Well! Certainly a nice surprise but more than the apology is their willingness to even admit that they were wrong and to admit what they had done. It may be just one website, and there was hardly ever activity on it - not even on their forum. But it's certainly a big move to admit a mistake and to move forward.
If only more people would come forward and admit their mistaken choices and views, it would give so much more strength to others to also step forward. It would never be too late to apologise, mend our samaya and make that change, which would be better than just stoically holding on to our point of view for the sake of being right - which is what I think a lot of anti-shugden camp people have started to do. Now, the Shugden issue seems to have become more a battle of wits, to "out-stare" each other than to do true practice and just admit when we have faulted.
So seeing a website so strongly against Shugden make a total turnaround and apologise publicly like this is extremely uplifting. It shows some true practice in action. In opening up to lose some respect for having such a change of heart, they will inadvertently eventually gain back the respect of people who will appreciate their honesty and for standing up for what they believe.
