Former anti-apartheid activist Allan Boesak was welcomed back into the fold in Bishopscourt on Friday by the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, Njongokulu Ndungane.
Earlier in the month Boesak received a presidential pardon from Thabo Mbeki expunging, his criminal record of a fraud conviction and imprisonment.
Boesak, flanked by his wife Elna, said he had often grappled with his faith and wondered, while in Malmesbury Prison, what God could ”put in the scale” to balance out his life for what he felt was a travesty of justice.
”Tonight, God is saying this is what I can put in the scale, love and warmth and friendship”.
He told his audience, which included Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu and Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool, that he was finished with politics.
However, Boesak said he was free to make a contribution to the Dutch Reformed Church where he would be inducted on Sunday at Piketberg.
He took a swipe at those who were opposed to and questioned the pardon, saying: ”If only we get the same passion on poverty and Aids”.
Earlier, Tutu said the public discourse in the country was ”incredibly weakened and impoverished” when Boesak was incarcerated. He also praised Boesak’s prowess as an orator and described him as one of the ”most brilliant theologians” South Africa had produced.
Tutu said South Africans seemed to have forgotten that if it had not been for Boesak, the United Democratic Front would not have been founded.
Referring to the notion of original sin, Tutu said the fact that people succumbed to it meant they were normal.
”All of us are normal for we have been infected by the virus of original sin,” he said, adding that God had called Boesak again to show everybody mattered.
Former South African ambassador to the United States, Franklin Sonn, paid tribute to President Mbeki for his ”acceptability and openness” to the appeals for Boesak’s pardon.
”No convincing was needed,” said Sonn, who also alluded to the behind-the-scenes role played by former SA Council of Churches secretary general Frank Chikane, now in the President’s office, as well as Mbeki’s legal advisor Majunku Gumbi.
Boesak was convicted in 1999 for fraud and theft of money entrusted to the Foundation for Peace and Justice, of which he was the chairperson.
He served two years of his six-year prison term, and in 2002 applied for a presidential pardon. – Sapa