Distinctions
Having asked a question about memorialization to a class not that long ago, I continue to ponder the distinctions.
For example, what is the distinction between "lest we forget" and "make them remember". I'm thinking of the annual memorial services in Rwanda every April, where in some cases, Hutu are asked to stand next to the Tutsi who forgave them and recall and reiterate their deeds. The story I tell myself is that two harms are occurring here - the one who forgave gains some sort of false sense of nobility while the one who is forgiven gains another real dose of shame.
Forgiveness is something I think about a lot. And I've said this before - there is a distinction between my deigning to forgive because it benefits me, as if taking the high road renders me better than. But that was and is never what forgiveness was meant to be. I still can't help thinking that forgiveness is intended to release the offender from shame, return them their dignity and make them human again, so that we can go forward, together, reconciled. If forgiveness is about my therapy or noble high road action, then I still see the one I've forgiven as lesser than, or nothing but, and there can be no reconciliation. The relationship - no - the people in it, must be transformed. My enemy transforms to my friend because of forgiveness, but a mutually reciprocal forgiveness, because there remains the question, "what might I have done to cause them to become my enemy?" Of course, in this vein, I'm not talking about those situations where the offender holds all the power and the victim is truly innocent, like a child or victim of violent crime, domestic abuse, etc. What I'm talking about here are situations where the parties involved hold relatively equal power, or have been living out of a tit for tat existence with one another.
For authentic reconciliation to occur, there must be a full examination of both sides, including their respective contributions, as well as a full ownership by both sides for those contributions. The contributions are not to be measured as one owning more or less than the other - it doesn't matter!! The end result is the same with the ultimate sin being the kind of hatred that can only be defined as murder in the heart...at that point, wrong is wrong.
It's the comparison of wrongs that keeps tripping us up, as if my sin is not as bad as yours, but tell that to a God who makes no such distinctions. Sorry, bunny trail that...
There must also be a mutual accountability, mutual acknowledgement of contribution, and mutual confession, and only then can there be a fully sustainable mutual forgiving and reconciliation.
So, as it pertains to Rwanda, some might say, "but what wrong do the Tutsi own?" or "no matter what wrong they may have done, it does not justify genocide" - and THEY'D BE RIGHT. NOTHING justifies genocide. What happened to the Tutsi in 1994 was tragic and despicable, just like what happened to the Hutu in Burundi in 1972 was tragic and despicable. Both peoples have harmed and been harmed, and it would seem that in order for reconciliation to be authentic and truly work, the truth telling must be reciprocal.
In my mind, memorialization is risky for reconciliation because so long as one group holds the other down with officially sanctioned memorials where they are compelled to retell the story over and over again, re-shaming occurs. That will serve to keep alive the distrust, anger, contempt and hatred that contributed in the first place.
The reconciliation that officials purport to exist is only as real as the official forgiveness offered to attain it.
For example, what is the distinction between "lest we forget" and "make them remember". I'm thinking of the annual memorial services in Rwanda every April, where in some cases, Hutu are asked to stand next to the Tutsi who forgave them and recall and reiterate their deeds. The story I tell myself is that two harms are occurring here - the one who forgave gains some sort of false sense of nobility while the one who is forgiven gains another real dose of shame.
Forgiveness is something I think about a lot. And I've said this before - there is a distinction between my deigning to forgive because it benefits me, as if taking the high road renders me better than. But that was and is never what forgiveness was meant to be. I still can't help thinking that forgiveness is intended to release the offender from shame, return them their dignity and make them human again, so that we can go forward, together, reconciled. If forgiveness is about my therapy or noble high road action, then I still see the one I've forgiven as lesser than, or nothing but, and there can be no reconciliation. The relationship - no - the people in it, must be transformed. My enemy transforms to my friend because of forgiveness, but a mutually reciprocal forgiveness, because there remains the question, "what might I have done to cause them to become my enemy?" Of course, in this vein, I'm not talking about those situations where the offender holds all the power and the victim is truly innocent, like a child or victim of violent crime, domestic abuse, etc. What I'm talking about here are situations where the parties involved hold relatively equal power, or have been living out of a tit for tat existence with one another.
For authentic reconciliation to occur, there must be a full examination of both sides, including their respective contributions, as well as a full ownership by both sides for those contributions. The contributions are not to be measured as one owning more or less than the other - it doesn't matter!! The end result is the same with the ultimate sin being the kind of hatred that can only be defined as murder in the heart...at that point, wrong is wrong.
It's the comparison of wrongs that keeps tripping us up, as if my sin is not as bad as yours, but tell that to a God who makes no such distinctions. Sorry, bunny trail that...
There must also be a mutual accountability, mutual acknowledgement of contribution, and mutual confession, and only then can there be a fully sustainable mutual forgiving and reconciliation.
So, as it pertains to Rwanda, some might say, "but what wrong do the Tutsi own?" or "no matter what wrong they may have done, it does not justify genocide" - and THEY'D BE RIGHT. NOTHING justifies genocide. What happened to the Tutsi in 1994 was tragic and despicable, just like what happened to the Hutu in Burundi in 1972 was tragic and despicable. Both peoples have harmed and been harmed, and it would seem that in order for reconciliation to be authentic and truly work, the truth telling must be reciprocal.
In my mind, memorialization is risky for reconciliation because so long as one group holds the other down with officially sanctioned memorials where they are compelled to retell the story over and over again, re-shaming occurs. That will serve to keep alive the distrust, anger, contempt and hatred that contributed in the first place.
The reconciliation that officials purport to exist is only as real as the official forgiveness offered to attain it.
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