Portraits of Justice #13: Immanuel {Colombo, Sri Lanka}

It's week #13, meet Immanuel {Colombo, Sri Lanka}. 
Sri Lanka was colonized by the Portuguese, received independence in  1948, and has since experienced more than 30 years of civil war. Immanuel's family, a minority in these wars, survived by being sheltered by neighbours. He now works at shaping his country into a just one.

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"Sri Lanka is a country that has been affected by civil war for three decades. We had a civil war, its sort of ethnic conflict. But its our conflict for justice, just required by the minority, the Tamils in the northern province of Sri Lanka.which was affected mostly."

"My father, one of the stories he shared with me, was about when the insurrection happened in the south. The Tamils, in 1983, were persecuted by the government. Most of the Sinhalese have come and protected us. For example they have threatened my family saying they will will put the 2 children (my sisters, I was not yet born, as I was born in 1984) inside the house and tie my mother and father to the house and burn the house. "

"That kind of threat happened, but the neighbours (who are Sinahelese) took my parents and the children and have kept them for days and weeks and months. They are the people who are protecting. We are the only Tamils in that village to survive and share these stories because of how the Sinhalese treated us. Even though the government was persecuting the Tamils, the Sinhalese came forward to protect because that's how the society has been. Its never a Sinhalese or Tamil issue, or a Muslim or Tamil issue, it's a political issue always. I think that it is beautiful in terms of justice, they come forward."

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"The young people asking for justice has been in the country more than  50 years, from the time we got independence in 1948, after that. We were colonized by the British last, and after we got independence in 1948 it has been a struggle seeking for justice. So the armed conflict ended official in 2009, but that doesn't mean it bore any justice, because that victory was finished by military, so it is a military defeat."

"None of the questions for justice were answered and we are 6 years after that now. Last year we have to change the government that brought the conflict in by the military mechanism, because they were not answering any of the questions. They were moving towards a more military government in terms of democratic values, etc. The justice in the country was in question. All kinds of justice. Economic justice. Religious Justice. Educational – everything is still a question. We are hopeful with the new government we have elected that we will have justice. Some say because the young people were the forefront of electing this new government. One million new votes made the real difference in electing the new government. Mostly the minority voted for this. The majority lost, we have to say. Young people came together to elect this government and we have a hope for justice. "

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Portraits of Justice #12: Lucian {Targu-Neamt, Romania}

Today marks the 12th story I have shared, and will also mark 1000 hits on this blog! Wow, thanks everyone for supporting this project and the amazing stories of people from all over the globe!

Meet Lucian from Romania. He is among the first generation to grow up under democracy after a 50+ year rule of oppressive communism . This is a man who is shaping his country's future while pursuing social justice. 

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"Romania use to be a communist country until 1989. Now in a post communist period, the transition is from communism to democracy. This actually took us quite a long time. We are now having 25 years of so called democracy. Even though it was a bit unstable at the beginning we still have hope we are going towards the road of democracy, rule of law and human rights" 

"In terms of justice, I would only refer to political justice, because we having a lot of efforts to strengthen our judicial system, our laws and constitution and so on. I am quite happy to share with you that in the last years we used to have a lot of VIP who were very popular in the country, that had a lot of “unclear” or “dirty business”, that are actually having a trial and are being put into jail. It was very helpful because Romania joined the European Union in 2007, so in this case with help from outside we are actually building right now a clear and fair system of justice in our country."

"Young people are raising this question and getting involved more and more in the process. This is very encouraging for a future of a country because young people, for instance, at the last presidential election last year in November, more than 60% of them participated in the election, which is quite remarkable – most of the time young people are not interested in politics. It is a very positive sign that the young generation is ready to move forward and rebuild a society where everyone will live better. "

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"Tell something beautiful that has happened in your country"

"Let me go back to the 50's and the communist times. There were a lot of people who were persecuted by the new regime who wanted to change everything. The church and particularly the elite of the country were an obstacle for this change. We had a lot of priests, theologians, writers and politicians that were in prison, tortured, and in some cases killed. I think that it is one of the examples of witnessing the faith in very difficult conditions, and still having hope that God is going to save the country."

"Through the sacrifice of these martyrs there are still some people that survived after the communist era, and some of them are still alive today. They were able to witness what happened in the communist prisons.  Even though the communist era brought injustice, these people didn't lose hope. I like to refer to this example because it was very relevant in 1989 (when Romanians were freed from the Communist Regime). After this, people used a lot of these (stories of) people to rebuild the country, and remind us to build again social justice in the future."

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Portraits of Justice #11: Alex {Beirut, Lebanon}

It's week #11 with the Portraits of Justice Project

This week I invite you to hear from my friend Alex, from Beirut, Lebanon. Alex is inspiring in many ways. He's founded a non-profit recycling program in a country without an existing social recycling program. As well, Alex helped start an inter-religious exchange in schools - within communities that are intolerant of one another. Read more about this reconciliation project below!

Located just north of Israel, and West of Syria, Lebanon deals not only with its own history of colonization and civil wars, but with a population that is nearly half refugees from Palestine and Syria. 

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"I only hear about justice in books, I've never seen justice, maybe anywhere in the world. Justice for me is a philosophical word, a relative word as well. All countries in the world seek justice, it is a lifetime process to be accomplished."

"If we are talking about minimal justice, the minimum to live as a human being, I never see it in my country. I live in Lebanon, an Arab country. We've been colonized for centuries. The last century we've been colonized by the Ottoman Empire and the French, we've had 15 years of civil war, We've had neverending Israeli attacks, since the creation of Israel in 1948. Recently we have had what we call the Arab Spring – I don't call it Spring. I call it Arab Winter, because it is still war. We as a Lebanese country we are surrounded by Syria. We are 4 million citizens, 1.5 million Syrian refugees, half a million Palestinian refugees, and a few hundred thousand Iraqi - about half the population consists of refugees."

Lebanon is just North of Israel, and shares
the majority of its borders with Syria

"On the local level, poverty is everywhere. 50% of the Lebanese population is under the poverty line. Sectarianism* is also an aspect of my country, we have 18 denominations that co-exist together. I don't know if they were forced at point of history to co-exist and live together. We are Muslim and Christian people. We are now facing Muslim extremism, so we now have ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria."

"On a local level, on personal level, if you want to seek a job you need to belong to a religion or a political party. You never get it on your competence. So your CV (resume) is read first to see if you are a Christian, and you are going to a Christian company or a Muslim company – it's nothing to do with justice.

If you want to go to a hospital, there isn't a medical health care system in my country, and maybe in all Arab countries. People live to save money. There is an Arabic saying in my country, “Save money for your black day.” The black day is when you go to the hospital and spend all the money you have for medical care."

What would need to change for justice to start happening?
"Education is an important factor to taken into consideration for a long term change. The change cannot be realized today or tomorrow or in a year, it's a long term process. Education is an important factor for me in change. I can give an example..."

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"Where we live in Lebanon in cities it is known that, for example, in the North it is for Christians, in the South it is for Muslims, and the West is for something else. So people that were raised in a Christian community don't know how the Muslim community live.Because the Lebanese civil war was based on sectarianism, Christian and Muslim hated each other. "

"There is a project I worked on with a couple of friends. We went to a Muslim school and a Christian school as a day exchange for students. For example, on Monday students from a Christian school go to a Muslim school and experience living with a Muslim student and study together, Science and literature. A Muslim student will also go to a Christian community. They will see each other praying as well. Its a small project that was realized two years ago. Now this experience is extended to many many schools in Lebanon to teach people how to co-exist together and love each other. Its a small project for reconciliation."



"The church not prominent in my country to fight for justice. All projects are done individually, its not the church meeting and deciding to do something. It's about individuals, and its about Christian movements that take care of aspects. When we received the Syrian refugees in Lebanon, we decided to as an Orthodox Youth Movement to take 1% of everyone's monthly salary and give it Syrian refugees. And we dedicate one or two hours a week to teach Syrian students, because the Lebanese academic system is completely different than the Syrian, so they can't integrate into the Lebanese system."

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Does something here encourage you or spark your curiosity? 

Please leave your comments below, I love hearing from you!!

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*Unfamiliar with this term? 'Sectarianism, like racism, is a form of bigotry, discrimination, or hatred arising from attaching importance to perceived differences between subdivisions within a group, such as between different denominations of a religion, nationalism, class, regional or factions of a political movement'. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sectarianism for a very basic but more expansive understanding. If you want some academic sources on this, just let me know!

Portraits of Justice #10: Cydney {Halifax, Canada}

Happy week #10 of this project, Portraits of Justice!

Today I introduce you to Cydney, from Canada's east coast,  and invite you to hear her understandings of justice as connected to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. The commission confronts Canada's colonial history of the Indian Residential Schools that resulted in a century of genocide and trauma for Indigenous populations.

 With the recent conclusion of the TRC ceremonies, the responsibility of taking action for reconciliation has been commissioned to the government, various public sectors, the churches, and every citizen of Canada. It is but the beginning. 

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"In 2011 the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada (TRC) came to Halifax. I went and heard some of the testimonials and stories - that itself was very powerful and moving. On the last day, they invited everyone who had even been remotely associated with the event to come to a local venue. They set the entire sports floor with seats and had a giant family reunion. They served a giant meal, and everyone was there, first nations people and allies."

"Behind the stage there were about 3000 cupcakes. We put a candle in every cupcake, and took them out to the floor and gave them to everybody and while we sang happy birthday. Because in the residential schools you didn't get a birthday, we had a giant birthday party for everyone who was there. They sang happy birthday in English, then in Inuktitut, Amiga, Obijiway, Mohawk, Algonquin...we sang happy birthday for like an hour in all these different languages! There was this 80 year old woman who was bawling her eyes out, because from the age of 5-15, she didn't have a birthday, and after that she was so messed up that it didn't matter to her. It was really beautiful, to see that it mattered now."    

"The TRC sticks out to me most. It's a good attempt at justice. It's not going to fix anything or everything, but I think the start of justice and reparations is telling stories. I think that narratives and storytelling is how you find commonality with other people, and is the way that you start any kind of process to tackle any issue. You start telling stories. That's not exactly what justice looks like, but it is what justice sounds like, is focusing on narratives and storytelling. Everyone's story is important."

"My dream way is that (Christians) would lead the charge for justice because they are divinely inspired to do so, and understand why equality is appropriate, and good and right. Whether they are able to do that is inhibited in a lot of ways by a lot of things. The role church is to inspire people...and interpret scripture in a way that doesn't alienate people and that doesn't promote more injustice"