At Waitangi, last Thursday he railed against immigrants and also suggested: "We should drain the Wellington bureaucratic swamp".

The Destiny Church leader was described in the Waitangi Day service schedule booklet as an 'Apostle Bishop'.

Tamaki had arrived with about 200 supporters, including his wife, Hannah.

Initially, his supporters were not allowed into the Waitangi Grounds.

Police were concerned about them causing trouble, but they were eventually allowed to enter.

Tamaki spoke for about half an hour to the crowd of about 1500 people at an interdenominational service at Whare Runanga on the Upper Treaty Grounds.

Te Tai Tokerau Anglican Bishop Te Kitohi Pikaahu had invited Tamaki to speak.

It was the first time he had been invited to participate in the service and was given the honour of delivering a sermon while others did shorter readings.

One of the most inflammatory comments was Tamaki's likening of immigrants to "termites and parasites" that "totally consume the host".

He suggested immigrants coming to New Zealand were pushing Pakeha and Maori out of their homes.

His comments were greeted by cheers from his supporters who were wearing t-shirts promoting the church's Man Up parenting kaupapa and Vision NZ, the new political party fronted by Hannah Tamaki.

The bishop blasted the Government for "selling off the country" to foreign powers - making multiple references to China - and said it's time to take New Zealand back.

His remarks have met with almost universal condemnation.

Race Relations Commissioner Meng Foon - who attended the Waitangi Day dawn service - described Tamaki's comments as shocking and utterly false

Labour MP Willie Jackson saying he needed a "slap across the ears".

Senior National MP Judith Collins also condemned the comments.

Source

• newshub.co.nz
• newshub.co.nz
• nzherald.co.nz
• waateanews.com
• Image: Screenshot nzherald.co.nz

Dew, the Archbishop of Wellington, urged New Zealanders to recommit to protecting the beliefs of followers of all religions and of non-religious people.

Preaching at the interdenominational church service at Waitangi on Thursday, Dew recalled the Christchurch mosques massacre last March and said New Zealand's tradition of religious freedom was first affirmed at the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi in 1840.

"It is time to recommit ourselves to protecting the faiths of all who live here - of Maori custom and spirituality, of the different Christian denominations, of Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists, Baha'i and many other faiths.

And also the freedom of religion and conscience of those who profess no faith," Cardinal Dew told the service, at Te Whare Runanga.

Dew said much discussion in recent years focused narrowly on whether New Zealand was a secular country where religion was not part of the public sphere; or whether it was a Christian country where only one form of public prayer should be privileged.

But our heritage was religious tolerance, religious inclusion and religious acceptance.

"I am a Christian, I preach Christ, who offers and brings salvation to all humanity," he said.

"Christians do not want to be less than we are; we do not want to be silenced or marginalised; to be told that the faith that gives us life is just a private matter.

Neither do we want any other religious group, or people of goodwill who do not identify with any religion, to be marginalised, silenced or told their beliefs are only private matters."

At the signing of the Treaty at Waitangi in 1840, Bishop Jean Baptiste Pompallier - the first Catholic Bishop of New Zealand - asked the representative of the British Crown, Captain William Hobson, for religious freedom to be respected.

Hobson formally affirmed: "Ko nga whakapono katoa i Ingarani, o nga Weteriana, o Roma, me te ritenga Maori, e tikanga ngatahitia e ia - the several faiths of England, of the Wesleyans, of Rome and also Maori custom shall alike be protected."

"Here at Waitangi on 6th February 1840 there was a hope, wishes, a vision of what Aotearoa New Zealand could be," said Cardinal Dew, adding that religious freedoms were also affirmed in the first debate in the new colonial Parliament in 1854.

Click here to read the full text of Cardinal Dew's Homily

Source

• Supplied: David McLoughlin
  Communications Adviser, NZ Catholic Bishops
  Te Huinga o nga Pihopa Katorika o Aotearoa
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Our first stop was St John's church in Te Awamutu, Waikato's oldest building. It was built to serve the mission station established there at Otawhao pain 1841. The community thrived, and its agriculture prospered. Read More

Fears of a sizeable protest from anti-TPPA protesters at the annual Ratana Church celebrations in January did not materialise.

But several speakers made reference to the deal and how it could affect New Zealanders.

A number of forcefully expressed misgivings about the free trade deal and urged the Government to delay its signing, until it is discussed more thoroughly with Kiwis.

After fielding criticism, the prime minister John Key responded with an impassioned address about his support for Maori which drew heckles from some in the crowd.

Mr Paraone, who is also a New Zealand First MP, said fiery outbursts from local elders on Waitangi Day always attracted attention but they gave the annual festival a bad rap.

Mr Paraone said people tend to confuse the political shenanigans at the marae on 5 February with Waitangi Day itself, which had for many years now been a peaceful day of ceremony and entertainment.

The organising committee generally received about $80,000 from the government to run the official programme, but he believed the Crown might be more generous if the marae did not repeatedly make unfriendly noises in the lead up to Waitangi Day.

Although the marae got a small amount of that funding to cover the costs of entertaining official guests, including the Governor-General, the Navy and the Crown, it also relied heavily on volunteers to provide food and service the needs of the manuhiri from 4-6 February.

Source

• radionz.co.nz
• stuff.co.nz
• Image: stuff.co.nz

There is choir practice the night before at 7.30pm at Sacred Heart Cathedral.

It's a great time, under the direction of Robert Oliver (St Mary of the Angels Music Director) to learn the Latin parts of the Mass and also to learn a sung version of the Our Father in te reo Maori.

Nau mai, haere mai ki te tautoko

Ma te Atua e manaaki e tiaki e arahi hoki i nga wa katoa

Supplied

At the Service, overseen by Bishop Kito Pikaahu, Key lead the congregation in prayer thanking the nations forefathers for their "courage to come together and sign the Treaty."

He honoured the work of New Zealand's police, firefighters and military.

The Prime Minister paid tribute to the memory of Parekura Horomia. He said Horomia would be remembered "for the beaming smile and the beauty of the human spirit he had"

"We pray that 2014 will be a prosperous, happy but mostly safe year," Key said.

Labour leader David Cunliffe began his prayer asking that God bless "the young, the old, the wet and the dry" which earned chuckles from the dozens standing in the rain outside the whare.

Green Party Co leader also offered a prayer

Te Ururoa Flavell spoke in Te Reo for the Maori Party, and Mana leader Hone Harawira elected not to speak.

NZ First leader Winston Peters' name was read out as one of the speakers, but he was not there. He later told 3 News he had not been invited to speak and had conflicting interview commitments.

Prayers were also offered from the Defence Force and on behalf of foreign diplomats.

Waitangi Day is New Zealand's national day and commemorates the signing of Treaty at Waitangi in 1840 between Queen Victoria and Maori, the indigenous people of Aotearoa New Zealand.

Source

• New Zealand Herald
• Stuff.co.nz
• 3News
• Image: TVNZ

"There are events happening all around the country which are about celebration... I think there's a whole lot of New Zealanders that are celebrating."

He says that while he thinks there is "a huge racial harmony" in New Zealand, there are issues that need to be addressed.

There are people with genuine reasons for wanting to say: 'Hey look, do you understand what happened to us over the course of our history?'"

"I think it's to the credit of successive governments that they have stood up and are addressing those," he said.

There is still conflict and much to work on, he says, but Waitangi Day is a time and a place where these issues can be aired and discussed.

The Maori-Crown relationship is deteriorating in the eyes of the public. A UMR Research poll commissioned by the Human Rights Commission has found fewer than a quarter of New Zealanders agree the relationship is healthy.

The numbers have fallen for the fifth straight year.

Source

• TVNZ
• The New Zealand Herald

The British are known for their abstemious ways with alcohol, and the respectful way they behave on, for example, soccer grounds.

They may be known for their steady drinking at neighbourhood pubs, their homes way from home, where they down pints while eating whatever's curled up in the warming cabinet, but goodness knows they'd never chunder on Westminster Abbey, or pee outside a pub. They only riot.

What better time could there be than our national holiday to remind us of their gentler introductions to this country?

Alcohol was among those; early descriptions of the carry-on in the Bay of Islands, fuelled by booze, depict a Saturnalia that would astound even us today. And think of the Treaty itself, a pact with Maori made by the British in the name of Queen Victoria, but soon flung somewhere out of sight for rats to gnaw.

Those land-grabbing acts by our founding fathers are with us today in the annual Waitangi Day demonstrations.

There are sour memories, actually, in all Britain's former colonies, where indigenous people got a raw deal - but why pee on their footpaths? It's so disrespectful.

I was in London recently. Their great Trafalgar Square was looking tired and tatty, and I noted how many of their memorials and statues had to do with one war or another.

But they also brought us the neighbourly art of curtain- twitching, fine china, the Church of England, Oasis and the Rolling Stones, so we should go easy on them.

Labour leader David Shearer put his finger, metaphorically speaking, on why we should be gentle with each other, too, on our national day, observing that: "Often we don't realise how lucky we are until we are on our OE or travelling offshore on holiday."

Few Ngapuhi are able to enjoy that experience, being mired in poverty, but what a nice thought. Read more

Sources

• Rosemary McLeod in The Press
• Image: International Business Times