"Courageous people do not fear forgiving for the sake of peace." - Nelson Mandela
Hearing an eighty-five-year-old man describing what it was like for he and his family to be forcibly re-located was difficult. Walking around the District Six Museum in Cape Town and reading the first-hand testimony of countless others who had the same experience in South Africa was more difficult. Reading the words of Nelson Mandela above - a man jailed for twenty-seven years for resisting the ludicrous laws the nation of South Africa imposed on him and every other non-white person beginning in 1948 - reminded me how far I still must travel to become a person of grace.
I cannot begin to imagine what might have been in my heart had I been forced to endure what black people in South Africa did under apartheid. But I'm reasonably sure I would not have evolved into a man anything like Mandela. Perhaps the time I spent listening to this morning's lecture and then reading the testimony of others forced to live with the horror of apartheid might get me within striking distance of that kind of grace.
Beautifully said. I too wonder how I would have been able to open my heart in such a way and not be bitter and/or hateful towards my oppressors. I still have work to do!
ReplyDeleteInes; Thanks for your comment and positive feedback. Sorry for delay in responding; been off the grid. I'm hoping to now get a few days in a row while in Namibia when I can publish some posts before returning to no Wi-Fi. Stay tuned.
DeletePat,
ReplyDeleteBeautifully written and said ... By Mr. Mandela of course. But I also appreciate and share your thoughts on this terrible time in anyones life. Vengeance, revenge ... I could go on I guess, but it also shows that I too, as Ines also shared, have work to do.
Be well
Bob
Bob; Thanks for the comment and positive feedback. We all have work to do, my friend. Mandela's example has shown so many the way.
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