Leadership
Reconciliation: A Never-Ending Ministry
by Fr. Tom Welk, c.pp.s.
Before the story aired on npr’ s Morning Edition on December 8 th , the
reporter made an editorial comment: “This story may be hard for some
listeners to hear.” I wondered if the story was going to have some salacious
content that could be seen as offensive. But as I soon discovered, the story
may have been difficult for some listeners because it narrated a challenging
situation: a father forgiving the killer of his son 25 years ago.
Forgiveness and reconciliation are not the order of the day in our time
and place when an evil deed is perpetrated our society is more prone to-
ward responding with hatred and vindictiveness than with forgiveness and
reconciliation.
Greg Gibson shared a counter-cultural response to his son’s killing in
the npr StoryCorps narrative. Michael Garafolo introduced the program
by giving this background for the story: “On Dec. 14, 1992 Wayne Lo, then
a student at Simon’s Park College in Great Barrington, Massachusetts,
stalked the campus with a semiautomatic rifle, firing at random using am-
munition ordered over the phone and delivered to him at school. At that
time, Lo said he was receiving commands from God. Lo wounded four
people and killed two, including Galen (Greg’s son).”
Greg Gibson acknowledged that he could easily have become embit-
tered by this. He took another route: “Almost since that first moment, it
has been my constant prayer to take this most awful of things that could
possibly happen and turn it into something good, so that it’s not all pure
waste and loss.” He set up a fund to assist organizations working to support
victims of gun violence. He had many conversations with other victims
and their families. These conversations led to the publication of a book,
Gone Boy. This book was read by Wayne Lo, which eventually led to a
meeting between the two. Their meeting led to reconciliation.
Several members of Greg Gibson’s family are not in agreement with
him that this was the right thing to do. That includes one of his sons: “He
just doesn’t want anything to do with it. He doesn’t want to talk about it.”
Greg acknowledges that according to the standards and expectations of
our society he can understand this reaction: “So yeah, I think they think
I’m a little crazy.”
As a Community, we have made it clear that our charism is to contin-
ue the work of Gaspar, to continue the ministry of reconciliation. There
may also be many who look at what we are doing and think that we are
continued on page 4
January 2018 • The New Wine Press • 3