There is a lot to be said for not forgiving people
who have done us wrong. Why should people who upset our lives, leaving us
bleeding in their wake, expect us to forgive everything and act as if nothing
went wrong? Is forgiving in reality a religious trick to seduce hurting people
into putting up with wrongs they do not deserve? Remember that we are
talking about forgiving things that we feel are insufferable. We are not
talking about the petty slights that we all inevitably suffer. We are talking
about forgiving people who have wronged us, deeply and unfairly. If
forgiving leaves the victim exposed and encourages the wrongdoer to hurt again,
why forgive?!
When we urge people to forgive, we are asking them to suffer
twice. First, they suffer the wrong of another person's assault. They
were ripped off. Betrayed. Left out in the cold. Now must
they suffer a second injury and swallow the insult to boot? They are
stuck with the hurt ---- must they also bless the person who hurt them?
Is there a case to be made for "honest" forgiveness?
Lewis B. Smedes, a former professor of theology and ethics at Fuller
Theological Seminary, in his book Forgive & Forget, offers
some helpful thoughts.
First, when we say "forgive" we may be asking
someone to commit an outrage against humankind's universal instinct for fair
play. Smedes says we should believe in forgiveness only if justice is
maintained and guilt acknowledged. You will forgive only when you dare
look at people eyeball to eyeball and tell them that they are responsible for
what they did.
Suppose we try to deny the hurt we feel. If we
are too afraid of our own pain to permit ourselves to feel it fully, Smedes
tells us, we do not need to deal with the issue of forgiveness. For
practical purposes, there is no hurt to forgive. But what shoves us into
crisis is when we realize the fact that we have been treated unfairly by
someone ---- someone who did not have to do it. We can begin to
forgive only when we refuse the soft-soaped temptation of toning down the wrong
that was laid on us. Forgiving is only for people who are being honest
about the wretched fact of unfair pain, says Professor Smedes.
Forgiving is not for everyone.
But, suppose one refuses to settle for the past (with it's
remembered hurt), and you also refuse to forgive. Is there another
option? Maybe revenge?
Vengeance is a passion to get even. It is a hot desire
to give back as much pain as someone gave you. An eye for an eye!
The problem with revenge is that it never gets what it wants ---- it never
evens the score. Vengeance always takes both the injured and the injurer
on an escalator of pain. The escalator never stops, never lets anyone off
as long as parity is demanded.
Why do family feuds go on and on until everyone is dead ----
or gets too old and too tired to fight? The reason is simple: no two
people, no two families, ever weigh pain on the same scale. The pain a
person causes me always feels heavier to me than it feels to the person who
caused it. The pain I inflict on you always feels worse to you than it seems to
me.
If you hurt me and I retaliate in kind, I may think that I
have given you only what you deserve, no more. But you will feel it as a
hurt that is too great for you to accept. Your passion for fairness will
force you to retaliate against me, harder this time. Then it will be my
turn. And will it ever stop?
Forgiveness is not the alternative to revenge because it is
soft and gentle, says Prof. Smedes. It is a viable alternative, he says,
because it is the only creative route to less unfairness.
Forgiveness has creative power to move us away from a past
moment of pain, to unshackle us from our endless chain of pain-related
reactions, and to create a new situation in which both the wrongdoer and the
wronged can begin in a new way.
Smedes says it well:
"Forgiveness offers
a chance at reconciliation. It is an opportunity for a
life together
instead of death together. Forgiveness is a miracle of the
will that
moves away the heavy hindrance to fellowship, a miracle that
will be fulfilled
when the two estranged people come together in as fair
a new relationship
as is possible at that time and in those circumstances."
Forgiveness begins midstream in the flow of unfairness,
and starts a new movement toward another fairness. An imperfect fairness,
to be sure, but better at least than endless perpetuation of the old
unfairness. It breaks the grip that past wrong and pain have on our minds
and frees us for whatever fairer future lies amid the unknown potential of our
tomorrows.
There is no guarantee. But, forgiving is the only door
open to possibility. This Christmas, do you see any opportunities
for reconciliation with someone who has hurt you in the past? This might
be the best Christmas gift you could give to yourself!
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These thoughts are brought to you by the Adult Spiritual
Development Team at CPC, hoping to encourage your personal spiritual growth
this winter.
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