Belfast Reconciliation Consultation
We were walking through Belfast in September, listening to stories of systemic hatred and very little reconciliation. We were listening for hope and had a fair amount of pain when a majority of the stories told, seemed to have a cynical twist, laced with a cloud of despair.
A few weeks later I was back in Seattle away from the Belfast "Troubles" and was asked to share my musings from Belfast with Father Treacy, a Roman Catholic priest who had joined us for the consultaion. As I prepared to share my observations the reality of division and despair struck me. The Belfast experience did have an impact on me!It was much deeper than I had imagined. I was becoming painfully aware that I needed a great deal of reconciliation deep within my bones and that any movement toward God's peace in our personal lives and our communities would require reconciliation beyond our normal paltry attempts. I began to recognize that broken relationships go through a series of downward steps and that to heal these broken relationships we have to retrace our downward path, reverse our course and start the long journey upward, against the strong and emotional currents.--Jon Sharpe More on Reconciliation
Roman Catholic Priest, Father Treacy, Dr. John Perkins, Dr. Jon Sharpe,
and the Lord Mayor of the Northern Ireland City of Lilburn.
Simon Wiesenthal, The Sunflower: On the Possibilities and Limits of Forgiveness. Schocken Books, 1997. Begins with the story of a Nazi asking a Jew for forgiveness; thinkers from a variety of theological backgrounds respond.
Glenn Jordan, Not of This World?: Evangelical Protestantism in Northern Ireland. Blackstaff Press, Ltd., 2001. This volume provides a portrait of the evangelical community in Northern Ireland, based on in-depth interviews with over 70 men and women from the Protestant evangelical tradition. These interviewees discuss their beliefs and convictions, their understanding of Northern Ireland's troubled history and their hopes and fears for the future. The result is a candid and complex portrait of an influential community – a portrait that also offers a more profound understanding of the wider society in which evangelicals live, work and worship.
Alwyn Thomson, Fields of Vision. ECONI, 2002. In this new book Alwyn Thomson encourages us to think about how we see our past and our future, our identity and our faith The book looks at the role that Protestantism has played in shaping the identity of Britain and of Irish unionism in the past and suggests that it remains a crucial factor in shaping identity in the present. Belfast Murals are a common urban scene
Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela, A Human Being Died That Night: A South African Story of Forgiveness. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2003. Pumla give an inside look at the seared conscience of a leader of the killing squads and her struggle to forgive one of South Africa’s notorious apartheid killers.
More References:
http://www.econi.org/Resources/resources_pathways.htm
http://www.contemporarychristianity.org/resources/index.htm
http://gbgm-umc.org/global_news/full_article.cfm?articleid=1183
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/05/01/europe/EU-GEN-Northern-Ireland.php
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,261161,00.html
Our thanks to Laura Simmons, PhD, Professor at George Fox Evangelical Seminary for assistance in preparing the bibliography.