Final Thoughts
Ecce homo. Antonio Ciseri c. 1880.
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This is the final entry on "living
in truth." One way to use the 16 entries is to review them over the course of several days. For example: read one per day (online or
printed); reflect on it; and make at least one personal application. You can do this on your own, with a friend, or as a small group. These entries by JC et al. are meant to shine light on our virtues as well as bolster our resolve
to face our own distortions—memories, motivations, and morality—and to live more honestly (in
truth) with ourselves and others. Truth is a foundation for trust. And trust is necessary for peace. "So love truth and peace." (Zech. 8:19)
*****
Truth-telling, struggling
for justice, working toward forgiveness: these are three central dimensions of
the social process of reconciliation. In all situations I know, they are never
undertaken on a level playing field; the consequences of oppression, violence,
and war are not predisposed to honesty, justice, and even good intentions in
all parties. Nor are the processes, for the most part, orderly. And they never
seem complete, in fact, we usually experience them as truncated, prematurely
foreclosed, high-jacked by the powerful. We can find ourselves acquiescing to
half-measures, half-truths, compromised solutions. Robert Schreiter, Reconciliation
as a New Paradigm in Mission (2005). Quoted in Global Member Care: The Pearls and Perils of Good Practice 2011, p.
114 (quoted also in the Reality DOSE article, available in 12 languages: https://sites.google.com/site/mcaresources/).
*****
Everyone on the side of truth listens to me.
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