PROCLAMATION OF FORGIVENESS

2012 Dr. Estella Conwill Majozo

(Read at Elmina Castle in Ghana, Africa after receiving the name, Afi Tsoeke, which means FORGIVE, at a traditional African naming ceremony. This fortress was the embarkation point for shipping Africans for enslavement in the new world.)
I must learn the dance of forgiveness where I lay it all down, strip myself completely to honor His sacred crown. I must let go of this bundle hoisted high upon my head all the heavy, weary years, our unrequited dead. I must untie the crying child fastened on my back, the one I nursed throughout the night while my own suffered lack. I must let go of this machete tucked inside my waist, offer my heart to my Redeemer, ask to be made chaste. And all the times we were not deemed our true human worth. I forgive because your said so, Lord, and Im longing for new birth. I forgive the unjust imprisonment and Lord Jesus, all the rapes, and all the lies and propaganda that stereotyped us as apes. And my people being forced into ghettoes without jobs or means to survive, the sub-standard health care, and the poison we eat to stay alive. I forgive the early questions about me owning at all a soul, and that 3/5th designation in place of the whole.

I must forgive four hundred years, all the times that we mourned lay it all down right here so my soul can be re-born. I must forgive the whips, the chains, the bloodhounds in the fields, the broken ties, the drudgery, Lord, Jesus help me yield
the lynch mobs, the tarring, all the midnights my people cried, the burning crosses, the massacres, the mothers and fathers who died. I must forgive the bombing of our babies in Birmingham. Oh Lord, God of mercy, help me forgive them. I must forgive the death of leaders especially Martin, our cultural King, and our young son, Emmitt Till, castrated, for whistling. I forgive all the times racism was allowed to reign including the Tuskegee Experiment that left some insane.

And all the vicious attempts at my peoples genocide. I forgive, Oh Lord, I do I want your Spirit to abide. And all our European brothers and sisters who enslaved us, I forgive, and our African kin who helped enslave, I surrender that we all may live.
I forgive the march to the dungeons and the ocean floor thats paved with bones of the ancestors I forgive the Middle Passage grave. I forgive myself for all the times Ive been way too still when forgiveness truly is the only dance that heals. I forgive because my God worked it all for my good and because He forgave on Calvary, I know that I should. Because Love is who He is and mercy is His crown, I forgive, Lord God, I choose to love. I lay it all down.