ABSTRACT
At a time of growing tension between blacks and whites in South Africa, Desmond Tutu called for the abolition of apartheid. He used his status as a Christian bishop to organize international opposition to the government and to prevent racial violence. Tutu became a high school teacher in 1955, but resigned in 1957 to protest new, racially discriminatory laws. Feeling increasingly called to a religious life, he was ordained an Anglican priest in 1961. As leader of the South African Council, Tutu entered political life more forcefully, earning the reputation of a prophet for his use of Christian teaching when attacking the apartheid system. Tutu witnessed the final dismantling of apartheid after 1991, when Nelson Mandela was released from prison and his African National Congress was legalized. After Mandela was elected president in 1994, he appointed Tutu chairman of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1995 to study the human rights abuses of the old regime.
