Reflections on the Victorian Bush Fires

You may be aware that the state of Victoria, in South East Australia, is experiencing its deadliest bushfire season on record. More than 200 lives have been lost and many communities have been left desolate. The following are comments I wrote to share with my colleagues during the daily staff briefing:

Events like the bush fires of what is now known as Black Saturday raise questions about the suffering of innocent people, and God's role in the same. While much of this must remain a mystery, we can say a few words by observing the life of our Lord Jesus Christ. In Christ, we observe a compassionate and humble God who, for our sake, would become a servant and endure a most painful and shameful death.

In Christ, God did not eliminate evil. To do so would imply an elimination of human freedom. Instead, Christ shared in our suffering and faced the final enemy of humanity - death. Far from death overcoming, Christ descended into death and broke its bonds. An ancient Christian writer said the following about death: “It received a body, and encountered God. It received earth, and confronted heaven.” After Christ's resurrection, death ceased to be terminal . It became akin to a bridge into eternal life with God.

As Christians, we cannot always provide satisfactory explanations of human suffering. We can, however, declare an all-loving God who suffered and died voluntarily. We can shout: “Christ is risen ... Truly He's risen.”
I pray that, in our current state of mourning, we may allow the Light of Christ's resurrection to reach us. Amen.

Liberals and Conservatives

Recently, I received a book by G. K. Chesterton. I have not read it yet, but I have looked up the author on Wikipedia and found the following citation:

"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected."

A speaker came to my school to speak to us about the purposes of Catholic education. She certainly spoke as though the world was divided into two camps, and she fell in the "liberal" one. A few things struck me about her presentation, none more than the fact that she was very doctrinal about her liberalism. I thought it interesting that she defended her views in a way that involved attacking those whom she considered "conservatives" or "fundamentalists". Her definition of "fundamentalists" was very broad and included every classical Christian.

The head of religious education called me and introduced me to the speaker. In a two minute conversation during which she asked me the most basic questions about my Church, she suggested I work to change it. Isn't that extraordinary? She has her vision of the world and everyone has to conform to it or earn her scorn. Is that not a form of fundamentalism?

I am trying to find the time and words to speak and write to the head of religious education to put across my point of view. The last thing I want is to carry a label. I just have some objections to what was said.

I am glad I wrote this. It was very therapeutic!

Elias.

Oh Lebanon, where is your glory?

"Is it not yet a very little while
Till Lebanon shall be turned into a fruitful field,
And the fruitful field be esteemed as a forest?" (Isaiah 29:17)

I pray that this "very little while" arrive soon. I mourn for those who died in the last few days and those who will continue to die. After 15 years of civil strife, we thought forget the past, time will heal everything. This is convenient, no one had to repent of any deeds, no one had to compensate for any injuries. Hey presto, everything would fix itself. If we can't learn from our own mistakes, maybe others in this world can learn from them. People don't just "move on". Saying "sorry" and telling the other "you count, you are human too" is so essential.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners.

Elias

Why I went on strike

Today, teachers in several Catholic schools across the state of Victoria walked off the job. My school was closed, except to a small number of students whose parents chose for them to undertake "supervised study". An equally small number of staff was available to do the supervision.

I agonised a lot about this decision. I am convinced that our salaries are a reflection of our standing in the community. Striking will not enhance that. On the other hand, I was looking at a meagre increase that would put my colleagues and me further down the scale of affluence. Here are a few facts to explain our cause:

• The average national wage is $57,700. You need to be in your eighth year of teaching before you are at the average. Never mind the fact that any teacher is more qualified and works harder than "average". I think we should surpass the average in our fourth year.
  
• One university dropped its ENTER score for the Bachelor of Education to 56. This is a very low score and is surely an indication that teaching is being seen as an option to fall into when other professional options are closed.
  
• The state government keeps talking about "productivity increases" during wage negotiations, yet imposes a greater workload on us in the middle of a three year agreement. How about recognising our increased workload with a just salary increase?
• A Victorian teacher earns less than a colleague in the two states that border Victoria. Some say we're the lowest paid of any state, but I haven't done any research to verify this claim. I know the claim to be true for New South Wales and South Australia.

The business council has identified attracting teachers as a top economic priority. They proposed a model under which a high-quality teacher (however this is measured) can earn up to $130,000. The Victorian government is trying to maintain a false economy where the education system runs on the good will of those employed in it.

Finally, I cannot close this entry without acknowledging our wonderful principal. She supported us and even wrote to the parents asking them to write to their local member of parliament protesting our level of pay. Long live the principal!

Elias.

The day we said "sorry"!

Today, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, said "sorry" to generations of indigenous Australians who were stolen from their families. As kids, they were removed by force from their parents and sent to institutions or white families so they could be "saved", "assimilated" and, some would say, so that the Aboriginal identity would be erased forever.

Some have opposed the apology on the following grounds:

• It is an admission of guilt by a generation that had nothing to do with it; and
  
• It does nothing practical to help ease the poverty and social disintegration of the Aborigines.

Yet, sorry is a powerful word and those in favour of uttering it won the debate. The parliament of Australia legislated for the removal of children from their families and it should say sorry, even if the mouthpiece is of a younger generation. The stolen generations have requested that they be apologised to and the least we can do is honour their wish.

Today is a historic day in the history of this country. Previously, I have resisted wearing symbols, draping myself in flags and all such demonstrations. Today, I wore a black, yellow and red bracelet at school and changed my facebook status to "sorry". My family was not in Australia and I wasn't even born when the injustice was committed. I want to be part of the future of Australia and I want my kids to grow up in a united country. Saying "sorry" is the beginning of the healing process.

I pray that practical steps do follow and that Aboriginal children grow up in health and dignity. Tonight I will sleep with this vision. "Tomorrow will worry about its own things" (Matthew 6:34).

Elias.

End of the holidays

Today is officially the last day of the summer holidays. Tomorrow is Australia Day, so Monday is a public holiday. Tuesday is back to school for us teachers and on Friday we take the year 7s through the routine of using their lockers. The locks work very intuitively - not at all!

I have had a great 6 weeks at home. I spent heaps of time with my two kids, did some work on my Master's thesis (about half of what I had planned, mind you) and managed to slot in just enough double bass practice to stay at the same level (not a very ambitious attitude, I know). I taught my little one to sleep in his cot again and that was quite a good thing.

Anyway, the new school year beckons. Many things to do in preparation but as they say in the movies "bring it on"!

My best wishes to teachers around Australia as they get back into the classroom. I hope you have all had a holiday with much to be grateful for. I know I had.

Elias.

Mathematics as the science of reasoning

Last year, a music teacher at my school photocopied an article and placed it in my pigeonhole. I picked up the article and saw the title "Maths minus reason = failure". I assumed it was an apology for everything being taught with its real life applications. Gladly, I was wrong. The article was written by Marty Ross who does much to popularise mathematics in Victoria. His partner in this is Burkyard Polster. You might think of the pair as the Myth Busters of Mathematics - geeky, intelligent and entertaining.

Back to the article. Ross states: "Clearly the purpose for teaching mathematics cannot be primarily to convey facts and formulas that are rarely used and almost immediately forgotten. The true purpose is to teach the reasoning by which these facts can be established."

Ross goes on to lament the way in which the Pathegorean theorem is taught in Victoria. It is a formula to be accepted and applied over and over. He states that "the fundamental reason to teach the Pythagorean Theorem is because of its central role in Euclidean geometry, that monumental body of work immortalised in Euclid's Elements." And here is what he says about the Elements:

The Elements is the most successful textbook of all time ... But its popularity was not because of some universal love of geometry ... . The real lesson was the process by which these geometric truths were obtained. The Elements is a brilliant, extended display of reasoning, beginning with a small number of accepted truths and proving all that follows.

Ross then presents a pictorial proof of the theorem and expresses his sadness at the fact that no emphasis is based on the beauty and simplicity of such mathematics. Instead, the curriculum documents present maths as a list of facts to be remembered and prescribe an ever increasing use of technology.

Ross then puts on his university lecturer's hat and says that, despite the fact that he teaches those students to need or choose to do maths at a university level, he finds that they "enter university viewing mathematics as no more than a collection of facts, upon which they have the most tenuous grasp. Albert Einstein said: 'Any fool can know. The point is to understand.'"

Reading Ross' description of Euclid's Elements is like reading a synopsis of my year 11 Geometry textbook. I was educated under an old-fashioned adaptation of the French system. We learned many theorems, always with their proofs. The test was always guaranteed to throw a new fact or a theorem at us with the simple question "demontrer que ..." or "show that ...".

I have often heard people say "how could maths be made different?" and each time I have thought "Oh, believe me, we could be teaching very different stuff."

Elias.