Having looked the beast of the past in the eye, having asked and received forgiveness and having made amends, let us shut the door on the past—not in order to forget it but in order not to allow it to imprison us.

The line frames reconciliation as an active moral process rather than a passive act of “moving on.” Tutu insists that confronting wrongdoing (“the beast of the past”), seeking and granting forgiveness, and making concrete reparative steps are prerequisites for any healthy closure. Only after truth-telling and amends can one “shut the door” on the past—meaning to refuse being defined or trapped by it. The final clause guards against denial: the past must be remembered and acknowledged, but not allowed to dominate identity, politics, or personal life. In Tutu’s broader ethical vision, this is the logic of restorative justice: healing communities by combining accountability with mercy.