Madiba of the Ages

Gandhi, Churchill, King, and Mandela all stood in that “yes” place to dare to declare their hope, their dream, their confidence in the midst of “facts” that were telling them all was lost. Their presence of active hope made all the difference and the “impossible” happened. Thus wrote elderly colleague Jeannette Stanfield in Canada on her November Thanksgiving note.

Commenting on a Paul Gilding book, The Great Disruption, she added: Now it is our turn to “choose active, engaged and strategic hope.” Human beings across the planet who are clear on our devastating situation must move through their despair and “roll up their sleeves.” For we who are teachers, facilitators, and preachers, we must continue to empower and grow resilience across all sections of humanity in order that as we face more and more chaotic times, we will together be able to engender hope-filled action and compassion instead of fear and violence.

She is commenting on two disruptions observed by analysts chronicled in Gilding’s book: climate change and the end of the economic growth model dear to economic planners of contemporary global society.

With most analytical bent headed straight into doomsday, it is heartening to hear and read of those who have the courage to say “nevertheless.” From many commentators this week, we will hear that word in describing one who is now known as a strategic prophet of reconciliation and a walking evangelist of forgiveness, a hero in Bill Clinton’s eyes.

The Madiba’s much-quoted pronouncement against poverty is once again getting another drumming and drubbing. He said, “Overcoming poverty is not a task of charity, it is an act of justice. Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings. Sometimes it falls on a generation to be great. YOU can be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom.”

Not for generational greatness, but Paul Clements—Dallas-born six years before we hit that town when we attended university, son of missionaries who served in India and Hong Kong, colleagues in a worldwide effort to further a comprehensive yet profound spirit movement on human development—is now running for the 6th district of Michigan’s representative to the U.S. Congress. He was active in the divestiture movement at Harvard when he joined to protest the university’s corporate funds from earning profits in apartheid South Africa. Paul served in the U.S. Peace Corps in Gambia in the late ’80s. The Princeton PhD lad teaches at one of the state’s universities.

Mandela’s claim to fame is not his quotable quotes. Much quoted as he is, none of his lines act as leech in the mind that attaches itself to suck the blood out of one’s passion, never again to be forgotten. Not his words but the incredible witness of his being that endears him to many of his global followers. All one has to do is watch the man in action, whether on stage or in office, and one can easily gets mesmerized by a self so seemingly devoid of aggrandizement, yet so marvelously brimming with selfhood, and then, not calling attention to himself, invites each of us in his quiet ways to be likewise.

The forgiving applies as well to ex-VP Dick Cheney, the power behind the swivel chair while George Bush the younger sat in the White House’s Oval Office. He was unrepentant in his vote to clear the ANC as a terrorist organization in the U.S. Congress. In fact, Mandela remained on the U.S. terrorist list until 2008, to Condoleezza Rice’s great consternation.

We will say the “nevertheless” word to radio commentator Rush Limbaugh’s harangue on the White House as using Mandela’s demise to prop up Obama, and his venom against the Clintons, accusing the couple of being opportunistic political riders on the tailcoat of Mandela’s greatness. We will even go so far as to forgive members of the Westboro Baptist Church of Kansas for tweeting that they are preparing to fly to South Africa to picket Mandela’s state funeral!

To what length does one go to forgive? In the case of the Nobel Laureate Xhosa regal tribesman, it seems endless, making Obama’s tribute appropriate: he belongs to the ages. For the act of pronouncing “nevertheless” and acting it to the fullest in one’s being is not natural. It is an act of faith, lived through the crimson line of humanity’s varied religious traditions of taking reality as one’s own, and giving it the characteristic stamp of one’s own being!

In Mandela’s case, it was a walk out of prison, in his reference to more than the 27 years spent on Robben Island, Pollsmor and Victor Verster prison’s iron bars: “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.”

Add the humor of a Tata (the honorific title for “father” in the Transvaal as well as in Malayo-Polynesia familiar to Pinoys), the father of the reformed nation of South Africa quipped: “In my country we go to prison first and then become President.”

The Rock of Ages lie in state this week.