Month: January 2023

I abbreviated my third and final trip to Canberra to one day of activities, to maximise my time with Jon, Angela and Evie who were by then quite settled into their townhouse apartment and lifestyle. However there weren’t any trains running that weekend, which meant I spent an extra night in the Hurstville church’s guest house, Baringa, which I have known since the original owner’s widow lived there when I was a young child. Before Angela’s sister Carolyn gave me a lift to Baringa, she and their parents Owen and Margaret Heldon came over for a farewell lunch and visit in a nearby playground.

Before returning to Woonona, where Jon and Angela now live with a view of the beach from their apartment, I farewelled the ever hospitable Murray and Lori Heldon over breakfast at their lovely home. With all these farewell meals, it was beginning to sink in that I was really going to be leaving, and Jon’s family wouldn’t be coming with me. But my path in 2022/2023 ended with us filling our final two days with a few adventures! First, south to North Woolongong, where Jon has joined an early morning breathwork group. We visited the two lighthouses, from 1870s and 1930s, saw the rockpool area where Jon’s group meets, looked at the boats in the historic Woolongong Harbour, and of course played in a park (AKA playground) on the lovely esplanade along the beach.

For my last day, we headed north for breakfast at Sydneys’ first communal motorbike workshop and restaurant combo for city dwellers. Angela’s cousin-in-law is one of the owners of The Rising Sun Workshop, where the ramen menu is outstanding. From there we took one of the famous Sydney Harbour ferries, to the Taronga Park Zoo wharf. Evie was enthralled by her first ever ferry ride on the dazzling Sydney Harbour. We somehow walked past the world-renowned zoo, and instead took the Bradleys Head Walk. Growing up, my family had come several times to Bradleys Head on Sydney Harbour for swimming and picnics, and I’d just been there for New Years Eve. Very different to be there again without the crowds, and in daylight! We swam at gentle Athol Beach, marvelled at the views of the harbour and the wildlife around us, and then swam and climbed on the rocks at Bradleys Head. Then off to the historic “Rocks” district of Sydney for an early dinner (we debated linner? dunch?), and then home in time for me to pack for my long flights to the USA the next day.

The adventure got real when I left Adelaide and headed off to Victoria on a road trip in a hire car! I accepted my GPS’s offer of the fastest route to Majorca, a small town in the middle of the state, where I was to spend the evening and next morning with my friends Barry and Edith Rabone. In infamous GPS tradition, it took me through the back roads for many hours, including a long stretch on a narrow track just wide enough for the wheels of my car. When oncoming traffic approached, which happened occasionally, we both had to go almost off-road into the red soil to pass each other. Luckily I had enough fuel to just make it to a country town to fill up the tank! Once I made it to the Rabones’ place, we had a great time catching up and discussing some developments in our faith community and my ministry. The next day Edith and I took their vintage 1968 (?) Mini Minor to a nearby town to meet Suzanne for brunch and more joyful post-pandemic catching up.

The drive up to Harrietville in the Victorian Alps/High Country was stunning, with alpine forests, mountain roads, European cafes and shops along the way, and ski slopes waiting for winter snow. In recent years, I’ve tried to go somewhere I’ve never been before in Australia as I follow my ministry and travel path. Growing up in Australia, I’d somehow never heard of the Victorian Alps. That’s where Lynelle, my school friend whom I hadn’t seen since 1974, and her retired minister husband are raising her granddaughter, who is delightful. While I was there we swam in a cold mountain stream near their house, and took a night walk around the town, where I found out about Bush Kindy (similar to Forest School in the US,) heard a local indigenous man playing didgeridoo accompanied by guitar and drums outside a pub, and learned about the mid 1800s gold rush origins of the town. Sleeping in the cool mountain air after a hot day was incredibly refreshing. The next day we bought breakfast from a Swiss-owned cafe, and took it to a beautiful lake, formerly a site for dredging gold. Locals gather for picnics, fishing, swimming and hiking. We had to stop as we drove back for a herd of kangaroo who wanted to cross the road right in front of us. I’d been lamenting I hadn’t seen any Aussie wildlife so far this trip, but my luck was changing!

More than an hour later, I made it to the Lookout, which was worth it in the end. Mt Kosciusko is the highest mountain in Australia, though actually dwarfed by the highest mountains in other countries. An hour-ish later, when I had almost finished my descent, my GPS announced the road was closed ahead and it was time to make a U-turn and drive back over the mountains! Considering all the recent rain and flooding, it seemed plausible. However, I firmly informed my GPS that I was definitely not going back over the Great Alpine Road! I continued on, and found that the closure was just roadwork that had closed off one lane.

During my time in Melbourne, I was able to have an afternoon BBQ with my rellies, meet up with some Swedenborgian/New Church friends, go to the opening evening session at the Australian Open AKA “go the tennis” as the locals say (another bucket list item!) and attend a church service at the new premises of the Swedenborg Community Victoria (formerly the Melbourne New Church.) The church building was sold in 2018 and after a short nomadic period, the community has bought a commercial unit with very adaptable spaces for their purposes: a good model I believe for congregations for whom a church building is no longer suitable.

Although my road trip through Victoria was mostly about travel and catching up with friends, I did have two wonderful conversations with colleagues in ministry. Rev. David Moffat is the Spiritual Leader for the Swedenborg Community Victoria, as well as the President of the New Church in Australia – an association of all the church communities. We talked about diminishing congregation sizes around Australia and the world, and placed that within the context of Swedenborg’s vision of “old” church-based practices being replaced by “new” spiritual practices and ways to relate to the Divine. In that context, David and I are both trying out new ways to reach people online: he’s developing the Swedenborg Community Victoria and I’m working with “Deborah’s Tree.” Right before I left Victoria to fly back to Sydney, I went for a short bushwalk with Rev. Martin Pennington and then talked over coffee. We shared our thinking and viewpoints on some aspects of Swedenborgian theology, but weren’t able to resolve all the questions and debates in our faith community! He also encouraged me to continue to offer support to a woman in Pennsylvania who was recently ordained online into a non-traditional ministry (hospital chaplaincy) in the NCIA, as I’m the closest thing to a NCIA ministry colleague for her. During our walk, Martin and I saw an echidna, an ant-eating mammal, which neither of us had ever seen in the wild. I also got to finally see and hear my favourite Aussie bird, the Kookaburra. During my path in 2022/2023 I had heard them cackling in many places, but hadn’t seen one. I felt complete in terms of connecting with Australia’s wonderful animals in the bush: kangaroo, echidna, and kookaburras.

Welcome back to “Walking the Path with Ros”! In 2020, as the global pandemic was starting to rear its head in China, I was in Australia for 2 months and got back to the USA a week before borders were closed to international travel. In this post I’m summarising that part of my ministry and travel path, as I didn’t manage to do so as it unfolded! I had been (finally) ordained as a minister in the Swedenborgian Church of North America on 1 July 2019, in Valparaiso, Indiana, during the annual Convention of the denomination. Many family members were able to be present, which was an incredible blessing. In Australia in 2020, I was a visiting minister from the SCNA, fully recognised as clergy even though women’s ordination in the New Church in Australia is limited to non-traditional ministry.

The next stop was the annual New Church Family Retreat, which has only been held virtually since then because of Covid. This time it was held in Adelaide, South Australia at the Nunayara Conference Centre. I gave a very participatory workshop about “Spiritual First Aid,” held a children’s session in which they wrote and illustrated a psalm in Biblical style, and narrated a play reading of “The Great Change” by Walter Horner. My parents had given me a copy of the play many years before, written by their dear clergy friend, which had never been performed. Two of his descendants were in the audience and one was in the cast. Rev. Jane Siebert, the President of the SCNA, who had ordained me, attended the Retreat – the first time I know of that a SCNA minister had attended.

The final stops on the path for 2020 were Sydney and Canberra. There are two Swedenborgian/New Church congregations in Sydney, one on the “south shore” of Sydney Harbour, and one on the “north shore,” though neither are actually anywhere near the waters of the harbour. In Hurstville I gave a presentation/class, and in Roseville I helped out in the Swedenborg Centre.

The ministers in those congregations sometimes visit the Swedenborgian/New Church group in Canberra, 3 hours drive southwest of Sydney, which does not have a minister. One weekend I drove down to minister to the group, and visit relatives. Michelle (in the photos) had been feeding and offering water to kangaroos who had been displaced by the bushfires nearby.

As my path in 2020 came to an end, with my joy tank filled, I returned to the United States, just in time to hunker down as the Coronavirus pandemic began.