Confronting Social Injustices

In the book The Tale of Two Cities, the author Charles Dickens begins by criticizing the aristocrats' treatment of the poor people of France--the shameless corruption, abuse, and inhumanity of the French nobles towards the peasantry. Even "church leaders entertained themselves with some 'humane' actions as sentencing a youth to have his hands cut off, his tongue torn out with princers, and his body burned alive--because he had not kneeled down, in the rain, to honor a procession of monks some fifty or sixty yards away." Dickens ends by noting that the same social atrocities occur even when the power shifts from the aristocrats to the lower classes--the masses, oppressed for centuries, rise up at last and destroy their masters becoming themselves just as evil and corrupt.

There is always a danger that this scenario could happen when social injustices are confronted, especially if a person or a people focuses on his or their victimization. Therefore, when confronting social injustices it would be wise to do so in a spirit of reconciliation and forgiveness rather than in a spirit of revenge and retaliation. It is only through the former that everyone can start to heal and move forward--and thus, break the unproductive cycle.

History and Forgiveness

It is critical that young people (and adults, too!) learn the history of our world and nation for as George Santayana warns, "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."


It is not only critical to learn history, but it's also important that it be observed from different perspectives. After all, as Ralph Waldo Emerson tells us, "All history becomes subjective; in other words there is properly no history, only biography." Seeing American History through the eyes of Native Americans, Blacks, Hispanics, and/or other minorities will paint a different picture. By studying one, we don't dismiss the other. We just acknowledge that history isn't one-sided.

Seeing history from other perspectives can often times be extremely painful, but Maya Angelou
reminds us, "History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again."

We must exercise extreme caution when sharing painful history. If the result is "white guilt" and/or anger and hatred and revenge and feelings of victimization we have lost site of our goal and ultimate hope to change the present and the future for these kind of responses are paralyzing.

So what is the healthy response to painful history that will allow up to paint a brighter future: FORGIVENESS

As we ponder the words of Anne Frank, Corrie Ten Boom, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Ishmael Beah, Coretta Scott King, Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, and the Amish people, we can glean the wisdom from them about the power of forgiveness.

Therefore, as we teach young learners painful history, it is crucial that we also teach them the importance of forgiveness, even when the offender doesn't ask for it. It will only be through forgiveness that our nation and we as individuals can heal and be strong. For only then can we be united in working together to fight the evils that hurt us all.