I went to a Reconciliation Week event in my area, on Friday night and at the end of the event - the Aboriginal performer said "we will see you again next year."

I then thought - will we ever see reconciliation - and how long will this week go for? Year by year, twenty years, fifty, one hundred, one thousand?

We still have the Aboriginal Tent Embassy from 1972 - and I question if many will move on from the past and recognise that no one human truly owns Australia at all.

Many people still see Australia Day (for example) as "Invasion Day".

How do we get people in general out of this mindset or is reconciliation simply something impossible to achieve in real terms?

I think we need to rethink the whole problem again maybe take a broader outlook
Australia is now portrait as a Multi-cultural society
But we still hang on christian beliefs Christmas/Easter etc
Maybe we should encourage a Full multicultural week for example encourage people to portray there cultural heritage food clothing etc in this one week each year and really celebrate it
Change Australia day to be ALL Australians day.
Change Christmas to xmas as a time for gift giving and celebrating the family (as most people look at it now anyway)
Easter as EGG day to have fun and let kids enjoy themselves
Simple fact is we are no longer a straight out Christian country So lets get with the Modern times
As a straight out reconciliation day I think this is the wrong way to go, It is terrible shameful what was done to aboriginal People in our past and also currently, But as a Multi cultural Country one group Can not have " Special rights" Fair and even for everyone is the only way to go.

Probably not. The concept is political nonsense, anyway. Their is nothing to reconcile in the 21st century.

Dear Aussieboy,

Christianity was the religion of the invaders. They have imposed it to a great degree on the Aboriginal people. One Australian Bible basher told me, "Aboriginal are still engaging in Satanic worship." He agreed with Archbishop Jensen that non-Christian religions are the 'tools of Satan', and the Aboriginal dances were a pre-Christian ritual.

However, in this 'enlightened age' we can recognise that the creation myths in Genesis have no more validity than the Aboriginal creation myths involving the Rainbow Serpent.

There is no reason that reconciliation has to come to an end. As we find out more about each other we can draw closer. I have been married many years. It is still a voyage of discovery.

Hey David
that was sort of my Point
Why keep flogging a dead horse
We are never going back to be a fully christian society so why not lead the way
We could always ask Cardinal Pell and his mates their thoughts NOT.
I like hearing Aboriginal myths and legends dream time stories
also Greek mythology and also Norse legends
Maybe if we gave Jesus a cape and more superpowers he would appeal to younger People more

The historian Henry Reynolds wrote
that when writing his books he spoke to
many Australians who felt that they had been
poorly served by their teachers and by the
nation's historians. They were denied information
and the past and they felt they were denied
understanding.

However, as Reynolds points out - it is now possible to
explore the past by means of a large number of books,
articles, films, novels, songs, paintings, primary
sources, archival records, and so on. Many voices
can now tell us about the past history of this country
and we can know a great deal about the history of
Indigenous-settler relations. But as Reynolds says -
knowing brings burdens which can be shirked by those
living in ignorance. With knowledge the question is
no longer what we know but what we are now to do, and that
is a much harder matter to deal with.
It will undoubtedly perplex us for many years to come.

Of course many things have changed. Much has been achieved.
Tolerance and understanding has broadened out and bigotry
to a large extend is in retreat. But the racist past still
weighs heavily on the present and as Reynolds says may yet
destroy any hope of reconciliation in this generation.

Black arm-band history is distressing. but it does enable us
to know and understand the incubus that burdens us all.
And Reconciliation Ceremonies play a big part in all of this.