Welcome to Eureka Street

back to site

Keywords: Christmas

  • RELIGION

    Opposing society's Scrooges

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 22 December 2010
    3 Comments

    Outside of Christmas, Scrooge is back in favour. If a government has big ideas and plans to spend money, all the talk will be about the burden on taxpayers and on the deficit. But to spend money for the benefit of people is a good thing to do.

    READ MORE
  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Stable bleatings

    • Various
    • 21 December 2010
    2 Comments

    Look at her, at the child cradled across her arm, replete in milky sleep, perfectly composed; At how her fingers fuss over his perfumed skin, The cool heal of her palm. 

    READ MORE
  • RELIGION

    Christmas in Islam

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 20 December 2010
    13 Comments

    The Gospels describe Christmas as a time of great happiness that a saviour has been born. But they also intimate the murderous business through which salvation will come. This Christmas many Christians in Muslim nations will be shadowed by fear.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Personal reflections on the Christmas Island tragedy

    • Tony Kevin
    • 20 December 2010
    23 Comments

    It is curious and sad that in weeks when our media are celebrating WikiLeaks and Julian Assange, we can accept so easily a government-managed story, whose public accountability obligation stares us in the face. Perhaps because editors know that our complacent society really does not want to go there.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Another date on the refugee tragedy calendar

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 17 December 2010
    12 Comments

    Let's hope Wednesday's tragic events are not exploited for political advantage. We remember those who died and offer prayers and condolences for their families. For the living, they need to be treated with dignity.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Burmese refugees' Christmas story

    • Duncan MacLaren
    • 13 December 2010
    3 Comments

    Outside: the fish factory that never sleeps. The people working in it are illegal migrants, paid a pittance and treated as sub humans. Only the strong return from the fishing trips. If you are ill and cannot work, you can be tipped into the sea along with the other rubbish for the seagulls.

    READ MORE
  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Escaping Oprah and Christmas

    • Brian Matthews
    • 10 December 2010
    2 Comments

    'Apodemialgia' is the opposite of nostaligia: a desire to escape. Add the brash, McDonald's-sponsored presence of Oprah to the pleasant but undeniably testing rigours of Christmas and apodemialgics all over the country will be reaching for something stronger than McCoffee. 

    READ MORE
  • CARTOON

    Julian Assange spoils Christmas

    • Fiona Katauskas
    • 08 December 2010
    2 Comments

    READ MORE
  • AUSTRALIA

    Shopping as communion

    • Sarah Kanowski
    • 15 November 2010
    6 Comments

    Buying and selling has shaped history. Alongside goods, new ideas and practices get exchanged, leading to the creation of remarkable civilisations. My young daughter and I recently caught a bus into the city to do some shopping. A mundane errand was transformed into something magical.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Asylum seeker decision tests Government sportsmanship

    • Kerry Murphy
    • 12 November 2010
    6 Comments

    A litmus test for the health of a democracy is what a Government does when it loses cases in the highest court in the land. The first consequence of yesterday's High Court decision regarding the cases of two Tamil asylum seekers is that many cases will need to be reconsidered.

    READ MORE
  • INTERNATIONAL

    Memories of refugees

    • Andrew Hamilton
    • 21 June 2010
    5 Comments

    I remember the 250,000 Cambodians in Site Two by the Thai border, and among them Chea, the sister of a friend, who died when the camp was shelled. I remember the many who spent years in Australian detention centres, and the sadness of watching as the light went out of the eyes of those detained for more than six months.

    READ MORE
  • RELIGION

    The 747 or the leaky boat

    • Frank Brennan
    • 21 June 2010
    14 Comments

    As the election lather on the asylum seeker issue continues, let's ask, 'Why is it right to treat the honest, unvisaed boat person more harshly than the visaed airplane passenger who fails to declare their intention to apply for asylum?'

    READ MORE