FORGIVE? EXCUSE ME?

The issue of forgiveness can be critical for those who have been severely abused. It seems that there are often intense, at times overwhelming emotions stirred up even by the word. Often you have heard a lot from "religious" people about what is "demanded" concerning forgiveness. Sometimes it may seem like just one more impossible thing—I can’t forgive someone, so I’m condemned. I feel guilty already for everything on the face of the earth, and it may seem as if forgiveness for me isn’t even a maybe. The whole thing can end up feeling like a puzzle without any solution, a bizarre, manipulative, weird, impossible maze that seems to make sense to everyone but me.

It doesn’t help when statements from clergy sound so absolute, so definite, so self-righteous. It doesn’t help when people talk about forgiveness or forgiving as if it’s primarily an emotion—"Just get to where you feel the emotion and you’ve succeeded." "Gee, does that mean that if I feel warm toward someone that’s forgiveness?" "If I feel rage toward someone, is it forgiveness if somehow I manage to wipe out that feeling?"

I would suggest that a key in all of this is to be honest about what’s going on and what is felt. Another key is to avoid the assumption that so many people make—that it’s all or nothing. Is one more OK? Be cautious any time you hear someone say: "In order for God to forgive. . ." God doesn’t need our wisdom in knowing how to forgive. I think we need his wisdom in order to accept forgiveness and to reach out to others with the same gift.

Here, then, are some thoughts and questions about forgiveness.

Let’s start with what might be meant by the term "forgiveness" or "I forgive."

• It can mean "I refuse to indict you, you do not have to answer or be judged for an action you have performed. I have decided to allow you to go free."
• It can mean "You owe me a debt, and I have decided that you don’t have to repay it."
• It can mean "I have the right to act in this situation, but I have chosen not to make use of that right."
• It can mean "The relationship between us has changed because of an action on your part. I chose to not base the relationship on a past wrong, but to set that aside and base the relationship on other things."
• It can mean "I seek to discourage emotions of resentment or revenge, and seek to encourage what emotions would be present if you had never acted to wound me."

There may be other ways that the term could be used, but these are at least some of them.

Different situations or relationships may well call for different aspects or understandings of forgiveness to be important. It probably also would help to realize that someone else may or may not be using the term "forgive" in the same way. When the word is used in the Bible, for example, it may be used in very different ways.

In a very real sense, forgiveness may not be about "justice." Someone can recognize that there is a right to some repayment of a debt or repair of an injury and then choose not to call for that repayment. Perhaps though, an additional pain or sense of outrage is present when there isn’t even an acknowledgment that any harm was done. Perhaps that comes across as a kind of disrespect of me as a human being, as someone of value.

It doesn’t seem to make sense if all an abuser has to say is "I’m sorry" and then it’s as if he had never abused anyone. It’s doesn’t seem to fit when there is such a struggle toward healing, over such a long time, for those who have been abused. It seems very reasonable to expect efforts at "restitution" for things that have harmed others. Part of seeking to be forgiven is to sincerely do what is possible to try to repair the harm that has been done. Often that’s impossible, but it’s important to work in that direction.

Often when someone is troubled by the idea of forgiveness there is a focusing on one aspect of it, to the exclusion of other issues that are just as important. The person can "lock in" on one aspect that just keeps them feeling like wandering around without getting anywhere.

Let’s talk about the idea of forgiveness and keep it as broad as possible. If you run into an aspect that does in fact cause problems, put it aside for a bit and look at the aspects that are not as much of a problem. You may find that eventually the whole thing looks a bit clearer.

Ready?

Can God forgive me? Has he?

Can God forgive the abuser? Does he? Will he?

Must I forgive the abuser?

Can I forgive those who didn’t stop the abuse?

Can they forgive me? Can society forgive me? For what?

Can I forgive God?

Can I forgive the others inside?

Can the others inside forgive me?

Could it be that sometimes when we focus so much on the issue of forgiveness from God we distract ourselves from the questions of forgiving inside?

No matter how we look at the issue or work on it, honesty is important. Perhaps the most destructive thing would be to assume that we should pretend that emotions are present that are not, or pretend that emotions aren’t present that really are. It would seem to be much more toward healing to say that an emotion is present, but I choose not to act on it, or at least not to let it run at full blast.

Different churches, different clergy, different traditions all seem to have different understandings of what is involved with forgiving. Interestingly, each is absolutely convinced that their view is right and everyone else is wrong! Hmmm.

Sometimes there’s a connection made between "feeling guilty" and objective, true guilt or responsibility for having done wrong. I can feel guilty without reason. I can have moral responsibility and emotionally brush it off. I can simply rationalize that everything I do is OK whether it is or not.

It is true that part of living a new life, of recognizing forgiveness from God, is to let go of a continuing sense of "feeling guilty" over what has happened in the past. All of us have things that we regret in our lives. All of us have times and ways that we’ve hurt other people. One part of forgiveness by God, in the Christian tradition, is certainly believing that the forgiveness is complete and real. It is not given grudgingly and hesitantly, but freely and completely.

In any discussion of forgiveness, whether based on Scripture or not, I think the idea or focus should be on working toward healing. It might take a lifetime to get to the point of not getting physically sick at the sight of an abuser. Does that mean the person is somehow in trouble with God? Would a survivor of the Holocaust have to embrace an SS soldier before receiving Communion?

The challenge of the Gospel, including the idea of forgiveness, is to work on a changing and new growth that leads to a different way of looking at things.

There is a spiritual problem that has been called "scrupulousness." A person sees the only acceptable standard as perfection and sees themselves as continually falling short and therefore, condemned. It is self-defeating and can end up being a kind of spiritual sickness. It robs faith of joy and hope and becomes an obsession. Sometimes a very simple question helps the process of working out of it.

Think of someone that you love or care a lot about. Could you willingly and fairly take the same standard that you’re applying to yourself and apply it to them? Would you want them to live life with that understanding of what is required? What principles are involved? Does focusing on such high standards honor those principles or make a mockery of them?

The practical dynamic seems to be "I feel condemned, therefore I look for reasons to support that feeling." In the process God starts looking like a bizarre dictator. Or perhaps God starts looking like the abuser, setting impossible standards.

I feel as if I should have some "conclusion" or "answer" but all of this is just too personal—too much of a process of growing and healing. I can say, though, that I think the responsibility of communities of faith is to proclaim God’s forgiveness and love—not to insist that they somehow do the impossible first. Eventually, with healing, more does become possible. Healing, and forgiveness, can’t be rushed or pretended. It has to be real.