Kia ora
It’s that time again! In three weeks the wheels of the bus will go round and round until we get to Castle Hill Village. It only takes half an hour to secure the van for the journey south; modern migration can be a swift and telling event.
When 15,000 people, families with babies in their arms, toddlers by the hand and old folk who are so tired they can barely stand, cross an international border every day, it asks much of the world. This is the greatest mass migration in history; a desperate flight from a terror so deep whole families simply abandon their homes and leave with a change of clothes. How do we respond to what we see?

Compassion is a difficult word to define. Love is a family with many children… kindness, affection, sympathy, empathy, attraction, passion, grace, charity, adoration and mercy to share a few… all expressed in many magical forms, and of all of them the one I left out… compassion… is the hardest to walk.
When I think of compassion I see a surgeon cutting deep to remove the tumour that threatens a life. Truth is sometimes called to move like a healing blade.

Having written nothing for twelve months I began again a few weeks ago, returning to actually writing some history, the thing I was trained to do. But I came to it from a different perspective. The Waitaha Elders had opened for me an exciting world of healing, the healing of the past. While we can’t change the past… because it just is… we can heal it.

However, there is a condition… to heal the past we have to face the truth of the past… be like the surgeon and cut deep to reveal the tumour within the body of the past. And if the blade of truth is the way in, the power of forgiveness brings all to that place where love shines bright.

Germany’s response in opening its borders to offer sanctuary to the dispossessed is a moment of truth for the nation, a wonderful act of redemption, which carries its people forward to a brighter future.

We all have a history and may carry wounds that need healing. What serves for a nation, serves equally well for you and me. It’s the wound unattended that needs to be offered compassion.
Nurture yourself and be free!

Time to sign off with a few words from Song of the Circle.

Love knows no master but love.
Love knows no fear, feels no shame
And holds no secrets.
Love has no rivals,
It does not compete.
Love walks without importance,
It only wishes to serve.
Love nurtures, seeks no recognition,
It steps beyond self.
Love does not stand in judgment,
It offers forgiveness.
Love seeks not to preach but to be,
Love lets go.

Have a wonderful Christmas with family and friends, have a great holiday in the Sun and take the time to gaze at the Moon and the Stars beyond.

Arohanui
Barry and Cushla.