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When 71-year-old Bishop Mounir Khairallah, Eparch of Batroun of the Maronites, was 5 years old, someone broke into his home in Lebanon and murdered his parents. During a press conference at the Vatican on October 5, Bishop Khairallah, who is in Rome for the Synod on Synodality, shared the story of how he was able to forgive his parents’ murderer and how his faith has helped him continue to choose peace instead of hate.
As his home country is once again suffering from violence and conflict, Aleteia spoke to Bishop Khairallah about the power of unconditional forgiveness, the important role Christians have to play in promoting peace, and God’s ability to draw love and hope out of tragic situations.
A young man asked you if you would forgive your parents’ murderer if he were in front of you in the confessional. Why did that young man’s question challenge you? How do you know if you’ve really forgiven someone?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: This young man who asked me this question put back into the depths of my heart what it means to truly forgive. I am a man, I have my feelings. From his question I understood that being able to forgive is a great challenge for every Christian and every person. In that moment I really understood how much personal, spiritual, and human effort it takes.
I really had forgiven [the murderer] as a child; however, I realized when I was asked this question that I had forgiven from afar. I had said “I love you” only with words, even though my intention was righteous. Also when one is a child, innocence plays a role, and in my family we had been educated in Christian values and virtues.
But to be able to forgive someone standing in front of me, after what he has done, is not an automatic thing. I understood that one has to renew his commitment to be a Christian, to be a disciple of Christ, a son of the Father, as Jesus said. At that moment I understood [the verse from the Gospel of Luke that says] that if you love those who love you, what merit do you have? Love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you, and so you will be children of your Father who is in heaven.
I said to the young people: I understand you better today, I understand why you do not comprehend what it means to forgive, or you cannot forgive because humanly speaking you carry in your heart this sense of revenge or indifference.
How do you think one can come to genuine and free forgiveness? How can one receive the grace to forgive those who have done you wrong?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: You said it well, it is a grace. Having faith is already a grace, but loving our neighbor and especially being able to forgive the other person, especially the one who has hurt us, who persecutes us, is a grace and a gift from God. And one has to be able to accept and want to live God’s will.
I have felt that personal testimony speaks more than many speeches. In fact, I think the message got through to everyone who heard what I said the other day [during the press conference]. They heard that it’s not just words I was saying, but it’s something I really lived with all the effort I put in as a man, as a Christian, and then also as a priest.
When I tell people my experience I feel that they try to understand but also to get to a certain level of overcoming themselves. To forgive takes this, overcoming oneself, one’s feelings, ideas, the way one’s used to living. There one can truly have the result of God’s grace, acting in us naturally by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Why should a person choose to forgive?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: I have discovered in my personal journey that when faced with suffering, when faced with wars, when faced with death, when faced with martyrdom, we can have two alternatives.
Either one takes the alternative that I have chosen, thanks to the will of God and my family, which is to condemn all that I lived before and really start again from a source of brotherhood and peace. Or you take the alternative of putting hatred and the spirit of revenge in your heart and live as if every opportunity is good for revenge.
I took the first alternative of course; there are others who take the second, as perhaps some Israelis or Palestinians do today. But where will they go from there? Violence begets violence, war begets war. And they do not end. Instead, to convince ourselves that we can make peace I think will bring good, and benefit all.
In a world full of conflict and where people are ready to attack others and define them by their mistakes, do you think Christians have a special mission?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: Our mission as Christians on earth is to bear witness to the values in the Gospel, to bear witness to the presence of Jesus Christ in each of us but also in our midst. This means in the midst of the people of our countries, whether they are Christians, Muslims or Jews. Our mission is to be able to condemn violence, hatred, wars, revenge, and to be able to truly build peace on these feelings of fraternity, cooperation, and respecting each other in our diversity.
So with the conflict we are experiencing today again in Lebanon, we are again called to be the disciples of Jesus Christ. We are called to be messengers of peace, of openness of respect for the other, prophets of truth, living the witness of Jesus Christ who is present in our midst.
I say that all the demons of the world have been unleashed on Lebanon for the last 50 years. Lebanon was a “message,” as Holy John Paul II used to say. I see no other mission, no other vocation than that.
So many people talk to us about demographics and say that Christians in the Middle East are disappearing because they either die martyrs or emigrate. But I say, no. The disciples of Jesus Christ on earth do not give importance to their numbers. The great importance is their mission, it is to bear witness to the values of the Gospel and bring them to our brothers and sisters and citizens. It is to tell the whole world that it is possible for Jews, Muslims, and Christians to live together as a people and in peace, in spite of everything that happens.
Can children growing up in a zone with generations of conflict be taught to live in forgiveness?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: For children I think we need to start within the family, that’s where education in Christian and human values begins. As we are saying in the synod, the family is the privileged place for education in faith and values. If the family is really committed to educating, to make children understand that living in peace is much better, that living in fear of the other or with a sense of revenge or rejection is not good for them, you can see a big difference.
If this education occurs in families, I think we will begin to see the hope of a new world. Schools, the Church, society also have a role, but we must above all start with the family.
My aunt who was a nun, for example, she not only invited me and my siblings to pray but educated and accompanied us so that we could continue to live this forgiveness. Since forgiveness is not something that can be solved in a moment, it is a whole life journey with continuous commitment, similar to other Christian values.
Have you had other experiences where you saw that your testimony touched or influenced the people listening to it?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: In 2006 when there was Israel’s war against Lebanon, it was a situation similar to today, where many Lebanese in the south fled to the north. In my diocese of Batrun we had taken in 15,000 refugees, all Shiite Muslims. We welcomed them with love, living in charity with them, and with a group of 120 young people we put ourselves at their service day and night for 33 days.
On the last day before they were to return to their home, on August 14, the eve of the Feast of the Assumption, they asked for us to pray together. I was a little surprised by this request, but we prayed together, each with our own expressions while knowing that we were praying to the same God, who is the father of us all.
When the prayer was over, I gave my testimony about loving our neighbor and forgiveness. Then an 18-year-old Muslim girl named Fatima came to the front to ask me if she could take with her this big cross that our scouts had made because she wanted to put it in the central square of their town, Touline, on the border with Israel. It had been 90% destroyed.
I told her, “But Fatima, this cross makes sense to us because it is where our Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, died and rose again to save humanity. But it doesn’t make sense to you.”
She replied, “It didn’t make sense, but now, since we have spent these days with you all, it makes sense. We have discovered your Christian values of charity and forgiveness. This cross can remain as a sign of recognition and friendship.”
Have you visited this city?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: Five days later I went with our group of 120 young people to visit these Muslim friends of ours in their village. In fact the houses were destroyed and people were sleeping in the gardens. They gave us a triumphant welcome and said, Father, we want you to not only visit our houses but also bless them and bless our families. And so I went around the city blessing them, according to the Christian blessing.
Then at the end of this day, the Muslim leader of this town, who was also an important figure at the state level in Lebanon, had prepared a meal for us at his house. He asked me if I could bless his family and home before eating, I gladly did.
Then he told me: “Since we came back from Batrun we have come to better know the values of charity and unconditioned forgiveness toward each other, and I realized that I too am called to live these values.”
He explained to me that in 1978, when there had been the first incursion of the Israeli army into Lebanon, he had lost his father, brother, uncles, and nephews, and that from that moment he had felt a hatred and a sense of revenge against the Israelis. But this leader told me, “Since we came back from Batrun, where I heard your testimony, I want to promise you in front of everyone that I will try to live not only in charity, but also in forgiveness, although I know it is very difficult.”
And what about Fatima, the young woman?
Bishop Mounir Khairallah: Two years later Fatima returned to Batrun on September 14, which is the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. For me this feast is very important because it is the day after the anniversary of my parents’ martyrdom.
She introduced me to her husband, also a Shiite Muslim, and told me that they got married the day before, September 13, in my honor. She told me that she had come to my cathedral to ask me to pray for them, to give them a blessing, and to ask God to help them raise their children according to the values they had discovered and lived with us: charity and forgiveness.
And today we celebrate...