sometime hopelessness and withdrawal entry Cathedral’s Centre for Reconcili-but, in other cases, a willingness to go ation ( www.coventrycathedral.org.uk),
forward by recognizing their role in the admits the church in Northern Ireland
lead-up to the conflict and has some “responsibility
a desire to search for ways for that aspect of history
During
to restore right relation- it helped stoke.” But he
The Troubles,
ships. as the Irish conflict feels it now has a different,
Though Northern Ire- is referred to . . . though no less responsible,
land has been out of the role to fill: that of speaking
churches were
media spotlight for many in the public square against
at the heart
years – and most people violence.
of every major
never want to go back to During The Troubles, as
peace initiative
the past – the potential for the Irish conflict is referred
n n n n n
conflict is still there. The to, Porter says the churches
perception that Ireland was a religious were at the heart of every major peace
struggle is not true, says David Porter, initiative and contributed “some of the
who was active in peace initiatives there most innovative dialogue.” Roman
in the late 1980s and early 1990. “The Catholic priest Alec Reid, for example,
conflict has always been more about na- pushed the constitution forward while
tional identity than religion,” he says. Presbyterian minister Roy Magee bro-
“If you understand history – and the kered the loyalists’ ceasefire. Magee be-close ties of religion and politics – it’s lieved in “direct contact with the bomb-not hard to see how the real issue of na- ers and gunmen, believing it would lead
tional identity got linked to religion.” to peace,” Porter says.
Porter, who is now director of Cov- That faith – particularly Christian –
should be at the forefront of reconciliation makes sense to Murray Cornelius,
missions director for The Pentecostal
Assemblies of Canada ( www.paoc.org).
The problem is sin – “Romans says we
exchange the truth for a lie and we are
given over to the tendencies of self that
will always divide” – so the solution
must be salvation.
“Reconciliation apart from the work
of Jesus is always going to fail,” Cornelius says, “because reconciliation is primarily the work of God who reconciles
all things to himself … the church brings
opportunities to forgive and lament that
you don’t find in secular attempts.”
It’s certainly what veteran CBC
journalist Brian Stewart saw in 40 years
covering conflict zones. Addressing the
2004 graduating class at Knox College,
Toronto, he said he was never able to
“reach the front lines without finding
Christian volunteers already in the thick
of it, mobilizing
congregations that
Repairing a Broken Relationship
When hurt damages a relationship, a simple “I
forgive you” is unlikely to fix everything. Dr. Wanda
Malcolm outlines the elements that contribute to
a successful reconciliation process.
By Wanda Malcolm
The heart of the good news of the gospel is that faith in Jesus’
life, death and resurrection restores us to a right relation-
ship with god. Those who welcome the good news are
called to embody that reconciling love and grace to those around
them in order that the whole world may be reconciled to him.
unfortunately, repairing a relationship damaged by interpersonal
hurt usually takes more than simply deciding to forgive and saying
the words “i forgive you,” even when both parties want healing.
when we have been hurt by someone we trusted, we have to
care enough to work toward a more fully realized forgiveness. This
can be represented by the acronym I CaRE: Identify, Cultivate,
accept, Relinquish, Experience.
fully realized forgiveness requires that those who have been
hurt figure out the core of what they hold against the person who
hurt them – that they identify and find words to describe what
was hurtful and exactly what needs to be
forgiven. how personal this is became clear
to me as i worked with a client. she told me:
“as hard as it was to forgive my husband for
having an affair, it was harder still to forgive
him for being impatient about how much
time i needed to grieve the loss of trust i
had taken for granted before the affair.”
a deeply hurt person will have to culti- wanda Malcolm
vate compassionate understanding of the
offender. forgiveness also requires that the hurt person accept
what happened and stop fighting against the unfairness of it.
paradoxically, achieving greater understanding and accept-
ance can lead to the realization that safety and trust are impossible
in a particular relationship. a man who comes to understand his
father’s rage may forgive his father for the abuse he endured as a
child but, if the father continues to give in to hurtful rage, the son
may have to give up the hope that his father will some day give
him the steadfast love and affirmation he longs for.
understanding and acceptance allow the hurt person to
relinquish any sense of entitlement to hold a grudge, seek revenge or demand an apology – and instead find the grace to
want what is best for the injurer. often the only way to do this is
to experience (often more intensely and for much longer than is
comfortable) the anger, pain, sadness and possibly shame that
comes with being hurt by someone we trusted.
