Waitangi 2024 – a personal reflection

Just before Christmas, I ended a decades long career in Public Health to take up a lay minister role at Christchurch West Methodist Parish. There was no better way to start this new life than by heading up to Tāmaki Makaurau for Trinity College’s Mana Tiriti course, which includes four days in the beautiful Tai Tokerau visiting the places where Methodism first took root in Aotearoa.

It was a rich and joyful time, meeting new people, visiting new places, sharing new ideas and experiencing new hope. There are plenty of memories to treasure – singing from the Wesleyan hymnbook in the historic chapel at Mangungu, seeing the sun rise over the sea after the Dawn Service at Waitangi, eating fresh mussels at the Haruru Falls Camp, joining the Covenant Service at Kaeo church – and it was a time of learning and laughter. As the only Palagi and only South Islander on the course, I returned home with a much stronger sense of Connexion and of the rich diversity of our traditions. And a few more words of Tongan and, most importantly, many wonderful new friends.

Learning Methodist history in the places it happened is profoundly humbling. Te Tiriti o Waitangi is in our Methodist DNA and our bicultural journey has never been more vital in a country currently described as ‘fragile’. When a signing ceremony was hosted at the Methodist Mission at Mangungu in the Hokianga, 64 chiefs added their signatures to the Tiriti. This is the largest number of Rangatira to sign at one event. The involvement of John Hobbs, the Wesleyan missionary, as interpreter was influential and, while many Māori had considerable reservations about signing, some were persuaded when they sought the view of the missionaries. I left Mangungu with a deep sense of Methodism’s responsibility to honour the faith those Rangatira placed in our missionary forebears.

One way to honour this history is to make sure we keep sharing the facts so that volatile political rhetoric is not able to do more damage. He Whakaputanga – the 1835 Declaration of Independence of the United Tribes of New Zealand – is a fact that too few people bear in mind when the relevance of Te Tiriti is raised. In He Whakaputanga, Māori declared a sovereign nation state, enabling them to trade and make treaties with other states. He Whakaputanga is central to understanding why any claims that those signing Te Tiriti O Waitangi were signing away sovereignty must be dismissed.

I also have renewed respect for the brave souls who made the long journey from England. A plaque at Kaeo Church lists the names of the men who came as Wesleyan Methodist Pioneer Missionaries. This increased my curiosity about the women whose names are not listed, wives and daughters who inevitably worked just as hard. I migrated from Kent in the 1990s. I now want to know much more about Jane Hobbs, also from Kent, who shared the Mission House at Mangungu with her husband John, when Te Tiriti was signed.

Attending an intensive course throughout Waitangi weekend spared me from much of the media coverage of political events. However, witnessing part of a pôwhiri on the Treaty Grounds, I was reminded of the rich gifts Tikanga Māori offers for brokering encounters between different, sometimes hostile, parties. For all the political rhetoric, the Treaty Grounds feel beautiful and peaceful. There is powerful emotion but there is no sense of violence or threat. This potential to meet, debate and challenge, without falling into fear and violence is something this country should guard with great reverence. It is a rare thing in a divided and aggressive world.

After the Dawn Service, drinking coffee on the beach, we agreed that we had been privileged to share in a unique experience – to walk in the footsteps of our Methodist forebears, Māori and Tauiwi, and feel their hopes and fears for the future of this beautiful nation. Te Tiriti is the covenant which holds us together and gives us the guidance and inspiration to shape the future together.