Reimagining God

Peter Maher*
August 2003

What theology do we hold? Do we follow a monolithic God who sides with the powerful or one that is discovered and experienced in human struggle?

Kowanyama people live on the Western Cape York Peninsula of far north Queensland. In their language Kowanyama means “much water”. They have survived the European contact which began in 1623, when the Dutch, under Jan Cartenz in the ships Pera and Arnhem sailed down the west coast of Cape York.

As their young ATSIC Regional Councillor Tania Major explained to the Prime Minister during his recent visit, “In less than 60 years the people of my tribe have gone from being an independent nation to cultural prisoners to welfare recipients.” (SMH, August 6 2003). She went on to point out that from her school class of 15 people, she is the only one to go to university, the only girl not pregnant by 15, only three are not alcoholics and, of the boys, seven have been incarcerated, mostly for violent crimes. Education and health are serious problems. She asked the Prime Minister to enter into partnership in changing this situation.

This event invites non-Indigenous Australians to consider what “theology” we hold. Do we follow a god who sides with the dominant white culture, just like the god who goes to war with “our troops” for example. God is on our side confirming the image of a god who is white, western and male. This same theological stance allows us, with John Howard, to “look in” on Kowanyama people; affirm the efforts at reducing alcoholism; affirm those like us – Tania Major and Noel Pearson; leave and do nothing.

Is there another god that we might find in a theological construction of a different kind. If our god is constructed on dominant white western culture, he will be the hero who saves us from our enemies – social, psychological and political. He will be the stabilising factor in a curiously uncertain world. What if we constructed a god based in Indigenous cultural experience? Maria-Cristina Ventura in Theological Deconstruction and Reconstruction in the fight against Racism (Echoes, 17/2000 World Council of Churches, p23) says “In the experience of many Black people the ... image of God is different for each person ... from within a person.” God cannot be hegemonic or used to support a particular view, but rather is discovered in the experiences of life. “So we can talk about God as a woman, as Black, Indigenous, a lamb, a hen, love, friend, wind, anger ... God has as many names as we have hopes and longings”.

This view is more akin to the God of the Judeo-Christian tradition. All the images above can be found attributed to God in the scriptures. This God is not the God of power, privilege and prestige who reinforces a particular cultural world; merely approving or disapproving of the human struggle from his certain throne. This God is the one who emerges in the life struggle of forming identity. Ventura (ibid. p.23) points out that Black identity is not only what others say to them in predefined terms especially when these terms are controlled by the dominant power structure. Black identity is formed in relationships as brothers and sisters.

So while the Judeo-Christian tradition has been co-opted to conspire with static, white western dominant power; it can be reconstructed as fraternal engagement with the human struggle in the forming of identity as liberated, valued and multifaceted. This is the God of the scriptures and Christian tradition that is not culturally bound and cannot be pigeonholed. God is found in the sacred landscape of people’s lives and cultural heritage.

Tania Major’s hope that non-Indigenous people might listen and act in partnership with the efforts of Kowanyama people through social, cultural and political will, can be directly related to the aspirations of the Christian God. The co-opting of a static (judging) god who chooses to bring Indigenous people under our gaze for our satisfaction bears no relationship to the Christ of Christianity. The gospel speaks of an itinerant compassionate listener who empowered the alienated by affirming the sacred within. He redefines the political spaces for constructing identity, valuing local symbolisation, stories and memories that fire the transformation of traditional structures of oppression that have left Indigenous people invisible and left out.

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