Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6 Page 7 Page 8 Page 9 Page 10 Page 11 Page 12 Page 13 Page 14 Page 15 Page 16 Page 17 Page 18 Page 19 Page 20 Page 21 Page 22 Page 23 Page 24 Page 25 Page 26 Page 27 Page 28 Page 29 Page 30 Page 31 Page 32 Page 33 Page 34 Page 35 Page 36 Page 37 Page 38 Page 39 Page 40 Page 41 Page 42 Page 43 Page 44 Page 45 Page 46 Page 47 Page 48 Page 49 Page 50 Page 51 Page 52 Page 53 Page 54 Page 55 Page 56 Page 57 Page 58 Page 59 Page 60 Page 61 Page 62 Page 63 Page 64 Page 65 Page 66 Page 67 Page 68 Page 69 Page 70 Page 71 Page 72 Page 73 Page 74 Page 75 Page 7638 Plough Quarterly • Summer 2015 Were the whole realm of nature mine, That were a present far too small; Love so amazing, so divine, Demands my soul, my life, my all. A passage from the Quran, the Bhagavad Gita, or the Bible would be read. Then Gandhi would speak briefly, followed by a short silence. One day as I sat at his feet, a very agitated Hindu pleaded with Gandhi for permission to retaliate, saying that his whole family had been wiped out by Muslims. Gandhi replied, as he always did: “Forgive. Peace. Love.” It was not easy or cheap for Gandhi to speak of forgiveness. His shoulders would come down as if he was carrying all of India’s pain and suf- fering. He reminded me of Saint John in his old age, who constantly repeated, “Little children, love one another.” At Gandhi’s direction, we moved to the refugee camps to get to work. Our first assign- ment was the Muslim camp in Ambala. On the way, we witnessed the exodus of refugees, walking in lines nearly a mile long. The camp itself was shocking: two hundred thousand people on just over two acres of land. Smallpox and cholera broke out; we hardly had enough time to bury the dead. Then the wounded arrived from trains that had been deliberately derailed. Our main duty was to help the sick and wounded get into the overcrowded trains going to Pakistan. Next we were assigned to a Hindu camp in Kurukshetra to receive those who were coming in from Pakistan. It was another scene of misery. Each refugee had a bitter story to tell of murder, rape, or fights, and their only thought was revenge. Anything we said about forgiveness, love, or reconciliation meant nothing; they had suffered more than we could imagine. Night after night we returned to our tent and poured out our pain to the Lord. The great change happened on January 30, 1948. From a broken radio we heard the news that Gandhi had been assassinated – gunned down on his way to the daily prayer meeting, at the same spot where a few months before I had sat at his feet. We returned to the camp, and found it silent for the first time. I saw tears in many eyes that until then had been filled only with lust for revenge. The words spoken in unison were: “He died for our sake.” We packed our things and left to attend the funeral in Delhi. It seemed like a dif- ferent city. Not a single fire was lit in any of the homes. Broken-hearted crowds pressed toward the van carrying the dead body to the funeral ground. Even people who had been hiding in fear for their lives came out boldly into the streets to catch a glimpse of the dead martyr they adored. We took our stand by the side of the road to witness the procession, with the country’s leaders at the front. There was no need for the police or army to keep order. People threw weapons away and joined together, irrespective of caste and religion, to pay homage to the departed leader. I, too, shed tears – not only because of Gandhi, but because his death reminded me of an innocent death two thousand years ago, a death through which abundant life, a life of love and forgiveness, was offered to me. Thanks to Gandhi’s witness, I found my life calling in the ministry of reconciliation. I have worked on race relations in Uganda, on bridg- ing divides in a caste-ridden church in Kerala, and on achieving reconciliation between staff and management as chaplain in a hospital in Vellore. In all this, I have been guided by the life and death of Jesus – the Jesus whom I learned to love more deeply through the life and death of Mahatma Gandhi.