Desmond Tutu Remembered By South Africans As Selfless Christian Seeking Justice

JOHANNESBURG— The late Anglican Archbishop Desmond Tutu who changed the world through his message of truth and racial reconciliation will be buried in Cape Town on Jan. 1, 2022.

Tutu passed away at the age of 90 in Cape Town on Dec. 26. He was bishop of Johannesburg from 1985 to 1986 and then archbishop of Cape Town from 1986 to 1996. Tutu was the first Black African in each role and advocated successfully against South Africa’s apartheid policy that segregated Black and White citizens. Tutu then helped usher in national laws against racial discrimination and challenged the new democratic government’s corruption on behalf of the poor.

Many prominent South Africans who knew Tutu personally — and even those who had a brief encounter with him — describe him as a peacemaker who did not classify people according to their race or gender but considered each person to be created in God’s likeness.

“He did not see the race of a person,” said Ronnie Alexander, one of Tutu’s former students and retired priest of the Anglican Church in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. “He saw people as people. He used to say, ‘God does not have grandchildren, He only has children. He does not see gender.”

Tutu was Alexander’s Hebrew lecturer and external examiner in 1975 at the Federal Theological Seminary St. Peter’s College in South Africa.

“When I met him, he was not popular,” Alexander said. “He was an ordinary man. He was one of the people who made you feel comfortable and would not make you feel intimidated.”

Alexander further described Tutu as a brilliant scholar, a “workaholic,” a jovial jokester, a thoughtful friend who often bought gifts and asked about a person’s family members, a disciplinarian who attended the Eucharist Mass every day and a teacher who imparted the importance of spiritual discipline and knowing the Bible by heart.

“One of the most important lessons that I learned from him was spiritual discipline,” Alexander said. “He taught us to read the word as often as we could. He would say to us, ‘Someday you will be in prison without a Bible; therefore how will you know your Bible if you do not read it?’ He did not only preach the Bible, he lived it.”

A father to the nations

Love for the unloved, the marginalized, the poor and the voiceless surpassed all other things in Tutu’s Christian walk, said Saki Macozoma — human rights activist, chairman of Vodacom Group and Safika Holdings, and one of South Africa’s richest men — who was mentored by Tutu.

Reflecting on the special moments he shared with Tutu, Macozoma said Tutu was not only a father to him but a man who restored his faith.

Macozoma is a former political prisoner who was incarcerated for five years after leading a student protest during the apartheid regime. He served under the leadership of Tutu during the archbishop’s term as secretary general of the South African Council of Churches and was also mentored by the late South African President Nelson Mandela.

“He restored my faith in Christianity especially of the Anglican variety,” Macozoma said. “He demonstrated that faith has to have consequences and that in an unjust society, it called us to action. I am grateful for this lesson by example.”

Macozoma added that Tutu’s personality, compassion for others and his faith drew the two men closer. He was “a deeply religious man who did not act piously in an exhibitionist way ... (who had) courage against extreme odds. His courage to pronounce his opposition to anything that was wrong without fear or favor.”

The three pillars of Tutu’s legacy

Friends of Tutu also compared him to the good Samaritan in the Bible for his selfless character. He is remembered for helping others during the apartheid regime without fear of being killed for “loving the unloved.”

Professor David Mosoma — the chairperson of the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities in South Africa — and his late friend Abraham Nkomo met Tutu at his house in Soweto. Mosoma and Nkomo were activists and met with Tutu to seek financial assistance for Nkomo to obtain a surgery that “was banned by the agents of the apartheid system” due to Nkomo’s activism. Tutu helped Nkomo.

“What characterized (Tutu’s) legacy was sacrifice, selflessness and service,” Mosoma said. “In the Bible, the issue of the good Samaritan was essentially about asking (yourself) the question, ‘If I do not stop to ask this injured man, what will happen to him?’ rather than, ‘If I stop and help this man, what will happen to me?’ And if you look at the legacy and the contribution of Archbishop Tutu, it is precisely that.”

Mosoma said that during the apartheid regime, people would ask themselves before helping anyone in need: “What will happen to me?” And the answer was, “Apartheid will kill you, so don’t dare help.” But Tutu sacrificed his life for others, asking himself, “What will happen to my people?”

“The Arch chose to love the unloved,” Mosoma said.

Truth and nothing but the truth

Although the president of one of the leading Christian political parties in South Africa, the Rev. Kenneth Meshoe of the African Christian Democratic Party, acknowledged that he met Tutu only a few times during meetings of church leaders and presidents, he described him as a man who “spoke the truth and loved justice.”

“He loved people, particularly the poor, the vulnerable and the oppressed,” Meshoe said. “He spoke the truth even when it is not wanted. He was brave in speaking the truth even when they (the apartheid government) did not want to hear it. He believed in telling the truth.”

Meshoe added that Tutu also challenged the democratic government under the African National Congress, speaking against corruption inside the ruling South African political party that came into power with Mandela.

“He even said that he will pray for their (ANC’s) downfall,” Meshoe said. “The church leaders must learn from him to speak in defense of righteousness and justice.”

Pastor Trevor Itumeleng Molefe of Mercy Seat Family Fellowship in the Boksburg area of Gauteng in South Africa, said Tutu’s was a life well-lived.

“His legacy for the church in South Africa, for me it would be to always be visible, proud of what you are (as a Christian) and trying your utmost best not to  misrepresent the kingdom to which you belong, being who you are in both favorable and unfavorable situations,” Molefe said.

Cyril Zenda contributed to this report.

Vicky Abraham is an investigative journalist based in South Africa and has reported for the Mail & Guardian, City Press, Assist News, the Nation newspaper in Nigeria and Nation Media Group in Kenya.