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What Forgiveness Does (and Does Not)
The Gospel lessons for this Sunday and next are about forgiving someone who has hurt you. To prepare for these lessons, I’d like to reflect on what forgiveness is (and what it is not).
Forgiveness is not an emotion or a feeling. Forgiveness does not condone negative behavior. Forgiveness does not guarantee reconciliation. Forgiveness does not minimize the wrong done, it does not pretend it didn’t happen. Forgiveness is not a substitute for making amends. So what then is forgiveness?
Forgiveness, in the Greek New Testament, means “to let go”, “to release”, or “to send away”. It is represented in two distinct relationships – between the individual and God and between individuals. Let’s focus on forgiveness between individuals. This is my working definition: Forgiveness is a conscious deliberate choice to let go of the right to resent, punish or seek revenge against an offender. You can forgive someone even when they are not sorry or are aware of the pain they caused because you are making the conscious choice to let go (to release/to send away). The choice you made to forgive is not conditional on the offender accepting any responsibility or showing remorse. In other words, you are forgiving to free yourself.
Forgiveness is a practice. The deeper the offense, the more one has to practice it. In the Lord’s Prayer, we ask God to give us our daily bread and then to forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us. I think the concept of “daily bread” applies to the daily practice of forgiveness. If forgiveness was an emotion, we could forgive and then move on to the next emotion. But it’s not. The feeling of betrayal may remain or pop up from time to time. Forgiveness, being a daily practice, means when the feeling of betrayal comes back up, we then (again) practice letting go and releasing the power that the feeling has over our lives.
I’ve learned a good prayer for when the feeling of pain resurfaces. Here it is:
“Lord, I’m remembering again what they did to me and I am feeling angry. Help me.”
Practicing forgiveness means we get to practice, over and over again, releasing pain to God and sending it away from ourselves. We also practice letting go of seeking to harm the offender.
Incidentally, chaplains I know in prison ministry have talked to people who have taken physical revenge on someone who harmed them. Prior to their arrest, each person said revenge surprisingly did not make their hurt go away and, in many cases, revenge exacerbated it.
Once in a great while, forgiving someone will make your body forget what happened. That’s truly a gift from God (because God does forgive and forget). Often, when we make a deliberate choice to let go of the right to resent, punish or seek revenge against an offender, the painful memory remains. Over time, however, the pain will become more manageable (and much more so than not forgiving).
Lastly, there are some things that seem impossible to forgive. And honestly, that’s okay. God’s mercy is infinite. In occasions like that, my mentor suggests that we replace “will not” forgive with “cannot” forgive. Instead of saying to yourself, “I will not forgive that person,” try saying, “I cannot forgive that person.” Then, lift your “cannot” to God, like this:
Lord, this person hurt me so much that I cannot forgive them. Help me.
The Lord of all forgiveness and, all hopefulness, who has infinite mercy, will help you.
– Fr. Dave
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