The Book of Forgiving: The Fourfold Path for Healing Ourselves and Our World - Hardcover

Tutu, Desmond M.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0062203568 ISBN 13: 9780062203564

Publisher: Harperone, 2014

Synopsis

Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nobel Peace Prize winner, Chair of The Elders, and Chair of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, along with his daughter, the Reverend Mpho Tutu, offer a manual on the art of forgiveness--helping us to realize that we are all capable of healing and transformation.

Tutu's role as the Chair of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission taught him much about forgiveness. If you asked anyone what they thought was going to happen to South Africa after apartheid, almost universally it was predicted that the country would be devastated by a comprehensive bloodbath. Yet, instead of revenge and retribution, this new nation chose to tread the difficult path of confession, forgiveness, and reconciliation.

Each of us has a deep need to forgive and to be forgiven. After much reflection on the process of forgiveness, Tutu has seen that there are four important steps to healing: Admitting the wrong and acknowledging the harm; Telling one's story and witnessing the anguish; Asking for forgiveness and granting forgiveness; and renewing or releasing the relationship. Forgiveness is hard work. Sometimes it even feels like an impossible task. But it is only through walking this fourfold path that Tutu says we can free ourselves of the endless and unyielding cycle of pain and retribution. The Book of Forgiving is both a touchstone and a tool, offering Tutu's wise advice and showing the way to experience forgiveness. Ultimately, forgiving is the only means we have to heal ourselves and our aching world.

About this title

Review:

"Desmond Tutu shows each of us how to transform our pain and sorrow into hope and confidence in the future. Whether you are the head of a country or the head of a household, you will cherish his words."--Nelson Mandela, former president of South Africa and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

"For decades [Tutu] has been a moral titan--a voice of principle, an unrelenting champion of justice, and a dedicated peacemaker . . . an outspoken voice for freedom and justice in countries across the globe; a staunch defender of the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender persons."--President Barack Obama

"Archbishop Tutu has the ability to see our shared humanity in each person he meets, and to get us to do the same."--Bill Clinton

"Archbishop Desmond Tutu, like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. before him, has offered us a luminous vision of love and hope. With his great warmth and compassion, Archbishop Tutu offers a spiritual message that if heeded can change lives as well as history."--Jimmy Carter

"I have the highest regard for my good and trusted friend Archbishop Desmond Tutu. I admire him for the wonderful, warm person he is and especially for the human principles he upholds."--His Holiness the Dalai Lama

"One thing I have learned from [Tutu] . . . is that he has that constant and persistent faith that things can be better and we can do something about it. We should not find excuses not to act or not to speak out."--Kofi Annan, former secretary-general of the United Nations and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2001

"Desmond Tutu has walked the talk all his adult life. We can all be grateful that, together with his daughter Mpho, he has now shared his secrets for why he has so much hope and joy."--Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland

"[Tutu] was not just an anti-apartheid worker. . . . He was somebody who had thought very deeply about spiritual values and had applied them to what he was doing. In some ways that reminded me of Gandhi."--Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize

"Bishop Tutu and his daughter Mpho reveal groundbreaking insights as to how to acknowledge and resolve our lifelong burdens of anguish and pain towards a new paradigm of transformative healing."--Annie Lennox

"I am lost for words to express my appreciation for this book ... Desmond Tutu and his daughter show clearly that suffering, while always painful, need not destroy."--Terry Waite, CBE

From the Back Cover:

How do I forgive?

Nobel laureate Archbishop Desmond Tutu has witnessed some of the worst crimes people can inflict on others. So wherever he goes, he inevitably gets asked this question. This book is his answer. Writing with his daughter, Mpho, an Anglican priest, they lay out the simple but profound truths about the significance of forgiveness, how it works, why everyone needs to know how to grant it and receive it, and why granting forgiveness is the greatest gift we can give to ourselves when we have been wronged.

They explain the four-step process of forgiveness--Telling the Story, Naming the Hurt, Granting Forgiveness, and Renewing or Releasing the Relationship--as well as offer meditations, exercises, and prayers to guide the reader along the way.

"With each act of forgiveness, whether small or great, we move toward wholeness," they write. "Forgiveness is how we bring peace to ourselves and our world."

About this edition

• Publisher: Harperone
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 0062203568
• ISBN 13: 9780062203564
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 229
• Editor: Abrams Douglas C.