South Africa: Healing relationships 10 years on
South Africa has much to celebrate after 10 years of democratic governance. Generations of struggle against oppressive rule and an unprecedented international advocacy campaign culminated in the election of Nelson Mandela and "a new South Africa" in April 1994.
The courage, dignity and pain of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission captured the world's imagination, but was just one step in a complex long-term process. The legacies of apartheid rule continue to cause poverty, heartache and conflict.
Violence and crime rates in South Africa are among some of the highest in the world, including domestic violence.
HIV/AIDS is ravaging the country, with about 20% of the adult population infected.
How can South Africans and others affected by violence live with the past?
Healing memories
In 1995 an Anglican priest began running workshops for victims of violence. Fr Michael Lapsley quickly became aware that all South Africans - regardless of whether they had experienced actual violence or not, lived with the burdens of the past.
Fr Michael was himself learning to live with the past. An ardent anti-apartheid activist, just 3 months after the release of Nelson Mandela, Fr Michael was sent a parcel bomb that destroyed his hands and an eye.
"All South Africans have been mucked up by apartheid," Father Michael says, "by what we did; by what was done to us; by what we failed to do."
A safe place was needed for people to tell their stories - whether or not they were involved in serious violations of human rights and the healing of memories workshops were formed.
People from every province and racial background in South Africa are now attending healing of memories workshops.
The Institute is growing, and Father Michael has also taken the workshops and concepts to communities in Alice Springs and Perth, Rwanda, Sri Lanka, East Timor, Germany, Uganda, and northern Ireland.
Father Michael describes South Africa as "a nation trying to heal our individual and collective memories."
Priest and Partisan - Father Michael Lapsley
Father Michael Lapsley arrived in South Africa from New Zealand in 1973 and began work as an Anglican chaplain to university students from diverse racial backgrounds.
He joined the anti-apartheid struggle, and this eventually cost him his hands and an eye when he was sent a letter bomb in 1990.
In his personal search for healing after the attack, and his role as chaplain to victims of torture and violence, Father Michael has grappled with the question "not of forgetting, but rather of how we deal with our memories".
Father Michael testified in South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission, however no-one has taken responsibility for sending the letter bomb that nearly claimed his life.
In the forward to Father Michael's book, Priest and Partisan, Nelson Mandela writes that Michael's story "is about our struggle for dignity and healing".
"Intellectually and politically one understands why (amnesty and reconciliation) is necessary. But deep in your heart, and when you are alone with your memories, this is no easy matter."
As Director of the Institute for the Healing of Memories in Cape Town since 1998, Father Michael has led workshops throughout South Africa and many other countries affected by conflict to provide opportunities for individuals and communities to deal with the burdens of the past - "of what we did, of what was done to us, and of what we didn't do."