During Refugee Week, we celebrate the one million people on humanitarian visas whose stories of resilience, hope, perseverance and kindness have become part of our Australian story, writes Congregational Leader Sister Catherine McCahill.

It’s Saturday morning. As I open my eyes to the new day, I relish my choices: when to start the day, what to eat, what to wear, how to use my time. The list is endless. Of course, each choice has consequences but fundamentally I am free to make my own choices.

Even the choice of writing this column or not is free; the topic and the content are mine to make. Today, I deliberately make this choice in solidarity with all those whose choices are limited, and for whom many basic choices have dire consequences.

This month, I freely choose to focus on asylum seekers and refugees.

The number of forcibly displaced people across the world is at a record high of 120 million. This is four times the population of Australia.

I think of them in makeshift camps, in unseaworthy vessels, in detention centres, squatting in unused buildings, sleeping rough in cities, spilling out of overcrowded houses and other buildings. My mind and my soul do not have the capacity to imagine the gravity and deprivation of their situation.

I wonder what they left behind as they fled their homes and homelands. Food, shelter, clothing? Loved ones? Precious photos and objects? Jobs and careers? Schools and education? Passports and identities?

Forced to flee by persecution or violence or prejudice or famine or some other life-threatening situation, many endure hazardous journeys in pursuit of safety or some other basic human need. They become homeless. Children are born stateless. Medical care, employment, education are mostly unattainable.

Today, due to instant technological connection for almost every human person, being neighbour is no longer a local matter. “Yet across the world, governments are stepping back from their humanitarian commitments.” (Refugee Council of Australia)

 I ask myself, my community, the Australian people and governments, will we follow this trend or will we be good neighbours to these displaced persons?

’A Million Stories’ is the 2026 theme for Refugee Week (14-20 June). Since the first humanitarian visas were issued by the Australian Government for displaced Europeans in 1947, one million such visas have been granted. The people’s stories of resilience, hope, perseverance and kindness have become part of our Australian story.

We who were born in Australia know these people. We have rejoiced as we saw them blossom when they were welcomed and accepted. We have watched them overcome prejudice and hardship. We have gone to school with them. We have received their service in health, education, music, art, hospitality and in so many other ways.

Our communities, locally and nationally, have been enriched.

Today, I choose to write this piece because along with my gratitude for the blessings of these one million persons, I am deeply saddened by the voices of prejudice that I hear all too frequently in this our homeland. It is not simply noise but wilful damage, violent protests, hate crime and even assault.

I hear politicians, would-be politicians, and those who consider themselves public commentators lamenting our openness to refugees, blaming them for all manner of societal woes.

Apart from our Indigenous people (about 4% of our population) we and our forebears have all arrived by boat or plane in the past 240 years. Now it’s a crime to arrive unannounced by boat.

Why do we glorify some boat arrivals and not others? Why did we welcome the unannounced refugees from Indochina in the 1980s and deposit more recent boat arrivals in ’offshore’ detention centres? Have we forgotten our history?

As I ponder this reality, I am challenged by the call of Jesus in the Gospel to be a good neighbour. Speaking to organisations working with ’migrants’ (in Australia, they would be called asylum seekers or refugees) at the Port of Arguineguin in Spain this month, Pope Leo reminded all of us that: “The Church cannot ignore these waters or any place where hunger, thirst, violence, fear or exile continue to wound human dignity.”

Leo goes on to remind his audience and us to honour and protect the human dignity of all people:

I want to bow before your dignity. You are not just numbers or files. You are people who have left behind families and homes. You have dreams that no one has the right to despise. …

This tragedy must serve as an appeal to the conscience of the nations of origin of the migrants, which must establish conditions for peace, justice and development. It is also an appeal to the conscience of the transit nations, which are called to protect the vulnerable and not leave them in the hands of criminal networks. It is likewise an appeal to the conscience of Europe [I want to say, Australia], which cannot claim to uphold human dignity while growing accustomed to the Mediterranean and Atlantic becoming unmarked graves, as well as that of the international community, which is called to effective and persevering cooperation. …

Human dignity has no passport and does not lose its value when crossing a border.

On 16 June Australia Post issued a stamp celebrating Refugee Week. Created in partnership with the Refugee Council of Australia and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, the stamp celebrates the one million people granted humanitarian visas in Australia since 1947.

Today, against the noise from those who oppose these arrivals and the blessings they have brought and continue to bring to Australia, I believe we need to give a strong neighbourly message of support.

I encourage all Australians who read this piece to buy at least one of these stamps and use it to write on behalf of asylum seekers and refugees to your federal Member of Parliament. Information is available at www.refugeecouncil.org.au

The problem is huge – we could be daunted. I am encouraged and challenged by Pope Leo:

The goal is not to solve everything, but to place everything in God’s hands and to be present where people suffer, where resources are insufficient, where there is no common language – but where gestures can still speak … bearing witness that concrete mercy can save and change lives.