Forgiveness: a transforming experience

Michael Henderson with this book has made a unique contribution for a worldwide movement for change and reconciliation. I do not have the slightest doubt that this has been God's plan for him to express in so fluent a language, his experiences for us readers so that we may be inspired to work with the same zeal and enthusiasm, as he has narrated in the pages of the book.

Billy Graham describes forgiveness as "the most glorious word in the English language." Even the cynic Oscar Wilde could advise, "Always forgive your enemies; noting annoys them so much."

Forgiveness is possibly the most remarkable quality to which the human species can aspire. Writer Peggy Noonan says, "To forgive is to change the world." That is, indeed, what many people whose stories are told in this book are doing on a small, and sometimes on a surprisingly large, scale.

The left-over debris of national past that continue to clog the relationships of diverse groups around the world will never get cleared up and animosity will never drain away until forgiveness enters those relationships.

There is an African proverb: He who forgives ends the quarrel. A Shawnee chant goes: Do not wrong or hate your neighbour; for it is not he that you wrong you wrong yourself. "Learning to forgive someone who has hurt you may be one of life's most demanding yet most meaningful tasks," writes Huston Smith in The World's Religions.

Forgiveness is a truly transforming experience that allows us to move beyond our self-desires and needs. We must let God old our hand and guide us. Pure thought is more precious, far more than all the diamonds and rubies of this world, for it brightens our inner life and sheds upon us its precious peace. That is why we need to go within. The inner light is always there shining with gentle glow even when we lose our contact with it.

Michael Henderson leaves his readers to form their conclusions, after reading a wide variety of experiences, that he renders so effectively. He has worked in thirty countries and knows personally many of the people described. He has been associated for several years with MRA. He has varied experiences as a professional journalist and as an outstanding media personality in Portland, Oregon, where he lived for about twenty years.

As we enter the new millennium, it is striking to notice how many countries and individuals seem ready to face up to past abuses. "We humans need apologies to make it possible to continue living in groups. This has always been true in private relationships and it is true to an ever-increasing degree in public life," says Deborah Tannen, professor of linguistics at Georgetown University.

The person who has tried perhaps hardest to direct the attention of the world to the importance of forgiveness is Pope John Paul II. One of his proposals was for an examination of the conscience at the end of the Millennium. He had said, "At the end of the second millennium we must make an examination of conscience, where we are, where Christ has brought us, where we have deviated from the Gospel."

I humbly feel, that we as Indians can learn a lot from the book if we try to read parallel in our minds the past of our nation, of our people, wrongs done to Harijans. I earnestly request our readers to have their personal experience of this journey into the spirit of forgiveness — it is most engrossing.

Prof. Vijay G. Joshi

Forgiveness: Breaking the Chain of Hate by Michael Henderson, Book Partners, USA