Cries for a Lost Homeland

Reflections on Jesus' sayings from the cross

Guli Francis-Dehqani

• Publisher: Canterbury Press Norwich
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781786223838
• eBook ISBN: 9781786223852

Guli Francis-Dehqani was born in Isfahan, Iran, to a family who were part of the tiny Anglican Church established by 19th century missionaries. Her father, a Muslim convert, became the first indigenous Persian bishop. As the Islamic Revolution of 1979 swept across the country, church properties were raided, confiscated or closed down. Guli's father was briefly imprisoned before surviving an attack on his life, which injured his wife. Soon after, whilst he was out of the country for meetings, Guli's 24 year-old brother, Bahram, a university teacher in Tehran, was murdered. No one was ever brought to justice and the family were advised to leave Iran. Guli was 14. They eventually settled in England with refugee status.Drawing on the riches of Persian culture and her own dramatic experience of loss of a homeland, Guli offers memorable and perceptive reflections on Jesus' seven final sayings from the cross, opening up for Western readers fresh and arresting insights from a Middle Eastern perspective.

1. ‘Father, forgive’

When they came to the place that is called The Skull, they crucified Jesus there with the criminals, one on his right and one on his left. Then Jesus said, ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’ And they cast lots to divide his clothing. And the people stood by, watching; but the leaders scoffed at him, saying, ‘He saved others; let him save himself if he is the Messiah of God, his chosen one!’ The soldiers also mocked him, coming up and offering him sour wine, and saying, ‘If you are the King of the Jews, save yourself!’ There was also an inscription over him, ‘This is the King of the Jews.’

Luke 23.33–38

Forgiveness – such a well-known concept (for good or ill), and this is where it begins, or at least where its power is located and its challenge to us is focused: at the cross of Jesus. Jesus, at his most helpless and at the point of greatest suffering, uttering the cry of forgiveness for his persecutors and, in so doing, setting the bar for us to do the same – to adopt a posture of forgiveness towards those who do us harm, who hurt us, whose words and actions cause us pain and anguish.

Luke’s is the only Gospel in which this, the first of Jesus’ seven last words from the cross, is recorded. During these few verses Luke digresses from the familiar account and goes his own way. But more than that, it may surprise some of you that the words ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing’ do not in fact appear in all the ancient manuscripts. They’re missing from some versions of Luke’s Gospel. The general view is that Luke must have intended for the words to be included – apart from anything else, they mirror so perfectly his account of the martyrdom of Stephen recorded in Acts chapter 7, where he too utters a similar cry at the point of death by stoning. It’s possible that the words were omitted in certain Gospel manuscripts because of the belief among some Christians that the crucifixion of Jesus was of a different order – beyond the pale; an unforgivable sin.

In any case, though it seems likely that the words are authentic, this confusion seems to me to reflect something of our anomalous and difficult relationship with the doctrine of forgiveness. Some recoil from the whole idea; others find it too painful and just impossible; some use it to accuse Christians of being spineless and soft on crime and wrongdoing; still others have embraced it and tried to make it a way of life.

Whatever you think of it, forgiveness is a central Christian theme that we can’t simply ignore. We must grapple with it and try to make sense of it. It has, undoubtedly, been misused and exploited down the centuries. It has been oversimplified, misunderstood and perhaps even abused by the Church, which has sometimes sought to force it on people in a controlling, manipulative way, leading individuals to remain in abusive relationships and to suffer ongoing horrors in silence. That is not how I understand forgiveness. It is not about tolerating injustice for the sake of it, or acquiescing in harm that belittles human life and dignity. Embracing forgiveness doesn’t mean giving up on justice or working for change. The church community in Iran, for example, where my early faith was nurtured and which has suffered so much persecution over the past 40 years, has sought to model the way of forgiveness while not giving up its cry for justice and for the rule of law. In the immediate aftermath of the Revolution, even as my father – who was a Muslim convert and Anglican Bishop in Iran – faced threats of arrest and violence, he never desisted from speaking out against the injustices the Church was undergoing. He wrote letters to the highest authorities, sought support from within and without the country, and made known to any who would listen the iniquities being perpetrated in the name of Islam.

So having tried to establish what forgiveness is not, I’d like now to share a few reflections on how I understand forgiveness, offering some windows through which we may contemplate this most testing of Christian ideas.

It strikes me as interesting that this is Jesus’ first saying, uttered early in the process of his cruel crucifixion, perhaps before the depths of agony and torment have truly kicked in. He voices his intention, his desire for the reality of forgiveness to be manifest, before he’s at a stage at which he might no longer have the strength to do so. Forgiveness is less a point of arrival at some clearly defined destination and more of a messy voyage – the ultimate expedition – undertaken in faith, knowing that we may stumble, fall and fail over and over again. But the yearning to be forgiving is, in itself, a remarkable beginning.

I met an elderly lady recently called Margaret, who told me that her grandson was in prison. I asked if she was able to visit and she said she hadn’t been, because she couldn’t yet forgive him. I asked if she wanted to, and she said: ‘Yes, I do, and one day maybe I’ll be able to.’ Margaret has unknowingly started on the journey that, unsurprisingly, she couldn’t articulate in all its complexity, overlaid as it was with emotions of betrayal, anger, embarrassment and hurt. There may be many twists and turns and complications ahead, but she has opened the door and is leaning into a future with possibilities, rather than one where there are only dead ends.

As the Islamic Revolution in Iran was beginning to take hold – in the early days, as its impact was gradually being felt by the Anglican Church through various raids on properties and confiscation of institutions, as missionaries and foreigners began to depart, leaving the community exposed and vulnerable – I remember a sermon preached by my father. I must have been only around 12 years old but it clearly made an impact on me and I still recall it well. Aware that even greater dangers probably lay ahead, for himself and for his tiny flock, he declared his intention to side with forgiveness rather than hatred. He talked of having preached for years about the theory of forgiveness, but that now it was time to practise it.

He didn’t know then that soon he would be in prison, his wife would be injured in an attack on their lives, and that eventually his only son would be murdered and he and his family forced into exile, where he would remain until his death in 2008. But he declared his intention early on to live with a spirit of forgiveness no matter what and, though this proved far from easy, that is the path he and my mother continued to travel and which I have tried to emulate.

Forgiveness is truly not the easy option; it is costly, messy and painful but it does open up the way of life. It prevents us getting stuck in the past, held fast in the grip of hatred and bitterness, and it allows also for the possibility of change in the one who has offended. It is a recognition that nothing and no one is beyond redemption; that the way things have been isn’t the way things need be in future; that good can come out of evil; that love can overwhelm hatred.

Now those who are offered forgiveness, to fully experience it, must choose to embrace it in a spirit of remorse and repentance – but the offer of it is the beginning, and that offer is the scandal of Christianity, for it is open to all, no matter who you are or what you have done. And it is a reminder too that we are, none of us, perfect and that we are on this journey together. All of us need forgiveness in our own lives, for our shortcomings and failures, our sins great and small.

In all this talk of being forgiving, it’s worth remembering that forgiveness isn’t always our gift to offer. Sometimes the greatest offence hasn’t been committed against us or at least not only us. When my brother, Bahram, was murdered, it was his life that had been cut short. The loss caused us terrible pain, but was it our role to forgive his murderers? Did we even have the right to do this on his behalf? Moreover, is forgiveness ever ours to offer, or does it belong to God? Neither St Stephen as he was being stoned, nor Jesus from the cross, said: ‘I forgive.’ Their cry is ‘Father, forgive them; for they do not know what they are doing.’

And in the phrase ‘for they do not know what they are doing’, I don’t think there is a suggestion that the offenders get off scot-free – that they shouldn’t take responsibility for their actions. Rather, in this act of evil, their very humanity has been diminished, and so only God can forgive. This is a significant distinction. Margaret, whose grandson is in prison, is struggling to do the forgiving when perhaps her eyes are set on a target she doesn’t need to aim towards. To ask God to forgive is to trust God and surrender to God’s will the task of judging and of changing hearts and minds. It is to release us from the burden of responsibility and liberate us to move into the future.

Which brings me to the heart of what forgiveness is – the starting place for hope. Even as I was grieving for the loss of my brother, coping with the rupture from friends and home, stranded in a new and unfamiliar place, I saw my parents travel the painful path towards embracing forgiveness for those who murdered their son. Through my teens, I watched them adjust with graciousness to life in exile and the apparent disintegration of all they had worked for in Iran. And as I watched, I began to realise that what they were doing was continuing to hope when all seemed lost.

I cannot end my reflections on forgiveness, and how it ties in with hope, without sharing the prayer my father wrote after my brother was killed. It was read, in the original Persian, at Bahram’s funeral in Isfahan. This is the English translation, which has become known as the forgiveness prayer.9

O God, we remember not only Bahram but his murderers.

Not because they killed him in the prime of his youth and made our hearts bleed and our tears flow.

Not because with this savage act they have brought further disgrace on the name of our country among the civilised nations of the world.

But because through their crime we now follow more closely your footsteps in the way of sacrifice.

The terrible fire of this calamity burns up all selfishness and possessiveness in us.

Its flame reveals the depth of depravity, meanness and suspicion, the dime...

Table of contents

• Copyright information
• Contents
• Dedication
• Epigraph
• Foreword
• Introduction
• Acknowledgements
• 1. ‘Father, forgive’
• 2. ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise’
• 3. ‘Here is your son … here is your mother’
• 4. ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’
• 5. ‘I thirst’
• 6 & 7. ‘It is finished’ … ‘Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit’
• The Tree of Knowledge
• Afterword from Holy Saturday
• Poem
• Notes