The Father I knew: A tribute to Desmond Tutu

The tributes being paid to Desmond Tutu this week often begin with words like ‘activist’, ‘campaigner’, ‘protester’, ‘fighter’ or ‘opponent’. They then go on to list the issues and ‘-isms’ he opposed, such as apartheid, racism, sexism, and so forth. They draw attention to how he championed human rights, or the liberation of black and coloured South Africans, women, or LGBTQ people. While these things are all true, sometimes in the last few days it seemed as though Archbishop Tutu had become a blank screen upon which anyone could project their own issues, passions, pains or concerns.

Yet these popular descriptions miss the heart of the person that I knew over four decades, someone who insisted on ‘being’ before ‘doing’, contemplation before action, or who said he wanted to be a ‘quietist’ more than an activist. 

When I got to know Archbishop Tutu, I soon learned that he needed to spend hours in silence and prayer before he could speak.