I try not to let this FB page get too political, but this is a story that is close to my heart, so naturally I think its important to share it! The man in the picture is an Iranian refugee. With his wife and two children he is currently living in community detention in St Albans. Community detention means he has no visa, no status, and is therefore not allowed to work. He receives a small weekly allowance from the government (for which he is incredibly grateful), but he would much rather do something constructive and pay his own way. He and his family are receiving some care and attention from the Xavier Social Justice Network, which I think is basically a group of parents of kids at Xavier college in Kew. One of those Xavier mums is a client here at JTV, and she asked if I could help them out. They noticed that the whole family was struggling a bit, and seemed quite depressed - especially the dad. Since he had had many dogs in his previous life in Iran, the Xavier mums thought that a dog might be just the thing for this family. So they called in some favours, and found an ethically bred cavoodle cross from a friend of a friend in Bendigo. My part in all of this was simply to check out the little dog, and do the vaccination and everything that goes with it. While they were here we found a few extra things to give them. The bed was given to us recently by someone who no longer needs it- so that seemed like an obvious choice. And I could have written an ordinary old vaccination card, I suppose. But I thought it would be nice if at least one member of this family could have a passport. Heres what I learned from the experience: 1. Dogs help to make people happy. I know that there are people out there without dogs - but I dont understand it. 2. Whatever terrible things some of their priests might get up to, 99% of catholics seem to be good people, and there is a strong culture of social justice that permeates the catholic (and the lapsed-catholic) community. 3. I really believe that most of us here in Australia are kind, generous and welcoming people, and most of us, given the choice, would treat the refugees that arrive here in a much kinder and more gentle way than our elected governments do.
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 02:12:30 +0000
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