Introduction: Ministry in a Divided Society
Ruth Hutchinson

Comment: Conscientious Objector
Adam Turkington

From the Director
David Porter

Christian Perspectives on Reconciliation
Norman Taggart

Ministry in a divided society
1. Pastor John Dickinson
2. Priest Ken Clarke

The Laughing Minister
Graham Cheesman

Forgetting to Remember
Peter Stevenson

Ministry in a divided society
3. Prophet Derek Poole
4. Peacemaker David Porter

Review: A New Start
Heather Morris

< Past Issues Archive

REFLECTIONS:
Forgetting to Remember...Remember Hauerwas
Catching a glimpse of Strangford Lough through the window, as the plane prepared to land at Aldergrove, signalled that I was almost home. During twenty years of missionary service ‘across the water’ it is a journey I have made many times. On this occasion I was looking forward to attending the ECONI conference and to hearing the keynote speaker, Professor Stanley Hauerwas.

A time to heal

From the outside looking in I am grateful to ECONI for offering a biblical perspective on things that are happening back at home. As a newcomer arriving at Stranmillis, I was made to feel very welcome at the conference. Conversations over coffee and lunch offered the sorts of insights on the peace process that the media cannot report. It was good to be able to sample some of the worship materials for ECONI Sunday and the bible study workshop on Psalm 85:10, considering Peace, Justice, Mercy and Truth opened up that passage in an exciting way.

The lectures made us work as Stanley Hauerwas offered us a closely argued exploration of the topic: Why time cannot and should not heal the wounds of history, but time has been and can be redeemed. This apostle of non-violence was in combative mood as he threw out some provocative questions and ideas about forgiving and forgetting. The more I reflect upon what he said, the more issues begin to emerge and I am painfully aware that it will only be possible here to explore a few aspects of what he said.

Let's forgive and forget

From the outset he made it clear that he was not going to address the Irish situation directly. Instead he spoke initially about the way in which blacks and whites in the US continue to struggle with the painful legacy of slavery. What steps are needed to make a new future possible in a country scarred by racism and injustice? Some argue that a 'no-fault reconciliation' is the only way forward in America because only by forgiving and forgetting the past is there any chance of creating a new future.

The idea of forgiving and forgetting is difficult enough when you think what has happened to this community in the last 30 years. Hauerwas was arguing that however difficult such forgetting might be, it does not in practice provide a reliable basis for the reconciliation that divided communities need. Indeed he argued that simply trying to ‘forget’ the wrongs we have inflicted on one another might in the long run cause even more problems. Speaking of his homeland in words that seemed painfully appropriate closer to home, he said: “The blood of the past has drenched our land and will continue to make it impossible to 'forget' in the name of easy reconciliation.”

I suspect that many people in both communities in Northern Ireland could identify with those sentiments. For some within the Unionist community the peace process is unacceptable because they feel that the sufferings of innocent victims of terrorism are now being conveniently forgotten. This is what Hauerwas had in mind when he argued that from a moral perspective the desire for revenge is not necessarily a barbaric emotion but is rather a desire to keep faith with the dead. Within that desire is an unconscious recognition that the community which cannot or will not remember its past is a community in danger of losing its history and identity.

In such a context talking too easily about forgetting may store up trouble for the future. If we cover up past wrongs with a veneer of forgiving forgetfulness this does not deal with deep-seated need to keep faith with those who have suffered and died. Covering up those painful feelings may help for a while, but in the long run it may lead to even greater violence. But if the way ahead is not through forgetting or ‘non-remembering’ then what hope is there for a community which might be accused of having an overactive memory?

Forgiving but not forgetting

Hope rests in the God and Father of our Lord Jesus ‘who interrupts the logic of violence by forgiving those who crucified his Son’. In saying this Hauerwas appears to be saying nothing more or less than lots of others before him. The sting in the tail was that he went on to say: “It is exactly, however, because the crime is not forgotten that forgiveness is possible.” From this perspective forgiveness does not necessarily involve a divine forgetting of human sins and crimes. Now that begins to make us anxious for we feel much more comfortable with the God who makes the promise: “I will forgive their iniquity and remember their sins no more.” (Jer. 31:34)

Hauerwas was arguing that if God had to forget all the sins and crimes he had forgiven this might mean forgetting the sufferings of His Son. Far from being forgotten the scriptures and the church confess and recall the sufferings of Christ. So when we turn to Revelation 5:6 we find the Risen Christ portrayed as the ‘Lamb, looking as if it had been slain’. In some way the glorified Christ still bears the visible reminders of his suffering and of the sin that made such a sacrifice necessary. It is as we remember and confess the sins which conspired to nail Jesus to the cross that we begin to realise that we are implicated in the crime of crucifying the Son of God. We recall and confess our sinfulness not to dwell upon it, but in order to remember forgiven sin. Failing to remember the depth of our sin would run the risk of undervaluing the enormity of God's ability to forgive, and His amazing power to redeem the damage caused by sin. The sin which caused the cross is not forgotten, but thankfully it has been forgiven. This is not unhealthy brooding upon past hurts. It is rather a kind of remembering which takes the shape of repentance and confession. For ‘Christians are required to confess and remember their sins, but they are also required to remember the sins of those who have sinned against them. Any reconciliation that does not require such a remembering cannot be a reconciliation made possible by the cross of Christ.’

This strong emphasis upon not forgetting the wrongs we have done to one another suggests to me a parallel with the process of grieving. This came home to me forcibly when a widowed church membe explained how after her husband’s death well-meaning friends were often unwilling to let her talk about her late husband. For her own healing she desperately needed to talk about the man she loved, but her friends refused her the chance to share her precious and painful memories. That well-intentioned mistake served only to delay the process of grieving and healing. Might it also be the case that encouraging victims of violence to forgive and‘'forget’ too quickly could be a communal repetition of that pastoral mistake? Maybe the deeper the wounds the greater the need to remember and to talk about those memories?

A few days before the ECONI conference I was the guest speaker at a special Remembrance Day assembly in south London. The school hall was full of teenagers for whom the events of two world wars are ancient history. Yet in spite of that there was a real sense of remembrance which took me somewhat by surprise. It was a healthy form of remembering that was free from any sense of anti-German or anti-Japanese feeling. The remembering was a refusal to forget the awful cost of war. Perhaps part of what Hauerwas saying was that such a refusal to forget may hold the seeds of lasting peace. Maybe the church's place in the community is not only to serve as Pastor, Prophet, Priest and Peacemaker but also to be a place which refuses to forget those who have suffered and refuses to forget the awful cost of the troubles?

Forgiveness versus justice

The desire to keep faith with the dead leads some to insist that justice can only be satisfied when the full punishment of the law is imposed upon the guilty parties. For them the offer of forgiveness is turning a blind eye both to the sin of the terrorist and to the suffering of the victim. This kind of reaction gives the impression that forgiveness somehow stands in opposition to justice. The conference’s bible workshop brought out in dramatic fashion the way in which many people feel that the demands of Justice and Mercy are often at loggerheads. But that overlooks the fact that within the very offer of forgiveness there is a definite element of judgement. The decision to forgive implies passing the judgement that something wrong has taken place which needs to be forgiven. Far from turning a blind eye to sin and suffering the call to forgive involves the judgement that sin and suffering exist and that they need to be dealt with. Similarly the genuine acceptance of forgiveness involves accepting the judgement that the recipient has done something which needs to be forgiven.

Part of the perceived conflict between justice and forgiveness comes from an over emphasis upon the punitive dimensions of justice. Within the Protestant tradition we have tended to interpret biblical passages about justice through the lens of the Roman legal system which leads to a harsh understanding of law and justice. We need to rediscover a more Hebraic and biblical understanding of righteousness and justice which will remind us that divine justice also has a saving and restoring function. Putting things to right, and restoring harmony to a world thrown into chaos by human sinfulness are essential dimensions of biblical justice.

Within our legal system the judge tends to be thought of as the one who imposes the penalty. However, there is also a sense in which the judge's task is to preside over the whole process of enquiry in order to bring the truth to light. For it is only when the truth of the matter has been brought to light that a just verdict can be reached. On a human level this bringing the truth out into the open is an essential part of justice and judgement. At a higher level an encounter with the divine judge will be a moment of truth which brings the truth about us out into the open. It is significant that one of the New Testament words for judgement is the word ‘krisi’ (for example John 3:19 This is the verdict/judgement) from which we get the word crisis. When a crisis strikes it reveals what things really are made of. The outer layers get stripped away and the true state of things is revealed. The divine crisis of judgement reveals the truth about our lives and about our communities.

Stanley Hauerwas mentioned The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa as an example of public remembering which may contribute to the healing of the nations. In seeking to bring the truth out into the open, even the painful, sad truth about the situation, they are exercising one dimension of the process of judgement. This is a form of saving justice because it brings the truth to light, and when we know the truth then the truth can set us free.

Redeeming the past

Hauerwas did not give a simple guide to what is needed to build a lasting peace in Ireland. Instead he challenged us to think deeply about the nature of forgiveness and the importance of memory. He also encouraged us to have hope because the God who can redeem the past is the one who ‘never tires of miracles’. Whilst the past cannot and should not easily be forgotten, within the grace of God it can be redeemed and the memory of it can be healed.

From one perspective the cross was the greatest defeat for good and for God, but in the light of the empty tomb we dare to believe that God could use even the sin and evil of human beings and turn it to good and to our eternal advantage. In the light of Christ's death and resurrection we dare to believe that in all things God can work for the good of those who love him (Romans 8:28). In all circumstances, including the circumstances of Northern Ireland, we believe that God’s forgiveness can redeem the past and create the future.

It was dark as the London plane flew over the County Down coast on my journey back the following evening. There was not much to see out of the window through the cloud and darkness but I returned grateful to God for warm Ulster hospitality and a conference which opened my eyes to see new things.

Rev. Peter K Stevenson MA M Litt - tutor in Applied Theology and Open Learning in Spurgeon's College, London. Born in Killyleagh, Co.Down he moved to England in 1978, where he ministered in Baptist Churches in Bedford, West Midlands and London. He has been in Spurgeon's College since 1995.