Living Well: The healing power of forgiveness

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

By Teresa Griswold

Jackson Hole, Wyo.-He could not stop weeping. Father Ubald Rugirangoga lost his mother, his brother and his brother’s wife and children, grandmother and uncles in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. In all, Father Ubald lost 80 members of his family and more than 3,000 parishioners. His father was killed in 1963 when he was seven.

At the time of the Rwandan genocide, Farther Ubald’s enemies wanted to kill him too, but he escaped to neighboring Congo by orders of his bishop. He was left with enormous sadness and questioned why he had become a priest. He felt he had failed in his mission. When Father Ubald was ordained in 1984, his intention was to teach Rwandans about love.

“In Rwanda, people did not love each other,” he said. “There was ethnic division and war.”

He returned to his country five months after the genocide, overcoming his sorrow and receiving strength through prayer and a visit to the famous healing shrine in Lourdes, France.

“If God has given me a gift of healing, it was the right time to return and heal the people,” he said. “I came back and began praying for inner healing and speaking about reconciliation.”

Father Ubald prayed for and took care of the children of the man who had killed his mother.

“Their father was in prison and their mother was dead. It was a way for me to be healed,” he said. “When you teach by example, people understand about forgiveness and pardon, because they see it. They see that it makes them free.”

Paul Vogelheim, a Teton County Commissioner and Our Lady of the Mountains Catholic Church parishioner, visited Father Ubald’s parish, situated in a rural area of Rwanda, close to the Congo and Burundi borders, last November. He witnessed the healing transformation that Father Ubald facilitates.

“There are lessons for us to learn,” Vogelheim said. “They all lived together [before the genocide], and they have to continue to live together.”

Vogelheim recalled an experience when Father Ubald tried to calm an angry man when their car broke down in a small village. About 40 children gathered around them, and the man was fearful of the white foreigners, and wanted the children to keep away from them. He was visibly agitated and yelling. Father Ubald recognized that the man was wounded, not in the physical sense, but in his spirit.
He told Vogelheim that we all have wounds and how we work through our own wounds is what transforms them.

“You either transform your wounds, or you transmit your wounds,” Father Ubald told Vogelheim.

Father Ubald said he teaches his parishioners to seek reconciliation in a process that takes about six months. For those who killed, he has them speak to the victim’s remaining family members and request pardon. When the family members grant pardon, they all come together to him and receive communion.

“When you can’t pardon, you carry a big weight. When you do, the weight gives way and you are free,” Father Ubald said. “If you don’t beg pardon, it is like a death, and you are dying. When you ask for pardon, it is a new life.”
The healing has been so profound in his parish that the government of Rwanda seeks Father Ubald out for advice on forgiveness and reconciliation as they rebuild the country.

Father Ubald recognized he had a spiritual gift for healing before the genocide. When he would pray for people who were sick, they became well. He shares his prayer for healing with people everywhere.

Last year, he made his first trip to the United States at the request of Immaculee’ Ilibagiza, author of Left To Tell, another genocide survivor. He will visit Jackson this week.

Father Ubald Rugirangoga will share stories of healing, 6 p.m. Sunday, at Our Lady of the Mountains Catholic Church, 201 S. Jackson. 733-2516. On Monday he will give a healing service at 7 pm. JHW

COURTESY Paul Vogelheim
Father Ubald Rugirangoga teaches about love and forgiveness.

PERMALINK:
Living Well: The healing power of forgiveness | Planet JH News Article: Living Well

Leave a Comment