A few years ago, I watched an interview with Bishop Desmond Tutu on the Bill Moyers show, talking about forgiveness and reconciliation in South Africa. How he explained forgiveness was not taught in the Catholic school I attended, or in any other studied religious or spiritual teachings. Forgiveness is taught, but not in those words. This is an attempt to present forgiveness in Bishop Tutu’s words.
To make this brief, Bishop Tutu told Bill Moyers that when someone hurts you, you have the right to avenge or retaliate. That means you hold on to the hurt, and maybe even let the hurt become hate. This in turn, develops into a vendetta or blood feud, which happened in South Africa, where he was bishop and archbishop. Bishop Tutu said that when you decide to forgive, you give up the right to get even and let it go. It does not mean the perpetrator was right, it just means you acknowledge the harm, tell the other you forgive and let it go. How simple that is, to free yourself from holding on and freeing the other, thereby stopping the vendetta or karma. In South Africa, the people faced each other, acknowledged what they did, and asked for and received forgiveness. This enabled the nation to heal and move forward. This was shown on the interview, and was profound.
To quote him:
“Without forgiveness, we remain tethered to the person who harmed us. We are bound with chains of bitterness, tied together, trapped. Until we can forgive the person who harmed us, that person will hold the keys to our happiness; that person will be our jailor. When we forgive, we take back control of our own fate and our feelings. We become our own liberators. We don’t forgive to help the other person. We don’t forgive for others. We forgive for ourselves.” Quoted from: Forgiving: The Fourfold Path for Healing Ourselves and Our World, by Desmon Tutu and Mpho Tutu. Harper One, 2014). To read the full article go here: http://www.dailygood.org/story/688/desmond-tutu-on-why-we-forgive-desmond-tutu-and-mpho-Tutu/.
He offers four steps to forgiving and healing:
- Telling the Story
- Naming the Hurt
- Granting Forgiveness
- Renewing or Releasing the Relationship
To read these four points explained, go here: http://religionnews.com/2014/08/25/desmond-tutu-forgiveness-apartheid/
The hardest one to forgive may be one’s self. Can we acknowledge we did something we think is wrong, and let it go? Would that heal? It is worth a try.
To comment or begin a dialogue, email Patty at:
maria@maria-grace.com.
This article is on the Insights page of maria-grace.com, and is saved on the blog:
mariagrace22..blogspot.com, along with previous articles.
