Michael Lapsley, an Anglican priest and social activist from South Africa, will lecture on his work as a facilitator of healing and reconciliation in a talk today titled “Breaking the cycles of war and terror in nations and individuals.”
The April 2 lecture will be held in the Kingsmill Room at Huron University College,
A casualty in the struggle for liberation in South Africa, Lapsley was blinded in one eye and had his hands blown off when he opened a letter bomb sent to him by operatives in the Apartheid government in 1990.
Since then, he has founded and served as Director of the Institute for the Healing of Memories, which offers workshops to address the emotional, psychological and spiritual wounds that are inflicted on nations, communities and individuals by wars, repressive regimes, human rights abuses and other traumatic events or circumstances.
In its final report, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa (1996-1998) commended the Institute for the Healing of Memories for its contribution to the rebuilding of civil society in Post-Apartheid South Africa. Currently, the Institute runs programs in several nations in Africa, South America, North America and Europe.