{"id":125317,"date":"2023-11-25T08:14:27","date_gmt":"2023-11-25T08:14:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/?p=125317"},"modified":"2023-11-25T08:14:27","modified_gmt":"2023-11-25T08:14:27","slug":"the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe-by-michael-roberts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe-by-michael-roberts\/","title":{"rendered":"The Humanitarian Social Commitment of Lakshman Wickremesinghe-by Michael Roberts"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2 style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Humanitarian Social Commitment of Lakshman Wickremesinghe-<span style=\"color: #800080;\">by Michael Roberts<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-78100 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/Michael-Roberts.jpg\" alt=\"Michael Roberts\" width=\"300\" height=\"252\" \/><\/p>\n<p><strong><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #333399;\">Source:<\/span><\/strong><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><a style=\"color: #000000; font-size: 16px;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/11\/23\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Thuppahis<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Professor Rajiva Wijesinha,\u00a0item taken from Daily News,\u00a0<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailynews.lk\/2023\/10\/24\/featured\/184537\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\">24 October 2023<\/a>, \u2026.. with highlighting imposed by The Editor, Thuppahi<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/11\/23\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-49618 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thuppahis.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/Bishop-Lakshman-Wickremasinghe-1-1.webp?resize=238%2C300&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"elanka\" width=\"400\" height=\"341\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe died on October 23 forty years ago. He was my uncle, and I had a special affinity with him with regard to both intellect and emotions. When I came back from Oxford, where he had studied a couple of decades before me, he was the family member who was most supportive of my resignation on the issue of the deprivation of Mrs. Bandaranaike\u2019s Civic Rights, for unlike most members of the elite he understood early on what that meant for the future of democracy, a blight that has never left us since it was followed by a premature Presidential election, the ghastly referendum, and then the attacks first on Supreme Court Judges and then on Tamils.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/11\/23\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-49618 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thuppahis.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/ColomboburningBlackJuly1983-1.webp?resize=300%2C207&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"elanka\" width=\"400\" height=\"341\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thuppahis.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/ColomboburningBlackJuly1983-1.webp?ssl=1\"><em>one moment during Black July 1983<\/em><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>His anguish about the pogrom of July contributed to his death<\/strong>,\u00a0<strong>\u2018heartbroken at the treatment of his Tamil brethren, the direct outcome of the tragic impact of race riots in Sri Lanka on his already weak heart\u2019.\u00a0<\/strong>This assessment comes towards the end of the piece my sister, Anila Dias Bandaranaike, wrote for a recently published\u00a0<em>Recollections of Senior Friends of the<\/em>\u00a0<em>Student Christian Movement<\/em>\u00a0<em>of Sri Lanka<\/em>\u00a0which is replete with references to his impact.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Having recently read that book, I was overwhelmed again\u00a0<strong>by the range of his activity, governed by his overwhelming commitment to the oppressed<\/strong>. He once noted that his role was to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted, and this was an urgent compulsion that possessed him throughout his life.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Impact on Social Justice and Pluralism<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">I can do no better than show the impact of his humanity, combined with intellectual analysis, through quotations from that book. I will start with the contribution of Michael Roberts, who was teaching at Peradeniya in the seventies, a period in which I was away, who having known him when he was an undergraduate, ensured his participation in the discussions arising from the upheavals of that period.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Roberts had been at the University when Lakshman arrived as Chaplain \u2013 \u2018It was not until some point in 1958 that the Protestant Church, away in the hillside valley was ready for use with the charismatic figure of Fr. Lakshman Wickremesinghe as inspiring leader\u2019. He expands then on Lakshman\u2019s seminal role, stressing his understanding of the changes in the social outlook of the country that occurred in that decade, and also noting his pervasive pluralism \u2013 \u2018Central to the convivial strands of Christian interaction from 1958 were two \u201cmonuments\u201d \u2013 the premises of the Church and Father Lakshman Wickremesinghe.\u00a0<strong>As convivial as inspiring, \u201cFather Lak\u201d developed several modalities of worship and fellowship.<\/strong>\u00a0In step with the socio-political transformations of that decade and our time in Sri Lanka, he initiated the practice of mixed carol services with Tamil and Sinhala hymns among the usual English ones. It was rendered particularly meaningful by the sheer beauty of the hymnal of expression, the arrangement of space and the religiosity of so many of the student regulars.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Roberts goes on, after reminiscences of his time as a student, to talk about the different world he worked in as an academic. He refers then to how he involved Bishop Lakshman in his efforts in the seventies to draw attention to the rising tensions in the country, with the introduction of a new constitution that seemed to all except the government parties to have been imposed without proper consultation.\u00a0<strong>The Ceylon Studies Seminar in 1972\/73 \u2018organised a half-day seminar in the Senate Room of Peradeniya Campus to review the constitution, with Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe and Professor A. Jeyaratnam Wilson among the main speakers.<\/strong>\u00a0Then in October 1973, there was a full-day conference arranged together with the Marga Institute, which was just coming into prominence, with the afternoon sessions \u2018devoted to what we called<strong>\u00a0\u201cBridge-Building\u201d<\/strong>\u00a0and involved four speakers, vis Neville Jayaweera, Vaithianathan Karalasingham, Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe and myself\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Though obviously,\u00a0<strong>it\u00a0is his efforts with regard to ensuring justice for minorities that now dominate perceptions of Bishop Lakshman\u2019s humanity,\u00a0<\/strong>there were other elements too that are worth recording, not least because his approach was so very unusual, back in the fifties, for someone of his elite background. He thought it important that the range of experience of those he mentored should be wide and inclusive.\u00a0<strong>Aware of the urban ethos of most of them, he was insistent that they experienced rural life too.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Surajith Peiris records that \u2018he organized a work camp for the male SCMers during the long vacation in April 1959. We travelled to Kilinochchi by train and had to sit in a tractor-trailer which took us several miles along an unpaved bumpy road to the work camp site\u2026We did eight hours of digging in the blazing hot sun and cooled down in the stream nearby in the evening\u2019. But typically, Lakshman seems to have shared in this for the article goes on to say \u2018Each evening Fr. Lak brought us back to our senses and closer to God with Bible Study and Prayer.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">I cherish those evenings we had with the loving and caring Fr. Lak and the guidance he gave us.\u2019<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Enduring Influence on the Student Christian Movement<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\">Narmesena Wickremesinghe, who had given me the SCM book, records another example of Lakshman\u2019s care and concern when his flock was away from their usual milieu. In 1960 he went with a delegation to the Triennial SCM Conference in Lahore, where he prepared the bible studies for the whole group. But Narme also records that when on the way back some of the group were quarantined in a hospital close to Dhanushkodi where they were to take the ferry, Lakshman stayed back with the SCM Secretary \u2018to attend to the needs of the delegates\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>His determination to expand the outlook of those he looked after went hand in understanding and sympathy for all those in need<\/strong>. Prof Lakshman Guruswamy notes another example of loving personal care in writing that \u2018I neglected my studies and was in a panic about failing the exams. Then providentially, Fr, Lakshman visited my house in Kandy and invited me to stay and study in the chaplaincy. I gratefully accepted and I passed my exams. SCM through Fr. Lakshman, thus saved me from a disaster in my career.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/11\/23\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-49618 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thuppahis.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/guruswamy.jpg?w=300&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"elanka\" width=\"400\" height=\"341\" \/><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Guruswamy\u2019s article<\/strong>\u00a0is almost ecstatic in its adulation of Lakshman, and I will conclude by quoting from it at length, to make clear Lakshman\u2019s impact on such a bright youngster \u2013 \u2018<strong>It was difficult to separate this wonderfully gifted, handsome, brilliant, charismatic, and pious young priest from SCM. If you followed Fr. Lakshman, you became part of SCM. It was impossible for me to disengage SCM from Fr. Lakshman who was the greatest, most devout, and charismatic person I have known.\u2019<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><b>\u00a0 \u00a0******************<\/b><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>PERTINENT LITERATURE\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Michael Roberts:\u00a0\u201cNationalist Studies and the Ceylon Studies Seminar at Peradeniya, 1968-1970s,\u201d<\/strong>\u00a02 October 2018,\u00a0<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahi.wordpress.com\/2018\/10\/02\/nationalist-studies-and-the-ceylon-studies-seminar-at-peradeniya-1968-1970s\/\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/thuppahi.wordpress.com\/2018\/10\/02\/nationalist-studies-and-the-ceylon-studies-seminar-at-peradeniya-1968-1970s\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>DBS Jeyaraj ..<\/strong>..\u00a0<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.dailymirror.lk\/article\/Black-July-Thirty-fifth-Anniversary-of-Anti-Tamil-Violence-153018.html\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/www.dailymirror.lk\/article\/Black-July-Thirty-fifth-Anniversary-of-Anti-Tamil-Violence-153018.html<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Michael Roberts:<\/strong>\u00a0\u2026..<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/07\/24\/the-agony-and-ecstasy-of-a-pogrom-southern-lanka-july-1983\/\">https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/07\/24\/the-agony-and-ecstasy-of-a-pogrom-southern-lanka-july-1983\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong>Michael Roberts:\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0\u2026..\u00a0<a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/07\/26\/reflections-my-engagement-with-the-pogrom-of-july-1983-in-sri-lank\/\">https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/07\/26\/reflections-my-engagement-with-the-pogrom-of-july-1983-in-sri-lank\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 16px; color: #000000;\"><strong><a style=\"color: #000000;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Black_July\" rel=\"nofollow\">https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Black_July<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/thuppahis.com\/2023\/11\/23\/the-humanitarian-social-commitment-of-lakshman-wickremesinghe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-49618 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thuppahis.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/BLACK-JULY-1-Al-Jazeera.webp?resize=768%2C512&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"elanka\" width=\"400\" height=\"341\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Humanitarian Social Commitment of Lakshman Wickremesinghe-by Michael Roberts Source:Thuppahis Professor Rajiva Wijesinha,\u00a0item taken from Daily News,\u00a024 October 2023, \u2026.. with highlighting imposed by The Editor, Thuppahi Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe died on October 23 forty years ago. He was my uncle, and I had a special affinity with him with regard to both intellect and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":125327,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,42710],"tags":[57925,57926,57927],"class_list":{"0":"post-125317","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-aside","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-articles","8":"category-michael-roberts","9":"tag-anila-dias-bandaranaike","10":"tag-lakshman-wickremesinghe","11":"tag-professor-rajiva-wijesinha","12":"post_format-post-format-aside"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.7.1 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Humanitarian Social Commitment of Lakshman Wickremesinghe-by Michael Roberts<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Bishop Lakshman Wickremesinghe died on October 23 forty years ago. 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