Religion and Politics

“I Have Sinned Against the Lord and Against You! Will You Forgive Me?”

In The New Republic, Eve Fairbanks profiles South African ex-police minister Adriaan Vlok’s search for redemption. Today, the evangelical Vlok washes the feet of those he admits to wronging during apartheid, when his police force murdered anti-apartheid activists. “Somebody has to take the blame for these acts, though,” Fairbanks writes. “And by owning up to a thousand subtle sins of ego but denying culpability for apartheid’s worst crimes, Vlok has pushed the guilt onto his former underlings”—perhaps undermining his own spiritual quest.

Read at The New Republic

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