Forgiveness News
Forgiving Muammar Gaddafi for the Lockerbie Bombing
The Wall Street Journal – Lisa Gibson, whose brother died in the Lockerbie bombing, has forgiven the only man convicted in the bombing, Abdel Basset Ali al-Megrahi, as well as Muammar Gaddafi, the former Libyan leader who was considered the mastermind behind the attack.
In Dec. 1988, Lisa was an 18-year-old college freshman and her brother, Kenneth Gibson, 20 at the time, was serving in the U.S. Army, in Berlin. He was coming home for Christmas on Pan Am Flight 103 when it blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing all 270 people on board.
Now 42 and living in Colorado Springs, Lisa says she always knew in the back of her mind that she would have to forgive the perpetrators of the attack. “I began to realize that at the heart of terrorism is hate, and the only way I could move away from it was to have light and forgiveness,” she says.
In 2004, she sent a letter to Ali al-Megrahi. It said, simply: “Only God really knows if you are responsible for this act. But as a Christian, I need to forgive you.” He wrote back, said he wasn’t responsible for the bombing but offered his condolences and shared verses from the Koran and the Bible.
Then, in 2009, Lisa met with Gaddafi when he came to New York to address the United Nations General Assembly. In the 10-minute meeting, she told him she had made a decision to forgive and he offered his condolences. “His words said “I didn’t do it,’ but his behavior said he did,” says Lisa.
Read the full story: Forgiving Muammar Gaddafi for the Lockerbie Bombing.
Boy, 14, Kills Mother, Family Offers Forgiveness
Detroit Free Press – As a 14-year-old boy was given 25-50 years for shooting his mother in the night, his uncle and grandmother were offering him forgiveness. His uncle, Leshaun Roberts, hugged the boy before he was taken away and said, “I forgive you and I love you. Please get him some help.”
Smith is accused of fatally shooting his mother, Tamika Robinson of Detroit, over a fight stemming from her telling the teen not to bring girls home or hang out with boys she regarded as thugs. On Feb. 27, Smith broke into a home office, where Robinson’s fiancé kept his gun, and shot her in the middle of the night, police said. He later pleaded guilty to second-degree murder.
Smith apologized in letters he wrote from jail, his grandmother said, claiming he was tired of seeing his mother suffer from debilitating bouts of the effects of lupus as well as kidney failure.
Read the full story: Family offers forgiveness to Detroit boy, 14, sentenced in mother’s shooting.
Widow of Killed Cyclist Offers Forgiveness to Errant Driver
KRQE News, Albuquerque, NM – It was something you don’t expect to see at a sentencing — an emotional widow telling the woman who killed her husband that she forgives her and that the woman should forgive herself.
Sherri Anderson, whose husband Dave was killed as their family was on a bicycle ride two years ago, spoke to a packed courtroom prior to the sentencing of Miranda Pacheco who was driving the car that veered off the road and crashed into Dave Anderson on a bike path.
“Miranda, Miranda, I forgive you! I really forgive you,” Sherri Anderson said. “This doesn’t mean I excuse what you did but forgiveness is not foolishness, Miranda!”
Anderson said she hoped Pacheco would teach others the difficult lesson she learned from the tragedy. Then she showed a video of Dave Anderson through the years before playin a song about forgiveness for Pacheco.
Read the full story and watch the KRQE News video: Family of Killed Cyclist Offers Forgiveness.
Bullied Teenage Girl Kills Herself, Leaves YouTube Video Behind
ABC News.go.com – Bullying behavior has claimed yet another victim, Amanda Todd, age 15, who apparently killed herself after years of struggling with being bullied. She chronicled her struggle on a YouTube video. The IFI is doing its part to combat bullying by developing a program that targets the anger within those who bully so that they no longer displace their inner rage onto others.
Read the full story and watch the video: Bullied Teen Leaves Behind Chilling YouTube Video.
Canadian Football Coach Asks Forgiveness After Devastating Loss
Chatham Daily News, Chatham, Ontario, Canada – The Canadian football (soccer) head coach, Stephen Hart, asked for forgiveness following a crushing 8-1 defeat from Honduras. As a result, the Canadian team is now out of the CONCACAF’s final round of World Cup qualifying for a fourth consecutive cycle.
In the guts of a dim and damp Estadio Olimpico Tuesday night, Canadian head coach Stephen Hart met with a small number of Canadian media after watching the Reds register one of the worst results in the history of Canadian sports.
Following an unthinkable 8-1 drubbing in Honduras, a result that put Canada out of CONCACAF’s final round of World Cup qualifying for a fourth consecutive cycle, Hart, at times, was poetic, acknowledging what was a Honduran “lesson in football” and using hard-hitting words like “disturbing” and “crushing” in describing 90 minutes of hell.
He was honest and regretful, asking for forgiveness on behalf of his players while announcing he didn’t expect Canadian supporters to forgive him for a result that will likely haunt him for the rest of his life.
Our question is this: Did the team play at least reasonably up to their ability level? Did they play honestly? If so, what is there to forgive?
Read the story – “Canadian soccer team begs forgiveness” – and then you decide if forgiveness is even an issue.
