Still drawing from Schreiter’s book on Reconciliation, here are seven ways of looking at folks that prevent reconciliation and ubuntu.
1. Demonizing. The other guy is powerful and dangerous, and he should be eliminated ASAP.
2. Romanticizing. The other guy is “god’s special little angel,” much better than you and I, and probably born that way.
3. Colonizing. The other guy ain’t quite right and could use our help, especially if it calls for “tough love.” Click to continue reading “Seven attitudes that prevent ubuntu (part 6 in ubuntu series)”
So if the best way to practice ubuntu is any way that works, then why aren’t we practicing ubuntu better? Violence and conflict—and the memory of violence and conflict—stand in the way. The only way around them to ubuntu is reconciliation.
Reconciliation is damn hard. Last night I took some time to thumb through an old book by Catholic theologian Robert Schreiter, Reconciliation: Mission & Ministry in a Changing Social Order. It’s a whopping 82 pages, and doesn’t really start until page 18, so if you can find a copy, be sure to pick it up. It’s a quick read.
Schreiter starts off the meat of Reconciliation by telling us three things reconciliation ain’t. The first thing reconciliation ain’t is a hasty peace.
A hasty peace is “forgive and forget.” It says, “Nothing to see here anymore. Move along, move along.” It tries to cover up a multitude of sins, often out of a fear of retribution.
Not surprisingly, this kind of reconciliation is often called for by the very perpetrators of violence, who either having seen what they have done or having realized the potential consequences of their actions, want to get on to a new and different situation.
The second thing reconciliation ain’t is an alternative to justice and liberation. When we seek reconciliation after conflict, there must be an accounting. It does no one any good to pretend that, because folks wants to reconcile, that folks don’t need to figure out together exactly what happened. Retribution, doesn’t do anyone any good either. Between the extremes of smoothing everything over and getting everyone back is the middle way of, yes, painful reconciliation.
Liberation is the necessary precondition for reconciliation. Consequently, calls for reconciliation can provide a goal for liberation, but they cannot replace it.
The third thing reconciliation ain’t is a managed process. Professional conflict mediation can help, but it ain’t reconciliation. Likewise on lawyering. Reconciliation ain’t a technology you can take MSW classes to learn. Reconciliation ain’t a skill, it’s a discovery. It ain’t a strategery, it’s a spirituality.
More from Schreiter in cue: seven attitude that keep us from reconciliation, and the three components of the spirituality of reconciliation. And here’s a quick overview of Schreiter on reconciliation by Ubolwan Mejudhon if you don’t have time for the book. The image below is taken from that paper. Click to continue reading “Three things reconciliation ain’t (part five in ubuntu series)”
So if ubuntu is so damn important—maybe even all we really need—how do we do it? Short answer: any way we can.
Buddhism has a nice concept called “upaya.” Upaya is the idea that, when crossing the river to enlightenment, any water-worthy thing that gets you across will do. Bass boat, yacht, driftwood—it’s all good.
“Upaya” is often translated as “expedient means.” While this gives a good idea of what it gets at, “expedient” can make it sound like anything goes. Anything goes doesn’t go. Anything goes won’t get you across the river. Anything goes is the wrong side of the river.
So what practices and habits get us across the river to upaya? I’ll make one suggestion: reconciliation .
(You can follow this whole ubuntu thread by clicking on the “ubuntu” tag link.)
The Daily Scribe lived. The Daily Scribe died. The Daily Scribe lives again.
On a personal note, the crew here at Making Chutney wish to thank Shawn for his vision and dedication and wish him well as he begins the next stage of his spiritual journey.
