This month’s blog was written by the Revd Canon Malcolm Rogers MBE, The Bishop of Liverpool’s Canon for Reconciliation. In this role, Mal leads the Diocese’s work in the Triangle of Hope. The Triangle of Hope is an Anglican communion that includes the Dioceses of Liverpool, Kumasi and Virginia who are dedicated to transforming the long history, ongoing effects and continuing presence of slavery in our world through repentance, reconciliation and mission.
In my role as Canon for Reconciliation, I am fortunate to be able to travel to West Africa fairly frequently. When you arrive into Accra Kotoka Airport, Ghana, there are two images which are visible from around the terminal. One is a huge ‘Akwaaba’ sign (Akwaaba means welcome in ‘Twi’ used extensively throughout Ghana) and the other, an equally prominent Adinkra symbol, sankofa,¸which represents the Akan proverb ‘it is never wrong to go back to retrieve that which has been forgotten’.
‘Sankofa’ is not just part of a rich cultural heritage, its values provide a framework for engagement with the present too, that the future might be transformed.
The image of a bird moving forwards but looking backwards encourages revisiting and learning from the past, symbolized particularly by the bird retrieving something. But there is at least one other way of engaging with sankofa, beyond the proverb perhaps. In the image we might also see a bird laying something down, perhaps ideas and legacies which continue to destroy and divide us?
When people engage with sankofa in the pursuit of truth and reconciliation, my experience is that they become more mindful of the importance of both these perspectives. They also find themselves becoming increasingly aware of the importance of engaging with the past not as individuals but as a group (and preferably a group containing those closest to and impacted most by the history being considered).
The sankofa journey made together cannot ever be made as a ‘one off’. If it is to be authentic, it requires an openness to being part of a complicated conversation you might say, between the past, present and with an eye on the future. Sankofa calls us not only to revisit but to rethink and remap, and this is a lifelong and cyclical journey as our learning and experience expands. It requires courage on the part of those whose ancestors were abused (and who themselves may be experiencing versions of that abuse and discrimination as part of its legacy) and those who have benefited and continually benefit from such abuse. Courage to speak out, to name and challenge. Courage also to repent and lay down power, privilege and false perceptions.
Sankofa must always be undertaken then within a firm commitment to the safety of all. For some the journey may be well travelled, for others it may be entirely new terrain. In either case, it can be traumatic in itself and also bring to the fore historic trauma. Tread carefully if you invest in sankofa, listen attentively to your own needs and the needs of others. Draw from the shared commitment to healing that which has caused harm and distorted truth, and if you are a Christian person remember that the journey is one which Christ also walks. I’m reminded from Luke 24 of The Road to Emmaus and how Jesus’ presence was recognised but not at first. There is something in this which is life giving to the process of reconciliation. Sometimes we have to journey with our fear, doubt and pain, and its not immediately clear what resolution, truth and healing would involve. But Jesus’ presence is an assurance that we don’t walk with our confusion alone, that He is with us even when we might not be able to recognise him.
But there are those moments when transformation comes, breakthrough moments of realisation which bring healing and hope. These come from relationship and fellowship, after walking the way together (perhaps only possible having done this), listening carefully and seeing and feeling the world through another’s perspective, as best we can.
It’s at that point when sankofa becomes not just a theory but a moment of opportunity. In re-discovering, in laying down, in journeying together, in those moments when like the disciples we find ourselves with vision, sankofa represents a promise that things can be different. History does not have to repeat itself. Sankofa provides us with a respectful and authentic way of recognising historic injustice in a way that is focused on the present and future. It is all about healing which requires every bit of our commitment to the truth that sets us free.
