Bishop of Jbeil: Forgiveness and reconciliation, from Geagea and Frangié the basis for the future
In the historical patriarchal headquarters a handshake between the leader of the Lebanese Forces and the head of Marada. A meeting that heals a 40 year-old wound. The mediation of Card. Beshara Raï. From justice the foundations for a "true peace": A gesture that is also valid for Muslims.
Beirut (AsiaNews) - The gesture of reconciliation between Samir Geagea and Sleiman Frangié, which took place yesterday at the patriarchal headquarters in Bkerké under the gaze of Card. Beshara Raï is a "very important step" for the future of Lebanese Christians and of the whole country.
The gesture of "reconciliation" was celebrated with a handshake (in the picture), to close wounds still open since the war "not forgetting but forgiving" says Msgr. Michel Aoun, bishop of Jbeil-Byblos of the Maronites commenting yesterday's meeting between the leader of the Lebanese Forces and the head of Marada. The embrace could end 40 years of hatred, divisions and rancor that have determined "one of the most serious injuries" of the civil war within the Christian community.
"During the conflict - underlines Msgr. Aoun - many mistakes have been made: murders, massacres, violence that belong to the past and which must be left behind. To look ahead without forgetting, by founding reconciliation on forgiveness, on justice, which is the foundation for true peace ".
This gesture, he adds, can assume "great value for Muslims" and brings to the center "the role of the Church and of the patriarch, who have always called the parties to reconciliation for the good of the country and the future of Christians in Lebanon and in the area".
The ferocious opposition between the two Christian components of the north originated on June 13, 1978, with the massacre of Ehden: an attack perpetrated by the Lebanese Forces against the family of former President of the Republic Tony Frangié, father of Sleiman. According to some, the hand of the Syrian army was behind the massacre by allowing it to take place -, given Damascus’ massive military deployment in the region at the time - to divide the "field Christian".
The executive president of the Lebanese Forces and the head of Marada therefore put a stone on the past and embarked on a path of reconciliation that can be defined as "historic". An enmity resulting from the massacre of his father, his mother, his sister and some twenty people linked to Sleiman Frangié, during the early days of the civil war in Lebanon. Samir Geagea has admitted to being part of the commando that attacked the small town of the Frangié; he said at the same time that he had not participated in the massacre because he had previously been wounded by a bullet.
The Maronite Patriarch blessed the end of he dispute, placing the reconciliation between Lebanese Forces and Marada in a "sacred" perspective, quoting Psalm 133. "God wants us to meet - the cardinal pointed out - and we turn the page to live happily in peace, so that friendship unites us" and "we may continue on the path of unity ". If one should speak of "bipartisanism" in Lebanon, he added, there is only one: two equal and complementary wings, Muslims and Christians ". This is the "secret" of Lebanon "in its diversity, its role and its message in the region".
After the handshake and the greeting together with the Maronite Patriarch, Geagea and Frangié held closed door discussions for almost an hour in the patriarchal headquarters in Bkerké. At the end the two leaders issued a communiqué in which - although without anticipating future steps - insisted on the need for each party to "respect the other" without trying to "eliminate it, despite the differences in political orientation".
The pacifying gesture was welcomed not only within the Lebanese Christian community. The Prime Minister (Sunni Muslim) Saad Hariri celebrated "the end of a period of suffering, hostility and unrest". He did not fail to pay tribute to the patriarch Raï [a moral and political authority, as well as a religious one] who "sponsored" and made this step of reconciliation possible. Satisfaction is also expressed by the Maronite Foundation in the world, according to which it can become a "preamble" to the "unification" of all the souls that make up the country.
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