Call of the Bell Bird by Jennifer Kavanagh

Author:Jennifer Kavanagh
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Jennifer Kavanagh
Published: 2015-10-19T04:00:00+00:00

In Australia our time was thoroughly organised by local Friends, who had emailed us in South America: “Would you be free to give talk on Friday 13th at 5.30?” Three months ahead we had no idea where we were likely to be. We were on another continent in a metaphorical as well as a literal sense. But once there we were enfolded in Quakerdom, and we felt at home. In Sydney, in any case a lovely city, we were rescued from a rather unfriendly Quaker guest house by the kindness of the former clerk, Cathy, and her English husband Barry. Canberra, denigrated by all we met, was lit up by the graciousness of Katherine who had stayed with us briefly in England and her lovely husband, Glynne, who sadly died a few days after our departure. In Melbourne we were looked after by James who had never met us before but was prepared to host us for a whole week. He worked for a community organisation that helped problem families, and asked if I would talk about microcredit at their AGM, which I did, not expecting an audience of a hundred or so. After our return they emailed me about the design of a feasibility study and in January 2003 started a pilot project with Iraqi refugees.

Stephen and I gave our usual talk in several places, and also talked about our travels at Victoria regional summer camp. Stephen, speaking from his heart about his spiritual doubts, found the audience much in sympathy. Frances, a friend of one of the members of our own Meeting, and who had visited Westminster in the past, generously took us out in her car for a day and a picnic in the Dandenong hills. It was there that I discovered that wild birds do not have to be afraid of human beings. Never having been shot at or pursued, they came to us, perched near us, obviously unafraid. It was such a startling revelation that I felt out of time – as if I had been given a flash of the eternal, a glimpse of what might have been possible in a pre-Lapsarian world. It was a realisation that was to be underscored later, in other landscapes.

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