REDEEMING THE DEVIL

Archbishop Desmond Tutu at the United Nations

"I have learned that we have the capacity for the greatest possible evil, all of us, but more exhilarating, we have the capacity for the greatest possible good. Human beings are an incredible creation." Thus spoke Desmond Tutu regarding the revelation of chemical and biological agents to manipulate and destroy the native population of South Africa during the reign of Apartheid. This acknowledgement of sanctioned genocide by the politically powerful of South Africa was the most devastating and truly shocking reality to Tutu and the rest of the world.
But in the face of such inhumanity, Tutu remained humane. He does speak of how one would by nature and rationality be justifiably angry with such treatment as this and its everlasting impact. And that when these horrors came to light that the peoples of South Africa would not simply embrace each other as if no tragedy had ever occurred.
But he still holds out the hope. He believes God's grace is ultimately irresistible, even to the one referred to as the locus of evil itself, the Satan. He refers to this as universalism, and credits the early church father, Origen, for its expression, even though his own Catholic faith tradition does not recognize this view.
Revealing planned genocide, being humane, evil, allowing redemption, enduring love and universalism. "Human beings are an incredible creation," the Archbishop says.
How does Tutu's action jive with his theology in the case of exposing and relinquishing Apartheid?
We all live in a world of possibility as described by Tutu. How do we go about creating the world possible?

Walter Morton for Terra Incognita