There are stories emerging from this Vigil, of synchronicity and co-incidence, of inspiration and of personal courage. Some have been about daring to venture forth and participate in ways not done before. Some people have tentatively offered to be focal locations, knowing this would alter their status in their local communities. Others have spoken of the knowing, of a quiet and sure faith which granted the strength to be on the beach that night.
We have needed to be brave to do this Vigil. It is not easy to take a stand for something when the majority of people around us seem happily oblivious to the urgency we feel.
The nature of a Vigil is also controversial for it carries a scent of the spiritual, of ritual and ceremony usually reserved for socially sanctioned events.
Thirdly, although the environmental movement has grown, it still bears that label of ‘greenie madness’ conveniently imposed upon it during more skeptical times.
A German philosopher offers some insight into human behavior which may help us to understand:
“All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.”
Arthur Schopenhauer (1788 – 1860)
People have shared their stories with me personally through phone calls and emails. I can understand why these are held precious within the self.
There is such a story told on Go Tv Geelong: Peter Cowden of Port Arlington stepped forward to save his town, and the Bay. Port Phillip Dredging Vigil,
Another story is from Craig Forster of Mt. Eliza.
[Background : The idea of the Vigil of Lights dropped into our lap - it emerged between Geraldine and me, over dinner early in November. We were both very upset that the approval had been granted to go ahead with the dredging of the bay. There had been too many years of community rallying, of walks, and talks, and information; of mandates and petitions. We shared the vision of Vigils along cliffs in England during WW2. A week or so later Soula (who shared our concern), responded passionately to the idea. She developed it further with me and we sent it to the Blue Wedges website. Andrew King boomeranged it, explaining that their role was with litigation, they did not have the time but they liked the idea and would welcome community support. Oh My …!
By mid December, I knew I needed to call on assistance and my daughter helped create a web site as a birthday gift for me. I started emailing, calling people and seeding the plan. The co-incidences, the offers of help, the ease with which so much fell into place, were quite uncanny. It was a fast learning curve but by Christmas, we had the message out into the wider community and it was enthusiastically supported by a large diversity of concerned folk.]
The 1st of January I received an email from Craig Forster, a local artist.
Dear Hilary,
Seems we have had the same thought.
I hope my letters give support.
Yours Craig
Attached was the copy of a letter he had sent out to editors, various newspapers, both local and City. It had not been published.
Dear Editor,
The waters of Port Phillip Bay and the beaches around it are as crisp and clean as they have ever been.
No longer are rivers and creeks filling it with sewerage and factory waste.
More than ever beach crowds are taking their rubbish with them.
Even the boatees are bringing their rubbish to shore rather than dumping it.
At the moment the bay is an exquisite blue, flocked with bird’s wings and canvas sails, its beaches mirage yellow, scattered with umbrellas and edged by busy bike paths and walking tracks.
It’s taken a long time for the people of Melbourne to learn respect for the Bay.
The Victorian Government should be commended for so carefully resuscitating the Bay.
Enjoy it now because we are about to lose it.
Within a few months of dredging, starting within the Rip and at the mouth of the Yarra, Melbourne’s recreational heart will become a toxic, turgid swill, heavily infected with poisonous algae.
Its sands will be awash with silt and slime.
Anything left alive will be heavy with metals.
Its beaches will stink of dead fish, penguins, dolphins and seals.
Commerce and tourism will die with them.
The Victorian Government who have so carefully educated the people of Melbourne to care for our Bay are now about to destroy it.
The Federal Minister for Environment, The Hon. Peter Garrett, treacherously, served the coup de grace last week.
Legally only the Federal Court now stands in the way of this purposeless catastrophe.
So what are you, my reader, doing; hoping the dredger will sink, or the government will change its mind or the Port of Melbourne Authority will come to its senses?
No hope mate- only you, the real people of Melbourne can now protect the Bay.
Give some thought to what your personal and family response might be.
What you might do and what I suggest for a start, is meet your friends for an hour’s vigil on the beach every evening from 7.30pm to 8.30pm from now on.
Take a torch and a mirror, marvel at the return of reflecting, flickering answers as thousands of others join you from their vigil point around the Bay.
Make your light be seen that our Bay may be heard.
And take the kids so that they can at least say to their kids, that Mum and Dad tried.
Yours
Craig Forster
I replied with surprise at the coincidence. Craig understood.
Over a lifetime of initiative I have found ideas are sometimes appropriate to the times and are taken up by many both locally and worldwide immediately, others ahead of their time and for all the life they may have in the abstract cannot be made practical at the time.
They lie in abeyance until their time is ripe.
Your image and idea is obviously of its time and practical.
Where I got it from I have no idea but I can assure you the past month has been closed off to all but family. Life has been so full of family and so close to home that it could not have come from outside.
I assume it must have come through the magical ether.
Whatever, well done, your image and idea of a Bayside Vigil has certainly proved itself strong and resilient to this point.
I hope to see it reflected in the waters of Port Phillip Bay until the thought of dredging it is aborted.
All the best for the New Year and thank you.
Yours Craig
Craig’s deeply felt anguish for the Bay was further exemplified in his visions for a sculpture, entitled Vigil at Sea.
Today he writes:
The photo show a marquette for a sculpture called “The Vigil” 2.5 m 
high in bronze to be placed off Pelican Pt Mt Eliza.
It is to commemorate the passion that women have felt for the Bay since “The Process” foundered off Pelican Pt in 1892 and a vigil was held for the drowned footballers from Mornington.
Your Vigil has today sparked the same passion and sense of boding loss.
You may like to comment on my concept.
Yours Craig
This is perhaps one of the effects of living around this Bay. We on the land are embracing a large expanse of water. Beneath the surface is a Kingdom unto itself to which divers can testify.
It feels a very feminine Bay, in the shape of womb, and containing within it a rich gestating life. She is healing, nurturing, giving and supportive. And when humans sink beneath her waves, one senses she shares our sorrows.
Her child is the City of Melbourne.
I ‘see’ a writer, in another time, inspired: Stories of the Bay. Poetry and ballads have been written to her: photographers, artists and musicians have known and loved her. Collected works in offering to a Muse.
Now, we have surrounded and honored her with our Vigil of Lights.
She is to be protected. She is our Sanctuary.
* Craig Forster
Holding the space at Sorrento today, by Rhys Jones.
Lots more reports coming in. See Around the Bay
The news footage of brave Portsea lawyer Michael Moorhead, holding vigil in the Federal Court for us all and for our Bay, is poignant indeed. Challenging him, the legal team of ’silks’, (QC’s) and lawyers with an entourage of assistants. A ratio of 1:8
A tired and hot John Willis of Blue Wedges quipped on Port Philip radio yesterday aftenoon , that:
“It was like being in a scene from (the Oz classic): The Castle!”
The Blue Wedges Coalition representing business concerns and the people of Victoria (and beyond out into the greater world) were glad to see supporters and ‘lovers of the bay’ who came to sit with them in this historic hearing: the people challenging the Corporate world of the POMc and the State and Federal Governments.
The Age and AAP has the latest. See Press Page.
Stories and pics are trickling in as people who participated release the inner ‘breath’ of spirit slowly. Holding vigil requires focus and energy.
The Federal Court Judge Peter Heerey has reserved his decision which is legal talk for – he needs to think about the case. Now this is good news folks. A person who takes the time to think more deeply about a case, is to be respected. May truth, sense and vision prevail.
So we still hold vigil dear fellow lovers of PP Bay. We all need time to relax and to regenerate. Melbourne has been scorched by blazing heat. Temperatures hit 40+ C. Thousands of people headed for the healing, soothing waters and breezes of this giant water reserve.
The template is there now. People can sit on the beaches and stand at the cliff tops and hold their own vigil. This weekend, those who participated on Tuesday night, (and those who heard about it later and wished they had), can walk along the shores and marvel at the beauty that is there. Please do, and nurture the love and honouring of this Sanctuary. People have rung and emailed me asking about another Vigil and “can we keep doing it?”
You can! Individually or in small groups.
For a larger project of surrounding the Bay in a synchronised Vigil of love and honouring of the Bay? Perhaps we could extend our Vigil up the Yarra and include Westernport Bay and make this an annual event? On the January new moon each year? An evolution of the Greek festival of the ‘blessing of the waters’ ? Perhaps, this being Australia … we need to consider all waterways and lakes, dams, and oceans.
The Vision I enjoy for Melbourne and this Bay wisped around me through the hot sleepless night. I shall write about it tonight and send it in for the Sunday Age. It is a week since the Age printed the full two page story that explained so much about the Dredging Project that too few had realised. Suddenly, Melbourne understood why the call went out to the people for a Vigil Of Lights.
The information that is emerging from the Court Hearing is disturbing. The planned toxic dumps, the confirmed prediction of water levels rising, the changing of the original portfolio between application and actualisation …
The need for transparency, integrity and consideration in these major decisions which effect so much and so many – is vital to a healthy society. How can we be a democratic nation if we:
1. Do not know what is happening nor the why and wherefore.
2. Are not consulted or listened to when we do contribute?
So much to consider .
Hold vigil in your hearts.
Faith.
The seagulls knew.
Take time to read the stories and look at the amazing photos sent in by people who were there on Tuesday night. There is a banquet of love, shared concern and human spirit. Around The Bay.
Be Cool. Hilary
* Pics of Blairgowrie Pier and ‘Rose’ at Seaford on Tuesday Night.
Over 4,000 people surrounded Port Phillip Bay last night in a sacred Vigil of Lights to protect this Bay.
A flotilla of boats led by John Lawler braved the unknown and was the first to venture forth for the Vigil. They trailed along the shoreline to encourage and support the people on the shores and to honour the reefs, the fish worlds and the sea creatures beneath the waves.
Edithvale Frankston Brighton
The Purpose of this Bay Vigil arose from a heartfelt and deeply soulfelt concern for the Sanctuary that is our Port Phillip Bay.
Four weeks ago, I gathered 3 friends to help me achieve a Blessing and protective honouring of this precious marine world. We four were all horrified and deeply disturbed by the approval of the Dredging of the Bay as part of a bigger plan to restructure Melbourne into an Large Industrial Port. The Blue Wedges Coalition supported me in this, acknowledging their different task with litigation and political challenges. Different folk and different strokes yet united in our Love and concern for the huge diversity of the peoples of Melbourne, the surrounding suburbs and towns and for the marine world itself.
Although some people have felt a little strange with my very direct spiritual approach – they have gladly joined in. I honour the willingness of people to contribute in their own ways and to express their own particular spiritual preferences and beliefs in a community challenge.
Last night on the 8/01/08 on the eve of a New Moon in Capricorn, nigh on FOUR thousand people surrounded this Bay and blessed it with their presence, their love, their concern and a very real committment to do everything they could to protect it.
There were over 32 groups who registered with us , with numbers ranging from 300 to 50. In addition, smaller groups, families, friends, and lone supporters of the Vigil, were spread around the entire Bay from Ocean Grove, thru Point Lonsdale and all the way around to Sorrento.
Added into this group project, were those elsewhere who have and still do, love this Bay and who held Vigil where they were and sent their blessings to join ours.
The Bay Vigil has fulfilled its Purpose.
I watched a flock of seagulls line themselves along a sandbank and stand at attention, still and quiet for over half and hour. The flock faced the beach and watched where over 100 people had spread themselves in little groups , couples, and alone, snuggled in the sand. This happened, amidst fishermen on the pier, a crazy carnival and partying tourists at Rye foreshore. For those of you who know these birds, and their usual scavenging behaviour (especially at sunset fishing time) , you will be intrigued.
They knew.
The Bay is loved.
The Bay Vigil has been beautifully achieved.
The Bay thanks you.
What occurs now in the larger public consciousness and with this marine world – is up to you – the people. Humans have a habit of riding roughshod over and through nature on this planet with an insensitivity usually attributed to off-world aliens. I pray and hope that these days are times when the people of Melbourne, of Victoria, of Australia, and indeed, the global community, mature a little. Stewardship is our appropriate role as humans. The glitz of rampant materialism, greed, indulgent commercial production and industrial sabotage of our beautiful planet – may continue. The litigation and political games may win today, tomorrow, next week … but not for long. Eventually, naturally, people WILL realise the necessity of environmental care as an extension of the care for their own bodies and ways of living. The people who demonstrated their love for the Bay and their rejection of the Industrial Port (for Melbourne), the preparation for this ‘Grand Scheme’ involving the Dredging of the Bay, are citizens of this country. I cannot prove this, but personally, this is the tip of iceberg. The people of Australia voted for a new Government with new ideas and values. helloooo?
Tomorrow, the Bay Wedges Coalition is in the Federal Court, challenging the decision to dredge. The story of Blue Wedges is now Legend. I hold vigil for and with you. May truth and justice prevail.
Emerging from the wings is another case over the Trade Practices Act: Sue Beveridge, now a Mornington Peninsular Councillor, is concerned that the ‘deal’ is illegal. Sue was responsible for the gathering of over 50,000 signatures to create a mandate from the people.
So much rallying, support, hard work and effort from the people to have a say in these major decisions which adversely affect so many. I am personally impressed and hold a deep respect for these people’s movements that are brave to battle against incredible odds and wealthy Corporations. Is this the most efficient and productive way to administer our society? It seems to me to be extremely unfair and very stressful.
This Bay hosts a Port and the City of Melbourne with its stylish suburbs along the shores, its seaside towns, its leisure, swimming, fishing, diving, yachting, boating, jetskiing, and own incredible marine world. It provides Sanctuary to humans, animals, birds, plant kingdoms sea creatures alike. It is , in modern scientific jargon, a giant carbon sink. It is already a model for the world struggling to reconcile the human desire for creating and building civilisations, with the sustainability and nurturance of an incredbily beautiful, natural world.
Thank you St. Phillip for our Bay. Thank you to all the men, women, children, babies and pets and the supportive media – for the 2008 Bay Vigil of Lights. The human spirit is alive and well.
Press Coverage
Reports from groups and pics as they are coming in
Rye: Against the backdrop of a crazy carnival, and looking out towards the sea, a scattered peoples collected in small pools of hope. Children played. A lone woman stood at the edge of the stone wall and held Vigil for the Bay. Newcomers drifted in and out looking for a happening to quench their thirst. Some just sat or stood. Confused and saddened, ruffled by the tourist mobs that didn’t know what they had right here, right now, we looked to sea. Fishing on the pier carried on as usual. But the seagulls knew and lined the sandbank to watch the people.
Across the softening glassy horizon, the night crept close and then, bright light shone hazily in the strangest of places. Way in the distance it held then travelled East. Flotilla! Our spirits lifted. Little groups clumped amidst the darkness waved their torches to cheer on the Fisherfolk who knew and cared. Then waved torches again to the Tasman Ferry, jewel like on the velvet sea. To the West, the Peninsular was blazing. Pockets of light grew round to Mornington and then beyond and shone more brightly as darkness caped the sky.
“Why aren’t there more people?”, was repeated oft along the shore. I stopped counting at 130 as I walked the beach and greeted the tribal clans. “We’re here” I soothed. The evening finale of a guitar and a song being written – about the Bay – comforted a weary soul.
The hoons were churning up the car park because the Carnival screeching had ceased and the silence of a balmy night was too serene. The young ones from the city who had built a fire – disappeared, disgruntled at my torchlight on their escapades and wondering why these people had interfered with their night.
Yes, we did this for everyone.
Including those who do not want not to know;
for those who do not know;
for those who DO know and care;
for those who know and choose not to care.
It is done.
And the Bay says Thank You.
*Joyful Pics and postings re the Vigil have started coming in and are up on a new page : Around The Bay. It is 4. am.
*Media Release from Minister Garrett. Arrived at the timely hour just prior to the Bay Vigil. [Word doc]
World’s smallest starfish in our Bay
For the tiniest form of life to the big ships that sail its waters, this Bay is a Sanctuary, a Port, a sea bath and beautiful marine world.
Groups are gathering all around the Bay tonight, to shine their lights to show the world they care deeply about the Bay. [See Bay Vigil Locations Page]
We Australians have developed all around and on this Bay, built a City and a Port, houses, suburbs, industries and tourism. We have maintained a healthy mecca for leisure and recreation.
We have come to love and respect the diversity of sea life. We have protected and befriended penguins, seals, dolphins, whales, sea horses and fish of enormous variety. We have achieved a remarkable balance of City and Sanctuary, of Commerce and Nature.
This City is NOW a model for the world.
Tonight we shine our Lights to respect and honour that.
Tonight we ’stand on the beaches’ and ’shine on the waters’ to show the world that this is what we are and that we do NOT want this delicate balance to be wrought and wrecked for economic or political gain in the short term – at the expense of our little bit of Paradise.
Groups are creative in their plans for tonight; some will be enjoying a summer picnic by the sea; some will be contemplating and praying; some will be dancing and drumming; some will create formations with their lights in the sand to depict messages and symbols to the Skies. All will be joined in this one Vigil – to shine the Light of Sense.
To all of you preparing now to particpate and to share in this Vigil;
the Bay
says
thank you!
Shine forth little human illuminators, shine forth!
Bless the Bay.
“Only when the last tree has been cut down; Only when the last river has been poisoned; Only when the last fish has been caught; Only then will you find that money cannot be eaten.” Proverb, American Indian
Pelican dance at sunset.
Port Phillip Bay is both a Port serving the Garden and Cultural City of Melbourne AND a Sanctuary for humans and marine life alike. Boats and whales rest here on their journeys. Children play along the beaches and divers explore treasure worlds of fish, coral and seahorses. The balance is there already, a Port and a Leisure world.
This balance is precarious and the looming threat of unwise development can render our beautiful Bay into a quagmire of toxins and industry. Like Botany Bay in Sydney, what has been a haven, becomes ‘out of bounds’. We are called forth:
We shall fight them on the beaches…!
So we researched the Saints who protect the Bays and Lakes:
St. Andrew, St. Phillip and St. Peter.
We call on their help, and our own courage and will to a Vigil tomorrow evening.
A Vigil is an ancient tradition of holding steadily,
the energy of the Light, that Truth may prevail;
and of Love - for the Highest Good.
We share a Common Purpose in this Vigil, that of our Love for the Bay. Love is an intelligence and energy to which Life in this world responds. We are responding and answering the Call to be guardians and advocates for the Bay and its own marine world.
From dusk to 10 pm we shall hold our lights. Aiming them towards the dark sky of a new moon and across the waters that nurture so much life, we quietly declare our honour. We will be merging with the sea world and with each other, people standing and sitting peacefully in Vigil on the shores and in boats on the water.
Together, and alone, we declare: protect and cherish this priceless Sanctuary.
We shine our Lights for The Bay.
* Peruse our new page for Bay Vigil in the Press.
* The Bay Vigil Locations page shows where people are gathering around the Bay, from Point Lonsdale to Sorrento. The Flotilla of boats will be leaving from Mordialloc. Come one, come many, come all who care.
Guidelines for groups and individuals: Guidelines for Vigil
[*photo by Rhys Jones]
Postcards of the Mornington Peninsular: an exhibition at Oakhill Community Gallery, Jan 12th -Feb 6th. Contact is Cherie Leeden who will be at Fisherman’s Beach, Mornington.
We have added Blairgowrie, another at Brighton, Frankston, Port Arlington and Point Lonsdale to locations.
Sunday Age today 6th January 08, and we have a huge two page spread about the dredging project and the impending Court Case. Yes, people are deeply concerned and are making an impact. Well done to the Age and Blue Wedges Coalition!
The ABC 7.30 Report will be covering the Vigil for Wednesday evening program. The Geelong Advertiser is considering covering the Vigil from helicopter bird’s eye view. It will be a new moon on Tuesday so our lights will shine brightly in the darkness of the night.
Lots of groups are gathering – some large, some small. John Lawler is still scouting for more boats and sailors to form a Flotilla off Mordialloc beach and the weather looks good for Tuesday evening.
It matters that you are there and join in. The energy of us all linking in consciousness and the impact of our lights for an hour will be powerful. Holding a Vigil of Lights is a very old tradition. The Bay deserves our attention for it serves us well.
Updated locations on Get Involved Page: Wonderful!
Portsea Pier
From dusk to 10 pm on Tuesday 8/01/08 we will surround Port Phillip Bay with our love and gratitude. For an hour we shall hold that focus and send our energies across the surface and deep into the sea.
By thinking of each other as we shine our lights around the shores and on the water, we shall form a bubble of life over the entire Bay – a sanctuary for humans and seaplants, for animals and birds, for our world.
The caretakers and guardians of this Bay are our own elected government. Our ministers are entangled and cornered in a contract that was made years ago in another time.
They are afraid now and lost. They need our Light.
We can free our politicians from this contract. We can grace them the chance to withdraw without ‘losing face’, without recrimination, without punishment or scorn.
We know, too well, the need to revise and rethink that which may have seemed so right in yesteryears. We, the people of Australia, have rethought our political landscape.
Our world is changing and we are maturing as a nation. The old ways of profiteering for a few at the expense of so much and so many – we, choose differently now. We know these days, too much to ignore and pretend.
What do we need of bigger ships?
Why should we poison our Sanctuary and Marine world?
How can we bear the loss of habitat; the loss of our freedom to fish, to dive, to swim, to sail, to explore and discover; the loss of our healthy world?
These losses and 30 years of pain for our marine world cannot be perceived as gain for anything or anyone. To do so – is illusion.
We decline.
Let us grant that space for our ministers
to think again,
how to minister.
We will hold our Vigil of Light on Tuesday night.
We shall shine the Light into the Darkness.
List of locations registered is on the Get Involved page under menu.
*Update Thursday 6.00 pm: On 3AW this morning – Nick MacCallum supports dredging. Aaaaaah! He IS intending to investigate further so let him know of your views. Phone for talk back is : 03 9690 0693 from 9.00 am to 12.00 noon.
Spoke on Radio Port Phillip with Alison and Jim in their environment show. Save the Bay swimathon at Mornington on January 19th for children. Flier will be posted here tomorrow.
Will be joining 3RRR Community Couch on Monday Morning 9.30 am. In Leaders – Mornington and Frankston; Bellarine Echo; Geelong Advertiser. The wave of Lights is gathering momentum. Come one, come all! ***
We little folk feel so small as we look out there to the Government and Big Corporate power decision makers that can destroy our cherished marine world. Yet the ferry (the big white boat) is a Lover of the Bay. Anyone who has travelled on it knows how the Captain tells the travellers when the dolphins are playing in the ferry’s wake. The trip across the bay from Sorrento to Queenscliff is a treat!
This Bay is a haven – both for the sea life that thrive in it and for us humans. We saw thousands of people swimming, yachting and relishing the cool sea during this Christmas-New year holiday season. The fireworks and lights of towns, cities and villages along the shores on New Year’s Eve provided a stunning display. The beaches and sea breezes gave sanctuary to hot and tired bodies.
This is precisely why we shall shine our lights in gratitude on the shores and water on 8th January.
Our little lights, our small and larger groups, our passion and concern – these will show our honouring. The human spirit shines brightly. We know that appreciating and respecting the life within our Bay is our human responsibility.
We have new locations being posted daily -see Get Involved Page.
The media is beginning to suppport us. Bay Vigil and Blue Wedges are on 3AW just after the 11.00 news Thursday morning.
We have one week to go to call forth carriers of Light. Get everyone you know to be part of this peaceful Vigil of Light. Line the shores with lights. Be there and make a difference.
Faith.
And a very Happy New Year to ye all!
*pic of Sorrento – Queenscliff ferry by Rhys Jones.
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