| Forgiveness Progressively Revealed in Easy Installments |
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by Jordan Shiveley So I watched a movie last night that had me in tears several times. It was the WW II P.OW. film "To End All Wars" but I wasn't crying for the reasons you are probably thinking. It wasn't a reaction to the horrible injustices endured or the raw humanity seeping from every stooped shoulder and shorn head in the film. Instead it was a concept that got to me. A reaction that these men turned to as their only hope of salvation in the madness of war . . . forgiveness. The film showed how these men chose to relinquish their "right" to vengeance and retribution and instead choose the path of mercy and grace. When the concepts are combined with the title "To End All Wars" I found myself at a chrystalization of thought that has been a long time coming. Forgiveness and grace hold the seeds that could if not end then deal a crippling blow to the forces of hatred and violence that we seem to be embroiled in at every turn. The forces of pro-war thought would have us believe that there must be a reaction, a violent reaction, to answer those who oppose or transgress against us as citizens or a nation. And perhaps they are right. Perhaps acts of terrorism and violence do "deserve" to be answered with "justice". But then how will we, those who seek to be peace makers, see that this justice is carried out? I say by forgiveness and if need be substitution. We can look to those who are "deserving" of death and say "Here with my own life I buy you. Now you belong to a higher power." How then would they respond when at every turn the "reasons" to strike out with violent vengeance are dissapearing and in their places the face of mercy and grace that says "You may kill me but the cycle stops here!"
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