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If forgiving depended on the culprit owning up, then the victim would always be at the mercy of the perpetrator. The victim would be bound in the shackles of victimhood.

Desmond Tutu

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Desmond Tutu
Age: 93
Born: 1931
Born: October 7
Activist
Anglican Priest
Non-Fiction Writer
Archbisphop Desmond Tutu
Desmond Mpilo Tutu
Bounds
Forgiving
Perpetrator
Victim
Culprit
Mercy
Perpetrators
Always
Shackles
Would
Depended
Owning
Bound

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Peace comes when you talk to the guy you most hate. And that's where the courage of a leader comes, because when you sit down with your enemy, you as a leader must already have very considerable confidence from your own constituency.
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Beware when you take on the Church of God. Others have tried and have bitten the dust.
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The abolition of the death penalty is making us a civilized society. It shows we actually do mean business when we say we have reverence for life.
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Without forgiveness, there is no future. Forgiveness is not nebulous, impractical and idealistic. It's thoroughly realistic. It's real political in the long run.
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Forgiveness and reconciliation are not just ethereal, spiritual, other-worldly activities. They have to do with the real world. They are realpolitik, because in a very real sense, without forgiveness, there is no future.
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God hopes that we are going to love God back.
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Our lives are a response to a love that we already have received.
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We can be human only together. A person is a person to other persons.
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Forgiveness says you are given another chance to make a new beginning.
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I'm coming to believe more and more in the truth that everything we do has consequences. A good deed doesn't just evaporate and disappear.
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I'm absolutely, utterly, and completely certain that God wouldn't be homophobic. I'd much rather go to hell - I really would much rather go to hell - than go to a homophobic heaven.
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The destruction of the earth’s environment is the human rights challenge of our time.
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Restorative justice says No, the offense affected a relationship and what you are seeking for is to restore the relationship, to heal the relationship.
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Human beings have a vested interest in being trustworthy.
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We must be ready to learn from one another, not claiming that we alone possess all truth and that somehow we have a corner on God.
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The moment our dignity is undermined, we get up in arms and want to see our dignity restored - especially if we are humiliated.
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Forgiving is not forgetting its actually remembering--remembering and not using your right to hit back. Its a second chance for a new beginning. And the remembering part is particularly important. Especially if you dont want to repeat what happened.
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