Redeeming the Past: My Journey from Freedom
Fighter to Healer,
Father Michael Lapsley, SSM; Maryknoll, NY, Orbis Books, 2012
Michael Lapsley is one of the many
unsung heroes of the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa. A devout
Anglican from New Zealand, he entered the Society of the Sacred Mission (SSM),
an Anglican religious order, when he was seventeen.
Sent by his religious superiors to South Africa in
1973, Lapsley was shocked by the signs of apartheid everywhere: an elevator
for Whites Only, another for Goods and Non-Whites; the law that said he must
live in a White area of Durban; the segregated beaches. Indeed, his first
evening in South Africa, during dinner with the family that had met him at
the airport, he asked his hosts if there were black people in their
congregation. ‘“Oh yes,” they said, “and they are very good—they always sit
at the back.”’ He even found that “. . .apartheid had thoroughly penetrated
the mentality of my own community.”
In Durban, Lapsley was both student and chaplain
at the University of Natal. He used this position to teach and preach
against apartheid. By 1975, despite his pacifism, he became sympathetic to
the African National Congress (ANC), which he eventually joined as
chaplain. It was, however, the Soweto uprising of 1976 and its aftermath of
repression, detention and torture that catapulted him into a deeper
commitment to the struggle and greater perceived threat to the government.
Before long, he was expelled from the country. Instead of returning to New
Zealand, he went to neighboring Lesotho, where Bishop Desmond Tutu welcomed
as a priest of his diocese. There, with other activists, he continued his
anti-apartheid work.
The event that turned Lapsley from Fighter to
Healer occurred on April 28, 1990, after the defeat of the apartheid regime
and the release of Nelson Mandela. He opened a piece of mail, and a bomb
exploded in his hands. He lost his hands and one of his eyes. He shares
with the reader his feelings during his long physical and emotional recovery
from this trauma. It is significant that, for functionality, he chose hooks
as prostheses rather than more aesthetically pleasing hands. His work from
then on has been with the movement he founded, Healing of Memories
workshops, which he has taken globally.
Of course, Lapsley’s telling of his own story
cannot be separated from his descriptions of and reflections upon the
everyday realities of apartheid. In fact, this blend of narrative and
reflection characterizes the book. For example, he admits that as a child,
“Alas, I didn’t always have an age-appropriate sense of my limits, and I
think I was sometimes quite obnoxious with my religiosity.” In describing
The Development of Theology program, an initiative of the Lutheran World
Federation, with which Lapsley worked during a time of displacement, he
writes, “We understood theology to be a living organism that had to grow and
change in response to the conditions in which people lived. That was, after
all, Jesus’ way.” And later, after reporting a particularly moving incident
during a Healing of Memories workshop, he reflects, “I think we are called
to be signs of hope, but to do that we must be able to deal with our own
woundedness.”
The book includes good photos of Lapsley using his
prostheses, which enhance the narrative. I recommend the book for anyone
looking for insight into unconditional commitment to the Gospel by someone
how freely admits his own failings and weaknesses.
Pat Chaffee OP
Racine,
Wisconsin.
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