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Good morning,

On the day when, back in 1990, Nelson Mandela was released from prison in South Africa. It brought to an end, 27 years behind bars for resisting apartheid. When I was a child, I was mesmerised when adults remembered what they were doing, when the news broke of some such significant event. Now I have some memories of my own. I know where I watched the events of 9/11 and when Princess Diana died in Paris. But the memories are not all about disaster or death. I have very clear recollections of good news stories too: the Live Aid Concerts, the collapse of the Berlin Wall and I can remember so clearly, that day, when Mandela was finally set free.

Famously, as prisoner 46664 left his final prison cell, he reflected that if he did not also leave his bitterness and hatred behind, then, at least psychologically and spiritually he would remain incarcerated for life. There is perhaps nothing more difficult to do than to walk a long road to a freedom that requires us to forgive someone who has caused us harm or upset. Mandela knew well that forgiving does not mean forgetting or ignoring that the harm was done to us but it does mean, no longer allowing that harm to define who we can become. Maybe that's why, when Jesus was asked about how many times we should forgive someone, he told the disciples ‘not just seven times, but seventy times seven’. Keep doing it, in other words, because perhaps it's less about how often we are hurt and more about how often our anger and pain return, threatening to imprison us again.

If like Mandela, we can find our way to forgiveness, then maybe every day will have its own good news moments of personal release.

Forgiving God
Lead us today
on this long road to freedom
and seventy times seven
give us the grace to take another onward step.
Amen