Hard Questions

One of our new friends just left our house … and left us with hard questions, left our hearts and minds talking. I don’t even remember how we started talking about it, but it was about the genocide and whether reconciliation is useful or pointless – and really what reconciliation and forgiveness are.

The genocide is not talked about here. People don’t even talk about whether they were/are Tutsi or Hutu. It’s a strategy of the government to help with keeping the peace in Rwanda and possibly one day expelling the prejudice and hatred that has existed in Rwanda between tribes for generations. You are not to call or consider yourself Hutu or Tutsi, but simply Rwandan. Unfortunately, its going to take generations to get the point where there truly is peace and forgiveness … but its happening. This friend is among the first generation to be dealing with the after-effects of the genocide and taking the necessary first steps to real reconciliation.

So what does that reconciliation look like? And when does reconciliation and forgiveness really happen? And can it happen just like that? And when it does happen, how do you know it really, truly has happened? Can there be different kinds of forgiveness? I had never thought of it before, but its something I’m still thinking about tonight. Julie mentioned that you can forgive someone so you don’t have to face it, but then you can also forgive and it truly be forgiveness. Someone can say they’ve forgiven someone, but really its just so they don’t have to face them or the issue. Can you forgive someone in your head, but not in your heart? But then, sometimes I wonder if it’s a matter of knowing what you are suppose to do and wanting to do it and thinking about it so much so that it finally happens – that your heart finally catches up with your mind. A lot of the time my head and heart aren’t in line with each other. My head might know something, but it takes a while for my heart to believe it. Or my heart might know something, and I find that I have to justify it to my head.

I also think forgiveness is a process. And its not something that can be done overnight. Some people might disagree. And maybe in some cases, you are able to forgive in the moment. But I’ve found myself that if its really, truly forgiveness, it has to happen over a long period of time for me. I need time to heal. And time to remember and recognize my love for the person. And time to allow that love to outweigh the hurt and anger that I’m trying to let go.

That’s another thing I wonder … what if you were living amongst people who killed your family? Could you do it? Could you live under the same roof? There are people that do. They live and work with people who murdered their families. Or whose families killed their families. What if I fell in love with a man, and later discovered his family was the one that killed my loved one? Would my love for him be strong enough to figure out how to live with his family and exist in the world with them? Or would my hatred and hurt win? I like to think the former would be the case, but I really can’t know because it’s a situation that’s so far from my comprehension that its hard to be able to guess what I’d do. But if I know myself the way I think I do, I think the love would win. Would it win for you? Should it win for us as Christians?

And should we forgive as Christians so much so that we are living with those who hurt us? Are we humanly able to? (stealing these thoughts from one of my fellow interns) Some would say we are called to forgive no matter how it hurts or what it does to us, to forgive completely and “perfectly” … but then you also have to think about the fact that we are not perfect and therefore could never attain the level of perfect forgiveness we are called to give. Jesus is in the only perfect being … so can that perfect forgiveness happen?