A dying racist struggles to deal with his past sins

[dtotire]

dying racist struggles to deal with his past sins
April 6, 2009 - 8:06am.
By HELEN O'NEILL

(AP Photo)Elwin Hope Wilson leans back in his recliner at his home in Rock Hill, SC, a sad, sickly man haunted by time.

Antique clocks, at least a hundred of them, fill his neat ranch home on Tillman Street. Grandfather clocks, mantel clocks, cuckoos and Westministers, all ticking, chiming and clanging in an hourly cacophony that measures the passing days.
Why clocks? his wife Judy has often asked during their 49 years together.
He shrugs and offers no answer.

Wilson doesn't have answers for much of how he has lived his life — not for all the black people he beat up, not for all the venom he spewed, not for all the time wasted in hate


more:

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/node/16901

[willing dwarf]

1. He knows that time is passing and he wants to redeem it

This man is tasting grace, and yet if he is truly blessed, he will be saddened and tormented to his end by realizing the many many blessings he shut out of his life when he shut the door on his neighbors. It was that simple really. Forget the harrassment, the beatings, the cruel jokes and racial slurs her spread. Forget all that and just think of what he lost in not knowing the people in his community who would have welcomed and cared about him like one of their own, if he had been able to open his heart. The losses are his.

But too, the hundreds of people he hurt, their children and grandchildren who live with the bitter taste of racial hate, are victims.

It's beyond all measure, our woundedness as a nation, as people who live with the history and present day reality of racial hatred. We should be very gentle and compassionate with each other, and try to reach out knowing that the painful past is still alive, and needs healing.

[izquierdista]

2. "There's just so much bad in the world."

I see Elwin has a mirror to go along with all his clocks.

[madmom]

3. When I first read this, my first thought was, he's

just covering his ass. That's the way pretend christians get to heaven isn't it. They do what they want until it's "time" then they ask for forgiveness.

[Karenina]

5. I saw the clip posted below of him with Lewis...

Neither I or anyone else can know what is really in this man's heart but what I FELT watching him speak was that he had confronted his deeply personal :wtf: moment. I'd love to sit with him and just hold his hand.

[Raine1967]

4. John Lewis found forgiveness for this man.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NtJioVDTVUs

He Beat John Lewis at a bus station... The video is worth the watch.