Ferch, S: Forgiveness and Power in the Age of Atrocity

Forgiveness and Power in the Age of Atrocity coexists alongside the quiet subtleties of mercy, and people and nations currently encounter a world inIn a fresh rendering of the role of leaders as healers, Forgiveness and Power in the Age of Atrocity which not even the certainties of existence remain even as grace can sometimes arise under the most difficult circumstances. Ultimately, Forgiveness and Power in the Age of Atrocity is a book about the alienation and intimacy at war within us all. Ferch speaks to categorical human transgressions in the hope that readers will be compelled to examine their own prejudices and engage the moral responsibility to evoke in their own personal life, work life, and larger national communities a more humane and life-giving coexistence. In addition to a primary focus on servant leadership, the book addresses three interwoven aspects of social responsibility: 1) the nature of personal responsibility 2) the nature of privilege and the conscious and unconscious violence against humanity often harbored in a blindly privileged stance, and 3) the encounter with forgiveness and forgiveness-asking grounded in a personal and collective obligation to the well-being of humanity. Modernist and postmodernist notions of the will to meaning are considered against the philosophical notion of the will to power. The book examines the everyday existence of human values in a time when we inhabit a world filled as much with unwarranted cruelty as with the disarming nature of authentic and life-affirming love. The book asks the question: Can ultimate forgiveness change the heart of violence? In Forgiveness and Power, people are challenged not only by the work of profound thought leaders such as Mandela, Tutu, but also Simone Weil, Vaclav Havel, Emerson, Mary Oliver, Martin Luther King, Paulo Freire, bell hooks, and Robert Greenleaf. The hope of the book is that people of all ages and creeds come to a deeper understanding and of personal and collective responsibility for leadership that helps heal the heart of the world.

1 Publications Acknowledgments2 What is Servant Leadership?3 Servant Leadership in the Present Day4 Foreword: The Power of Servant Leadership5 Preface: Balefire: The World of Violence and ForgivenessChapter 6 Servant Leadership, Forgiveness, and PowerPart 7 A Fine GracePart 8 When We RisePart 9 The Dignity of LifePart 10 The Eloquent QuestionPart 11 Of Love and Human ViolencePart 12 Emerson on LovePart 13 Sand CreekPart 14 The House of LightChapter 15 Personal Consciousness, Interior FortitudePart 16 Shame and ForgivenessPart 17 The Family, The WorldPart 18 The Way of the ChildPart 19 Martin Luther King Jr. and Desmond TutuPart 20 The Question of Love and PowerPart 21 Before the Velvet RevolutionPart 22 The Practice of ConsciousnessPart 23 Servant Leadership Consciousness and ListeningChapter 24 A Narrative of Hope and Responsible ActionPart 25 The Inward RoadPart 26 The Illumined Nature of PersuasionPart 27 People of Self-TranscendencePart 28 Shadow and LightPart 29 A Cree Man's JourneyPart 30 The Nature of the Forgiving TouchPart 31 Healing the Heart of the World32 Afterword: Acts of Courage and Clarity33 Endnotes34 References35 Recommended Readings in Servant Leadership36 About the Author37 Other Publications by Shann Ray Ferch