Paula Deen, Nelson Mandela and God's Justice

The past few weeks two names in the news have been Paula Deen and Nelson Mandela, both who are  contrasting examples on racial justice, one in how justice has been sought and denied with no forgiveness, and the other with how justice was offered through actions of unspoken forgiveness.

Ms. Deen's open admission to using a racial slur many years ago in her past landed her in the hot seat with the racial justice activist who seek restitution in the form of destroying lives, with no mercy, of anyone of notoriety with indiscretions in their past.  Now let me say that No !! I do not know the truth or the extent of Ms. Deen's failures and short comings when it comes to her attitudes and actions towards persons of other races. There have been endless articles regarding additional claims of raciest comments or actions. However, this is not my point to prove or disprove, which I never could, but to say that these attacks on Ms. Deen have been in my opinion over zealous and to point out this underlying reason is in stark contrast to Mr. Mandela's example.

The attack on Ms. Deen by the racial justice purist calling her a bigoted racist because of her past use of the "N" word was quickly followed by many companies pulling their contacts and relationships with Ms. Deen thus hurting her income sources. No less, these private companies who cut their business relationship with Ms Deen are within their full right to choose who they do business.

The problem with these responses and actions by those who call for such is that those who thirst for justice seek it in way absolutely void of any forgiveness.  At the core of this justice seeking is a deeply rooted inability for those who are offended by Ms. Deen's omission's to find any justice acceptable short of inflicting pain and suffering on her to the point of destroying her livelihood. There has even been claims that she has made her fortune off the heritage of African-american cooking for which she has supposedly given little to no recognition to this fact. This type justice is not appeased by any heartfelt apologize but requires utter and total personal destruction.

The problem here is the type of justice that's sought will never satisfy these justice seekers, because the entire point here is that this type of justice is not for man to apply, but it is for God, where all ultimate justice resides. While bigotry and racism can be crimes of civil and criminal law, however in this case its a question regarding the heart and soul of a person. I'm not saying that we should be a society without justice as part of our civil society, we should apply justice when anyone breaks a criminal and civil law. However, this is not the nature of this case. No one knows the true heart of Ms. Deen as to what her heartfelt intentions were or if her admission and apologizes were genuine. The truth is we'll most likely never know, this is why justice seeking in this case is a troubled road and one that will leave the justice seekers unsatisfied by anything Ms. Deen says or does.

The connection with Nelson Mandela, who has been hospitalized in failing health, to Ms. Deen's story is that when Mr. Mandela came to power after the apartheid was dismantled he did not seek to destroy the former ruling white minority, he sought to incorporated them into the nation as they were. The world justice says that we must destroy our enemy, pay back what they paid us, but Mr. Mandela knew what the world does not know today, that this justice is a losing proposition.

The power of Mr. Mandela's type of justice in the early days of the new South African nation is portrayed in the 2009 movie Invictus, starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon. Invictus is about the South African national rugby team and its competition in the 1995 rugby world cup which were held in South Africa.  Mr. Mandela infused black players with the traditional all-white team, called the Springboks, together into a unified team, as well as his security detail which was a secondary story to the rugby team. In the movie there were those who wanted the white minority to have nothing to do with the new government and nation including fielding a mixed race rugby team. Mr. Mandela knew that the only way to move the nation forward was to allow through forgiveness, even when not asked for or spoken, to prevail. The nation would not come together and survive if justice and restitution required destroying the white minority while trying to establish a truly democratic nation. Mr. Mandela was a wise man, while I do not know every story regarding Mr. Mandela and South Africa I'm sure it has not been without its issues nor has it melded together as a nation without racial strife, but the man that was portrayed in this movie was someone who understood that nothing but forgiveness could fix the injustices of the past. Mr. Mandela did not have to speak it or ask for it, he just acted on it.

As to God, Jesus said the 2nd most important commandment was to love your neighbor as yourself, even the neighbor (and who is your neighbor?)  who hates you and to pray for your enemy. I think that Nelson Mandela is more like Jesus than the justice seekers on Ms. Deen. He treated those who wanted to destroy him in the past as his neighbor in the present despite what the world said was just.

What we need today are the Nelson Mandela's, Martin Luther King's and Abraham Lincoln's of the world who understand that destroying one for their past indiscretion is a losing proposition, unconditional forgiveness is the only path to real justice.

Things I learned from my Dad... and some I've not practiced !

Tomorrow being fathers day I was recently inspired to write this blog by watching the movie Life of Pi. While the movie itself was a bit slow and I did not see it in a theater where I'm sure the visuals were even  more magnificent on the big screen in 3D.  However, there was a very important message where at the end of the movie Pi tell's the young writer,to whom he had just told this magnificent story of surviving stranded at sea with a Bengal Tiger, that everything he learned to survive he learned from his father. Pi's father was a strict disciplinary and drove Pi to learn knowledge and life lessons sometimes with great difficulty and struggles.

So, what did I learn from my father?   While there is little correlation to my life and the fictional Pi's, however there are things that I learned from my father that have carried  with me in life, even if I've failed at times to practice them. Some of these are trivial and others not.  While I'm not surviving stranded at sea, but the life lessons that my dad taught through his life helped me to navigate the sea of life which is filled with its similar challenges. Below is a list of things that my dad taught me in no particular order of importance;

1. Family is important - More than anything Dad loved his family, he loved being with his siblings and when grand-children came along he loved being around them more than anything. When the first grand-child was born he arranged a move to get as close enough to visit.  He greatly looked forward to the times spending with family. 
2. "If you don't know the answer its okay, just sound like you do" - My dad was a story-teller extraordinaire, he had the gift for gab. He could make you believe that whatever he was saying was truth, even when the story was quite extraordinary.   Now this might seem like a condoning telling fibs, but this is not what I'm saying, I don't think.  If you've ever seen the movie Big Fish, well this was my dad portrayed on the big screen.  The bottom line is that you have to be confident in how you tell something, believe it, know its true and convey it. 
3. Love the Mamma - Dad always loved our mom and showed it, he always respected mom, even though yeah at times when caught being wrong he did not like being challenged. When they were apart he would call every evening (okay I've not practiced this consistently). 
4. To play Golf and Fish - Kind of trivial, but I learned to play golf and fish from my dad. He was an avid and good golfer and bass fisherman. I was always a much better golfer playing with my dad, than not. We had some interesting fishing stories, there was the one where the copperhead glanced off me and then landed in the boat wiggling, lunging at us and everything. The time we got pulled by a fish 100's of yards down the dam of a lake, it boiled the water once but we never knew what it was. There was the time we had to jump into the water flip the boat to survive a hail storm with hail stones the size of grapefruit (see #2 if you have problems believing this ). We played golf with the Gatlin brothers in Nashville, we had no idea who they were. 
5. Personal connections and relationships are everything - Dad loved meeting and interacting with people, he never met a stranger and was comfortable with just about everyone. Where ever we'd go dad would strike up a conversation with anyone he encountered.  He operated that there was always something to learn or to be gained by interacting with even complete strangers. He would find if the six degrees of separation rule applied. 
6. Don't let dreams get in the way -  My dad had some big dreams in his life. I know that he considered moving to Alaska prior to my being born and he always through his life talked about moving to Australia, I never did understand this.  However, dad did not live by big dreams or on the future possibilities, he also did not let business failures get him down too much (see more in #7). He just enjoyed life as it came focusing on the simple things, many of which I've listed in this blog. 
7. Even if you fail, try again, take risk- Dad was not very successful at business, he went bankrupt twice and both times he came out of bankruptcy. The point here is that he tried, he took risk to better his life and family, even when he failed once it did not prevent him from trying again.  
8. Laugh at yourself, and everything else- Dad along with telling stories could tell a few jokes as well, he was a person who could laugh at himself, and found the humor in life. 
9. Faith is important - While Dad was not a religious man, at least in my memory, but we as a family attend church on a regular basis and were active in church life. There were times when Dad would go fishing on Sunday and he would tell mom that he could commune with God just as good out on the lake as he could sitting in Church. I think there is some truth to that !  There are many Sunday's I wish I was communing with God in some other way than sitting in a church building..  

Happy fathers day to all you Dad's... remember what your father taught you!