Compassion - an essential ingredient for a better community. Ballarat Regional Multicultural Council and Ballarat Interfaith Network come together to host an important conversation

Picture above:

Sam Afra, Dr Jane Mummery (Watch Dr Mummery here), Sister Veronica Lawson, 

Margaret Lenan Ellis (Public Relations Officer, Ballarat Interfaith Network),

Sister Nivedita Chaitanya, Bishop Garry Weatherill, Father Constantine Osuchukwu,

Dr Sundrum Sivamalia, Ballarat Regional Multicultural Council.

Last Friday night, a successful interfaith public forum was held by the Ballarat Regional Multicultural Council and the Ballarat Interfaith Network around the topic of Compassion - an essential ingredient for a better community. The Museum of Australian Democracy at Eureka (M.A.D.E.) was the venue for the evening.  Here is a taste of what went on!

Table discussions ---- with food and friendliness.

Question time

Every war, every conflict between human beings has come about 

because of some argument about how things are described.

This craziness is totally unnecesary!

Just beyond the words that push us apart, a table waits. Hospitality. Companionship.

They wait for us to make ourselves comfortable.

What we praise is one!

It makes sense that the praise is also one!

So many jugs are emptied into an infinite basin.

So many religions. So much singing. Just one song!

The differences are merely illusion. Or maybe pride.

Sunlight itself looks slightly different on this wall rather than on that.

It may look quite different on a third. Yes, it’s just one light.

These clothes, these personalities: all borrowed from that same light.

When we praise with a full heart, we return light to Light. ------------- From Rumi

Video by Ian Hall