wfn.org | Australian Lutherans urged to review history on Aboriginal issues

[FRANK_IMHOFF.parti@ecunet.org (FRANK IMHOFF)]

Acknowledgment of past wrongs necessary for healing

ADELAIDE, Australia, Feb. 19, 1998 (lwi) - Australian Lutherans are being
urged to take another look at Aboriginal history. "Can we be proud of our
past?" is the challenge raised in the first of a series of articles on
Aboriginal issues and the church published in the Lutheran Church of
Australia (LCA) national magazine, The Lutheran.

Acknowledging past wrongs and coming to terms with them is necessary for
their painful effects to be overcome and healing to take place, says the
Rev. John Pfitzner, member of a special LCA task force set up to deal with
Aboriginal issues. "We now have carefully documented evidence of much in
our past that is shameful. We now know, for example, that Aboriginal people
were not only dispossessed of their land without benefit of treaty,
agreement or compensation, but that this dispossession was carried out
often with great brutality and ruthlessness," he writes.

As Christians we should never be afraid to face the past fairly and
squarely, Pfitzner says. We will find failure and wrong-doing which will
require repentance and forgiveness, but we will also find plenty of
evidence of God's goodness and blessing which will lead to thankfulness and
celebration.

The situation of the Aboriginals was already on the agenda of the LCA
general synod meeting at the end of September last year when it was agreed,
among other things, to provide more information to congregations and
schools on issues of racism.

Pfitzner, currently publications editor of Openbook Publishers in Adelaide,
spent many years as pastor to the Aboriginal people in Hermannsburg in the
Northern Territory.

The LCA has over 6,000 members of indigenous origin.

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Lutheran World Information
Editorial Assistant: Janet Bond-Nash
E-mail: jbn@wcc-coe.org
http://www.lutheranworld.org/