John Cena says CM Punk apologizing to fans in Saudi Arabia was “one of the best moments in wrestling”

There is no shortage of divide. We have a million different ways to gravitate toward like-minded groups and block everyone else out. You had someone who, in a moment of frustration and reaction, said some pretty hateful things about a culture. And then you had that culture respond with, ‘F*** you. Come at us. Not in our house.’

Then you have a man who is brave enough to walk into the lion’s den. For young performers, old performers, please watch that pre-show. I think it flew under everybody’s radar. I was bawling my eyes out, saying, ‘This is the best thing ever.’

Phil goes out there — and I want to say Phil because this is about his development as a man — front row. There is a dude who holds him accountable, and I’m huge on accountability. In that moment, Phil was accountable for what he said. He gave a good explanation for why, and then asked, ‘What can we do after that?’ He said, ‘I’m sorry.’ And then you leave it at that. That’s all you can do.

Forgiveness takes time. When someone is ready to forgive, they’ll mend that fence. That gentleman forgave him right there and broke down. The forgiveness was infectious.

What I saw was, ‘Holy s***, wrestling just brought cultures together.’ Wrestling brought people with different ideologies together in an embrace and shared excitement. Phil went on that pre-show at 5:00 PM. We did a promo at 8:30. He went from being the most hated person to saying sorry to one guy, being forgiven, then having the whole pre-show forgive him.

Then he went out in front of 31,000 people — and they forgave him. I don’t know if there’s a better moment than that. I don’t know if there’s a better example of what we can accomplish in wrestling by saying, ‘I f***ed up. This is why I did it. This is what was going through my mind.'”