Aboriginal Sunday

Respecting and honouring the First Nations people of the land on which BUC stands, particularly the local Wurundjeri – Woiworong Tribe, the Worship Service on Sunday 31st January is intended as a Day of Mourning.  This is an expression of the Brunswick congregation and Uniting Church’s commitment to justice and truth-telling, honouring 26th January respectfully as the closest Sunday after that date.  We will mark in lament the truth of our shared history and we will  lift up to God our prayers for First Peoples and our nation.

It’s intent is in the spirit of our Walking Together as First (Aboriginal) and Second Peoples (non-indigenous peoples). We will listen to First People’s voices, reflect on the effects of invasion and colonization on Australia’s First Peoples, the tragic history of our nation and the violent dispossession of its First Peoples, and lament that as a Church and as Second Peoples we were and remain complicit.  We will acknowledge & affirm First Peoples as the sovereign peoples of this land.  Our declaration of a Day of Mourning allows us to stand together in remembering the truth of our history, and honouring the culture of Australia’s First Peoples, their families and the next generations. It will be an important part of our Covenant relationship in the Uniting Church and our journey toward justice, healing and a new relationship as First and Second Peoples.

The resources in the  service are taken from UCA Assembly and Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian Congress (UAICC) Day of Mourning resource and the Common Grace movement, through which individual congregations are encouraged to hold an Aboriginal Sunday service  around 26th January as a response to Aboriginal Christian Leader William Cooper’s original call to the Australian churches from 1938 to 1941.

This year, though Aboriginal Sunday is 24th January 2021, our service at BUC will be on 31st January, acting in solidarity with First Peoples. It will be led by Ian, Dave and members of the BUC Walking Together group.

Jenne Perlstein Facilitator BUC Walking Together Group