Reconciliation is a journey on which we should all travel as friends, according to Priscilla Orchid-Wightman, a Yulaaray-Gameroi woman from Lismore in northern New South Wales.
Despite suffering the trauma of being removed permanently from her parents by the authorities at the age of two, Ms Orchid-Wightman said that she has forgiven those responsible, “because you have to forgive to grow”.
“But I never forget the struggle we have gone through,” she said.
Ms Orchid-Wightman never saw her parents again following her removal. By the time she traced her family as an adult, they had already passed away.
Ms Orchid-Wightman said that after the apology of the Federal Parliament to the Stolen Generations in February, she felt a weight had been lifted from her.
“For me it meant a beginning, a first step,” she said of the apology, which she witnessed from the public gallery of Parliament House.
“I felt the presence of my parents and the generations before, and I went away feeling a lot lighter,” she said.
Service for reconciliation
Ms Orchid-Wightman was speaking at a reception prior to the annual service for reconciliation at Sydney’s Baha’i House of Worship on 2 June, 2008.
Her son Richard, 13, read the initial prayer in the service. The service program included readings from the Scriptures of the world’s major religions.
Ms Orchid-Wightman’s brother, Jeffrey Samuels, artist and co-founder of Boomalli Aboriginal Artists Co-operative in Leichhardt, also accompanied her and spoke about the traumatic history of Aboriginal Australians.
Personal relationships
The reception also included a presentation by Judith Light, who has been coordinator of Lismore People for Reconciliation for the past 10 years.
“The reconciliation struggle comes down to our one-on-one personal relationships,” Ms Light said.
“It’s about standing with our brothers and sisters and validating the truth,” she said.
“Truth has to come out, and there can be no healing until that happens.”
Quoting from the Baha’i Writings, Ms Light said she believes all people are “leaves of one tree, flowers in one garden, and drops in one ocean.”
“Racism raises its head the moment we talk about ‘they’ and create an other,” said Ms Light, who is a Baha’i.
“Reconciliation is not something that will happen through an institutional arrangement. The core of reconciliation is friendship and love,” she said.
Following the service, Budjedi elder Uncle Max Eulo performed a traditional smoke ceremony as a blessing for the Temple grounds.