Up Front

with the Editor

A “talent for talking on several levels”, is what a Sydney religious commentator said about the Pope after listening to his addresses during last month’s visit to Sydney and “Oceania”. It was a pertinent comment.

I listened to the Pope, from close up, in Sydney, and I was impressed by this special ability of his. He uses the language of diplomacy. You could, if you wanted, believe he was merely mouthing platitudes; but if you cared to look further you might con vince yourself that he was, perhaps, saying something else.

As a result of seeing this extra ordinary diplomat at work on my own doorstep, I will not again pass over the Papal utterances from far off Rome, when I see them in my newspaper, as bleatings of no prac tical relevance to today’s world. I shall study them for other meanings.

I suspect that if I look hard enough I will find he is directing my atten tion to a specific ill, as well as to the general problem of mankind which is the theme of most of his statements.

The need for peace and unity in the world is always his wider theme.

In Sydney I believe he was pointing to a specific ill when he said at an open-air mass, “Do not close your limited circle of friends for the sake of a selfish satisfaction.”

It was a typical Papal statement. It could be taken as a platitude, not worthy of further attention; or it could be taken as an exhortation to us in our personal daily lives to re pair our friendships; or it could be read as an appeal to the Australian Government to relax the country’s immigration policy for Islanders.

Some people chose to read it as a comment on Australia’s immigration policy, and I am one of them. But the interesting fact is that none of us can be sure our interpretation is correct, for this is an example of the brilliance of Papal diplomacy in a complicated world where the head of a large slice of Christendom must say neither too little nor too much.

I interpret his comment as refer ring to immigration because immigra tion turned out almost to be the theme of the conference of Pacific Catholic

bishops, which took the opportunity to meet in Sydney during the Pope’s visit. The Pope kept abreast of what they said, and spent two hours with them at the conference the same day he made his statement.

As PIM reported last month—and there is something further in this issue—Bishop Rodgers of Tonga had something direct to say on this aspect, and he got much support from his fellow bishops. Basically, what they asked for was a quota of Islanders to be allowed into Australia —preferably Island families.

This is a question I’ve discussed before in this column, and my view is firm on the point. Australia should take in an annual quota of Pacific Islanders as migrants—not merely as students or temporary workers in need of training (and Australia is generous in this way). Furthermore, the world should be told the quota exists.

I could, however, find myself in

argument with some of the bishops on one aspect of this question. If of them believes—and I think som of them do—that Australia should allow in Islands migrants because the Islands need to solve their popu lation problems and syphon off sur plus workers, then I am not on their side.

It’s not Australia’s responsibility to solve other people’s population prob lems by creating some of her own.

Migration to Australia is an easy solution for the Islands. The alterna tive, doing something about keeping down your population and building up your economy, is harder.

In my view Australia can do two things to help herself and the Islands.

The first is allow in a quota of Islanders; the second is to do more than we are doing to build up Islands economies.

If in helping the Islands we have to share our trade, to give less than full protection to our own tropical products, then that’s just too bad for us. We’ll still manage very well.

As the Pope says, we can’t “close our limited circle of friends for the sake of a selfish satisfaction.”

Not that I can swear that he ex pects me to interpret his words that way, but if anybody has a better in terpretation, they’re welcome.

Stuart Inder