|
Justice and Community Services
Our social justice advocacy work and community welfare
services express our belief that God is committed to life
now. It is our response to the Bible's call to care for and
protect the marginalised and vulnerable. Issues addressed
include the environment, the rights and dignity of asylum
seekers, the treatment and care of prisoners, inadequate
gambling legislation, religious intolerance, multicultural
cross-culture issues, fair employment practices, and much
more. The Uniting Church in Australia is
also the largest non-government provider of community
services in Australia. We achieve this through our community
services arm, UnitingCare. This is an umbrella of
more than 400 agencies, institutions, and parish missions
throughout Australia. Areas of service include aged care;
children, youth and family; disability; employment;
emergency relief; drug and alcohol; youth homelessness and
suicide. A leading edge in our justice
work is the UCA's efforts to bring indigenous and
non-indigenous Australians together and to support the
indigenous community generally. Reconciliation, land rights
and indigenous leadership training are among areas in which
we are engaged. We do this primarily
through the Uniting Aboriginal and Islander Christian
Congress (UAICC). Established in 1985 as the indigenous arm
of the Uniting Church in Australia, and the UAICC is
dedicated to seeking the spiritual, physical, social, mental
and emotional wellbeing of indigenous Australians.
The Uniting Church recognises the pain and damage caused to
our country's native people through settlement and beyond.
In 1997, recognising its past mistakes, the Uniting Church
made a formal apology to the Stolen Generation. We
participate each year in National Sorry Day. |