Thoughts on the Rwanda genocide

I've been reading a book on the Rwanda genocide recently - "we wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families" by Philip Gourevitch from the New York Times; it's a fantastically well written book and an amazing analysis of an absolutely brutal and shocking time; not something for light reading.  I came across a quote today during his analysis of the time after the refugees returned, and victims and perpetrators were being encourage to live together and forget about the past without addressing it; "For values to change, there has to be an acknowledgment of guilt, a genuine desire for atonement, a willingness to make amends, the humility to accept your mistakes and seek forgiveness.  But everyone says it's not us, it's our brothers and sisters.  At the end of the day, no one has done wrong.  In a situation where nobody is willing to seek forgiveness, how can values change?"  How much the true and amazing news about who God is, revealed in Jesus, and what He accomplished - atonement for all sin and a way for forgiveness from God, and hence between people - is needed in this land.  And is there not a lesson here for us too?  How many today point outside..."everything I do that's wrong is someone else's fault" (Anna Russell, Psychiatric Folksong).  The sentiment for the way forward in Rwanda is the same for everywhere else in the world, for people are the same across the globe with regard to the major issues of life...for our world to change, for peace between men, there must be peace in the heart of men; and for this, we must know that atonement has happened, we must embrace it, and acknowledge what has gone wrong.  Jesus is the only solution for this malady of the heart.