LESSON LightofRestorationPeace,WorldCulture,Heavenly 27 FORGIVING OTHERS LESSON OBJECTIVES 1 Understand the meaning of forgiveness and the relationship between forgiveness and peace. 2 Understand the need for forgiveness through a variety of cases. TERMS TO KNOW • Forgiveness • Reconciliation • Apartheid
Everyone experiences being unfairly treated or having their feelings hurt in big or small ways throughout their lives. Some even experience being attacked by another person, which results in them or their loved one being hurt or dying. At times like this, people want to take revenge to pay back how much they’ve been hurt. These feelings are not wrong and are natural reactions of our hearts. Certain matters should have laws and principles of punishing the assailant to prevent such things from happening again. However, apart from legal punishment, there is a different method stemming from the heart that we can choose to use towards the assailant. It is forgiving.Forgiving someone begins by admitting that I am also an incomplete person who is capable of inflicting pain and hurting others. Just as others have hurt me, I have probably hurt and inflicted pain upon others. If people surrounding me did not forgive me of my mistakes and decided to take revenge for every single one of my mistakes, how unfortunate would that life be? It does not make sense to expect others to forgive me when I am unable to forgive others. For me to be forgiven by another, I must also become someone who covers inadequacies of others and forgives their small mistakes and wrong doings. Furthermore, to forgive, I must know that the other person’s wrongdoing may not be ill intended. Typically, we have the tendency to think that when someone does us wrong, that it was done intentionally. We think “Why would they do that? What a terrible person! I am going to hurt them back because they hurt me.” However, when we wrong another person, we tend to write it off as it having been unavoidable or done within reason. Of course, with explicit crimes such as wars, murders, sexual assaults, or scams, there should be definitive punishments based on the law. Close supervision and direction are also necessary to ensure that such things do not repeat themselves. However, in most situations, the
Forgiveness and Peace
2 27. Forgiving Others
27. Forgiving Others 3 mistakes that happen within personal relationships are often mistakes that resulted from complex circumstances and the momentary loss of control over one’s emotions rather than with malicious intent. It is the same situations that cause me to make the same mistakes to others in the past. Regarding these situations, we need a bigger heart of understanding that will open the road to forgiveness. Why do we need to forgive? It is because when violence is repaid with violence, violence will never cease in the world. We need to choose a different approach and cut the chain of this vicious cycle. If we repay hate with hate, anger with anger, and resentment with resentment, what will become of this world in the end? The past has already passed, and we cannot take back our history. However, we can take a difference stance on how we view our history and past. We can also choose a different approach consisting of not bearing grudges against others for their wrongdoings in the past and choosing to not retaliate, but to choose to forgive instead. We are all called to put an end to the wrong customs of the past and to begin a new world of peace with forgiveness. Forgiveness of Kim Phuc Kim Phuc was hiding with her family at a Caodai Temple on June 8, 1972, during the Vietnam War. Then, just a few seconds after hearing the voices of soldiers saying, “Get out of the field!”, napalm bombs flew towards the temple, and the entire village was suddenly engulfed by orange flames. The napalm bomb flames caught on Kim Phuc’s left arm on her cotton clothes. In fear, Kim Phuc desperately ran through the streets, throwing her clothes off, and then passed out. At that moment, Huynh Cong Ut, a photographer at the Associated Press, photographed the scene. Kim Phuc was invited to speak at the Veterans Memorial in Vietnam on Memorial Day in May 1996. She spoke of forgiving those who bombed the village and overcoming the pain of the past
The audience in attendance cried together and applauded after witnessing this heart-wrenching moment of forgiveness requested and forgiveness given. (This speaks of personal forgiveness, not forgiveness between nations.)
South Africa ‘Truth and Commission’Reconciliation
The word ‘apartheid’ means racism that occured in South Africa. Black people were restricted from entering white areas and moving from one section to another without a certified pass. Resident registration records allowed ethnic information to be recorded, and marriages between different races were strictly prohibited. There were 17 different Figure 27-1 The Terror of War, Phan Thi Kim Phuc running down a road after a napalm bomb
4 27. Forgiving Others in the name of peace. During her speech, John Plummer, a bomber pilot during the war, was present. When Kim Phuc’s speech concluded, John jumped out of his seat, went towards her, and confessed. “It was me. I was the pilot who bombed the village 24 years ago. I am sorry. I am very sorry.”
27. Forgiving Others 5 educational systems by race, so black people had to receive lowerquality education compared to other races. There were also beaches, buses, and hospitals that were available according to race. In Cape State, people of color were also deprived of voting rights. On March 21, 1960, near Johannesburg in Sharpville, police fired guns at protesters against apartheid, resulting in 69 deaths and 289 injuries.Nelson Mandela was arrested in 1962 on charges of treason while fighting against apartheid policy and was sentenced to life in 1964. He was released from prison in 1990, and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1993. Then the next year, he was elected South Africa’s first black president in 1994. Since then, South Africa has come to the point of punishing racist criminals. The South African government took the most difficult path, which was reconciliation and formed a “Truth and Reconciliation Committee.” During the apartehied, there were perpetrators of state violence who suppressed black people’s fight against racial discrimination by burning and firing squad. The Truth and Reconciliation Committee granted amnesty to these perpetrators if they sincerely confessed and repented of their sins. Because of this, they received statements from more than 20,000 people, who appeared at televised hearings and testified courageously. The perpetrators confessed to making a solemn apology for their human rights violations. That alone brought comfort upon countless people.Bishop Desmond Tutu, who was chairman of the “Truth and Reconciliation Committee,” stressed that forgiveness is not about turning a blind eye to or watching past events, but about dealing with past affairs thoroughly to prepare for a new beginning. There is no future unless you forgive and reconcile, so we must become a people who forgive, reflect, and reconcile themselves. Through the work of the committee, Tutu perceived that evil is clearly present everywhere, but humans have the amazing ability to do good, and that is why they can hope even in the most difficult circumstances.
6 27. Forgiving Others The Truth and Reconciliation Committee, ending its activities in October 1998, posted five reports of 3,500 pages to President Mandela. The report has become an official memory of the national community and a human rights textbook that has been distributed to all school libraries and public institutions. The Truth and Reconciliation Committee left a very important mark in the history of overcoming human violence. Figure 27-2 Nelson Mandela
27. Forgiving Others 7 Reviewing the Lesson 1 What perspective do we need in order to forgive others? 2 Why is forgiveness necessary to create a peaceful world? 3 What kind of war was Kim Phuc bombarded with? 4 What is the term used for racism in South Africa? 5 What did the South African the Truth and Reconciliation Committee do? Activities 1 Discuss about the times when I have forgiven others and when others have forgiven my mistakes. 2 Let’s share our thoughts perceived from the above examples of forgiveness. 3 Find and present good examples of forgiveness in the history of each country.
Lesson27. Forgiving Others 5th floor 20, Nambusunhwan-ro 347-gil, Seocho-gu, Seoul, South-Korea Tel. +82 02-514-1963 Fax. +82 Thehwpl@hwpl.krhttp://www.hwpl.kr02-514-1961firsteditionon31 July 2022 Published by Heavenly Culture, World Peace, Restoration of Light Copyright 2022 Heavenly Culture, World Peace, Restoration of Light All rights reserved. You must get consent from a copyright owner to use all or parts of the contents of this book. Image Credits Figure 27-1 https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/ba/The_Terror_of_War.jpg Figure 27-2 From Wash D.C. Longworth building October 4, 1994. Mandela’s first trip to the United States, John Mathew Smith, CC BY-SA https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Nelson_Mandela_1994.jpg2.0,
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