The story below was written by a young woman who, together with her mother and father, participated in a dialogue facilitated by myself, Dave Gustafson, and Susan Underwood, another of our long-term and highly valued CJI staff facilitators, in a nearby prison last December.
One quiet evening at home, over 18 years ago, my mother sat awestruck watching as a tragic story unfolded on the TV evening news. Katy Hutchison, a young widow from Squamish BC, working with CJI staff, had met with and had forgiven the young man who took her husband’s life. Katy, committed to ensuring that the rest of her life was invested – not in the manner of Bob’s death and the pain of his murder, but in his life and the healing and wellbeing of everyone impacted by his loss – was now sharing her story with the world. That newscast was my mother’s first encounter with what our family came to know as restorative justice (RJ). Little did my mother know that in the year 2016 she would, herself, be living out a story very similar to Katy’s.
In 2016, my brother Johnny’s life was taken in a pre-trial correctional facility as a result of an altercation with his cellmate in segregation. Knowing from day one that our family would want to meet with the young man who took John’s life, we asked our Victim Services support worker to help us get connected with a restorative justice organization that would assist us with our wishes. This organization was CJI. We admit that, at the time, we knew nothing of CJI or even what it might mean for our family to engage in an RJ process. All we knew was that we wanted to meet the young man who turned our lives upside down.
I can recall at least four face-to-face meetings with our CJI Facilitators before we met with the offender. They made themselves available for what seemed like 24/7 via email, texts and phone calls. They encouraged us to meet with them on our schedule and at meeting places we were comfortable with. They were kind and gentle. They provided a listening ear as we related stories of the good memories we shared of Johnny. Whenever I had concerns or questions about the process- and boy did I have questions! – they were understanding and answered them in a timely manner. My mother, father and I all felt very comfortable sharing our doubts and fears with them.
When it came time to meet ‘Gordon’ (not his real name), the offender we felt as prepared as we could ever be. We were able to ask him questions about what occurred that day and to receive honest answers. Together with the facilitators who had brought us together and arranged our entry to a federal prison, we sat in a circle and shared our thoughts and feelings in meaningful dialogue with Gordon. Not only did we get answers to some of the heavy questions that had been weighing on our minds for nearly two years, but we also received perspective. We learned a good deal about Gordon: how he grew up, his struggles, his strengths, his hopes and future goals.
Forgiveness is neither a requirement nor an expectation of CJI’s RJ processes. However, offering Gordon forgiveness allowed us to see him as a fellow human being, and not as the ‘monster’ our minds may have been trying to convince us he might be. Choosing to forgive him had been our objective from day one. We knew that carrying the guilt and shame of what he had done was already enough for him to bear. We wanted him to know that we would be okay. But, it was not until we offered our forgiveness to him face-to-face that we realized it was really for our own healing. In fact, my father says “Forgiving him for what he had done to my son changed my whole outlook on life.”
Without the opportunity to meet with the offender face-to-face, I honestly do not know where my family would be at in our healing journey today. We likely would not have had the peace within our hearts that we now carry with us. I am forever grateful to have received the free and life-transforming services that CJI offered my family. Further, I want to offer my sincerest THANK YOU to all who dedicate their time and efforts to helping others find reconciliation and receive healing through CJI!
~ Jillian
Thomas Moore, the famous Psychotherapist and author, in his best-seller, Care of the Soul, comes as close as anyone I know to describing how we, as facilitators, go about accompanying the survivors of often horrendous trauma and the prisoners who caused those harms as we bear witness and help them to find what they were seeking when they first made their tentative approach to us. Perhaps what we are really offering is a form of care of the soul. Moore describes how that might differ from most therapeutic approaches:
Care of the soul is quite different in scope from most modern notions of psychology and psychotherapy. It isn’t about curing, fixing, changing, adjusting or making healthy, and it isn’t about some idea of perfection or even improvement. It doesn’t look to the future for an ideal, trouble-free existence. Rather, it remains patiently in the present, close to life as it presents itself day by day, and yet at the same time mindful of religion and spirituality….
Care of the soul is a sacred art (Moore, 1992).
In Jillian’s account of their participation, she makes clear that “Although forgiveness is neither a requirement nor an expectation of CJI’s RJ processes…choosing to forgive him had been our objective from day one.”
Many VOMP participants ultimately get to forgiveness, but it would be a small percentage who, like this family, start there. In our first meetings with them, they were clear that they had come to their convictions along what had become two converging paths. They were of Métis heritage, and intimately acquainted with the teachings of their elders, including the list of ‘grandfather teachings’, the cardinal values which have come down to them and to many indigenous peoples through the ages: Respect, Love, Caring, Honesty, Kindness, Trust , Honour, Sharing. It is easy to comprehend how, given commitment to that set of traditional teachings, values and virtues, it would be difficult to seek vengeance, nurture hatred, or wish for evil to befall anyone, even the ‘offender’.
Added to the values embraced as a part of Métis culture, Jillian, Ken and Sandra were committed Christians, members of community within a community that embraced the teachings of Jesus about forgiveness. Having been recipients of great Grace, they explained, they were motivated to offer that Grace, in turn, to another who had gravely offended against them and their loved one, Johnny, son and brother.
I’ll never forget the hours spent with these lovely people, culminating in a powerful facilitated dialogue with Gordon, table set aside, wheeled chairs pulled into a tight circle as they shared with him the journey they had been on for the previous two years, and how they had come to consensus about offering forgiveness to him, the young man who had taken Johnny’s life, motivated by teachings such as these:
So, chosen by God for this new life of love, dress in the wardrobe God picked out for you: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. Be … quick to forgive an offense. Forgive as quickly and completely as the Master forgave you. And regardless of what else you put on, wear love. It’s your basic, all-purpose garment. Never be without it. (Colossians 3:13-14 The Message).
This family is clear that their VOMP participation has impacted them profoundly. It seems clear that their grace and mercy have also profoundly affected Gordon. The hope is that their forgiveness will enable him to forgive himself and to put his energies into his own growth and healing goals, including the commitment made to the family, “never again to do violent harm to another”.
Not everyone who participates in VOMP has the same experience of transcendence or transformation of their personal tragedy, but many, over the 30 year history of the program have done so. The notions we had at the beginning, of melding learnings from the worlds of victim–offender mediation, peacebuilding, the psychology of trauma and recovery and of offender treatment programming with the values and principles of RJ, have been vindicated and have borne fruit in many lives. And still, after 30 years and more of immersion education in these very things, with having witnessed hundreds of exchanges of apology and forgiveness as well as the life trajectories of the victims and offenders which followed those encounters, there are still mysteries that seem bottomless, too deep to be completely plumbed and paradoxes which remind us that truth is often found between what appear to be opposing poles, as one of the great scholars and teachers of forgiveness, John Monbourquette, reminds us in his book How to Forgive:
The Great Paradoxes of Forgiveness:
Easy but often inaccessible
Available but often forgotten
Liberating for the other and even more so for ourselves
On everyone’s lips and yet misunderstood
Innate to the human heart and yet illusory
Vital for humans but so often feared
Bestowed upon the soul and yet menacing
Mysterious and yet an everyday occurrence
Utterly divine and utterly human (Monbourquette 2000: 193).
This family – and Gordon, too – know these paradoxes well. To a great degree they have plumbed the mysteries and discovered that, yes, while forgiveness is “utterly divine”, it is also “utterly human”. One thing they know for sure, the truth of what John Monbourquette had written: forgiving has proven “liberating for the other, and even more so for [them]selves”.
Moore, T. (1992). Care of the Soul: Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life. HarperCollins.
Monbourquette, J. (2000). How to Forgive: A step-by-step guide. Novalis, St. Paul University, Ottawa, Canada.
