The German legal system insists it is the last opportunity to react to the hell of Auschwitz with the rule of the law , a last chance to see some degree of justice and accountability for those most affected . Kor considered it necessary for personal healing , but also that keeping the man out of jail as far more effective in countering Nazi extremism than watching an old man serve out his days behind bars .
The topic of forgiveness was also considered some times ago by Giles Fraser in the same newspaper .
10 April 2014 ) He gave thoughts to the reconciliation process in Rwanda . He said that ‘ forgiveness is not something that you feel , but what you do ’. He warned of sentimentalising it , that person A should feel kindly towards person B when B has done them enormous harm . He says that the Bible does not say how Jesus felt , but what he did , so forgiveness was an act , the refusal to respond in kind , to answer violence with violence , a refusal of revenge . It seems that forgiveness is fundamentally unjust , that it represents unpunished crime . The problem with justice is that it is sometimes too closely aligned with revenge . Tragically , the victims can easily become the next set of victimisers . Forgiveness , as in refusal of reciprocity does not make us feel good inside , we can still be bitter and angry , but it may be the burden we have to bear . Forgiveness breaks the cycle of revenge and makes possible a future not trapped in hatred of the past .
Sanctuary in our times
Sanctuary was for centuries a sacred institution . Those seeking refuge in a holy space were removed from the grip of their persecutors , seeking the right to claim a stay of justice , persecution and mistaken punishment of an innocent person . It is surprising that this kind of concept still exists , although not in the legal systems of modern states . The number of refugees seeking sanctuary in German churches has risen dramatically in recent times . It started about 4 years ago with 70 people , meanwhile the number of those seeking sanctuary amounts to more than 500 . Most of them are failed asylum seekers . For instance African refugees have been living in the Frankfurt church Gutleutkirche since the summer of 2014 in makeshift partitioned quarters , the idea being that when a person seeks refuge in a sacred place , he or she will be looked at differently from outside . Inside he is seen as a human being in need of protection , a person anxious about his uncertain future . The modern sanctuary brings to mind , that there are two different kind of truth in this world which are in competition . Even if those failed asylum seekers are not persecuted opponents of foreign regimes , even if they came for economic reasons and not for humanitarian ones , even if they cost a lot of money ( also for the churches who house and feed them for 6 months ) who can deny the churches the moral right to give them shelter . The churches tell those outside , that this society which prides itself of its respect for human rights must not send back these people into hopeless situations .
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