Love Above All
Forgiveness of a Young Rwandan Genocide Survivor
by
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FORGIVING FACE TO FACE.
After deciding to find those who killed my family or who hurt me in one way or another during the genocide against Tutsis, I was wondering how they would take this after 15 years without talking to someone. The last time to meet some of these were when they were trying to hurt me and then we were going to meet telling them I had forgiven them, yet they had not apologized. I was thinking that they might consider this as a way of cunning. I was afraid that this would be a way of increasing their shame of what they did and this would cause them to hate themselves and hate me more than ever before. I was afraid of being killed again. I had two consciousnesses. One forcing me to do it and another one to leave that idea of forgiving. Apart from this, some of my friends tried to convince me telling me that what I was about to do was total foolishness. They added that it was a way of not giving the true value to my killed family. I was already convinced to do it mostly after reading what the Bible says that we should forgive. This also goes in the same line with our country’s policy.
The first thing I did was to find their cell phone numbers and I talked to them on the telephone one by one. The first one I talked to was someone called Aloys. Before the genocide, he was a singer in the main choir at our church. His wife trained our children’s choir. But remember he was the first to tell me that I would inform my mother that we had to flee otherwise he would kill us. The conversation we held was short and was like this:
· Allo, How are you Aloys. You are talking to Jado.
· I am fine, how are you? Who is this Jado I am talking to?
· The one who was called SEDEDE (my childhood nickname)
After knowing me, his voice changed and started talking as someone afraid.
· Ehh,I remember you, how are you ?
· I am fine and I praise the Lord. I call you just to let you know that I have forgive you even if you didn’t apologize after planning to kill my family and me.
· Is it true that you had forgiven me? Is there any chance of me to meet you and apologize?
· I had already forgiven you, instead try to find others you hurt then you ask for forgiveness and do not forget to repent before Lord Almighty.
· Please allow me to talk to you face to face.
· I accept and I will try to make it possible.
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About the Book
In 1994, in Rwanda, a country from the Central East Africa; genocide was perpetrated against Tutsis by some extremist Hutus. In less than 100 days, over one million (1M) of Tutsis were exterminated and my family perished among them. Eleven years old then, I became an orphan.
My life struggle started then, commemorating my lost family and the way they died, searching if any of my relatives survived, and fixing to earn everyday life as I did not hope for the future. This struggle took long. However, as time went on, I started gaining hope for the future. I first started thinking beyond myself, then about helping my fellow genocide survivors and finally about contributing to the reconstruction of my country in particular and assisting to people of all generations in general.
My belief in God generated love, love brought me to forgiving people who killed my family and forgiveness took me to making them my friends. Peace and forgiveness resulting from love is what I preach and this is what I wish for everybody.