For the first time in three years, Australia’s Hellenes can celebrate Easter without coronavirus restrictions, even though the caution remains especially amongst the elderly in our community.
Sadly, this Easter will see many Greek Australian families and expats struggle, with poverty and loneliness on the rise.
Fortunately, the Easter table for underprivileged expatriates has once again been provided by the Welfare Centre of the Archdiocese of Australia.
“The number of people who have asked us for help this year is up 10 per cent” Yannis Pilalidis from the Welfare Centre of the Archdiocese of Australia told Neos Kosmos.
“In fact, for the first time this year we are not only being asked for food, but also for money,” Pilalidis added.
According to Pilalidis, requests are coming from people of all ages.
“About 30 per cent are elderly people who have children involved in gambling or drugs. The rest are families and women and here the problem is the same: drugs and gambling.”
While in previous years a large portion of the underprivileged members of the community were the so-called “newcomer Greeks”, Pilalidis added, this year’s statistics hold another surprise.
“Only one year, at the beginning of the pandemic, we had requests from newcomers. Today these people are coming to help our fellow human beings who are suffering.”
“The Welfare Center recognises the tremendous need to support our fellow human beings affected by poverty and has collected food to distribute during the Easter holidays to Greek Australians with serious socio-economic problems.”
It is worth noting that the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia offers assistance to many families in the wider community “not just Greeks or Orthodox, but all of them” throughout the year.
