The Liberating Humour of Desmond Tutu

2021 ◽  
Vol 110 (2) ◽  
pp. 327-340
Author(s):  
Tinyiko Maluleke
Keyword(s):  
Desmond Tutu

Suffering, hope and forgiveness: the ubuntu theology of Desmond Tutu

2009 ◽  
Vol 62 (4) ◽  
pp. 477-489 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles G. Haws
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Jesus Christ ◽  
Blaise Pascal ◽  
Desmond Tutu ◽  
The Way

AbstractBlaise Pascal once said, ‘Knowing Jesus Christ strikes the balance [for theology] because he shows us both God and our wretchedness’. Indeed, the majesty of Christ is that in him the despair of wretchedness and the hope of God are held together. Theology often does not reflect this balance, leading towards either anthropocentrism or nihilism. The ubuntu theology of Desmond Tutu does, however, by proclaiming the inherent interconnectedness of humankind. Tested by the context of South African apartheid, this notion called ‘ubuntu’ counters segregation and violence with reconciliation and justice. It refuses to execute retribution upon transgressors, instead committing itself to re-membering the disinherited of Christ's inclusive body. Forgiveness is the only future for this body and, though it remains an aporia in the context of radical evils such as apartheid, it is the only way to achieve justice without economising balance. That is, only forgiveness can realise ubuntu because it progresses forward toward justice not backward toward vengeance. Ubuntu is the prophetic balance of a divine gift that transforms the wretchedness of human atrocities. It represents Tutu's attempt to realise the way of God in his context, an attempt from which all theologising can benefit.

scholarly journals Between separation and celebration: Perspectives on the ethical-political preaching of Desmond Tutu

2015 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 41 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johan Cilliers
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
African Society ◽  
South African Society ◽  
The Past ◽  
African Film ◽  
Desmond Tutu

Recognising the complexity of a pluralistic South African society, this article attempts to identify four ethical movements in preaching in the past, as well as the present. These movements are from silence to struggle, from eparation to celebration, from lamenting to longing, and from shaming to playing. In this regard, cognisance is taken in particular of the sermons, speeches, and letters of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The paper concludes with a discussion of a classic South African film from 1976, entitled <em>e’Lollipop</em>.

Desmond Tutu:

2021 ◽  
pp. 185-186
Author(s):  
Ingrid le Roux
Keyword(s):  
Desmond Tutu

scholarly journals Taking responsibility for reconciliation: a Christian response to the legacy and challenges of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC)

2009 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
S. Barry
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Healing Process ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation Commission ◽  
Good News ◽  
Reconciliation Commission ◽  
South Africans ◽  
Truth And Reconciliation ◽  
Christian Churches ◽  
To Come ◽  
Desmond Tutu

At the conclusion of the TRC, Desmond Tutu stated that the Commission’s task was to promote, not to achieve, reconci- liation. Reconciliation, he maintained, is the responsibility of all South Africans, and expressed the hope that the Christian churches would be in the forefront of this healing process.  This article explores how the Christian church can be in the forefront of binding up the wounds, facilitating the healing pro- cess, and living as a people and a sign of hope. The answers it seeks to offer fall under three interrelated themes, namely the church’s:  • spirituality of reconciliation; • ministry and mission of reconciliation; and • resources for its ministry and mission of reconciliation. Cultivating a spirituality of reconciliation would mean making reconciliation a lifestyle, rather than a series of strategies, pro- grammes or initiatives, yet remaining concrete, practical, mea- surable and accountable.   The church’s mission is primarily to proclaim the good news of God’s Kingdom that is already here, but not yet fully here and therefore still to come. This proclamation is the message of reconciliation between God, others and the self, and anticipates the unity of all creation in Jesus Christ.   The resources given to the church to fulfil this apostolic ministry include prophecy, evangelism, pastoral care and teaching, as well as its liturgical and sacramental life, its ministry of pre- sence, its people and its commitment to social justice.

scholarly journals Uvid u borbu nadbiskupa Desmonda Tutua protiv apartheida u Južnoj Africi

Kairos ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 111-122
Author(s):  
Alexander Kokobili
Keyword(s):  
Desmond Tutu

Ovaj članak razmatra ulogu koju je nadbiskup Desmond Tutu odigrao u borbi protiv rasizma i socio-političke nejednakosti koju je promicao sustav apartheida u Južnoafričkoj Republici. Tutu je često u svojim govorima i javnozagovaračkim istupima osuđivao apartheid te promicao jednakost, pomirenje i miran suživot svih Južnoafrikanaca. Ideologija apartheida je crncima u Južnoj Africi otuđila svako ljudsko dostojanstvo, što je u suprotnosti sa Svetim pismom u kojem piše: „Tako Bog stvori čovjeka na sliku svoju. Stvori ga na sliku Božju. Stvori ih kao muža i ženu“ (Postanak 1,27). Unatoč tome je 1948. godine bjelačka Nacionalna južnoafrička stranka ozakonila apartheid kao politički sustav i pritom dobila podršku Nizozemske reformirane crkve bez obzira na to što se radilo o primjeni etike koja je protivna kršćanstvu. Apartheid je u Južnoj Africi usvojen s ciljem da se bijela manjina pozicionira kao viša društvena klasa, dok je crnačkoj većini bilo oduzeto niz prava i povlastica. Desmond Tutu je bio jedan od malobrojnih kršćanskih vođa koji je u Africi utirao put crnačke teologije pri rušenju apartheida u Južnoj Africi. Tijekom njegove borbe protiv apartheida, Tutu nije poticao na nasilne prosvjede ili nerede, već je više pokušavao djelovati kroz svoje propovijedi i poticati javnost na sudjelovanje u aktivnostima koje su promicale nacionalno jedinstvo, ljubav i jednakost svih Južnoafrikanaca.

Gladness and sympathetic joy: Gospel witness and the four noble truths in dialogue

2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 235-250
Author(s):  
Amos Yong
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Tibetan Buddhist ◽  
Christian Mission ◽  
Global Context ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Monastic Community ◽  
Christian Witness ◽  
Desmond Tutu

Several years ago, His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu published together, The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World (2016). If the famed Lama was calling on notions of joy developed in and through his own Tibetan Buddhist tradition to suggest a way forward for a fraught 21st-century world, the almost equally famous South African social activist and Anglican bishop was drawing from even more ancient Christian sources regarding rapturous and jubilational delight in order to propose engaging with the complexities of a globalizing third millennium. This article seeks to dig deeper into the scriptural tributaries feeding these contemporary proposals, focusing first on the 5th-century CE Indian Buddhist thinker Buddhaghosa, in particular his teachings regarding the role of joyful equanimity for the salvation of the monastic community found in the classic text Visuddhimagga, and on the appropriation of these ideas by contemporary Buddhist practitioners, and second on the apostolic writings of St. Luke, for whom joyful prayer and worship were central expressions of a Spirit-empowered proclamation of the gospel by the earliest followers of Jesus in their sojourn to the ends of the earth that has galvanized Christian mission historically. We will find that both traditions can learn something important in this dialogical process which can, in turn, also nurture in the present age a more humble and also, paradoxically, more potent Christian witness in Buddhist environments in the present 21st-century global context.

A Theology of Community

2000 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Battle
Keyword(s):  
Retributive Justice ◽  
Desmond Tutu ◽  
Better Than

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, South Africa's primary public confessor, articulates why forgiveness is better than retributive justice, spiritually and politically.

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