These have been heavy days in Australia.
Our Jewish neighbours are mourning the loss of loved ones and wondering if they’re safe. Our Muslim neighbours grieve alongside them while bracing for the suspicion and hostility that so often follows. And all of us, whatever our background, are wrestling with the kind of violence that shakes something loose in the soul.
Last Sunday, Bondi Beach should’ve been alive with the joy of Hanukkah: families gathering, candles lit, a community celebrating light in the darkness. Instead, it became the site of Australia’s worst mass shooting in nearly three decades. Fifteen lives were taken: a ten-year-old girl named Matilda; an eighty-seven-year-old man who had survived the Holocaust only to die in an act of antisemitic terror; two beloved rabbis; a couple who gave their lives trying to wrestle a weapon from one of the killers. Dozens more carry wounds, visible and invisible. A community has been torn open.
For those of us who seek to follow the Way of Jesus, moments like this strip away all pretence. We can’t retreat into comfortable theology or partisan point-scoring. We are confronted, again, with the question that lies at the heart of discipleship: “What does God’s love and discipleship to Jesus require of us now?”
It’s natural to want answers: someone to blame, some failure of policy or leadership that, if only corrected, would’ve prevented this. And there’ll be a time for those hard questions; accountability matters. But I want to suggest that right now, the deeper call is toward one another. We’ve frightened neighbours. We’ve communities wondering whether they truly belong in this country. We’ve a fragile social fabric that could tear further, or could hold.
Australia, at its best, has shown a remarkable capacity to bridge differences and find common ground. That capacity isn’t automatic; it’s a choice, made again and again, especially when it’s costly. As Christians, we believe we’ve been shown a Way: not a way of fear or vengeance, but of self-giving love, even for those we find most challenging to love. This is the moment to walk that Way together.
What Does Faith Ask of Us Now?
As a Christian, I find myself turning to the witness of Jesus in moments like this, not for easy answers, but for orientation. What does faithfulness look like when the ground beneath us feels so unsteady?
First, I think it looks like grief. The Psalms of lament teach us that honest sorrow before God isn’t a failure of faith but an expression of it. Jesus himself wept. We don’t need to rush past the horror of what happened, or smooth it over with platitudes. We can sit with our Jewish neighbours in their pain, bearing witness, simply being present. Sometimes there are no adequate words, and that’s alright.
Second, it looks like solidarity. Jesus was Jewish. The Hebrew scriptures are Christian scripture. An attack on Jewish people celebrating a festival of liberation isn’t someone else’s tragedy; it’s an assault on those to whom Christians are spiritually indebted. Standing with the Jewish community isn’t optional for those who follow Jesus; it flows from the very logic of our faith.
Third, it looks like refusing to let fear and hatred have the last word. The attackers wanted to fracture us, to turn communities against one another, to make us retreat into suspicion and tribalism. The resurrection is, among other things, a declaration that violence and death don’t write the final chapter. Christians are called to be people who live by that hope, who continue to build bridges across difference, even when it’s costly.
Grace for Each Other
Our politicians are human beings navigating something genuinely difficult: trying to condemn violence without inflaming hatred, trying to protect some of us without alienating others. They won’t get it perfectly right. None of us would.
It’s also painfully easy, in moments of grief and fear, to lash out: to attack those we already disagreed with, to score points against the other side, to let ethnic or political or religious divisions sharpen into weapons. But when we do this, we only throw fuel on the fire. We become part of the problem we claim to oppose. And we fail to reflect the reconciling, peacemaking Messiah who blessed the peacemakers and called his followers to be agents of reconciliation in a fractured world.
What I’d love to see in the coming days is something that’s become rare: a little grace. For each other. Even for those we disagree with. Not because accountability doesn’t matter, but because we’re more likely to find our way through this together than we’re tearing strips off one another.
This doesn’t mean ignoring hard truths. Any honest Christian reckoning must acknowledge the long, shameful history of Christian antisemitism, from medieval pogroms to the complicity of churches in the Holocaust to the conspiracy theories that still circulate in some corners today. Repentance is an ongoing posture. If hatred has found any foothold in our own communities, this is the moment to root it out.
And we must hold space, too, for Muslim Australians who are grieving this tragedy while fearing what may come next. The perpetrators claimed an ideology that the vast majority of Muslims find abhorrent. To punish a whole community for the actions of murderers would be to compound one injustice with another. That isn’t the way of Jesus, who consistently reached across the boundaries his society had drawn.
The Harder Work of Consistent Truth-Telling
There’s a temptation, in moments like this, to speak only the truths that come easily to our side. But if we believe that truth-telling is an act of love, and as Christians, we should, then it can’t be selective. It has to cut across all our tribal loyalties.
So let me say plainly what needs to be said: antisemitism has been allowed to fester in Australia, and the failure to name it clearly and confront it consistently is part of how we got here. When Jewish students feel unsafe on university campuses, when synagogues require armed guards, when “Zionist” becomes a slur hurled at anyone who is visibly Jewish, these aren’t abstractions. They’re the soil in which violence grows. We can’t claim to be shocked by the harvest if we’ve tolerated the sowing.
This deserves to be said. Jesus himself was willing to speak hard truths, even uncomfortable ones. Matthew 23 shows us a Messiah who didn’t shy away from naming what was wrong, even when it cost him. Prophetic speech is part of faithful discipleship.
But here’s the question I find myself asking: have we been consistent truth-tellers ourselves? Have we spoken up about antisemitism with the same energy we’ve brought to other causes, or only when it’s been politically convenient? And have we also spoken up about Islamophobia, about the deaths of tens of thousands of civilians in Gaza, about the suffering of Palestinians under occupation, about Indigenous suffering in our own backyard, and about the rise of aggressive nationalism among young men in our country?
Or do we only tell the truth when it suits our ideological tribe?
This isn’t whataboutism. It’s a question about integrity. If our moral voice is selective, fierce about the injustices committed by those we already oppose, silent about those committed by our allies, then we’ve forfeited our prophetic authority. We’ve become partisans with a religious veneer, and the world can smell the hypocrisy from a mile away.
The same Jesus who excoriated the Pharisees also wept over Jerusalem. The same Lord who overturned tables in the temple touched lepers and spoke tenderly with Samaritans. Truth and grace weren’t opposites for him; they were integrated. He could hold the complexity because his vision wasn’t tribal, it was shaped by the coming Kingdom, where every victim matters and every perpetrator is called to account.
So yes, let’s tell the truth about the antisemitism that has been tolerated for too long in progressive spaces, on campuses, and in public discourse. Let’s name it for what it is: an ancient hatred that has repeatedly erupted in mass murder, and which must be confronted with the same moral seriousness we bring to any other form of racism.
And let’s also be honest with ourselves. Have we wept for the children of Gaza as readily as we weep for the children of Bondi? Have we named the dehumanisation of Palestinians with the same clarity we bring to the dehumanisation of Jews? Have we noticed the young men in our own congregations being radicalised by online ideologies of resentment and supremacy?
The Christian calling isn’t to pick a side in the culture war; it’s to bear witness to a Kingdom that judges all our kingdoms. That means we’ll sometimes be out of step with everyone. Our progressive friends may be frustrated when we insist on naming antisemitism they’d prefer to ignore. Our conservative friends may be frustrated when we insist on naming injustices they’d prefer to excuse. So be it. Faithfulness to Christ has never been a path to popularity.
What I’m calling for isn’t neutrality, neutrality in the face of evil is its own kind of failure. I’m calling for consistency: a willingness to apply the same moral standards to all parties, to grieve all victims, to hold all perpetrators accountable, and to refuse the easy tribalism that sees atrocities only when committed by the other side.
This is hard. It requires us to hold multiple truths at once: that this attack was a horrific act of antisemitic terror, and that Palestinian civilians are also dying in unconscionable numbers. That Muslim Australians deserve protection from bigotry, and that Islamist extremism is a genuine threat that must be confronted. That our political opponents are often wrong, and that they are also made in the image of God.
The world doesn’t need more Christians who function as chaplains to one political tribe or another. It needs followers of Jesus who can hold complexity, who can weep with all who weep, who can speak uncomfortable truths to every side, and who can model the kind of moral consistency that points beyond our fractured politics to the reconciling love of God.
We need to examine our hearts and our speech. As Christians, our truth-telling can’t afford to be partisan. If we’re going to insist that truth-telling is an act of love, and we should, then it has to apply even when the truth implicates us and our allies. That’s the harder work. And it’s the work to which, I believe, we’re being called.
Light in the Darkness
Amid the horror, there were also glimpses of extraordinary courage. Boris and Sofia Gurman, a Russian-Jewish couple, tried to disarm one of the attackers and were killed in the attempt. Ahmed al-Ahmed, a Syrian-born fruit shop owner, wrestled a gun away from one of the shooters. Lifeguards rushed into danger with surfboards as stretchers. In the days since, a record number of Australians have signed up to donate blood.
This is who we are at our best. Not the violence, but the response to it. Not the hatred, but the hands reaching out across every divide to help.
The Prime Minister asked Australians to put candles in their windows, a reminder that light can defeat darkness. For Jews celebrating Hanukkah, the festival of lights, this image carries particular resonance. For Christians approaching Christmas, it echoes our own conviction that no darkness is so deep that it can’t be overcome.
We’re one Australian people. That’s not naive, it’s a choice we make, again and again, especially when it’s hard. It’s a choice to see in our neighbours, whoever they are, the image of God. It’s a choice to build a society where everyone can celebrate their faith without fear.
Let’s make that choice now.
May the God of all comfort be with those who mourn. May we have the courage to be peacemakers. And may the light not be overcome.
Light That Can’t Be Overcome: A Prayer After Bondi
God of all comfort and God of all peoples,
you who scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts
and lifted up the lowly,
you who sent your Son to be light in the darkness,
a light no darkness has ever overcome,
we come to you in this hour of grief and fear.
——————–
You’re the God who chose Abraham and Sarah,
who liberated Israel from Egypt,
who sent prophets to call your people back,
who in the fullness of time became flesh in a Jewish child
born to a Jewish mother,
raised in the rhythms of Torah and Temple.
The scriptures of Israel are our scriptures.
The story of the Jewish people is integrated into our story.
An attack on your ancient people is an assault
on those to whom we’re forever spiritually indebted.
——————–
You’re the God who weeps with those who weep,
who numbers every hair on our heads,
who sees every victim,
who remembers every name.
——————–
We confess, O Lord, with heavy hearts and bowed heads,
the long, shameful history of Christian antisemitism.
From medieval pogroms to centuries of persecution,
from the complicity of churches in the Holocaust
to the conspiracy theories that still circulate in our midst,
we’ve sinned against our elder siblings in faith.
We’ve twisted your scriptures to justify hatred.
We’ve blamed your chosen people for the death of your Son,
forgetting that he laid down his life freely,
that Roman and Jew and Gentile and all humanity
stand equally in need of grace.
——————–
We confess that antisemitism has been allowed to fester
in our society, in our institutions, in our discourse.
We’ve watched Jewish students feel unsafe on campuses.
We’ve grown accustomed to synagogues needing armed guards.
We’ve heard “Zionist” become a slur
hurled at anyone visibly Jewish,
and too often we’ve been silent.
We can’t claim to be shocked by this harvest
when we’ve tolerated the sowing.
——————–
We confess, too, our selective truth-telling.
We’ve spoken up only when it suited our tribe.
We’ve been fierce about injustices committed by those we oppose
and silent about those committed by our allies.
We’ve become partisans with a religious veneer,
and the world has smelled our hypocrisy.
We’ve failed to weep with all who weep,
to grieve all victims,
to hold all perpetrators to account.
Forgive us, Lord, and restore to us
the integrity of prophetic witness.
——————–
We lament, O God, the horror of what has happened.
Bondi Beach should have been alive with the joy of Hanukkah:
families gathering, candles lit,
a community celebrating light in the darkness.
Instead, it became a site of mass murder,
the worst in this land in nearly thirty years.
——————–
We weep for Matilda, only ten years old.
We weep for the eighty-seven-year-old man
who survived the Holocaust
only to die in an act of antisemitic terror.
We weep for the two beloved rabbis,
for Boris and Sofia Gurman,
the couple who gave their lives
trying to wrestle a weapon from the killers.
We weep for the fifteen whose lives were stolen,
for the dozens who carry wounds visible and invisible,
for a community torn open.
——————–
We grieve with our Jewish neighbours
who mourn their dead and wonder if they are safe.
We grieve with our Muslim neighbours
who share in this sorrow
while bracing for the suspicion and hostility
that so often follows.
We mourn the ancient hatred that keeps erupting,
the tribalism that tears communities apart,
the ideologies of resentment and supremacy
that radicalise young men into murderers.
——————–
How long, O Lord?
How long until your people can worship without fear?
How long until festivals of light
aren’t interrupted by the darkness of violence?
How long until we learn to see in every neighbour
the image of God?
——————–
Yet even in this darkness, O Lord, we turn to you in hope.
For we’ve seen glimpses of extraordinary courage:
Boris and Sofia, who gave their lives to protect others.
Ahmed al-Ahmed, a Syrian-born fruit shop owner,
who wrestled a gun from one of the shooters.
Lifeguards who rushed into danger with surfboards as stretchers.
Record numbers who signed up to donate blood.
This is who we are at our best:
not the violence, but the response to it;
not the hatred, but the hands reaching out
across every divide to help.
——————–
We remember that Jesus himself wept.
He wept over Jerusalem,
he wept at the tomb of Lazarus,
he carries our sorrows still.
The same Lord who overturned tables in the temple
touched lepers and spoke tenderly with Samaritans.
Truth and grace were not opposites for him;
they were integrated.
He could hold the complexity
because his vision was not tribal
but shaped by the coming Kingdom,
where every victim matters
and every perpetrator is called to account.
——————–
We remember the resurrection:
your declaration that violence and death
isn’t write the final chapter.
The light shines in the darkness,
and the darkness has not overcome it.
Even now, you’re at work:
bringing comfort to those who mourn,
drawing together communities that could have fractured,
kindling candles in windows across the nation.
——————–
So we come to you now with our petitions, O Lord.
——————–
Comfort those who mourn.
Be near to the brokenhearted.
Hold the families who’ll face empty chairs
at every gathering from now on.
Heal those who carry wounds in body and soul.
Give rest to the traumatised,
peace to the terrified,
hope to those who feel the ground beneath them is unsteady.
——————–
Give us courage to name antisemitism
clearly and confront it consistently.
Help us see it for what it is:
an ancient hatred that has repeatedly erupted in mass murder,
a poison that must be confronted
with the same moral seriousness we bring to any racism.
Root it out wherever it has found foothold:
in progressive spaces and conservative ones,
on campuses and in congregations,
in public discourse and private hearts.
——————–
And give us the integrity to be consistent truth-tellers.
Help us weep for the children of Bondi
and for the children of Gaza.
Help us name the dehumanisation of Jews
and the dehumanisation of Palestinians.
Help us confront Islamist extremism
while protecting Muslim Australians from bigotry.
Help us notice the young men being radicalised
by online ideologies of resentment and supremacy.
Free us from partisan blinders
that see atrocities only when committed by the other side.
——————–
Give wisdom to our leaders.
They’re navigating something genuinely difficult:
trying to condemn violence without inflaming hatred,
trying to protect some without alienating others.
Grant them grace when they stumble,
and grant us grace for them.
——————–
Protect our Muslim neighbours
from the backlash that so often follows.
The perpetrators claimed an ideology
that the vast majority of Muslims find abhorrent.
To punish a whole community for the actions of murderers
would be to compound one injustice with another.
That isn’t the way of Jesus,
who consistently reached across the boundaries his society had drawn.
——————–
And so we commit ourselves, O Lord,
to walking the Way of Jesus in this moment.
——————–
We commit to grief:
to sitting with our Jewish neighbours in their pain,
bearing witness, being present,
not rushing past the horror with platitudes.
——————–
We commit to solidarity:
standing with the Jewish community
not as an optional act of kindness
but as an expression of the very logic of our faith.
Jesus was Jewish.
The Hebrew scriptures are Christian scripture.
An attack on Jewish people celebrating liberation
isn’t someone else’s tragedy; it’s ours.
——————–
We commit to refusing fear and hatred the last word.
The attackers wanted to fracture us,
to turn communities against one another,
to make us retreat into suspicion and tribalism.
We won’t give them that victory.
We’ll continue to build bridges across difference,
even when it’s costly.
——————–
We commit to grace for one another:
for our political opponents,
for those we disagree with,
for leaders who won’t get it perfectly right.
We won’t lash out in grief,
score points against the other side,
or throw fuel on the fire we claim to oppose.
——————–
We commit to repentance:
an ongoing posture, not a single moment.
If hatred has found any foothold in our communities,
we’ll root it out.
If our truth-telling has been selective,
we’ll expand our vision.
If we’ve been chaplains to one political tribe,
we’ll learn again to bear witness
to a Kingdom that judges all our kingdoms.
——————–
We commit to being one Australian people.
This is our choice,
made again and again, especially when it’s hard.
It’s a choice to see in our neighbours, whoever they are,
the image of God.
It’s a choice to build a society
where everyone can celebrate their faith without fear.
——————–
Until the day when swords are beaten into plowshares
and nations learn war no more;
until the day when the wolf lies down with the lamb
and nothing hurts or destroys on all your holy mountain;
until the day when every tear is wiped away
and death is swallowed up in victory;
until the day when your Kingdom comes in fullness
and your will is done on earth as it is in heaven,
——————–
Keep us faithful.
Keep us hopeful.
Keep us together.
Keep us reaching across every divide
with hands that help rather than harm.
Keep us lighting candles in our windows,
refusing to let darkness have the final word.
——————–
Blessed are you, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
who chose a people to be a blessing to all nations.
Blessed are you, Christ who wept over Jerusalem,
who died outside the city gate,
who rose to reconcile all things.
Blessed are you, Spirit who broods over chaos,
who brings order from disorder,
who makes of scattered peoples one new humanity.
——————–
May the God of all comfort be with those who mourn.
May we’ve the courage to be peacemakers.
And may the light not be overcome.
Amen.
