An Anglican priest who lost both hands and an eye in his fight against racism in South Africa urges the “dominant culture” in Hawaii to open its heart and mind to the grievances of Native Hawaiians and to make substantial reparations.

Father Michael Lapsley said that’s the key to bringing about genuine healing of an old wound that has festered since the 1893 overthrow of the Hawaiian kingdom.

On Sunday, during his talk as the 2015 Margaret “Peggy” Kai Memorial Lecture’s keynote speaker, Lapsley spoke about the need for “restorative justice” for many of the “foundation nations,” or indigenous people, around the world. The event was held at The Cathedral of St. Andrew.

His message was tied to his own efforts to help South Africans heal from the injustices of the government’s apartheid system, which was officially abolished in 1994. Years earlier the government had tried to stop Lapsley’s activism against the racist policy. In 1990 he received a bomb in the mail, tucked into a thick magazine. The explosion blew off in his hands, shattered his eardrums and destroyed his vision in one eye. His struggle to recover his own physical and spiritual well-being prompted the founding of the international Institute for Healing of Memories in 1998.

Lapsley said there should be more “national conversations” about pain and suffering in countries where indigenous populations were conquered or certain races were enslaved. He said the recent “Black Lives Matter” movement in the United States attests to unresolved injuries pertaining to slavery.

“And in Hawaii the key social indicators — including homelessness, rate of incarceration, health, poverty, life expectancy — all show that Native Hawaiians (are) worse off than the rest of the population,” Lapsley said. “Many social scientists speak … of how the moral and spiritual injury, the historical trauma of the illegal overthrow of the monarchy and its consequences continue to infect Hawaii today.”

In Hawaii, Laspley said, “we need more courageous conversations, places where we can speak, places where we can listen both with the head and with the heart.” He added, “The moral courage to speak and to act are part of the calling of all faith communities,” and conversations are needed in schools, workplaces and at the dinner table.

“And those of us from the dominant culture … we need to make sure that we listen twice as hard, with compassion and kindness to the voices of those who have not been heard,” said Lapsley, who is white and a native of New Zealand. In 1973 the Episcopal priest moved to South Africa where he took up the cause to overturn apartheid.

“On a personal note, I’ve often asked myself why I survived a bomb that was supposed to kill me when so many others died. I hope that in a small way I can be a living testament of what racism, evil and hatred does to our bodies and our souls. But a thousand times more importantly, I’ve hoped that I can be a sign that stronger than evil and hatred and death is kindness, compassion, gentleness, justice and love of God and country.”