Andrew Hamilton February 13, 2008 ApologyToday we have an apology. The Government has consulted about its contents, hoping that both sides of politics will support it and that indigenous people will accept it. The consultation and the concern to find a generally acceptable form of words have been proper. Any apology made by a government, on behalf of a nation which did not own it, to its indigenous people who were insulted by it, would be destructive. Whether the apology could have been bolder will be much discussed. Some Australians still believe that apologies by national governments, particularly for actions of previous generations, are incoherent and unreasonable. They argue that responsibility can be attributed only to individuals for actions in which they have been involved. So only individuals can apologise. Most Christian groups have argued strongly that the government should apologise. It sits easily with stories told in their tradition about the shared responsibilities of peoples for their history and for its consequences. The prophets did not simply sheet home the abuses of tyranny, of extortion, of manipulation to the officials responsible. They imputed them to the whole people, who would also suffer the consequences. Similarly, virtuous behaviour in public life would be rewarded with national prosperity. In the Gospels, too, Jesus preaches the Kingdom of God to the whole people, and demands its conversion. His followers saw the beginnings of the promised Kingdom in his rising from the dead. They also recognised in the faith of those who accepted Christ the seeds of a world made new. They focused first on what God had done for all human beings, and only then on the individuals whom God loved. So in the Christian tradition apologies and acknowledgement of sin were always in order, whether made by individuals, by churches, by nations or by the human race. Because nations carried their history and were shaped by it, the passage of time never removed the need for an apology. Where scars remained from ancient injustices, and where one part of a nation still benefited from what its forebears had done while another suffered from it, apologies needed to be made. Nor did individual apologies satisfy for the symbolic need for the nation to apologise through its rulers. Apologies, of course, are symbols. They do not of themselves mend the harm caused by wrongful actions. But in the Christian tradition of reconciliation, apologies must have certain qualities if they are to be good symbols. They must be honest. This implies that they name accurately what has been badly done, focusing on the experience of those who have been harmed by it. An abstract account that slides over the human reality of oppression and despoliation lacks in honesty. Apologies must also include a desire for restoration. This implies that those who apologise wish to remedy the disadvantage of those hurt by the original wrongdoing. Although they might do this by financial compensation to particular groups, the desire implies a larger commitment to the whole community affected. Those who make the apology are invited to imagine differently the welfare of the whole community. They will give a different priority to the needs of those affected by past wrongs. From this perspective financial implications are not central to the apology, although the willingness to bear financial consequences might offer a scratch test of honesty. The heart of an apology lies in the commitment to a new pattern of relationships based on respect between different groups and on respect for the reality of their shared history. No apology by itself will forge this respect and commitment. It is a symbolic gesture that can create space for new possibilities. Among those possibilities of new forms of respect we might hope that, in future relationships between the descendents of the overseas settlers and the original inhabitants, the latter will be consulted before actions are taken on their behalf. We might hope that they and their communities are seen as agents of change and not simply as its objects. Andrew HamiltonAndrew Hamilton is the consulting editor for Eureka Street. He also teaches at the United Faculty of Theology in Melbourne.
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