Are you the one who made your lugages sir/madam? and do you know every item that is in it? eventhough to many this question seems very "stupid and unnecessary" its many times that we find things in our luggages that we didnt pack. i would like to use it to illustrate a point. in life we have many burden/ resentments that we hold that arent ours.we hate some people because we have been told by our parents that those people are our enemies. for example in Rwanda many people killed their neighbors because for some reasons the so called tutsis king used to step on a hutu to stand.this is probably a myth and even if it was true that was more th50years before the birth of the many that commited genocide!!!we hate people or groups of people for no apparent reason.
eventhough this has been a common thing in our for many generations i believe that the 21st century generation need to change we need to stop hating each other for hatred leads to more destruction and pain.
but how can we change? i believe that each person needs to do self analysis look withing you and take out the lugages that you did not make!!i believe that in order to make NEVER AGAIN NEVER AGAIN each one of us has a role to play! each one of us needs to question those prejudices that were given to you and take a step and break the barriers!!!! Get to know that boy or girl that they categorised as your enemy and only then will you be able to know that race/gender or other stereotypes says soo little about a person.
and that the goodness or badness of a person doesnt depend on his race but on his values and his heart.
break the circle
Monday, March 15, 2010
Hope
“Love comes to those who still hope even though they've been disappointed, to those who still believe even though they've been betrayed, to those who still love even though they've been hurt before.”
A lot of things have been going through my mind vis a vis forgiveness. Forgiveness is a journey but can we have forgiveness without hope?
For me I think that forgiveness is deciding that despite the wrongs that have been done in the past, I decide to not hold grudges against you and am open to a new possibility of a relationship with you. However, if people have no hope can they really forgive? I believe that they cant and this is why. Hope is that deep belief that despite the hardship that we may be enduring or that we endured in our past, that our future holds greatest things. Hope is when we decide not only to dream again but to open our hearts and minds for new possibilities that are sometimes beyond our imagination. Hope is what drives a underprivileged kid to school with no meal, no books, no school supplies but with a deep desire to see a brighter future for him and his family. Hope is what drives soldiers, freedom fighters who live in horrible conditions and live in sacrifice so that their kids might live in a better country. Hope is what keeps each human being positive despite the negative circumstances.
However, many people all over the world have lost their hope. Their hearts have been hurt so deeply that they turned cold, they have lost any desire in living and bitterness, anger drive their life. Telling these people to forgive their “enemies” would be wrong because it’s just impossible for them since their heart is not set for that! Nevertheless, I think that these people need to be given hope, they need to feel alive again and in the end forgiveness will occur.
But how can one give hope? The first way to provide hope to people is to listen to them. Listening is probably the most important tool in healing! As you listen to these people empty their hearts(without judging them) you are giving them a chance to replace their stony hearts into a flesh heart. After listening to them however I think that they also need words of encouragement, they do not need you to tell them that they are irrational, all they need is love and understanding!
I also believe that that Hope can be found into a higher being and his love.
And finally I do believe that in order to provide hope to victims there also needs to be material things. These material things are not aimed at replacing the lives of their loved ones but they are meant to ease their life to make their lives easier.
So as we provide hope for people who are experienced great hurt, we are giving them back the joy of life, the joy to live and as peace settles into their heart one day the redeeming power of forgiveness will turn their hatred into love.
A lot of things have been going through my mind vis a vis forgiveness. Forgiveness is a journey but can we have forgiveness without hope?
For me I think that forgiveness is deciding that despite the wrongs that have been done in the past, I decide to not hold grudges against you and am open to a new possibility of a relationship with you. However, if people have no hope can they really forgive? I believe that they cant and this is why. Hope is that deep belief that despite the hardship that we may be enduring or that we endured in our past, that our future holds greatest things. Hope is when we decide not only to dream again but to open our hearts and minds for new possibilities that are sometimes beyond our imagination. Hope is what drives a underprivileged kid to school with no meal, no books, no school supplies but with a deep desire to see a brighter future for him and his family. Hope is what drives soldiers, freedom fighters who live in horrible conditions and live in sacrifice so that their kids might live in a better country. Hope is what keeps each human being positive despite the negative circumstances.
However, many people all over the world have lost their hope. Their hearts have been hurt so deeply that they turned cold, they have lost any desire in living and bitterness, anger drive their life. Telling these people to forgive their “enemies” would be wrong because it’s just impossible for them since their heart is not set for that! Nevertheless, I think that these people need to be given hope, they need to feel alive again and in the end forgiveness will occur.
But how can one give hope? The first way to provide hope to people is to listen to them. Listening is probably the most important tool in healing! As you listen to these people empty their hearts(without judging them) you are giving them a chance to replace their stony hearts into a flesh heart. After listening to them however I think that they also need words of encouragement, they do not need you to tell them that they are irrational, all they need is love and understanding!
I also believe that that Hope can be found into a higher being and his love.
And finally I do believe that in order to provide hope to victims there also needs to be material things. These material things are not aimed at replacing the lives of their loved ones but they are meant to ease their life to make their lives easier.
So as we provide hope for people who are experienced great hurt, we are giving them back the joy of life, the joy to live and as peace settles into their heart one day the redeeming power of forgiveness will turn their hatred into love.
Is it the Right time?
Is it right to forgive?
Is it the right time to forgive?
Forgiveness: the new F word! Sounds so easy, but actually involves so much! For the past month, two questions have been in my mind: Is it right to forgive and Is it the right time to forgive? These questions stemmed from a series of discussions I had with friends and genocide survivors who don’t feel any need to forgive those who dehumanized them.
First, is it right to forgive? In other words, do killers deserve mercy? From childhood we are taught that when people do wrong, they must bear the consequences of their actions. We are taught that we are to repay evil with evil, and that we must have justice, justice that we deserve! We are never taught that sometimes we ought to show mercy! We see mercy as weakness, as something that uncovers our inability to respond with strength to offenses against us. But mercy is never for the weak. As Dr. Martin Luther King used to say, “It takes a lot of courage and love to be able to not respond to darkness with darkness.” The fact is, nobody ever deserves mercy. Mercy is something that can never be “deserved,” yet it is universally needed. We are all alike in that we constantly wrong others; the common bonds we share are our imperfections and (at least potentially) our forgiving love.
But can we forgive something like genocide? Should we?
Forgiveness is a gift that you give to another, yet it affects you the most! Think about it: when you hold grudges and bitterness, you are only hurting yourself! The moment you start thinking of the person that has hurt you, the poison seeps through your mind making you miserable! Your own unforgiveness destroys you, takes away your happiness. Nelson Mandela said that “unforgiveness is like drinking poison and hoping your enemy dies.”
Is it the right time to forgive? I believe that forgiveness is a very personal matter and that each person should find his/her own way to forgiveness. No one should be forced to forgive; instead, they should be given the opportunity to work through the difficult process of radical forgiveness at their own pace. Making absolute statements such as “this is not the right time to forgive” or “this is the right time to forgive” suggests that we all are the same. Not true! Each one of us must find our own way and our own pace. For some it may take a few days; for some many years. And some might never find it in their hearts to forgive.
Does the fact that you cannot forgive make you evil? No, I don’t believe that. But if we are to find healing for our hearts, we will only find it through forgiveness!
Is it the right time to forgive?
Forgiveness: the new F word! Sounds so easy, but actually involves so much! For the past month, two questions have been in my mind: Is it right to forgive and Is it the right time to forgive? These questions stemmed from a series of discussions I had with friends and genocide survivors who don’t feel any need to forgive those who dehumanized them.
First, is it right to forgive? In other words, do killers deserve mercy? From childhood we are taught that when people do wrong, they must bear the consequences of their actions. We are taught that we are to repay evil with evil, and that we must have justice, justice that we deserve! We are never taught that sometimes we ought to show mercy! We see mercy as weakness, as something that uncovers our inability to respond with strength to offenses against us. But mercy is never for the weak. As Dr. Martin Luther King used to say, “It takes a lot of courage and love to be able to not respond to darkness with darkness.” The fact is, nobody ever deserves mercy. Mercy is something that can never be “deserved,” yet it is universally needed. We are all alike in that we constantly wrong others; the common bonds we share are our imperfections and (at least potentially) our forgiving love.
But can we forgive something like genocide? Should we?
Forgiveness is a gift that you give to another, yet it affects you the most! Think about it: when you hold grudges and bitterness, you are only hurting yourself! The moment you start thinking of the person that has hurt you, the poison seeps through your mind making you miserable! Your own unforgiveness destroys you, takes away your happiness. Nelson Mandela said that “unforgiveness is like drinking poison and hoping your enemy dies.”
Is it the right time to forgive? I believe that forgiveness is a very personal matter and that each person should find his/her own way to forgiveness. No one should be forced to forgive; instead, they should be given the opportunity to work through the difficult process of radical forgiveness at their own pace. Making absolute statements such as “this is not the right time to forgive” or “this is the right time to forgive” suggests that we all are the same. Not true! Each one of us must find our own way and our own pace. For some it may take a few days; for some many years. And some might never find it in their hearts to forgive.
Does the fact that you cannot forgive make you evil? No, I don’t believe that. But if we are to find healing for our hearts, we will only find it through forgiveness!
Story telling
Young people in Rwanda and in any other post-conflict society of the world are faced with what might seem to many as an impossible task. the task of dreaming and imagining a better society that the one that they live in. as a result of history, many of their society are full of broken hearts,fear, resentment and bitterness. Young people are victims of their history. Victims because they have to bare the consequences of actions that they did not undertake. The effects of these actions still define many lives in those post conflict societies and as we are trying to rebuild our lives and society we have to deal with those consequences on a daily basis. Whether through the constant reminders of our history, like the prevailing poverty or through constraints that are imposed us by our elders. The greatest consequence of conflict is the mentality of “us” and “them” where we are constantly told that “those people” are different from us that “those people”are evil and we are good people. This ideology is one that created the conflict itself, by dehumanizing the “other” it becomes easier to commit evil deeds against them because in your eyes they are “not human”. To break this pattern of though however is a hard thing because it requires a radical and complete change of mind and heart.
However, God's gift for young minds has always been a free mind that can imagine greater things and a undivided energy to work towards that future! In order for that to change, like suggested in my last posts there’s need for Hope and faith.
But today I want to share what I believe is important in this process of change and that’s story telling. If there’s anything that separates humans from animals it’s our ability to tell stories. Humans communicate through stories. According to walter fischer humans are homo narrans. We understand our world through stories: about ourselves, about other people.
Stories have a powerful influence on us, because it’s through stories that we find meaning to our lives and our identity.
But how can stories be used to reconcile former enemies”?
The “US vs them” mentality suggests that a group of people have the same story, which is simply untrue.
Each person has stories that define them, story that shaped not only their character but their lives. And as each one of us tells our story we break away from that mentality.
Imagine for example if a child of a perpetrator of the genocide and a child of a genocide survivor sit down together and share their stories. As they share their stories it becomes easier for each one of them to see the “ humanity” in the “other” it becomes easier for them to see that admitting that the other suffered does not mean that you did not suffer too! And as they tell their stories they slowly break the walls that separated them before.
However, story telling in itself is not enough if not backed with goodness and the willingness to listen to the “other” and accepting him as a fellow human being. Story telling also require humility and courage.
So my brothers and sisters, if we truly want to change the world and make it better lets go out there and look for the “other”. The person whom you have been told to hate, the person whom you have been told to fear and talk to them and don’t worry if you are scared,” Courage is not the absence of fear but rather the judgment that something is more important than fear. The brave may not live forever but the cautious do not live at all”
Have a nice day
Rwanda: the power of forgiveness
Towson university African Diaspora with the sponsorship of the BSU is organising an event intituled "Rwanda: the Power of Forgiveness". this event which will take place on Towson Campus is part of the hope revolution where the leaders of this movement are reaching out to community and churches to explain to them what is happening in Rwanda! if you can please attend!!
Monday, March 1, 2010
Justice or Charity?
Most times when one says charity it has a negative conotation, people see charity as something that you do just because you know it's good to help people and you know give back to community etc... people complain all the times about having to give to charities.. but is helping people charity? is giving relief to people jut charity? personally i think that it's not charity it's also justice. justice is the process of making things fair and just for everyone. Helping people is not just about giving them a little coin ( by the way thats the least of things you can do so stop complaining about having to give money) but its more than that. it's creating an environment where they would be able to succeed if they are willing to work hard and sacrifice. Poverty is the greatest injustice there's in this world! how can a child spend days without a meal! that's not right. how can a kid die of hunger and disease when some of us are dying of obesity!??? that's not right!! it's not right to just sit there and complain that the world is unfair because you werent able to have the latest louis vuitton or the IPOD touch and whenever you see a video of starving kids all you do is complain about the way African governement/the west/the aid community and everyone else is not doing anything!! but the question is what are we doing? what are we doing when people in our communities suffer while we are enjoying our lives? what are we doing when we see kids/adult women and men suffering just because they never had someone to cater for them someone to just give them a hand and a small push a little word to say "everything is gonna be alright?" what are we doing for that child that has no parents but who has to look out for his brothers and sisters what are we doing to make his life more just??
it's justice not charity! It shouldnt be like that!! however complaining has never changed anything!!! we need to act!! but how when the need is so strong. Do your part, show kindness to your neighbor and those in need around you!! you may not have changed the world but you would surely change their world.
" everybody cannot do everything, but we can all do something"
REFUSE TO DO NOTHING!!
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