Every dead Gazan child had a name. We recited each one, out loud, at Collins Street Baptist Church, Melbourne
In the morning, 3.30 in the morning and I sleep in a vest with a red wall behind the Collins Street Baptist Church. Hot and dark here. The old Bible and pale lily smell and hard to wake up. I leave my sleeping bag and go back to the church, socks feet. The reading is still going.
A sound in the dark. Calling their names. Approximately 19,000 children who died in the last two years in Gaza. Their names are printed in phonetically and next to the name, next to their ages. This seizure committed all the collected names to read more than 30 hours aloud.
The bodies of two of 19,000 children were massacred in Gaza.Credit: AP
We read the names of 40 Jewish children who lost their lives on October 7, 250 children killed in the West Bank, and then the children of Gaza. Lany sounds like a heartbeat, a name, a name, a name. Does not stop.
In the early hours of this evening, a stunned woman stood up and added 10 names to the list – children from the wide family killed the day before. He read his names, continued the list lying in front of him. He stumbled in about eight minutes, turned into a cliff.
“This nephew’s name,” he whispered. Then he pulled his shoulders back and continued to read in a more time than time.
It is like monitoring the “Great Crowth of Witnesses” in order to continue the scores of people, Jewish people, Jewish and Buddhist priests, journalists, actors, politicians, artists and daily people.
During the day, we stopped on the outside steps, and then we moved to the sanctuary as the sun sets, and the whole time did not stop the names. The church was washed in half the light of the candles and I go to the microphone and show where to start from the current reader.
The names are beautiful, each of them is carefully selected and the story is full of family and hope. My voice is caught in my chest and my heart beats fast. I did this job before. This praise of the soul.
Every minister knows that the moment when the funeral service reaches the top of the mountain, when we praise the soul of those who leave God. There is a reluctance, relaxation that should be. The soul may sometimes disappear or not want to leave. This is our job.
