Faith & Spirituality in Review
Shane Howard, Lyrics, One Day Hill, 2010, illustrated, 212 pp, rrp $35.00.
Methodists used to speak of the real presence of Christ in the hymn book. They meant that in singing they found themselves sustained and uplifted in their faith. Catholics don't sing so well, but most of us find ourselves spiritually nourished by songs.
In this respect Shane Howard's book of poems and songs is a delight to read. It is beautifully produced, and accompanies the lyrics with evocative paintings by Theresa O'Brien and Shane himself. The songs are colloquial and their topics not religious, but their depth of feeling and grasp of imagery and rhythm engage the reader even without their musical setting.
The lyrics record Shane Howard's preoccupations over almost thirty years. He came to public notice in the 1980s through his band, Goanna. He has continued to pursue his music and his commitment to the truth of Australia and its histories, living with indigenous communities and visiting his ancestral Ireland and deriving the inspiration for his music from the places and people with whom his life in intertwined.
The themes of the lyrics are familiar in folk song - love, struggle, freedom, the beauty found in unexpected people and places, love of familiar land and the pain of absence. The point of interest is the singer's individual perspective on these themes. Here, the focus is on constancy. Constancy is a particular kind of faithful and enduring love that must necessarily face and conquer all the intractable forces in yourself, in circumstances and in others that make you give up. Shane Howard's commitment to justice and his companionship with indigenous Australians has taken him into hard places. His songs form a dialogue in which constancy is sought, feared, loved and finally embodied.
In some of his early songs the invitation to constancy involves naked courage in the face of brutal force:
But when they're coming with daggers in their eyes
Don't take that nowhere ride
Stand yr' ground.
Other songs celebrate the inevitable and hard struggle to keep going despite our own failures, disappointments and brokenness:
So get out of your head and face the day
No-one's goin' to take the pain away
Got to find the strength within, to get up and start again
Now you know you're not the only one.
Above all, though, constancy is the flowering of love. Most of these lyrics could be described as love songs, even when they focus on the land, on values or on people overwhelmed by the misery of their lives. Although they tap deeply into the darkness of being human, the songs are sweet and wistful in the hope that animates them.
The bird of paradise just won't land
On the greedy, grasping hand
Surely love is the sweeter thing
It can heal the wounded heart and the broken wing
Love will always find a way.
Shane Howard comes from a part of Western Victoria which was settled by Irish immigrants. Their symbols run through his songs. He was also involved in the struggle of the local people to prevent St Brigid's church at Crossley being alienated. When the Catholic parish remained determined to sell it, locals raised enough money to buy it as a community centre. The final poem in this collection celebrates the spirit of the early Catholic community that built the church.
So devoted so devout
They had so little but went without
To build that church up on the hill.
Shane Howard's feeling for the church and his commitment to the campaign to save it embody the world represented in this collection of his songs. His appreciation of the constancy of purpose of earlier generations, his recognition that their constancy makes a claim on their decendants to respond in kind, and the image of the church on the hill that represent both the hoped for end of the uphill struggle and the inspiration to continue the journey, frame a generous and courageous vision.
This book is beautiful to read and look at. The albums are great to listen to.
Doing Justice: Reflections from Thirty Years of Jesuit Social Services 1977-2007, Josephine Dunin, Jesuit Social Services, 2010. Available from JSS, PO Box 271, Richmond 31212, tel 03 9427 7388.
Anniversary publications often say much about organisations than those who commission them intend. They spell out what matters to the organisation. Sometimes what matters is success. The history will be handsomely produced and bound, with annals of the great and good, and the history of the enterprise's inevitable rise to esteem and power. Doing Justice fails by such standards. It is short and simple, has pages that fold out and a half-size section bound in. It is illustrated by photographs of the people whom the programmes serve, with few pictures of flash buildings or people in suits.
The artless but attractive presentation echoes the tendency of human beings to expand beyond the neat categories within which we place them. In Doing Justice, it is clearly people who matter. The book begins with the story of George, who came from gaol in 1977 to stay at the newly founded Four Flats. The house offered accommodation to young men after their release from prison.
Only after George has told his story does the book turn to the conditions that led young men to be sent to gaol and to the effects of gaol on their spirit. And then finally does it record the reflections of those working in this work from which Jesuit Social Services was born. They include Peter Norden, the founder and guiding spirit of Jesuit Social Services for much of its history. The humanity of George and of so many people like him is the centre of the book and of the organisation. Other things flow from this humanity.
The order of the book is shaped by the needs, and more important, by the gifts of people whom Jesuit Social Services meets. The different branches of JSS nurture such activities as gardening, painting and camping that allow young people to recognise unformed desires and to discover unrecognised gifts.
Any sustained commitment to the human value of people who are not valued by society is bound to be full of struggle. The burdens of confronting daily the effects on young people of government policies and administrative procedures that place efficiency and uninformed public opinion above humanity are only hinted at in the book. So is the strength needed to press for better ways of doing things. The heart of Doing Justice is the story of young people who want to live more fully but lack the necessary encouragement. Many have clearly found encouragement from the generous and modest people who accompany them and plead their cause.
