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WHAT HOPE IS THERE FOR FINDING

THE WHOLE TRUTH HERE TODAY?

{Thoughts I had that would have applied well to yesterdays Restorative Justice event as it developed}

When witnesses are sworn in, they are asked to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth. But if I swear to tell the whole truth, and tell my truth, giving my facts, they are still from my perspective. My facts are inherently subjective and personal. When the first witness in a courtroom is called on to tell the “whole truth”, we do not then say that is that and we are done, for we would be wrong.

We assume there is a Whole Truth; a complete representation of the facts in full context, but none of us ever truly knows it as our own. Investigators ask for as many witnesses and as much information as they can, to get a more complete picture of what happened. We do know we are here because we are hurt and we seek a means of healing.

Each of our own angles on this Whole Truth, is never more than a piece; a piece requiring other pieces to fill in the puzzle that is reality. With enough angles put together in this issue, we will arrive at some measure of comprehension. This does not mean our subjective viewpoints will not still seem true, and perhaps someone else’s, still seem wrong to us.

We cannot always easily erase our feelings and history of assumption on an instant. Some work at forgiving ourselves for not being fully open to fuller truth may be required. I might have to work at keeping my heart and mind open to someone, and their feelings, who seem not to see things as I do. I might still feel someone is not being true, but I might have to look deeper into my own soul to ever rest that case.

We are here to hear for the interest of Whole Truth, and not necessarily in having any one of us “win” at our viewpoint. One of us has been blamed by a court hearing, and is here because the rest of us believe we want a solution to the issues of the matter more than punishment. We will hear some viewpoints which may be much closer to the true story. Some might even feel they are the true story, and everyone else somehow does not understand. We are hear to build the true bridges into reality for the sake of true understanding.

I can chose to only keep my viewpoint, but that is a sure recipe for self deception. Censoring other perspectives is appealing at times. It can be hard to acknowledge having been wrong in any way. It can be hard to accept that what I thought was true, turns out to be mistaken. Most of all, it is hard to accept that the hurt I feel, does not only belong to me. Others are in pain. We all have wounds. We can pick at each others scabs, point out our lacks of perfection, look at ugliness under bandages, but why not tend to one another’s wounds? Are we here to perpetuate disease or to seek healing? To punish through pain, or to solve by love holding us into understanding?

For in some respects; we all have wounds behind us, hidden on our own back sides of life, which we may not see or be able to reach to tend. We need ask one another at times, to discover what is wrong, how bad it is, and can they or someone help us where we cannot see? We go to doctors for this very reason, but who do we go to here for this hurt? We all are here.

We can go to who is here, for we here, wanted to be here. We are here, then, for Truth and for Love. We are here to serve these Grand Things because we can extend them to one another. May we listen to Their words.

… Benafia
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