CBS Evening News (2013) — President Clinton remembers his friend, Nelson mandela. No American president was closer to Nelson Mandela than Bill Clinton. Their terms in office overlapped, and when Clinton got caught up in a scandal, Mandela stood by him. The former president spoke with Scott Pelley about their relationship. (3:40)

Don’t allow them to turn you again into their prisoner!

When Bill Clinton met Nelson Mandela for the first time, he had a question on his mind: “When you were released from prison, Mr. Mandela,” the former President said, “I woke my daughter at three o’clock in the morning. I wanted her to see this historic event.” Then President Clinton zeroed in on his question: “As you marched from the cell-block across the yard to the gate of the prison, the camera focused in on your face. I have never seen such anger, and even hatred, in any man as was expressed on your face at that time. That’s not the Nelson Mandela I know today,” said Clinton. “What was that about?”

Mandela answered, “I’m surprised that you saw that, and I regret that the cameras caught my anger. As I walked across the courtyard that day, I thought to myself, ‘They’ve taken everything from you that matters. Your cause is dead. Your family is gone. Your friends have been killed. Now they’re releasing you, but there’s nothing left for you out there.’ And I hated them for what they had taken from me.

Then, I sensed an inner voice saying to me, ‘Nelson! For twenty-seven years you were their prisoner, but you were always a free man! Don’t allow them to make you into a free man, only to turn you into their prisoner!'”

SOURCE: Tony Campolo, Let Me Tell You a Story: Life Lessons from Unexpected Places and Unlikely People (Nashville: Word Publishing, 2000).]

You can never be free to be a whole person if you are unable to forgive. You see that, don’t you? There are many people who are imprisoned by their own anger, their own hurt, their own inability to let go of the past and move on. Here’s the other thing we need to see about forgiveness: THERE IS ONLY ONE PLACE YOU CAN FIND THE ABILITY TO FORGIVE. It is at the throne of Christ. — Fr. Tony (http://frtonyshomilies.com/)

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