NON-yb1 ENCE -WO N D NON-yb1 ENCE -WO N D E ' ,Lazb W el *S 1 SECOND SUARTER 1994 You may be receiving this small publioat ion foi' the f1u'a ti, j' It has to do with the South Afria. Pell*w hip of R-a I and its history. Please read it through and respond if you are interwsst. NA.KI! HISTORY This cuarter of 1994 has been a thriller. After a bumpy ridebmt far Is= bloodshed than there might have been ,the great transition has been achieve ffm m agu .old Maoe domination to a shared society. Even though the unsuspeoting orowd cheers the flypast of the instnsats of domination and the military men close ranks behind the new President a his Deputies, the aohievement is almost without parallel in history and those who worked and suffered for it can rejoice. Along with "Reooiioruction", the word "Reoonciliation" is now on the lips of our statemen and women. South Africa onco had a tiny organisation ambtiously named "The Fellowship of Reconciliation" (SR)R). What role did it play, together with the baokizg of the International Fellowship of Reconolialon (IVIR) in this almost pea.ceful trensition? Did its speifioally pacifist ohareater, its imawoo on nonviolenoe, limit it to a small group with a marginal role? Or did it plat seeds that grew bigger than we realise? How did it relate to the 5ass movements of oppressed people? Is the FOR vision and emphasis relevant now7 Is it needed to calm the endemio violence in our society, or to counter our national te"Ptgion to sell to other oauntries the very weapons we developed in killing one another? In the past dew- des of Etrugle the methods of nonviolence were increasingly used, bat often in a spirit of enmity. TII greatly reduces its effectiveness, especially to produce an elroady reconciled situation as the confliot ends. Goodwill towards the opponent is the real spirit of nonviolenoe. As these methods continue to be used in our oountry's development do we need a specific movement o* organisation to foster this spirit and to promote nonviolenoe not merely as a strategy but as a way of life as :!. tho way society will function best? You may be aware that a few groups are testing out the possibility of reviving the South African Fellowship of Reconciliation for this purpose, We already receive a small bat high-quality contribution towards nonviolence and peacemaking from the Society of Friends (Quakers). Also there is the Methodist Order of Peacemakers. These are denominational organisations oommiied to nonviolence. The SAMlR, if reoonstituted, would be an inter-faith organisation. It would have international links with more than 40 other similar national and regional bodies through the International FOR. The latter describes itself as "an organisation of people whoso faith has led them to commit themselves to nonviolence as a way of life and as a moans of personalp social and political ohanage." WRITING HI8OR I am no longe in touoh with the nerve oentres that supplied this News Letter over the past 14 years. However, I may still be able to supply interested people with the stoz7 of the SM R spanming the past 50 years. Then we ow better assess what it w:-c; wh-1 supported it, what it did or failed to do,, -why. i'l mt it I M w" whcthn r it is worth reviving -and, if so, what it should now *tAR 11 4 14 'isycar in October the IFOR oalebrates its 75th szmivorsary andb asng~ th-t rnttional branches could write up their history. I an not inih of a vojft IF -sc- rchcr, but I do have the meagre romainingwzoords of tho 14009 was la 1$ fr- rn 1960 and knew some of its past leaders. The Ca~pe Thimn MRFo)!w 'W t'ht I shculd attempt this through Non-Violonce News. I have adod Uhe hep Dr !ar7rert Nash, Mary Elder and Richard Steele in particular, IntI ln !!L;--Cour help. Margaret Nash has pointed out the need to explore what interaction the"e ws in :.'-tor between the Western pacifism of the POR ad the iienuu Indirm em ~ -n nnviclonoe of Gandhi and Luthuli in brin~ging the ocuntry to the h.V--ic-. -.- c w., ni)w have. You may be able to contribute infcrmation on this nnd %: -fthe r~rs no a-nd events tha-t will feature in the sto-ry I try to vritc. -c is to -r-:)duce !a brief embryonic history in the next four issues, rs f-)llows: SiCc oz-cnd Quarter: The Origins of the MfR (1914-1919) and of the SA.FVR (1942-1951) : 7 hird arter The Times )f Arthur Blarxall (1952-1963) 0.F-urth Qxt'rtcr: Frn-;m Bltaxall to Recess (1963-1973) P?1iret Qu-rter: I1TR's R.ole in SA's Stzngle (1974-.1992) f s ctibn, which frs the ren-ainder of this Ne-ws Letter, I hn%' 'd-i .,w cmisting '.ccounts -'f our history. The fo--llow-ing three- will be 't 7-Y cyp~'a xpcrionce of the :,rgnis,-tion togethor vith data fr- ncm rcss c-uttings and ru ports. -l:e rt t c fyu have -aythiziZt - - rrcct) :and togct'her w.e may be fble t7 nro-duzcc a fuller and ncr -. ~ ~ ~ ~ n t-:~ts s~v - - -~ suszrb,,rs t- -n-V-loncc Ncws -fit f-rrnr r-cipients who I think mtay be in'terested - z- T -nta cts wce h-ve in thQ Thirbnan and Cape: T-wn giroup-s r st --ad prr;sont recipients of the IMR bi-mnnthly 7-nazin.e IF n~ ir-:,n zs "Rrc-nciliaiti,-n Intcrnati)n-.l" := rshcs and -rPnnisati-ns tha-t may ha~ve ran intorest. v:- IS- T RECEIVE THE FKLOWIN,' TH.a ISSUES thcr., since - -- F:7sidcc.*, I afinancirl -ntrimti~n fro'n y-u. will bc rn-affizi.-nt, ',,y oh~quj -)r p-st 1-l irpa-b t- F ca ' - 4.St 3Lnd 227 4.5s - sta--c sta-ms if tha t i3 c\sicr.A rcccipt will = --r.t if y-u, - k f r it. Plo7ase givc y--ur nr-:-, -nna a2Arcss clecarly wi-th FES Di 7Hils NOW. I d-~ not pr-,mrisc y -a the nuxt issue plus gct' rr.Andcr as h-.Tpun, 01 1 \st yerazl ...............F *- n irw -i-.r f: th~~rs y u thn W -'A TmU DM AMXOAI FELLOWSHIP OF RECONCILIATION A ~ The Overseas Beginnings The Fellowship of Reooniliation (FOR) arose within the oentury of total war. Its birth was almost within sound of the opening guns of World War I. N.No -en, in the heartbreak of a peace oonferonoe shattered by the last swift forerunners of that oonfliot, conceived the idea. Friedrich Siegnmund-Schultze, pacifist Lutheran chaplain to the Kaiser, and Henry Hodgkin, English Quaker, gripod hands on the platform of Cologne railway station on August 3rd 1914, one _.ry before their countries formally declared war on one ather. tkw vowed not to fight against each other and to support others who took the me dccision. They parted, each t work out the implioations of that pmise. Henry Hodgkin initiajed the Fellowship of Reoonoiliation at U6 with -128 nerbcrs as 1914 drew to its close. Friedrioh Siogmand-Sahaltse m areted 27 tines during the war but eventually saw the formation of the Vr -Xr s :f the Fellowship agreed: "That Love, as revcalod and interpreted in the life and death of Jesus hrist, involves more than we have yet seen, that it -i the only power 1y which evil :an be overcome, and the only sufficient basis for human society; . ':., in order to establish a world order based on Love, it is incucnt tn those who believe in this principle to accept it fully, both for thmselvcs and in their relation to others, and to take the risks involved in icinrg ss in a world which does not as yet accept it; . T..at, thereforc, as Christifins we are forbidden to wage war and that our loyalty to our country, to humanity, to the Cumrch Universal, and to Jesus I"hrist, 3ur Lord and MX-.str, calls us insteA to a life of service for the enthronement of Love in personal, sooial, commercial and national life. After the war, in October 1919, fifty men and women from tan countries, including Hodgkin and Siegmund-Schultze, set up the International Fellowship of ecoonciliritin (IMOR) at a conference in Bitlhoven, Holland. Today it has br- .nshcs in over 40 countries and on all continents and includes adherents Wvriyus faiths as well as Christians. lh..c Origins of the South African Fellowship A t-wn in the Free State is nme d after the heroine of South Africa's oldest Pcace movement. A o:ur eous English women, Enily Hobhouse of the Society of Friends (Quakers) crossed the aca to ohampion the cause of Boor women and children in conoentration omps as her peaoomaking response to the Anglo-Boor Wr. Such is thu blinding naturo of nationalism that a later government, with no ooncepti-n of her pacifism, ironically named a submarine after herl L:.ter, after World War I, two British Qu-kers, William Henry and Harriet Aloxmdar, visited South Afrioa on a mission to d-ipossessod Boorlao s with seed to start afresh and with their family Bibles thnt .bad bon looted by British soldiers during the Anglo-Boer War. Influenced by thb two, soattored individuals linked up with the British FOR and one of ftase, Olive Warner, publieWd a pacifist ma&Caine "The Ambassador" from Johfnnosburg.