You can search online or even purchase his book to read about his accolades and accomplishments.
What I want to discuss today is the inspiration we can gain from his life story.
We are fortunate to have shared a moment in time with this man to see that all that he accomplished could even be possible.
South African apartheid is no different than racism in the United States. Both grow from the belief that one group of people, based on the color of their skin, are superior than another group of people and that belief is justification to systematically keep them in a state of inferiority.
Racism is global. It is sickening. It is ugly. It needs to be eradicated.
One man, in one country, on one continent agreed and spent his life fighting for equality.
I can imagine that it was a lonely and long battle.
But he endured!
For me, and people like me, it seems like we're beating in the wind when I say, "a world without racism is the world I want to create."
Yes! It was here before me. It may still remain once I am gone, but Nelson Mandela's life example is all the more reason to keep fighting for it.
So, I mourn. I mourn not for him but for the world. A world that no longer has this man who taught us how to live, and fight, and love, and forgive, and endure until our purpose is fulfilled.
I second the sentiments of Justice Malala who said, "[Mandela] taught us to strive for what is good and right, even as we ourselves stumble; to strain for perfection, even as we are caught up in our own flawed lives; to put the poor and downtrodden at the centre of our endeavours, even as we reach for the good life."
Mandela is a great man. The movement he left behind is even greater.
Rest in power Madiba!
Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela
18 July 1918 – 5 December 2013
"Poverty is not an accident. Like slavery and apartheid, it is man-made and can be removed by the actions of human beings." -Nelson Mandela
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