Art & Music

There were only two windows of opportunity for me to meet and get to know Kwementyay Haines, who passed away earlier in 2024. I’d like now to tell the story of our small interaction with him, as he performed final checks of two Gospels in Anmatyerr, John’s Gospel in 2010 and Luke’s Gospel in 2018…. Read more

In October a group of women gathered in the Alice Springs Lutheran Church for a one-day Bible course. The course, the first in a series on ‘God’s Big Story’, covered creation and the fall of humanity and its consequences. Importantly, we learnt how the results of human rebellion and mistrust of God have been reversed… Read more

After sitting through eight one and-a-quarter-hour teaching sessions at a Bush Bible Course, the brain seeks a bit of rest and rejuvenation. However, at the recent Bush Course at M’Bunghara, linguist David ‘Stricko’ Strickland was talking with some Anmatyerr language-speaking young men. They decided to use their spare time to translate the lunchtime hymn, ‘Spread… Read more

The cover of this cherished book is adorned with a design painted by talented local artist Clarabelle Swift in 2016. Her work has truly captured the essence of our church, and we extend our heartfelt thanks to Clarabelle for this beautiful cover. At Bethlehem Lutheran Church in Hermannsburg we take great pride in our ‘visitors’… Read more

Recently we held two ethno-arts workshops, the first in Alice Springs at the Baptist Church and the latter at Ti Tree. These were held at the initiative of my wife Ming Fang, who had done fundraising for this purpose. Her vision was to encourage Indigenous folk to try their hand at painting stories from the… Read more

Just as early German missionaries travelled north from Bethany to Ntaria, so the Ntaria Choir set off, this time, southward-bound to the Barossa Valley to share their gifts of music and language.

With the Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP) document in hand and copies of the RAP poster, Marilyn Wall returned to Central Australia in October. The purpose of her visit was to discuss how best to share this information with the Aboriginal members in the Lutheran communities.

Art conservator Eric Archer is working on a project to unframe, photograph, document and prepare 18 watercolour paintings for new museum-standard mounts and frames.

Pastor Rodney and I visited for Pepa (devotions) only late yesterday, but the lady asked, ‘Can you come again tomorrow afternoon?’

On 5 April, Pantjiti Unkari McKenzie from Docker River was presented with the Order of Australia Medal (OAM) by the Administrator of the Northern Territory, Her Honour the Honourable Vicki O’Halloran AM.