Australia Day – A Festival of Identity

Well, today we celebrate a festival – Australia Day. In my last entry I wrote that

Festival times are periods that take us away from the normal passing of time. To celebrate well means that we take time from our ‘useful’ activities. We mark the time in different ways – with food, dress, gifts, songs, symbols, with friends and family and with worship.

Today, many Australians at home or abroad will celebrate this festival. What in fact, do we celebrate? For days even weeks, in the lead up to today the media has talked/written of cockroach races, barbecues, thong-throwing competitions, beach parties – all the activities that are supposed to epitomise Australians. Pity about those Aussies who don’t identify with any of those activities.

On the more serious side we have the Australia Day awards and citizenship ceremonies.

With the Australia Day awards we recognise Australians who have made outstanding contributions to society. Theoretically they are not political and theoretically they celebrate commitments to society over and above what we accept as the norm. Perhaps we don’t always get it right and it is these times that make me really think about what is, or should be the criteria for such awards.

I wonder what God’s Australia Day awards would be. What criteria would God use? If the acknowledged saints and martyrs are anything to go by, some of the criteria would be very different. Some of God’s gongs may go to the oddest people if the criteria of the Gospels are any indication. Take Matthew 5-8, the ‘Sermon on the Mount’: Jesus tells his listeners that those who are poor in spirit are blessed, those who are sorrowing, those who hunger and thirst for holiness, those who show mercy, the single-hearted and the peacemakers. Blessed too are those persecuted, ridiculed and insulted for Jesus’ sake. Jesus asks us to forgive, to be utterly faithful sexually, to keep to our word, to relinquish revenge, in fact to love our enemies, to pray with filial trust, to know where our true riches lie, to be satisfied with enough, to ‘Treat others as you would have them treat you’. To respect others as my very self.

Finally, lest all this sounds a little like the 60’s hippy ‘all you need is love’ stuff, Jesus tells us to watch out for the liars, to develop an inbuilt charlatan-detector. ‘Be on your guard against false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but underneath are wolves on the prowl.’ This is tough stuff. It gets even tougher. Those who will receive God’s gong will be those who take these ‘criteria’ and strive to live them out day by day by day. These are the ones Jesus calls wise.

Now, I have no doubt that many who have received the civil awards today have lived out many of these qualities. However, there are many people who will never be recognised because they discomfort us or their service is unobtrusive or their triumphs are inner – the triumph of survival over destruction, of sanity over insanity. We pray to see the world as God sees it – not as we have learned to see it. I think we will be in for a very big surprise when we see God face to face.

This brings me to Citizenship. Today we welcome people into full participation in the life of our country and they accept the rights and obligations that go with that. Culture is an ever changing thing and each new citizen will bring something new to Australian culture and in turn Australian society will change them. Our citizenship is one of God’s gifts to us. It is part of our identity and the shape of our place in humankind.

It interests (and irks) me that in the press we (Aussies) are regularly defined as ‘taxpayers’. In doing this, the economy has become the new criteria for defining people. The economy has been exalted to almost religious status and people are really only of importance when we contribute to the economy and are not a drain on the economy. Well the economy is important, but it is important in a context of what it means to be a citizen, of how we participate in our society, of what sort of a society we want to live in.

This brings me back to the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus tells us here what is asked of us as ‘Citizens of Heaven’. I don’t think it is really too different from the sort of society in which we would like to have citizenship. Forgiveness, compassion, generosity, honesty are probably good qualities for a society, however they don’t just happen. We make them happen. Each one of us.

The early Spanish explorers called this part of the globe ‘The Great South Land of the Holy Spirit’. As Australians we are a facet of God’s face in creation. So, today, let’s us celebrate, rejoice, repent and give thanks for Australia – our land and our people. Citizens.