From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng  (Original Message)    Sent: 6/24/2006 11:27 PM
Could you forgive the unforgivable?
 
Some violations are so terrible - burying your murdered son, enduring repeated raping by kidnappers, being maimed for life by a letter bomb - that you wonder how those responsible can ever be forgiven. Yet the victims in those three cases, all featured here, have done just that. According to a group called the Forgiveness Project, such moral leaps of faith might be your only chance to move on
 
Kate Kellaway
Sunday June 25, 2006
The Observer

Forgive and forget is the glibbest association of words in the English language. The phrase slips off the tongue, as easy to say as it is hard to do. It is almost a year since the London bombings and no one will have forgotten Reverend Julie Nicholson, who resigned as an inner-city vicar because she would not preach what she could not practise. She could not forgive suicide bomber Mohammad Sidique Khan who killed her daughter, Jenny, 24. 'It is beyond my capacity to deal with,' she said. 'What is there in scripture that says a mother should forgive?'
She has never seen forgiveness as a private matter. On the contrary, she asks that forgiveness - the word and the concept - be put under a magnifying glass: 'We need openness and public debate,' says Nicholson, 'to consider the weight of the language... what do we really mean by faith and forgiveness?'
The Forgiveness Project, founded by journalist Marina Cantacuzino, is dedicated to doing just that, except that it has no religious or political agenda. It has no agenda at all apart from the brave, unfashionable wish to turn the blame culture on its head, to share the stories of people who, in extremis, have discovered that 'the only way to move on in life is to lay aside hatred and blame'. It tells of victims and perpetrators from all over the world: South Africa, America, Israel, Northern Ireland.
Understanding differences is the aim. It even includes stories where forgiveness has not been reached. There is nothing Sunday-school or trite about it: the collective impact of the stories is overwhelming. Tears came to my eyes as I read about the steep challenge of forgiveness, the moral achievement of it. In the 21st century, as Cantacuzino says, people are in danger of forgetting Mahatma Gandhi's warning that 'an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind'.
Cantacuzino deplores the 'bellicose' tendencies of the press, where vengeance strong-arms its way into print, but stories of forgiveness are rare. It was, pleasingly enough, an exceptional television news story that engendered the Forgiveness Project. A three-year-old girl, Najiyah Hussain, was killed when she was given laughing gas instead of oxygen by mistake during an operation. 'I was expecting the father to talk of litigation and retribution. Instead he walked across the room and hugged the surgeon.'
For Cantacuzino, this was a turning point. Since then The Forgiveness Project, supported by Anita Roddick, has grown from strength to strength, exhibiting internationally and running workshops in prisons and schools.
Before encountering it I would have said that some things were unforgivable. Take last week's story about the HIV-positive woman jailed for 32 months for infecting her boyfriend. She deceived him throughout their relationship. Will he forgive her? Will she forgive herself? You could be forgiven for responding with a crisp 'No' to both these questions. But the extraordinary thing is that one can never be sure. People do forgive the apparently unforgivable. Berthe Climbié, the mother of eight-year-old Victoria, who was tortured and killed by a relative who was supposed to be looking after her, explains in the boldest language: 'To be locked into a fixed attitude of retribution is to kill a child twice.'
Linda Biehl, mother of the student Amy Biehl, who was stabbed to death in South Africa, now works with two of the youths convicted of her daughter's murder (they were granted amnesty by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission). She puts it like this: 'I have come to believe passionately in restorative justice. It's what Archbishop Desmond Tutu calls "ubuntu": to choose to forgive rather than demand retribution, a belief that "my humanity is inextricably caught up in yours".'
Andrew Rice, whose brother died in the 9/11 attacks, met the mother of one of the hijackers. They wept together. He writes: 'One day I'd like to meet Zacharias Moussaoui. I'd like to say to him, "You can hate me and my brother as much as you like, but I want you to know that I loved your mother and I comforted her when she was crying".'
These stories are tremendously moving but they are complicated too. Would it be unfair to suggest that Rice's sentiment sounds precariously close to revenge? Forgiveness can be uncomfortable. It may induce squeamishness, strain, disbelief in the onlooker and, perhaps, in the forgiven. It can seem artificial. It seems to involve an emotional double-jointedness, an ability to bend backwards further than an ordinary person is designed to go. And yet, at other times, something miraculous occurs. People seem to emerge into a new landscape, a clearing where negative feelings no longer consume them. I imagine that it is not an easy place to be. They are exposed, unsupported - for revenge and hatred were, in their ugly way, crutches - but they are free.
Cantacuzino has playfully called the exhibition 'The F Word'. 'I hold on to the name because it always creates debate. But forgiveness incenses and affronts a lot of people,' she says.
Eva Kor, a Holocaust survivor, knows this better than most. She was, with her identical twin sister, used in medical experiments by Dr Josef Mengele at Auschwitz. But she has forgiven Mengele. 'I believe with every fibre of my being that every human being has the right to live without the pain of the past...' she writes. 'Some survivors do not want to let go of the pain. They call me a traitor and accuse me of talking in their name. I have never done this. Forgiveness is as personal as chemotherapy - I do it for myself.' 'Chemotherapy' is an unnerving definition: forgiveness as complicated medicine. What exactly is going on when one person forgives another? Is it something you can choose - or a gift?
Adam Phillips, writer and psychoanalyst, suggests: 'Forgiveness is not an act of will, if genuine.' He is quick to see its darker aspect: 'It puts the forgiver in an immensely powerful position. There is word magic here: the belief that if you forgive, people will be absolved of their guilt. At worst, forgiveness is a tyrannical gift: your life in my hands. You'll feel better when I forgive you.'
Marian Partington, whose sister Lucy was one of the victims of Frederick West, the Gloucester mass murderer, disengages herself from the word: 'I don't like "forgiveness". It is completely barnacled with aeons of piety. I prefer compassion: empathy with suffering.' If the word is to be used, she sees it as 'a verb not a noun. I get a bit suspicious of people who say "I have forgiven", as if it is something in the past.' The first thing she did when she heard that Lucy was one of West's victims, 20 years after she had vanished, was to make a choice. 'It was my immediate response to light a candle, and not watch the news. I made a pledge to bring something positive out of it.'
After trauma, she believes, people often experience a 'frozen silence with no words. There are no words to describe this place'. Time involves a thaw and 'acceptance' and, in Partington's case, luminous words to describe her feelings, to break the silence. It was a year before she could even think of planning a funeral. She went to the mortuary in Cardiff to hold and wrap her sister's bones. It was then that 'something shifted and I made a step towards peace'. Although brought up as an agnostic, she found herself, in trauma, turning to religious language.
Forgiveness seems religious by definition. 'Religio', after all, means to tie together again. But David Black, editor of a new book, Psychoanalysis and Religion in the 21st Century, is concerned with the way that religion complicates our sense of forgiveness: 'The Christian church has used forgiveness as if it were easy, as if we could effortlessly forgive those who cause us damage.' He says of Julie Nicholson: 'When she decided she could not forgive, my thought was it was a pity her religion had made her think she ought to forgive instantly. Forgiveness is a very long process. It is like a grief process. It is a grievance process. You have to work through rage, hatred and bitterness.'
Archbishop Tutu agrees. But he argues that holding on to hatred 'locks you in a state of victimhood, making you almost dependent on the perpetrator.' He points out shrewdly that 'to forgive is not just to be altruistic. It is the best form of self-interest'.
But there will always be those for whom forgiveness isn't possible. As Julie Nicholson points out today: 'Forgiveness is complex, not black and white. An absence of forgiveness does not automatically assume a desire for vengeance or an "an eye for an eye" mindset. Neither does it mean one is consumed with hatred or prevented from 'moving on in life' (another phrase that could do with putting under the magnifying glass)'. In a comment book at a local church in Northern Ireland where a Forgiveness Project exhibition was held, the father of a murdered Special PC wrote that he felt 'permanent loathing' for the 'evil IRA' who killed his son. 'It is easy to write in this book and express moving, humbling, inspiring sentiments,' he said. 'It is not easy to forgive and forget.'
That phrase again. Isn't it time to rewrite the cliché? Forgive and remember.
www.theforgivenessproject.com
Camilla Carr: Victim of rape
In April 1997 Camilla Carr, 45, and her boyfriend Jon James, 43, went to Chechnya to set up a rehabilitation centre for traumatised war-children. Three months later they were taken hostage by Chechnyan rebels. Their ordeal lasted 14 months, during which Camilla was repeatedly raped by one of her jailers.
'Rape is a terrible violation of a human being. I will never forgive the act, yet I can forgive the man who raped me; I can feel compassion for him because I understand the desperate place he was coming from.
That's not to say I condone what our captors did to us - the physical and psychological abuse was appalling - and if I met them now, I'd want to ask all of them: 'Did you have any idea how much you were harming us?' But I still understand the desperation that caused them to do the things they did.
As soon as we were taken hostage we decided to take the line of least resistance because our four captors were so clearly traumatised by the war. If we'd shown anger they could have reacted with violence. After several weeks one of them - an ignorant and wounded person who we named Paunch - took the opportunity to rape me. The only way I could get through this horror was by thinking to myself, 'You can never touch the essence of me - my body is only part of who I am'.
He raped me many times, but mostly I was able to cling on to this detached state of being. He always did it when he was alone and I didn't dare tell the other captors in case it gave them the idea of gang rape. This went on until I got herpes, which gave me the strength to say no. Paunch asked me to explain why. With a dictionary I shakily pointed out, 'No sex, no violence.' I couldn't take any more. He said he just wanted to be my friend! In his own way he was apologising. He stopped raping me and instead he would talk about his dreams.
We were released in September 1998. Initially I seemed to be doing well. We were basking in the euphoria of freedom and love from our family and friends. Then two months later I collapsed. I couldn't stop crying and had no energy. This lasted a few weeks, but it wasn't until 2001, when Jon and I moved to Wales, that I found the space and silence to let go and surrender to weakness and vulnerability. Only this way could my nervous system finally heal.Some of our Chechnyan friends can't understand how we can forgive. They feel tarnished with the guilt of their community. I tell them that I believe forgiveness begins with understanding, but you have to work through layers to obtain it. First you have to deal with anger, then with tears, and only once you reach the tears are you on the road to finding peace of mind.'
Marie Fatayi-Williams: Bereaved mother
After Marie Fatayi-Williams' only son, Anthony, was killed on the No 30 bus in London on 7 July 2005, her call for an end to violence made headlines across the world. A devout Catholic, she lives both in London and Lagos, Nigeria. Her husband is Muslim and they also have two daughters.
When I gave that speech just five days after Anthony was killed, I couldn't self-consciously control what was coming out of my mouth. All I knew was that God Almighty was guiding me as well as Anthony's spirit. I needed to reach out to my son and plead with those who had him to send him back to me. But, somewhere deep in my subconscious, I did have an uneasy feeling that perhaps he was no more, and if this was really the case, then I had to appeal to those out there who had done this or who had masterminded it. I wanted to say to them: 'Can't you see how deeply hurt I am? Can't you see what you've done to me and all those like me? What good or cause has been served?' People are perhaps surprised that I have no real hatred. Perhaps I'm trying to psyche myself not to feel like this, but if so it's because I know that no amount of hatred will bring Anthony back. Actually I only feel deep sorrow for those who did this and for those who actively seek out blank minds on which to imprint negativity and hatred. At first I didn't want to look at the face of Hasib Hussain, but eventually I did look ... and what I saw was just a young man. I wonder sometimes if he meant to blow up the bus, or if at some point he chickened out? If so, it means there is hope. I am confident that if he had been asked what cause he was ready to die for, he would not have been able to clearly justify such extreme action.
I never believed that I would be a victim of terrorism. Anthony was a peace-loving young man who only ever had love in his heart. He was never in support of war in any form. This is why I have set up a foundation [www.afwfoundation.org] in his name. I can't think of any other way to heal my heart and help others. You need to work hard to achieve peace. It doesn't come on a platter. Together we've got to make, have and give peace.
Anthony was my first and only son. He was supposed to be my stay in old age. So now the only way I can carry on and make my two daughters know that life doesn't end with death is to show that you cannot deliver peace by terrorism. If I could stop just one potential bomber committing a catastrophe because he felt sorry for the pain inflicted on Anthony's mum, realising the senselessness of killing innocent victims, I would bless him and Anthony's death would not have been in vain.
· Marie Fatayi-Williams' book, For the Love of Anthony, is published by Hodder & Stoughton on 6 July at £12.99. To order it for £11.99 with free UK p&p go to observer.co.uk/bookshop or call 0870 836 0885
Michael Lapsley: Maimed by a bomb
After Father Michael Lapsley was exiled by the South African government in 1976 he joined the African National Congress (ANC) and became one of its chaplains. While living in Zimbabwe he discovered he was on a hit list.
Three months after Nelson Mandela's release from prison [in April 1990] I received a letter-bomb hidden inside the pages of two religious magazines that had been posted from South Africa. In the blast I lost both hands and one eye, and had my eardrums shattered.
For the first three months I was as helpless as a newborn baby. People have asked me how I survived, and my only answer is that somehow, in the midst of the bombing, I felt that God was present. I also received so many messages of love and support from around the world that I was able to make my bombing redemptive - to bring life out of death, good out of evil.
Quite early on after the bomb I realised that if I was filled with hatred and desire for revenge, I'd be a victim for ever. If we have something done to us, we are victims. If we physically survive, we are survivors. I travelled further, going from victim to survivor to victor. To become a victor is to move from being an object of history to become a subject once more. That is not to say that I will not always grieve for what I've lost, because I will permanently bear the marks of disfigurement.
In 1992 I returned to South Africa to find a nation of survivors, but a damaged nation. Everyone had a story - a truth - to tell. I've developed a programme called the Healing of Memories. Our workshops explore the effects of South Africa's past at an emotional, psychological and spiritual level. I try to support those who have suffered as they struggle to have their stories recognised.
I haven't forgiven anyone, because I have no one to forgive. No one was charged with this crime. But if I knew that the people who sent my bomb were now in prison, then I'd happily unlock the gates - although I'd like to know that they weren't going to make any more bombs. I believe in restorative justice and I believe in reparation. So my attitude to the perpetrator is this: I'll forgive them, but since I'll never get my hands back, and will therefore always need someone to help me, they should pay that person's wages.
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/review/story/0,,1805036,00.html