Pope Francis’ call for Church communities to provide a welcoming presence for migrants and refugees came to vibrant life at the SVD’s Marsfield community recently with the celebration of Multicultural Sunday.
The day began with Mass, followed by cultural performances by different ethnic groups. The celebration ended with a multicultural banquet under a clear blue sky.
Rector of the Marsfield Community, Fr Mikhael Loke says the day was timed to fit in with the worldwide celebration of Refugee and Migrant Sunday.
“It was a great day for us,” he says. “We had cultural groups come from our Macquarie Fields parish, as well as from our own Arnold Janssen Chapel community and it was wonderful to see so many people from different cultural backgrounds all coming together and learning from each other.
“And it was good for our SVD community too. All the confreres who live here came, and really got behind the day, which is important for its success.
“Days like this help to foster our identity as SVDs, because we are very multicultural. That is our charism, it’s almost our nature, the way we are.”
The cultural groups taking part in the Multicultural Sunday celebrations included the Chinese, Vietnamese, Indonesian, Slovak, Indian, Filipino and Samoan communities.
“Some of them came in national dress and they entertained us all with performance, dance and song,” Fr Mikhael says.
“We also invited them to bring food from their culture to share, and we had some wonderful food!”
Fr Mikhael says the liturgy for the day included the special readings for the 104th World Day of Migrants and Refugees, under the theme, ‘Welcoming, protecting, promoting, and integrating migrants and refugees’.
“This is a day that Pope Francis and the whole Church supports,” he says. “We’re not doing it simply because the SVD has the opportunity to do it, but because it is something the Church is doing worldwide and by reflecting on that, we’re looking at the whole picture.
“We’re saying there is a value in being together and welcoming other cultures. You could see it happening here on the day. People mingle, get to know one another and straight away they start to think differently about each other.”