UnitingCare Australia has welcomed the Prime Minister’s announcement of a Royal Commission into aged care.
Claerwen Little, National Director of UnitingCare Australia, stated that the services of the Uniting Church in Australia supports action to ensure the safety of older people in our community, and all people in residential aged care settings.
Never Again: Reflections on environmental responsibility after Roe 8, edited by Andrea Gaynor, Peter Newman and Philip Jennings. UWA Publishing, 2018
The Roe 8 Highway extension and the related Perth Freight Link was a hugely contentious public issue in the lead-up to the 2017 WA State election. Never Again outlines, purely from the perspective of the project’s detractors, the reasons why they believe it should never have happened and, as the title suggests, why it should never happen again.
Whilst it is narrowly focussed on the Roe 8 project, the implications of the discussion broaden its scope. Significant questions (and solutions) are raised about the state of our democratic processes, transport planning, environmental protection and respect for Aboriginal culture and heritage. Some of the chapters, contributed by an impressive array of leading academics, give serious pause for thought across all of these issues. There is also an account of activist strategies, legal proceedings and citizen wildlife monitoring revealing how politicised the project became.
The 42nd Annual Synod of the Uniting Church Western Australia, held over the weekend, called on the State Government to place high conservation value forests in secure national parks for the survival of threatened species.
The Uniting Church has a long held concern for the environment alongside its strong social justice stances arising out of its Christian belief that God, as the Creator of the universe, calls us into a special relationship with the creation – a relationship of mutuality and interdependence which seeks the reconciliation of all creation with God.
The Synod decided that given the uniqueness of the South-West forest ecosystems, the vulnerability of numerous threatened species endemic to the region, the relatively small areas of uncleared forests remaining and the need to mitigate against further damage to the climate system, the remaining South-West forests need to be protected from logging activities.
The 42nd Annual Synod of the Uniting Church Western Australia, held over the weekend, called on the State Government to take action on the purchase and disposal of single-use plastics.
The Uniting Church has a long standing commitment to social, environmental and intergenerational justice. Recognising the impact of plastics on the environment, particularly in marine ecosystems, the Synod affirmed the 2018 decision of the WA State Government to ban the provision of single-use plastic bags, and called for further action.
The 42nd Annual Synod of the Uniting Church Western Australia, held over the weekend, committed to taking the next step in advocacy for people seeking asylum, calling on Australia’s leaders to restore dignity to people seeking humanitarian protection.
The Synod agreed to write to the Federal Government expressing concerns at the restriction of access to the Status Resolution Support Service (SRSS). Removing the service leaves families at risk of destitution and homelessness, and the church is calling for full access to be reinstated.
While our Federal Government still takes a hard line approach to refugees and asylum seekers, many Australians want to do more to help those coming to Australia for safety. There are a number of practical ways members of the Australian community can help.
The Uniting Church WA has been a long-time supporter of the Coalition for Asylum Seekers, Refugees and Detainees (CARAD), who provide support to refugees and asylum seekers in Perth. Recent cuts to the Status Resolution Support Service mean that up to 500 people in Perth may lose access to this program, leaving them without any form of income. Individuals and groups, such as Uniting Church WA congregations, can help by donating items to CARAD’s Food Bank or organising a fundraiser to donate cash.
Poverty is a serious issue, but it doesn’t mean you can’t have fun raising money to tackle it. Members from a range of Uniting Church WA congregations have recently shared in some delicious Sri Lankan curries and danced to Bollywood music as part of a combined effort to raise much needed funds for five preschools in Sri Lanka.
Susy Thomas, one of the event organisers, was particularly glad to see people enjoy themselves.
Dianella mother, Alwynn Hynes, wanted to give her son, Bobby, something special for his first birthday, something he could reflect on in later life as an event that helped shape the person he would become. That birthday present was the ‘gift of giving’.
Domestic and family violence, climate change and voluntary assisted dying (VAD) were some of the pertinent issues discussed at Uniting Church in Australia’s 15th Triennial Assembly meeting in July. Elsa Samuel reviewed these sites that advocate and inform on these issues.
President of the Uniting Church in Australia Dr Deidre Palmer has called on Australians to respond with love, hospitality and inclusion to a surge in anti-immigration rhetoric in Australian public life.
“Jesus’ great commandment to his followers was to love God and love your neighbour. As Christians we believe all people are created in the image of God and deserving of respect and dignity. Racism is incompatible with the Christian faith,” said Deidre.
In recent weeks, inflammatory opinion pieces have suggested a ‘foreign invasion’, a neo-Nazi has been allowed to air his views on a news channel; there has been more fearmongering about so-called ‘African gangs’, and a Senator has used his maiden speech to honour the White Australia Policy and call for future migration to “reflect the historic European-Christian composition of Australian society.”