I agree with Solzhenitsyn that without repentance, we cannot change ourselves or our society. We must feel responsibility for our history. Who was it who made Stalin's terror? It was we - our fathers - and we must now pay for our fathers. But this is repulsive to most people. They want to blame others. They accuse Jews or someone else. They do not want to accept responsibility.
Andrei Smirnov, Film Director, March 1990
Quoted in Hedrick Smith, The New Russians (New York: Avon Books, 1991), p. 121.
Repulsive indeed. Are children bear guilt of their fathers? Moreover - what about children of the victims? Should they repent too?
ReplyDeleteWe have children of executioners and children of victims here in Russia.
Former are still rule. Latter are still deprived of their heritage.
Asking repentance from the former is naivete. Askin repentance from the latter is hipocricy.