PAKENHAM Uniting Church, which is part of the Officer Mission Area, celebrated its present and past cultural heritage on Sunday 2 October.
The congregation in recent times has welcomed folk from South Sudan, Iran, Cambodia, Afghanistan Germany and Ethiopia. Longer-term members have come from Holland and the United Kingdom.
The community recognises heritage from those, and many other countries. The Uniting Church in Australia in 1985 declared itself to be a multicultural church, and Pakenham exemplifies that.
The Pakenham community is also multi-faith, and this is acknowledged in the mural on Main Street.
The guest speaker at the Church service was April Robinson, the Developer from the Victoria/Tasmania Synod (the state Uniting Church body) ‘Uniting through Faiths’ Interfaith Network.
April spoke of the fact that getting to know people of other faiths leads people to realise that, though there are different ideas of ‘God’, and ways of worship, the underlying fact is that all are the same. April organises activities that enable people of differing faiths to get to know and understand each other, doing away with fear of the unknown.
Earlier in the service that idea was demonstrated by Margaret McKay using bananas – many shades of colour, skin blemishes, and even shapes, but, inside, the essential banana is the same.
After the service, courtesy of some of the folk, an international morning tea was enjoyed in the church lounge, which was decorated with artefacts, posters and flags of many nations. It was a memorable morning.
