If I happened one day - And it could be today -
being a victim of terrorism which now seems to encompass
all foreigners living in Algeria,
I would like my community, my Church, my family,
remember that my life was UP to God and country.
them to accept that the Sole Master of all life
not a stranger to this brutal departure.
they pray for me
how would I found worthy of such an offering?
they able to link this death with so many other equally violent
left in the indifference of anonymity.
My life has no more value another.
She did not less either.
Anyway, she has not the innocence of childhood.
I have lived long enough to know that I
of evil which seems, alas, to prevail in the world,
and even one which would strike me blindly.
I would, in time, have a clear space
that would allow me to beg forgiveness of God
and that of my brothers in humanity,
same time to forgive with all my heart who would have reached.
I do not desire such a death.
It seems important to state this.
I do not see, in fact, how I could rejoice
if the people I love were to be accused indiscriminately of my murder.
is too costly so-called, perhaps, the "grace of martyrdom" to owe
to an Algerian, whoever he is, especially if he says
acting in fidelity to what it believes to be Islam. I know the contempt that can be heaped on Algerians indiscriminately.
I also know the cartoons of Islam promoted by a certain idealism.
It is too easy to feel good
by identifying this religious way with the fundamentalist extremists.
Algeria and Islam, for me, that's another thing, a body and a soul.
I have proclaimed this often enough, I believe, in the full knowledge of what I received,
finding there so often this strand of the Gospel
learned at the feet of my mother, my very first Church ,
specifically in Algeria, and already, in respect of Muslims.
My death, obviously,
appear to justify those who hastily judged me naive or idealistic:
"He now says what he thinks of it!".
But these will need to know that finally my most avid curiosity.
Here I can, God willing,
plunge my gaze in that of Father
to contemplate with him His children of Islam
as they see them, all shining with the glory of Christ,
fruit of His Passion, with the Gift of the Spirit whose
secret joy will always be to establish communion
and restore the likeness, playing with the differences.
this life lost, totally mine and totally theirs,
I thank God who seems to have willed it entirely for this
-JOY there, in spite of everything. In this THANK
when all is said, now, my life,
I certainly include you, friends of yesterday and today, and you
, O friends here,
alongside my mother and my father, my sisters and my brothers and their families,
hundredfold granted as was promised!
And you too, friend of the last moment, who would not know what you did.
Yes, for you too I want this THANK YOU and this "A-DIEU" in face-you.
And we find ourselves is given, thieves happy
in paradise, please God, the Father of us both. AMEN!
Insha Allah !
Algiers, 1 December 1993
Tibhirine, 1 January 1994
Christian
just nothing to add. Go y.
