Abundant life: honouring the discovery of Mungo Lady

Community, Culture and Religion, Indigenous affairs, Politics, Religion and Faith

Abundant life: honouring the discovery of Mungo Lady

Apr 30, 2023

Site in the ancient shore dune of Lake Mungo in outback New South Wales, Australia. The soft rocky outcrops are glowing pink at sunset.

On Wednesday I met with a wonderful Australian geologist, Jim Bowler, famous for discovering the Lake Mungo remains – ‘the oldest human remains in Australia, dated to 40,000 years ago.’ ‘Mungo woman’; Mungo Man’. Jim and I will dream dreams on Sunday, within the abundance of the divine. Asking, against the backdrop of nuclear bombs and submarines: what might Australia yet become? It will be a joy to thereafter share where our dreaming takes us.

Last week our guests at Holy Trinity Port Melbourne were Dr Tun and Ko, representing the National Unity Government of Myanmar. (Helen Barry shared this photo below). Tonight, 5 pm, is the National Prayer Service for Myanmar in Collins St. Baptist Church. After last Sunday’s Service I spoke at a Religious Harmony for World Peace Conference, hosted by the Namdhari Sikh Society.

One thing led to another after this and so I met in Holy Trinity Port Melbourne on Wednesday with a wonderful Australian geologist, Jim Bowler, famous for discovering the Lake Mungo remains- ‘the oldest human remains in Australia, dated to 40,000 years ago.’

‘Mungo woman’; Mungo Man’.

Jim and I will dream dreams on Sunday, within the abundance of the divine.

We are ‘droving into the light’, as in Hans Heysen’s painting.

When we met ahead of Sunday, Jim and I discussed that moment, now dated to 13.5 billion years ago, when time and space began.

Before that – no time, no space.

Then an event- a very big bang, so called… and here we are in this particular cosmos… with life.

Such a divine gift.

We breathe in; we breathe out. We listen; look; smell; feel…

It is all a gift.

And with it, the promise of abundance, as in the Easter Gospel for this Sunday.

But, of course! Why create all this and then hold anything back?

Pondering such matters, Jim and I sat in silent wonder for a while.

Wonder and God… The ‘apophatic way’ is the name given to a theology which strips everything back to wonder. God is not this. God is not that.. God is.

’I am who I am’, said Yahweh to Moses when he asked. [Exodus 3.14]

So creation rolled along and then, one day, unexpectedly and amazingly, Jim found those we know as ‘Mungo Woman and Man’, some 40,000 years after their burial in the astonishing landscape north of Mildura.

What was that moment like? What is its significance now?

We have a glimpse through the poetic invitation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

We have a glimpse in the evolving movement of people seeking to better integrate spiritual practice with peacebuilding.

Even whilst others, captured by unspeakable banality, plan with their one life on this planet in a universe of beauty, weapons like nuclear bombs and submarines.

This terrifying folly is much discussed in the fine articles of ‘Pearls and Irritations’.

On Sunday, Jim and I will dream dreams, as the Bible says we elders must! [Acts 2.17].

What might Australia yet become?

It will be a joy to thereafter share where our dreaming takes us.

In the meantime, I share with you Jim’s wonderful 2018 article on the discovery of a historical legend: Mungo Lady.