Webs of Interconnectedness

I was sitting in a room of unfamiliar faces, in an unfamiliar country. It was that first day of a conference - that day I dread when, for the first time, we all look around the room pretending not to judge and stereotype as we measure one another. In these moments of uncertainty people sought out the comfortable and the familiar as small groups formed around the room: Swahili speaking Africans, Indians, Filipinos, Francophone Africans, Indonesians, Sri Lankans, Eastern Europeans, Americans and the Aussie – all coming together in language groups, simultaneously forming bonds of friendship and barriers of protection.

But, as the conference got underway, and the theme began to unravel, the single purpose that brought this disparate group together in the middle of nowhere Kenya, began to break the barriers, expand the bonds and create a new web of interconnectedness that seemed unlikely but quickly became the comfortable and the normal.

As much as I find the first moments of an event like this uncomfortable, eventually I love being in a varied group of people like this, hearing new stories, understanding issues through a different worldview and learning once again that it is through this diversity and difference that I learn to be more. And at the end of the time I have made new friends, new connections and together we have begun to fulfil our expectations.

Vinoth Ramachandra writes; “The theological understanding of human personhood is that we image God in relationality. Just as God's being is dynamic relationality, so we are constituted as persons through webs of interconnectedness. We become the occasion for each other’s self-fulfilment. Those who love us make us what we become; we only learn love by being loved.”

People are designed to be in relationship, to explore and become enveloped by webs of dynamic interconnectedness. It is by being loved that I become more than I am and that I learn to love others. But that is often messy and sometimes painful, it takes effort and time, it takes intention and perseverance and it often leaves you vulnerable and open to criticism. But, after fighting with it for a long time, (and watching it modelled by someone I love), – I am nevertheless convinced that it remains the only way to be real, to be human, to be!

Mary Meets Mohammad

One of the most divisive and emotive debates in Australia is the "asylum seeker issue". As long as we are able to keep it as a theoretical debate, it is fed by xenophobia and protection. But, when the issue is informed by the meeting of people, by the sharing of story and the willingness to hear, then the issue is transformed from abstract to personal.

[What continues to disappoint me, (sadly, it no longer surprises me), is how our country's leaders are able to visit and see a land from which some asylum seekers are escaping and still fuel the debate with the language of protection and feed a fearful community with images of extremist, fundamentalist, terrorists. How do you ignore the individuals that, despite all the best efforts and intentions of our military personnel, still have a "well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality membership of a particular social group or political opinion... and is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country".*]

However, Mary Meets Mohammad is a documentary that tells the story of one such transformation from bitter uninformed distrust to abiding respect and love:

Tasmania’s first detention center opens and local knitting club member Mary, a staunchly Christian pensioner, is not welcoming of the 400 male asylum seekers mostly from Afghanistan.

Mohammad is a 26 year old Muslim asylum seeker detained inside the center. An unlikely friendship develops between Mary and Mohammad after her knitting club donates woolen beanies to the asylum seekers. Mary finds many of her prior beliefs are challenged as her relationship with Mohammad deepens.

Coming next week to the Keno Cinema (Melbourne), Chauvel Cinema (Sydney). Check out the Preview.

* The definition of a LEGAL asylum seeker from Article 1 of the Convention relating to the status of Refugees, as amended by the 1967 Protocol.