Who is to blame?

Who is to blame?
By The Post
Mon 26 July 2010, 04:10 CAT

TODAY, July 26, marks the 19th anniversary of the launch of The Post, the Weekly Post as it was then called. Many things have happened and changed since then in our country and at The Post. But many things have also remained the same. Our principles, our standards have remained the same and so have the attacks on us and the support for our work.

Tomorrow, we will be starting another journey towards our 20th anniversary – 20 years of independent and courageous journalism.

It was difficult to imagine on that Friday, that July 26, 1991 when The Post was launched, that 19 years later, this newspaper would have the strength, the vigour and the record it now has. During these years many intolerant politicians and other evil-minded people have tried to destroy, annihilate The Post. But we are still here, and we will never be forgiven for still being here.

And over all these years, petty-minded politicians and their supporters have tried to blame us for their problems. UNIP, which was in power when our newspaper was launched, tried to blame us for the political problems and for the humiliating electoral defeat they suffered at the hands of the MMD in 1991.

A number of political parties have been formed over the last 19 years, and most of them have run into problems. When they are formed, we are seen as midwives assisting their birth. And when they die, we are seen as the malukulas assisting their burial and blamed for their death. We are used to this baseness and we just say we are not to blame, “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing” (Luke 23:34).
No matter what wrongs they commit against themselves and others, at the end of the day, we are blamed for them for simply exposing them and commenting on them. This is still happening today. Only the other day, Hakainde Hichilema was accusing us of bias, trying to blame us for the problems their pact was facing. Why do they do this to us?

All of us, commit actions that hurt ourselves and others. We call these actions wrongs. As St Thomas Aquinas says: “We do not hurt God unless we hurt ourselves.” Every wrong hurts the one who commits it and often others.

These wrongs could be suicide, withdrawing from others, criticising and blaming others, stealing, cheating, rape, murder and the like. Most of us admit that there are evil actions and we would be better off if we did not indulge in them. As Prophet Ezekiel says, “The soul that sins shall die.”

The question arises why we commit wrongs even though they ultimately hurt us. The answer is that either we do not know what we are doing or are not free not to do it. From the cross, Christ tells us, “Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.” Of course, they knew what they were doing: that they were crucifying a man, that he was suffering intense pain and that he would die in a short while.

But did they know fully what they were doing? Did they know that Christ was the one they were expecting, one who was their saviour, one who wanted only their good and loved them so much that he was ready to die for them? Did they not think, of course because of their blindness of heart and vested interests, that he was a troublemaker out to destroy their society and established order? Did Caiaphas not say to the Jews: “You know nothing at all; do you not understand that it is expedient for you that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation should not perish?”

(John 11:49-50). Christ sees his crucifixion from a wider perspective, the perspective of the offender. St Peter reaffirms this ignorance of the Jews: “Now, brothers, I know that you acted in ignorance, as did your leaders. But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets, saying that his Christ would suffer” (Acts 3:17-18). St Paul points to the same when he says:

“Even though I was once a blasphemer and a persecutor and a violent man, I was shown mercy because I acted in ignorance and unbelief” (I Tim 1:13). The above texts refer more directly to lack of full knowledge on the part of the wrongdoer. However, St Paul refers to absence of freedom too as the cause of the wrong acts: “I do understand what I do.

For what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do. And if I do what I do not want to do, I agree that the law is good. As it is, it is no longer I myself who do it, but it is sin living in me. I know that nothing good lives in me, that is, in my sinful nature.

For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. For what I do is not the good I want to do; nor, the evil I do not want to do – this I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it, but is sin living in me that does it” (Romans 7:15-20). It is important to note here that Paul goes to the extent of saying: “Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin which dwells in me.”

People commit wrong acts because they do not have sufficient knowledge or freedom; knowledge about the act and its implications and freedom not to do what they know is wrong. Such is the case with the terrorists and others like them. Some of us will claim that they know what they are doing and that they are free.

Yes, they have some knowledge and some freedom. Water must reach hundred degrees to boil; eighty or even ninety degrees will not do. Much in the same way, one has to have sufficient knowledge and sufficient freedom and not some knowledge and some freedom to be able to avoid evil, wrongdoing and to do good. We are, as a result of childhood and later emotional hurts, compelled to behave in a particular manner.

Do we not still carry with us some bad habits? Why don’t we get rid of them too? Maybe, we will, after a few more years of experience. Maybe they will follow us to the grave. So in doing wrong, we are victims of ignorance and consequently lack of freedom. In fact, many people inflict harm on others, thinking they are doing a good deed, as was the case with the Jews who crucified Jesus. Hence the words of Christ: “They will put you out of the Synagogue; in fact, a time is coming when anyone who kills you will think he is offering a service to God” (John 16:2).

Christ finds it easy to forgive because he knows what stuff humans are made of; how they are victims of ignorance and unfreedom. Not only does he forgive sinners who come to him seeking pardon, but his own tormentors as well (John 8:14; Luke 7:37; Luke 23:34). He mixes with sinners with compassion (Matthew 9:10; Matthew 9:13; Luke 15:2; 19:7).

He teaches unconditional forgiveness as his mission (Matthew 9:13; Luke 15:1-32). Saints and truly great people find it easy to forgive, because they know that people sin or do wrong due to ignorance and lack of freedom. Mahatma Gandhi was once knocked down unconsciously by an Indian immigrant on the streets of South Africa, for the attacker believed that the path followed by the Mahatma was against the interests of the Indians there. On regaining consciousness, the first thing Gandhi did was to forgive the offender, the wrongdoer, his aggressor, saying that he would not have done such a thing had the latter known what he was actually doing. He even told his friends to ask the police not to harm the offender.

Learning to forgive oneself is indeed more difficult for some than to forgive others. A mature person is one who knows that he has wronged others and yet has been pardoned.

But to know that one does wrong out of ignorance and lack of freedom and hence not really guilty is not a licence to do wrong. Whether one is subjectively guilty or not, every wrongdoing destroys him and others. If one drinks poison, thinking that it is health tonic, his lack of proper knowledge is no guarantee against poisoning. So it is with wrongdoing.

We owe it to ourselves to grow in awareness and freedom through feedback from people and other means so as not to harm ourselves. Salvation is precisely this growing awareness and freedom that help us avoid doing wrong and do good. If one is not really guilty of his wrong acts, so are others. The selfish, the attention seeker, the moody, the hot-tempered, the betrayer of trust, the manipulator, the obstinate, the antisocial and the obsessive compulsive – these are all that they are because of lack of knowledge and freedom.

Their behaviour hurts us and others. It is their duty to get out of the bondage of their ignorance and lack of freedom. It is our duty and the duty of all others to help them grow in awareness and freedom. Most of all, we are bound by human fellowship as brothers and sisters to draw them to a better life by witnessing in our lives a life that is lived in awareness and freedom, a life that manifests peace and joy.

Let’s learn from Christ's teaching and example. Why did Christ have to suffer? It was because he lived for certain values, the values of the Kingdom. 'Vested interests' who found these values troublesome wanted to put him to death. Christ seems to say that unless we live our life courageously and lovingly, accepting all the pain involved in it, even to the extent of accepting death by crucifixion, we will not be able to do God’s will in our lives.

It is significant that in his teaching on self-denial, he asks each one to take up his cross, implying the crosses of daily life. Inner freedom implies the ability to say goodbye to what is lost or cannot be got back. In fact, our whole life is an adventure in saying goodbye, beginning with our first goodbye to the comfort and protection of one's mother’s womb and ending in death.

Those who have learned to say goodbye are happy as they grow older; those who have not, will be weeping over spilt milk all their lives. As Christ says, “No one who puts his hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God” (Luke 9:62). As Ivern Ball says, “That which you cannot let go of, you do not posses. It posses you.”

We are ending where we started. After 19 years of very hard work, we are back where we started, doing the same things we used to do. We are much more experienced and more committed than we were 19 years ago, and those dealing with us or trying to take us on should understand this very well.

We cannot sacrifice 19 years of painful work for peanuts; we are not for hire. We are a newspaper and not an insurance company, and no one should think because they are our friends, our relatives or because they extended some favour to us, then that was a premium protecting them from being touched, being exposed and criticised when they do wrong. The only effective and efficient insurance policy from our criticism is doing the right thing at all times and in all circumstances. Blaming us for things we have no control over, we have not done will not do.