Ghost Writers. David Shaw
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lifetime on this Earth to try and maintain peace within our lands. I also take my hat off to those people unfortunate enough to find their life here shortened by terminal illness, yet fight this tenure with an unassuming dignity. But it is those individuals that choose to fight oppression with simple reasoning that hearten me with the greatest hope for the future of this huge sanctimonious-filled ball of life that we call Earth. And I will now attempt to explain why.
Gandhi, King and Mandela were all victims of totalitarian regimes that denied them the right to live a life free from prejudice and restriction of choice. Any attempt to break free from persecution brought violence and abuse crashing down upon them and everyone else who stood beside them. Gandhi and King fought this terror with incisive tongues that ripped through their bigoted immoral societies. And, as countless souls yielded under the broad sword of injustice, Gandhi and King stood firm against their immensely powerful opponents. Both men were eventually assassinated but not before their legacy had been firmly put in place. That legacy decreed that no man should be treated as unequal, regardless of their skin colour or their credence. Incredibly, this was achieved by denouncing any form of violence whatsoever against the dictatorships that had principally governed their regimes through direct violence.
When Nelson Mandela was eventually released from prison, he also denounced any form of violence against the hierarchy that had systematically starved his country of civil liberties. His ethics were akin to the principles shown by Gandhi more than fifty years earlier. Yet, unlike Gandhi and King, Mandela’s political apprenticeship was stained in controversy.
Unable to make his government concede that apartheid was abhorrently unfair, the young Mandela and his political activists believed that the only way to make change happen was to take up arms against their oppressors. Mandela and his associates were subsequently charged with treason and jailed for life. It’s fair to say that conditions in his jail cell would not have been very satisfactory; nor would the jailers have been very sociable.
After twenty-seven years Mandela was finally released from prison. The government were now prepared to listen to his viewpoint. Mandela chose to work alongside them to find a solution to the social problems that were beginning to tear South Africa apart. He did not seek revenge for twenty-seven years of injustice, nor did he choose to fight his aggressors with aggression. He simply asked his supporters to forgive those responsible for the acts of violence and discrimination endured, and to now embrace a partnership between fellow South Africans.
When he was eventually elected as president of South Africa, Mandela gave his people a voice to be heard, a life to be lived and a country to be proud of. Incredibly, he worked alongside people who had made his own life a misery for many years. His choice to forgive was his greatest asset and his greatest achievement.
When Nelson Mandela died at the age of ninety-five, the whole world rose to salute a man who endured a lifetime of hate, yet parted with a lifetime of love.
Gandhi, King and Mandela solemnly decreed that the people should willingly forgive their respective governments for crimes committed against civil rights. It is arguable that if the people had not forgiven the perpetrators of these atrocious crimes against humanity, then humanity may very well have died on those blood-stained streets.
“The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.” Mahatma Gandhi.
“We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.” Martin Luther King.
“If there are dreams about a beautiful South Africa, there are also roads that lead to their goal. Two of these roads could be named Goodness and Forgiveness.” Nelson Mandela.
Never too late to say sorry
There were two messages left on Jason’s answering machine. Pressing the play button, he looked over at his partner for some kind of reassurance. Keith nodded his head to signify his approval. As the first message was played, both men just stared at the floor, not moving, not saying a word. The second message relayed virtually the same information, except this time there was a bit more urgency in the caller’s voice.
At the hospital, Jason asked Keith to remain in the waiting area whilst he went to see the attending doctor. The hospital ward was extremely busy, but Jason somehow knew which particular doctor he needed to speak to.
‘I... I… I’m here about my father, William Thornton’, stuttered Jason; his words struggling to come out despite the fact that he had been rehearsing this sentence in his mind for the past thirty minutes whilst driving to the hospital.
Without saying a word, the doctor quickly ushered Jason into a private room where his father lay motionless on his death bed. Suddenly, there were only two men in this room; two men who hadn’t spoken a single word in almost five years, and yet neither man seemed keen to end this linguistic drought. The noisy hospital ward had thankfully become incredulously quiet, although five years of simmering tension had prevented either man from even looking the other squarely in the eye.
‘Son, I’m dying,’ whispered William, a tear slowly garnishing his pale, yellowish face as the silence was finally broken.
As Jason slowly raised his head, he would see only a shadow of the man who had brutally thrown him out of the family home almost five years earlier. That was the day that his mother was laid to rest after she committed suicide. His father had blamed Jason for her death. He maintained that his wife could never accept the fact that her son was gay and the constant shame instigated her chronic depressive state. In actual fact, it was Jason’s father who couldn’t accept his son’s sexuality and he started drinking heavily. Eventually, his mother couldn’t take any more of her husband’s alcohol-fuelled behaviour and she overdosed on sleeping tablets. On the day of her funeral, both men had a huge argument and Jason didn’t see his father again – until this moment.
Jason suddenly pointed his forefinger aggressively in the direction of his father. ‘You blamed me for Mum’s death. You’re not going to blame me for yours!’
‘I know I did…and I was wrong,’ replied William, before holding out his hand and beckoning his son to approach the side of his bed. ‘I lost my wife five years ago and then I lost my son because of some stupid religious belief. I am so sorry for everything.’
William then wrenched his lifeless body up one final time to whisper into his son’s ear. ‘Despite what’s happened between us I never stopped loving you. I was just too ashamed of myself to admit it. That’s why I arranged for the nurse to telephone you on my behalf.’
As Jason listened to his father’s tender words he felt five years of hatred slowly begin to evaporate. He held his father’s hand and nodded his head in approval. The tension, previously evident in the faces of both men, began to disappear. And as William relaxed he whispered his final words. ‘I’m so very proud of you. I only wish I could’ve been half the man that you have become.’
As William’s body began to sink comfortably into the contours of the hospital bed Jason realised that his father was breathing his final breath. ‘I forgive you, Dad, I forgive you, I do love you…’
In that one final moment, they made their peace. The courage of an apology and the compassion of forgiveness was all that they could finally offer each other. Nonetheless, it was all that they would ever truly need.
The hustle and bustle of the hospital ward returned as succinctly as it had somehow disappeared; and as doctors and nurses prepared for the world’s problems to come crashing through the hospital doors, there would at least be one less to worry about from this day forth.
For over forty years now, William Friedkin’s classic horror movie, The Exorcist, has terrified movie fans all over the world and consequently instilled the widespread notion that anyone who typically displays a rather neurotic temperament should seek the services of a religious liberator. And even though the star of this film, Linda Blair, was seen to rotate her head a full 360 degrees, whilst implying