health policy and So what can we do about all this? Not prices are needed to recoup research prevent a precautionary approach much if we act in isolation, but collec- and development costs, but for this being applied to any newly identified tively we have enormous power . For drug, those costs would be recovered in health threats . In other words, all new the TPP, the next couple of months just a few weeks . health policies would be required to are critical . In the next month or meet an unreasonably high burden of so, the “Fighting Foreign Corporate PHARMAC hampered proof before they could be introduced Control Bill” will come before parlia- In NZ medicine affordability would without fear of reprisal by foreign ment — a member’s bill proposing also be affected by impacts on investors . This would amount to a NZ not sign any agreement allowing PHARMAC .PHARMAC is an agency huge tilt of the playing field favouring investors to sue the government . This with an international reputation for corporate profits over the health needs bill needs your support . My advice negotiating affordable medicines for of ordinary New Zealanders . would be to keep a close eye on the New Zealanders and it’s no secret it’s “It’s Our Future” website (http:// under threat by the TPP . Although limp safeguards www itsourfuture. org. nz/). now and we have assurances that concessions Reassurances have been given about regularly over the coming weeks, for won’t be made on the “fundamentals” “safeguards” against these cases, but practical ideas and suggestions about of PHARMAC — this doesn’t mean just a couple of weeks ago, a leak of what you can do to support this bill very much — the bargaining power the latest TPP Investment chapter and to resist the TPP . n of PHARMAC could still be substan- was far from reassuring . It showed tially undermined . that even the very weak legal safe- Dr Joshua Freeman is a member of guards included back in 2012 have the New Zealand Climate and future health laws threatened been further hollowed out to replicate Health Council.

The other major health concern is agreements responsible for some of Cartoon used with permission of that foreign investors would be given the most alarming historical rulings . The Alliance for Democracy. new rights to sue the government in offshore tribunals in response to new health laws or policies perceived to Celebrate the Mass with threaten “anticipated future profits” . Under existing agreements these law- Young People suits have been initiated in response Popular Children’s Missal to a whole range of legitimate health Designed to guide children through the Mass. regulations and policies . These include This lovely sacramental gift is written for the tobacco companies suing Australia and Southern Hemisphere and is suitable for ages Uruguay for cigarette plain packaging 7 to 12 years. legislation, a pharmaceutical company per copy +$4.50 p/pkg challenging a Canadian court ruling on $13.99 Quantity Discount Available patent law, and cases filed by toxic waste Freephone 0508 988 988 and fossil fuel companies in response [email protected] to environmental health standards and 38 Higginson Street, Otane bans on toxic chemicals . Over the last Central Hawke’s Bay decade the number of these cases has www.christiansupplies.co.nz increased tenfold, but even just the

25 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 scripture spirit – poured out in living water

Kathleen Rushton traces the images of water and light in the Johannine Pentecost readings - John 7:37-39 and John 15:26-27, 16:12-15 or 20:19-23 - as symbols of the pouring of the Spirit.

Kathleen Rushton

e had followed the path water flows out Prayers were offered for winter to the source of the Rock, spring, source, water flowing, rains (water), so necessary for fertile north branch of the what is unseen … evoke a favourite crops the following year, and for the RiwakaW River where water emerges passage in John’s gospel — the renewal of sunlight (light) . from the rock via a cave, into a mysterious verses of Jn 7:37-39 . If early rain fell during this time, deep, clear, astonishingly beautiful, Traditional interpretation, such as it was regarded as an assurance that spring-fed pool . Towering above us the Jerusalem Bible, translates Jn 7:38 God would send abundant rain . were huge moss-covered rocks that as if the believer is the source of living This hope was acted out in a solemn had tumbled down the Tākaka Hill water . Another possible translation, ceremony . On the seven mornings of perhaps thousands of years ago . called the christological interpreta- the Festival, a procession set out for Below us was Te Puna o Riwaka . tion, sees the living water as flowing nearby temple hill and the fountain This wāhi tapu or sacred place of from within Jesus . of Gihon, the source of the Pool the people of Te Ātiawa and Ngāti If we interpret the water symbol of Siloam . A priest filled a golden Rārua has special mana or status, within the twofold pattern of sym- pitcher with water while a choir for from here springs waiora, the bols in John’s gospel, the first level repeated: “With joy you shall draw waters of life . For generations this of meaning concerns Jesus and the water from the wells of salvation ”. has been a place of healing . If what second level concerns disciples . For (Is 12:3) The procession returned to can be seen filled me with awe so example: “I am the light of the world” the temple through the Water Gate does what cannot be seen . (Jn 8:12), applies to Jesus and then accompanied by crowds carrying Ross McDonald, aged 83, one follows something about disciples: Festival symbols: in their right hand of five divers who first charted “Whoever follows me … will have twigs tied with a palm (representing what lies beyond the spring and the light of life ”. branches used to build the huts) was among those gathered in 2013 and in their left hand symbols of to mark the 50th anniversary of festival of tabernacles the harvest . Once in the Temple, the their historic dive, described what Rich symbolism surrounds the Festival priest poured the water into a special they found . of Tabernacles (in Hebrew, sukkoth; in funnel from where it flowed into the After descending into the pool English, shelters, booths, tabernacles ground . the divers entered a hole, swam or huts) . During the Festival time Jesus was in Galilee near the time about 30 metres, rounded a corner, people slept and ate in small, flimsy of the Festival of Tabernacles (Jn surfaced, climbed up a waterfall and huts in memory of the forty years the 7:2) . In the middle of the celebra- dived down again to swim a further Israelites lived in tents in the wilder- tions he went up to the temple and 50 metres . Reaching a ledge, they ness . There is also a special relation- taught (Jn 7:14); he cried out as he climbed up into a huge cathedral- ship to the Temple in Jerusalem at taught there (Jn 7:28) and he cried like space about 30 metres in diam- this time because the dedication of the again proclaiming: “If anyone thirsts eter and 6-7 storeys high . Then they first Temple built by Solomon took …” (Jn 7:37) . Jesus said to them: “I plunged through waist-high water place at Tabernacles (1 Kings 8:2) . am the light of the world ”(Jn. 8:12) . until after about 40 metres the cavern The natural world and the agricultural He was teaching in the treasury of the narrowed into tiny unpassable pas- rhythm of life were integral as this temple (Jn 8:20) and went out of the sages . Beyond that spot, cavers start- Festival was celebrated in the northern temple (Jn 8:59) . So the Temple and ing from an undisclosed place, may autumn (September-October) with Tabernacles, with its symbolism of enter the larger cavern ahead through celebrations which accompanied the water and light, are the background a dry entrance . grape and olive harvests . for Jn 7:1-8:59 .

26 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 living water On the last day of the Festival, Jesus cried out: “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me ”. The imagery of thirst as longing for God is well known (Psalms 42:1-2 and 63:1) . In Jn 7:38 translations use “heart” or “side” or “breast” for koila but it means literally “out of his belly” . For Hebrews, the belly was the seat of deep human emotions . Depicting Jesus as the giver of living water (Jn 4:13-14) and as the rock (Jn 19:34) recalls a whole series of OT images . From the rock God gives water to the people in the desert (Ex 17:6; Ps 105:41) . Water comes out of the Temple (Ezek 47:1-12) and heals the holy Te Puna Riwaka land . Living water comes out of Jerusalem, the holy city, and heals God, the Church . Re-creation con- Māori people identify with their local the whole earth (Zech 14:6-11) . tinues when later Jesus “breathed river . Rivers link with the ancestors . Against this background, Jesus on them” saying: “Receive the Holy How does the gift of the Spirit, “cried out” claiming to be the life- Spirit” (For Jn 20:22 see Tui Motu imaged as the pouring out of “rivers nurturing living water for which April 2015) . of living water”, inspire Christians to the pilgrims prayed . He stood and The imagery of springs of living live in ways which value the vital gift cried out (Jn 7:37) as Wisdom in water flowing from the rock leads of water? And how might Christians Proverbs stands and sings out her deeply into the mystery of Jesus understand water as a symbol of invitation (Pr 1:20 and Pr 8:2-3) . who gives the Spirit . Living water is their longing for God and as free gift Spirit pouring as living water necessary to sustain all forms of life — endangered and yet necessary to in Papatūānuku, Earth . As theologian sustain all life? n The gift of the Holy Spirit poured Linda Gibler says: “Creation is water- out is identified with “rivers of living drenched . All living beings on Earth Kathleen Rushton RSM is a scripture water” to be received by believers in are born of water — in oceans or scholar, involved in adult education and Jesus . At this stage in the gospel, ponds, within eggs, seeds or wombs ”. is a keen tramper. however, they were not yet ready Every river has its mauri or life force . because Jesus had not been glorified (Jn 7:39) . The Baptist reported that Jesus had received the Spirit already (Jn 1:32-33) . Jesus had assured the Jubilee Bursaries woman of Samaria that the hour for University theological education for “worship in spirit and truth” was already at hand (Jn 4:23-24) . APPLICATIONS INVITED In the farewell discourses, Jesus for Semester 2, 2015 promises the Spirit (Jn 15:26-27, Applications close FRIDAY 5 June 2015 16:12-15) which is given when “he Applicants must be Catholics making a contribution to the mission of the Catholic Church in bowed his head and handed over the Auckland Diocese. the Spirit” (Jn 19:30) to the women The bursaries are a contribution toward university fees for theology courses. and the beloved disciple near the For information and an application pack please contact: Michelle Jarvis cross . When water flowed from the [email protected] pierced side of Jesus on the cross it "#$%&'()*&+)&',!!-./$!%&'()*&+)&01! evoked the “rivers of living water” 2.3#4567!87#4459!:;;67.556

Celibacy and Soul: Fraying: Mum, Memory Exploring the Depths of Loss, the Medical Maze Chastity and Me by Susan J Pollard by Michele Gierck King Fisher Press, 2015 University of New South Wales Reviewed by Katrina Brill RSJ Press, 2015 Reviewed by Ann Nolan PhD

“Celibacy is not for everyone . It frees you for love, for vulnerability, for sur- raying is a story written in an prise, for unanticipated friendships . informal tone in diary form It’s not an end in itself,” explains which describes a daughter’s one of the 28 sisters, nuns, monks, Fjourney in dealing with her mother’s brothers and priests who participated multiple medical problems and in Susan Pollard’s research into the for relatedness” . One participant memory loss due to Alzheimer’s disease . experience of living the vow of celi- put it this way: “My heart has been Both mother and daughter’s lives bate chastity . stretched, moulded and shaped and I are changed when memory loss is diag- Interweaving every chapter are became celibate . It has been a process nosed and the daughter undertakes and the “real life” experiences of the par- of becoming celibate over the years . commits to accompanying her mother ticipants . This gives the impression It is a process in which something to the myriad of medical appointments of a dialogue between the participant happened to me … I guess it is a and social service agencies in their voices and the content Susan Pollard freedom to love ”. shared desire to enable her mother to draws from mythology, mysticism, Susan Pollard is a Sister of St remain independent in her own home . philosophy, literature, Christian Joseph living in Adelaide . She is a Unlike some accounts of carers of spirituality and analytical psychology . Jungian analyst trained in Zurich persons with Alzheimer’s, this book Looking at celibate chastity through and practises in South Australia . She does not explore how the person with the window of these different strands has lectured for 20 years on ana- memory loss perceives and describes and of archetypical images makes lytical psychology and religion . Her how she experiences changes to herself this book different from other books book came out of her own struggle and how to make sense and meaning of I’ve read on chastity . While at to understand her commitment to the deterioration this brings . For such times I was almost overwhelmed celibate loving and a desire to hear an account you might well read Keeper: by the language of mythology and others’ experience . She acknowledges a book about memory, identity, isolation, psychology, the author constantly that some survey participants were Wordsworth and cake, by Andrea Gillies lured me into encountering new disenchanted but she chose to focus (2010), set in Scotland . insights in the experiences . on those who find meaning and con- Gierck focuses very fully on her The underlying theme of Celibacy tentment in celibate chastity . own experience of caring for her and Soul is that celibate chastity is an This book will have par- mother . She is continually swamped evolutionary process . The book itself ticular interest for women and men by information and attends various is structured to reflect the transitional Religious . It may also have appeal kinds of medical appointments in her times of the “four movements” in the for those who live a celibate life by carer capacity to get the very best care path to maturity . The author calls for choice or circumstance . I believe this she can as her mother’s advocate . She a re-visioning of the vow of chastity book will be affirming and helpful describes in detail her frustrations, her as a journey of ongoing intimacy for many striving to live celibate sense of being inundated with tasks with God and with others, rather chastity meaningfully . n and things to organise and manage . than of having virginity as an exclu- She writes of her anger as well as her sive goal . With Diarmuid O’Murchu positive reactions when things go well she suggests celibacy is a “vow of and

28 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 film review a carer’s diary chronicler of the poor The Salt of the Earth This utterly absorbing film is co- directed by German heavyweight Wim Directed by Wim Wenders and Wenders and Salgado’s son Juliano . The Juliano Ribeiro Salgado resulting network of family connec- tions and friendships is foregrounded Reviewed by Paul Sorrell in the film, although Wenders himself keeps a low profile, sharing the narra- tion with the older Salgado . Sebastião’s any readers will be familiar father is also interviewed, on the farm with Sebastião Salgado’s where he grew up with seven sisters and striking images of Brazilian which was devastated following years of Mgoldminers swarming like ants in vast drought . The story of Sebastião’s early open-cast pits: brown, muddy “toilers projects is told through high-quality of the earth” . Sometimes pigeonholed images, often reproduced from his as a “social photographer”, Salgado was beautiful books . Others — such as his exposed to liberation theology in his journey among a remote indigenous native Brazil as a young man and his tribe in Brazil and his exploration work shows great empathy with people of arctic wildlife — are captured by struggling to survive in conditions of Wenders’s cameras . abject poverty and hardship, especially Salgado’s latter years have marked or a breakthrough encourages her to when viewed en masse . a turning point in his development as continue to survive well . Salgado’s training as an economist a photographer . Moving away from Both mother and daughter grow in — he worked for the World Bank for a chronicling disaster and despair, his closeness, love and share laughter along time — showed him “the way the world most recent project, “Genesis”, seeks the way until the end . The author works” and gave him an understanding to show the earth as a Garden of Eden, distances herself from her catholic of the movement of goods and people a place of hope and the promise of upbringing while her mother remains across the globe . This experience stood restoration . Nowhere have these ideals a devout catholic . In the last few days him in good stead in chronicling the been more powerfully realised than on of her mother’s life both mother and- genocide in Rwanda and the Congo the Salgado family farm, painstakingly daughter pray together, a “powerful, so in the 1990s, when large groups of replanted in native trees and today a full of grace” experience for the author . starving refugees were constantly on flourishing oasis . True to Sebastião’s The originality of Michele Gierck’s the move, hounded from one impov- generous spirit, the property has been book Fraying lies in her tenacity and erished halting place to another . These gifted to the nation as a national park . grim persistence not to be overwhelmed photographs — and others, such as I’m very glad I watched this film . by what she describes as the “tentacles his workers and migrants series — go Rather than the aesthetically oriented of the aged-care beast” as well as her beyond mere documentation; they are treatment of a famous photographer preparedness to provide information infused with Salgado’s compassion for I had anticipated, The Salt of the and resources she found helpful in the humanity and his deep desire to make Earth revealed Salgado as a man with Australian setting . the plight of the poor and the rejected a passion for justice and a burning For a very informative book about known to an international audience . heart for the world’s poor . n dealing with dementia written from a New Zealand perspective, try Dr Chris Perkins’s, Dementia: A New Zealand Guide (2004) . Gierck’s very personal account will appeal to readers who find themselves new caregivers to know that they are not alone and that it is very reasonable to have feelings and reactions which may come with dealing with what can feel like uncharted waters in the medi- cal and social health-care world . n

29 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 comment Crosscurrents Jim Elliston islamic female theologians future of workers increasing activity aimed at under- The proliferation of women who are How should we judge progress? A mining Cardinal George Pell, theologians, both lay and religious, recent New Zealand Herald described Francis’s man chosen to finish the since Vatican II is having a benefi- how robots are expected to take over job . Francis backed him and won . cial impact on the Catholic church . a large portion of jobs currently done To me, this is an instance of Pope It now seems Muslim women by human beings . This seems a great Francis’s sound managerial skills . theologians are increasing in number . idea if people are released from the Cardinal Pell is a theological con- Iranian Shahrzad Houshmand drudgery of repetitive tasks . And we servative; he has publicly opposed Zadeh, a professor of Islamic Studies have seen how industrialisation has Francis’s line on the Synod on the at the Pontifical Gregorian University created new, more interesting jobs Family; he’s a supporter of the Latin of Rome (and mother of three), and raised living standards for many . Mass, and is a climate change sceptic . is qualified in both Catholic and The flip side, however, is the trend However, he had the financial nous Islamic theology . towards fewer jobs together with a and personal fortitude to carry out In a recent interview she lamented requirement for much higher skills, his allotted task . So, unlike many the fact that fundamentalism is which condemns many to unem- Vatican appointments where per- fuelled by ignorance: “It is time to ployment — a more soul-destroying sonal relations prevail, Francis chose read the Qur’an with new eyes . effect than menial tasks . a man suited to the task . And women play a decisive role in With fewer people working, how At a more basic level the princi- this . The moment of female Islamic are businesses going to sell their ples Francis has endorsed through theologians has come, they are an goods, make profits, etc — let alone Cardinal Pell are instituting an antidote to extremists ”. She added be concerned about the vast impover- entirely new form of governance for that there are many today, calling ished masses? the Holy See . There is now a system themselves “Muslim feminists”, from of checks and balances in Vatican Iran to Morocco, from Tunisia to new church direction operations that reflects the highest Indonesia and Europe . In March Pope Francis celebrated the international standards for transpar- She said: “Of the 6000 verses second anniversary of his election . ency and accountability . contained in the Qur’an, fewer That month also saw the completion It seems obvious from the increas- than 10 can be interpreted as justi- of the main task his fellow cardinals ing reports of dissatisfaction with the fications of violence . And yet there entrusted him to carry out, namely, direction Francis is leading the Church are those who take advantage of the the cleaning up of the Vatican that many didn’t realise he brought ignorance of the faithful, twisting finances — a source of scandal and with him a theological outlook devel- these few lines to persuade them embarrassment for some time . oped by the South American bishops to perform evil actions ”. A major It appears some cardinals didn’t which had culminated at their general problem is the existence of Koranic realise that in electing Francis they meeting at Apareceda in 2007 . schools that receive financing from also gave a platform to what might According to Austen Ivereigh in abroad “where the focus is on be called the “Apareceda programme” his biography of Francis: “If Francis memorising the Qur’an, without which the pope is implementing — perplexes Europeans and North an informed and responsible read- currently a cause of heartburn among Americans long accustomed to think- ing thereof … less than 20 per conservatives, and probably also ing in liberal-conservative terms, it is cent of the world’s Muslims have among some liberals before too long . because he uses a lens and a language Arabic as their mother tongue . This Pope Benedict had begun to that come from outside those catego- means interpretation of the verses address the multi-faceted financial ries … In essence the ‘theology of the will be the prerogative of a few, task, but the old-boys’ network people’ rejected liberal and Marxist while the masses will be open to proved too much . All the white- categories ”. Francis judged them “ide- manipulation … While for Islamic anting and the so-called Vati-leaks ological colonisation” which negates theologians knowledge of Arabic is added to his Papal burdens . Some a people’s culture and history . He essential in order to ensure a correct observers believe the chaos revealed advocates engagement with people in interpretation of the Sacred Texts, by those disclosures influenced his their real life situations . “His approach the content can be communicated decision to resign . is shaped by nationalism and culture, in any language ”. Over the past year there was rather than social sciences ”. n

30 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 comment blood, sweat and teardrops

Cavaan Wild

Same shirt, different day . dead ends, police stations, He wore that shirt for 5 days . parole offices penitentiaries and PD vans . A working week for the unemployed moving couch to God defend our prisons full of young men and women, all couch ‘cause his Mum kicked him out . having their day under the halogen tubes Time is money; the lack of both is the root of all evil . of the District Court . No one ever gave you either . In the bonds of incarceration we entreat you to consider the consequences of your actions and the long lasting effect The prospectus for a prospect is enticing if NCEA isn’t for they will have on your victims . you, truancy officer long gone, But recognise that the effect of my time in prison will be Ministry of Education says he has better things to do . far longer lasting . I don’t care for the But you don’t . triple star, guard me from the shafts of You’re sitting on a couch bleached by the weather and older personal strife and the Crimes Act . than the long white cloud . You assume this position of despondency like many young God defend my Land of the Long men and women before you . White Cloud, Trying to get what’s yours — be that a criminal record . long WINZ queue, shorter prison sentences and gun barrels . Regardless of colour we are all painted with the brush of God knows and the devil knows inclusion . We want something to identify with . but you don’t know that this next bullet You’re monochrome, blue or red foot to head is for you . and all you have to show for it is a minor criminal record But thank the Lord that wasn’t you . and a pregnant girlfriend . Just another young man like you, sinning You know you won’t make money . and failing to stay alive like you . Nobody repped a colour for a reasonable salary, feasible I only pray to the Lord that mortgage and a down-payment on a Corolla . won’t be you . n No interest from the opposite sex, save at 2:30am on a cold street when you’re alone and nobody’s picking up the home Cavaan Wild is studying phone and you’re three streets over from your house Arts and Law but a very long acre from where you want to be . at Victoria University. You knew the path you chose would lead to a multitude of

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31 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015 a mother’s journal

last year, being back in a knee brace I’m looking ahead by Kaaren Mathias to months of rehabilitation and surgery beyond my present low mobility . I’m scared about fitness and few weeks ago I had a high speed mid-air future prospects for tramping . collision with another woman on a basketball A friend in Auckland invited me to go beyond the court . I landed badly and ruptured two liga- pain of now and reflect on the place of my knees in mentsA on my right knee . After my left knee’s fracture my whole life . Here’s an ode to my knees:

Knees

You knobbly, mid points between my belly and the You kept me upright on many days tramping on ground treacherous ground, rarely noticed, you just quietly go about your job crossing glaciers, fast rivers and high peaks. keeping me on my feet and getting me to the next place. But the only times you were noticed Have I ever stopped to tell you were those blips of knee injury and distress. how much my life’s happiness and functionality I see the scar on Knee Left from a hockey stick rely on your quietly and humbly doing your job? attack on a high school field. It is time for you to get some air-time And poor old Left Patella - broken twice in cycle and notice accidents and even a bouquet. aged 15 and 45 years. So of course Left Knee is pretty clunky now but You two knees chugging along trying to be dutiful for the last several decades getting me from here to there. have smoothly bent and straightened supporting me silently through the mundane tasks Now Knee Right always strong and slick of daily life: has her time of distress. to get me out of bed each morning You need special exercises and supports. to get me to the floor to play with my babies Time for healing. to stand me back up again to cook the dinner to pedal me on my bicycle to work O God to walk me down the road to buy vegetables may I be kind to these knees. to saunter me through bush with a backpack Be kind to myself to grittily kneel on an old wooden pew for prayer. and remember to notice, appreciate Every day, faithfully, you have brought me back and be grateful for home again all things that faithfully walked me up the stairs and gently bent and low- do what is asked and required ered me back into bed. with quiet cheer. Amen

You two knees Kaaren Mathias lives with her family in have supported me silently in moments of intrepid North India. She works in community health action too - and development. kept me standing as I led my first workshop in Hindi stalwart as I discussed strategies for child survival.

May beauty like water on parched ground seep through our messiness germinating orchards of love. From the Tui Motu Team

32 Tui Motu InterIslands May 2015