In Adelaide there are many projects. The R.A.A. cares for cars. R.S.P.C.A. cares for cats. Travellers’ Aid helps the stranded. The Good Neighbour Council meets the needs of recent immigrants.

We too have many projects. Project Compassion takes our money for the poor. St. Vincent de Paul takes our clothes for the needy. In 1990, we introduced Family Groups which now bring together 120 families. The R.C.I.A. (Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults) greets catechumens (enquirers) and welcomes them into our Christian community. Community! That’s the word! The wider Church is divided into dioceses. Each is divided into parishes. The parish is sometimes called a community and the diocese a ‘community of communities’.

We celebrate Mass four times each weekend. The building can accommodate 800 parishioners. Some sit regularly in the northern transept, some in the southern, the rest in the centre. But even at one Mass, many on the northern side never meet those on the southern. Call that a community? So our bishop has introduced another project called Basic Ecclesial Communities (B.E.C.). Each parish will be subdivided into manageable sections of some 100 to 150 families.

One or two families will be invited to call on fellow Catholics who live within their section. After several visits, they will get to know their neighbours. The project is user friendly. The Parish Priest sends a letter saying they will be visited. The callers introduce themselves, say they are fellow parishioners dropping in to say hello. Jokingly I suggested that if they start by saying: "We have not come to collect money or to ask you to come to church" they will be invited in immediately. It is only a ‘getting to know you’ exercise.

Hopefully the group of families in the area can develop into a community, something like an extended family. Many migrant communities have brought with them this concept of the extended family. When they first arrive they tend to buy homes in the same vicinity. They visit one another and support each other. Some of them used to hug each other on meeting. We tended to look askance at such goings on.

Recently I read a book entitled The Little Book of Hugs by a nurse in the United States.

She discovered that her little girl was emotionally deprived. After much research, she came to the conclusion that her child needed to be hugged and hugged often. So the author now recommends hugging not only for children but also for adults. Those immigrants were not so silly after all.

The concept of a community is more visible and felt in small country towns. When we migrate to the city, many forces tend to isolate us. We are out working all day. When we come home we want to be left alone. Television entertains us at home and so we do not worry our neighbour. We end up being isolated and we suffer for it.

The time has come for us to reach out with the hand of friendship to our immediate neighbours, also promoted by Neighbourhood Watch, and move, once again, towards extending our family, towards becoming a community, a Basic Ecclesial Community.