How to React When You've Been Wronged

Colombia's new President, Ivan Duque, will come to office facing a population that suffered hundreds of thousands killed by rebels who now are allowed to hold public office under the terms of a 2016 peace accord. Instead, many of his wronged constituents want retribution for crimes against their families.

     In The Monarchy of Fear, Martha C. Nussbaum writes about Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and the valid anger he faced as a leader of once-enslaved African-Americas in the United States. She also sees anger growing among those whose standard of living is threatened by automation and outsourcing of jobs, while others thrive from globalization.

     When President Obama was asked to deliver the Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture in South Africa this year, he too reflected on the way globalization and technology can benefit the rich and powerful while facilitating inequality. But he reminded his audience about how Mandela responded: 1) to his over 20 years of captivity under an apartheid structure that defined the artificial domination of whites over blacks by studying the thinking of his enemies, and 2) to his election as President of South Africa by abiding by the constitutional limit of his presidential term and by not favoring any group.

     Obama acknowledged, IT IS HARD to engage with people who look different and hold different views from you. But you have to keep teaching that idea of engaging with different people to ourselves and our children, he said.

     Each of us has to hold hard, as Nelson Mandela did, even while he was in prison, to the firm belief that being a human entitles each of us to a human inheritance. All people are created equal and endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights, Obama reminded his South African audience. What flows from that firm belief in the equality of rich and poor, woman and man, young and old, and every other human difference is Mandela's conclusion: "It's not justice if now you're on top, so I'm going to do the same thing that those folks were doing to me, and now I'm going to do it to you."

     Nussbaum expresses the same idea. Saying something is wrong and should never happen again is valuable, but deciding to fix it by making the doer suffer is not helpful. Put another way, an African-American, speaking on a panel at a forum, observed it is more productive to go forward with an attitude based on the Civil Rights movement than an attitude derived from slavery.

     Once you concentrate on your own value as a human being and that of all other humans and vow not to repeat past failures, there's hope for a better future.

   

   

   

Let There Be Peace

As the Singapore meeting of Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump approaches, the words of Sy Miller's and Jill Jackson-Miller's song bear repeating:

Let there be peace on earth

and let it begin with me

Let there be peace on earth

the peace that was meant to be

With God as our Father

Brothers (sisters) all are we

Let me walk with my brother (sister)

in perfect harmony

Let peace begin with me

Let this be the moment now

With every step I take

Let this be my solemn vow

To take each moment and live each moment 

in peace eternally

Let there be peace on earth

and let it begin with me

The Continuing Struggle between Good and Evil

Kayla Mueller's message of hope after she was kidnapped in Syria in 2013, like that of Anne Frank, and the story of Kayla's life, like the life stories of Nelson Mandela and Maximilian Kolbe, will live on long after ISIS is, at most, a footnote of history. But that is not to minimize the horror of Kayla's 18-month captivity. As a hostage, she was the slave property of ISIS leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Because she feared her American appearance would lead to their recapture, she refused to escape with non- Western female captives and was killed in an air strike in February, 2015.

     Coupled with news that Shiite attacks on government buildings in Yemen's capital have caused the US, UK, and France to close their Embassies is the regret Yemen's Muslim women have since they are no longer allowed to wear the colorful veils that used to identify their home villages. Shrouded in black veils, women are no longer free to express any individuality in public. Few remember when no women covered their faces 30 years ago and how, at the sea, some even wore colorful two-piece outfits with long skirts, bare midriffs, and tops with sleeves.

     Taliban captors in February, 2015 released Father Alexis Prem Kumar, who had been serving as director of Jesuit refugee services in Afghanistan when he was abducted. Despite violence and turmoil, women at the ARZU (the Dari word for "hope") Hope Studio, founded in the Bamyan region of Afghanistan in 2004, have continued to come together to carry on the weaving tradition that has produced lush rugs for centuries. Located in central Afghanistan, Bamyan's arts and architecture have been influenced by diverse Greek, Persian, Turkish, Indian, and Chinese cultures. In 2001, however, it was the site of the Taliban's destruction of three monumental Buddhist sculptures carved into a mountain in the fifth century. Yet, women at the ARZU Hope Studio persevere, incorporating wartime imagery and biblical verses into their woven panels, earning an income, maintaining a community garden, and funding a preschool, health care, and community centers.

     Boko Haram finds it unnecessary to recruit followers. Like their earlier abduction of more than 200 young women in Nigeria, the group continues to TAKE girls and women as wives, cooks, and suicide bombers and young men and boys as soldiers. These little soldiers will be facing about 300 former soldiers from the South African Defense Force who, according to the Financial Times (March 27, 2015), have gone to Nigeria to fight terrorists.

(The earlier blog post, "Hope for the Future," mentions some of the successes that help remind us past problems have been solved.)

 

Changes to US-Cuban Relationships

In June, 2017, Raul Castro announced his intention to step down and President Trump announced new US regulations will change travel and business contacts that applied in President Obama's administration.

     In my earlier blog post, "Hope for the Future," I wrote that some day we would rejoice when a U.S. AID worker held captive in Cuba would be released. Alan Gross is now a free man after five years in a small room with two other prisoners.

      Calling Pope Francis the "real deal" and a source of inspiration, President Obama acknowledged the pontiff's role in restoration of normal diplomatic relations between Cuba and the United States. The countries reopened their embassies in Washington, DC and in Havana on July 20, 2015. Two months later, Pope Francis visited Cuba before he came to the USA. During President Obama's 2-day visit to Cuba in March, 2016, he met Cuban President Raul Castro and anti-Castro activists and attended a baseball game. On November 25, 2016, Cuba announced the death of Fidel Castro, who had led Cuba from 1956 to 2006, which included the Cuban missile crisis during the administration of John Kennedy.

      The US has not appointed an ambassador to Havana, but Jose Cabanas has been appointed Cuba's ambassador to the US.

     Until President Trump's new regulations take effect, individual US travelers to Cuba can still go to the Airbnb website, airbnb.com, to book bed and breakfast accommodations and facilitate cash payments and MasterCard and American Express credit card charges. Airbnb has one million listings of unique accommodations in 190 countries.

   

Reasons to Celebrate Global Victories

Kim Jong-un's North Korea has released Kenneth Bae and two other U.S. citizens; Cuba has released the U.S. AID worker, Alan Gross, who has been in prison there for five years (See the later blog post, "Good News from Cuba.")

With Ebola and ISIS uncontained, it is well to look around the world and derive hope from other difficult situations that have been resolved in the past. For a reminder of some of these past victories, see the earlier blog post, "Hope for the Future."