Central Western Daily, 5 Oct 2007
I read with a laugh in CWD 05 October 2007 "Adding voice to community harmony" by Ben Brennan about Graham Sattler from Orange Regional Conservatorium setting up the Sympotmatics choir at the Orange Base Hospital and Bloomfield mental hospital. What a great idea! As he said on Prime TV the other night, the arts do give an outlet for people and can lead to great increase in their self-esteem and build up the mind and heart! Good on him! I hope this venture grows and blossoms in Bloomfield! (pun intended)
Gordon Moyes from Wesley Mission in Sydney said when he was a young minister in Victoria he worked as a chaplain with prison inmates and produced a play with them in it in the jail as part of their rehabilitiation. It worked amazingly well! This gave the people hope and also let them expand their abilities and gifts. He later established Wesley Institute for Ministry and the Arts (WIMA) in Drummoyne in Sydney, a unique combination of theology and arts training in one.
I saw a riot of young Lebanese men at a festival in Guildford in Sydney stop when a rock band of their peers started playing only about 200m up the street!
Music and the arts is a powerful tool to use when a society is down in the dumps and needs lifting and building up. It lifts the soul. It is a God-given gift to benefit each other. Let's use it more often.