RELIGION AND RECONCILIATION IN POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA PDF Download

Author: Emperor Thembu 2nd Votani Majola
Publisher: Anchor Academic Publishing
ISBN: 3954898934
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 24

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Book Description
This paper examines the role that has been played by religion in South Africa to promote the spirit of peace and reconciliation in the post-apartheid state.

Author: Audrey R. Chapman
Publisher: Templeton Foundation Press
ISBN: 1932031286
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 335

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Book Description
Postapartheid South Africa's efforts to come to terms with its past, particularly its Truth and Reconciliation Commission's emphasis on forgiveness and reconciliation, is of special interest to many in the world community. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), led by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, was mandated to go beyond truth-finding and to "promote national unity and reconciliation in a spirit of understanding which transcends the conflict and divisions of the past." In contrast with other truth commissions, the TRC was led by clerics rather than lawyers and judge, and the TRC's approach to reconciliation was shaped by and imbued with religious content. The TRC submitted its final report to the Mandela administration in October 1998. Over the next two years, the Rev. Bernard Spong, former communications director of the South African Council of Churches, conducted a series of in-depth interviews about the TRC with thirty-three key religious figures. In this volume, they discuss and evaluate the following issues: •How should we understand the concept of national or political reconciliation and its requirements? •What are the differences and similarities between religious and political approaches to reconciliation? •Does national or political reconciliation require forgiveness between former victims and perpetrators? •What is the appropriate role of religious representatives in a truth commission process? And is it recommended that other countries emulate the South African model? •How do religious leaders assess the contributions and limitations of the TRC? •What kind of initiatives are contemporary religious communities taking to promote reconciliation among their members and in the wider society? The conversations presented in this volume, and the essays interpreting them, seek to illuminate issues and questions raised by the TRC model, including how to conceptualize reconciliation and the differences between political and religious approaches.

Author: Christo Thesnaar
Publisher: African Sun Media
ISBN: 1928480519
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 164

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Book Description
This publication takes one back to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s (TRC) Faith Communities’ Hearings in 1997 and the re-enactment of those hearings in 2014. Some communities revisit their support of those in power and their change of heart. Others revisit their struggle against the regime and its ideology. All also revisit promises made in 1997 to work together - individually and collectively - toward a new society post 1994. After twenty years, the same faith communities (and some additional ones) and some prominent South Africans who played leading roles in the run-up to and during the hearings ask what faith communities promised at the time and whether this has been achieved by 2014. Over two days, together with local and international observers, they again face the past, but also the unfinished business in the present and future of a just, reconciled and transformed South Africa so clearly envisioned by the TRC, in 1997.

Author: Richard Wilson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521001946
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 300

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Book Description
Based on extended anthropological fieldwork, this book illustrates the impact of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in urban African communities in Johannesburg. The study deepens our understanding of post-apartheid South Africa and the use of human rights discourse.

Author: Megan Shore
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317068149
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Book Description
This book examines the ambiguous role that Christianity played in South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC). It has two objectives: to analyse the role Christianity played in the TRC and to highlight certain consequences that may be instructive to future international conflict resolution processes. Religion and conflict resolution is an area of significant importance. Ongoing conflicts involving Palestinians and Israelis, Muslims and Hindus, and even radical Islamic jihadists and Western countries have heightened the awareness of the potential power of religion to fuel conflict. Yet these religious traditions also promote peace and respect for others as key components in doing justice. Examining the potential role religion can play in generating peace and justice, specifically Christianity in South Africa's TRC, is of utmost importance as religiously inspired violence continues to occur. This book highlights the importance of accounting for religion in international conflict resolution.

Author: John W. De Gruchy
Publisher: Fortress Press
ISBN: 9781451411614
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Whether born in the Mideast, Africa, Asia, or brought home to the streets of America, violent hatreds often threaten to swamp the minimal cooperation needed to foster life and health. Does Christianity have anything besides warmed-over pieties to offer a world torn by estrangement, alienation, and violently opposed worldviews? In this signal contribution to public theology, John de Gruchy, an internationally esteemed political theologian, emphatically affirms the possibility and necessity of reconciliation. For Christians, he says, reconciliation is the center and perennial test of their faith. De Gruchy expands reconciliation's relevance beyond personal piety and ecclesial harmony to encompass group relations, politics, and even the environment. In all cases, he argues, it involves the restoration of justice. Forged in the recent experience of South Africa, his work delineates the political and ecclesial significance of reconciliation and shows its importance for interreligious relations, addressing victimization, and international peace. Reconciliation will be welcomed by all whose faith leads them to help alleviate the world's mounting agonies.

Author: Rian Venter
Publisher: UJ Press
ISBN: 1920382917
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
Knowledge transmission and generation belong to the core mission of the public university. In democratic South Africa, the transformation of these processes and practices in higher education has become an urgent and contested task. The Faculty of Theology at the University of the Free State has already done some original work on the implications of these for theology. One area of investigation that has not yet received due attention concerns the role of theological disciplines, and especially the relation between academic disciplines and societal dynamics. This research project addresses the challenge and this volume reflects the intellectual endeavour of lectures, research fellows and a post-graduate student associated with the faculty. Each theological discipline has its own history and has already experienced reconstruction, both globally and in South Africa. Some of these genealogical developments and re-envisioning are mapped by the contributions in this volume. The critical questions addressed are: what are the contours of the (post)apartheid condition and what are the implications for responsible disciplinary practices in theology? The chapters convey an impression of the vitality of theology at the University of the Free State and in South Africa and give expression to fundamental shifts that have taken place in theological disciplines, and also of future tasks. This research project aims to stimulate reflection on responsible and innovative disciplinary practices of theology in South Africa, which, we envisage, will contribute to social justice and human flourishing. -Rian Venter, University of the Free State

Author: Ignatius Swart
Publisher: AFRICAN SUN MeDIA
ISBN: 1920338683
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 395

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Book Description
The topic covered by this book is important (crucially so in post-apartheid South Africa) and the research is meticulous. This has resulted in an impressive collection of material concerning welfare, religion and gender in twenty-first century South Africa, which includes both theoretical reflections and an abundance of empirical data. - Professor Grace Davie (Professor Emerita of Sociology, University of Exeter, UK)

Author: James R. Cochrane
Publisher: Ohio University Press
ISBN:
Category : Apartheid
Languages : en
Pages : 262

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Book Description
The unique desire of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) to turn its back on revenge and to create a space where deeper processes of "forgiveness, confession, repentance, reparation, and reconciliation can take place" reflects the spirit of some churches and faith communities in South Africa. Facing the Truth: South African Faith Communities and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, published in North America by Ohio University Press on November 1, 1999, is a candid study of the historical notes that formed that difficult process, which continues to be a struggle of theological and philosophical importance within faith communities. This book contains extracts of faith communities' testimonies before the TRC, and individual writers in Facing the Truth bring their unique voices to bear on the complex matter of healing wounds. The writers tell powerful stories, such as of meeting former torturers face-to-face: "He asked me to forgive him. It was one of the most difficult requests, perhaps the single most difficult, ever made to me. No matter how much I wanted to, I could not tell him that I could forgive him. All I could say was that I would try."

Author: Marthe Hesselmans
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004385010
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 286

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Book Description
Racial Integration in the Church of Apartheid relates the struggle of South Africa’s Reformed churches to overcome their apartheid past and merge into one multiracial church. It uncovers the potential of faith communities and their limits in untangling religious-nationalist affiliations.