No Future Without Forgiveness

Desmond Tutu

Doubleday, 1999 - Biography & Autobiography - 287 pages

"The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of South Africa has put the spotlight on all of us...In its hearings Desmond Tutu has conveyed our common pain and sorrow, our hope and confidence in the future."
--Nelson Mandela
The establishment of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission was a pioneering international event. Never had any country sought to move forward from despotism to democracy both by exposing the atrocities committed in the past and achieving reconciliation with its former oppressors. At the center of this unprecedented attempt at healing a nation has been Archbishop Desmond Tutu, whom President Nelson Mandela named as Chairman of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. With the final report of the Commission just published, Archbishop Tutu offers his reflections on the profound wisdom he has gained by helping usher South Africa through this painful experience.
In No Future Without Forgiveness, Tutu argues that true reconciliation cannot be achieved by denying the past. But nor is it easy to reconcile when a nation "looks the beast in the eye." Rather than repeat platitudes about forgiveness, he presents a bold spirituality that recognizes the horrors people can inflict upon one another, and yet retains a sense of idealism about reconciliation. With a clarity of pitch born out of decades of experience, Tutu shows readers how to move forward with honesty and compassion to build a newer and more humane world.

Contents

• NUREMBERG OR NATIONAL: 13
• IN THE FULLNESS OF TIME 3333: 33
• UP AND RUNNING: 67

About the author

Desmond Tutu was born October 7, 1931 in Klerksdorp, Transvaal, South Africa. He attended Johannesburg Bantu High School. After leaving school he trained first as a teacher at Pretoria Bantu Normal College and graduated in 1954 from the University of South Africa. After three years as a high school teacher he began to study theology, and was ordained as a priest in 1960. From 1962 to 1966 Tutu devoted his time to further theological study in England at King's College, eventually earning a Master's of Theology. From 1967 to 1972 he taught theology in South Africa before returning to England for three years as the assistant director of a theological institute in London. In 1975 he was appointed Dean of St. Mary's Cathedral in Johannesburg, the first black to hold that position. From 1976 to 1978 he was Bishop of Lesotho, and in 1978 became the first black General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches. Tutu won the Nobel Peace Prize on October 15, 1984 for his role in the opposition to apartheid in South Africa. He was then elected Archbishop of Cape Town in April of 1986, the highest position in the South African Anglican Church. Tutu is also an honorary doctor of various universities in the USA, Britain and Germany. He is the author of the best seller, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World, with the Dalai Lama XIV and Douglas Carlton Abrams.

Bibliographic information

• Title: No Future Without Forgiveness
• Author: Desmond Tutu
• Publisher: Doubleday, 1999
• Original from: the University of Michigan
• Digitized: Jul 7, 2009
• ISBN: 0385496893, 9780385496896
• Length: 287 pages
• Subjects: Biography & Autobiography / Religious; History / Africa / South / Republic of South Africa; Political Science / World / African; Psychology / Interpersonal Relations; Religion / Christian Living / Social Issues; Religion / Religion, Politics & State; Social Science / Sociology of Religion