For the past week, a big news story has been the
cold-blooded murder of 9 people at a black A.M.E. church in Charleston, South
Carolina. A lone, 21 year old white man entered the church at an evening
Bible study, and after listening for about an hour, stood up, pulled out a .45
caliber handgun and killed 9 of the class members, as he mouthed racist,
hateful words about black people.
Several days later after the arrest of the killer, at his
bail hearing, victim statements were allowed to be spoken to the accused.
A relative of one of the victims said to the accused killer, about the loss of
her sister: "I will never be able to hold her again. But, I
forgive you."
I have been thinking about the words: "I forgive
you." Those words can be such hard words for anyone to say.
What message does that word FORGIVE, convey? Webster's tells us it means
"to cease to feel resentment against an offender."
There is a lot to be said for not forgiving people
who have done us wrong. Why should people who have upset our lives,
leaving us bleeding in their wake, expect us to forgive everything and act as
if nothing went wrong? 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?!
An alternative would have been vengeance ---- 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! But, 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? Perhaps because 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 does 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. (Actually, now I am no
better than you!) 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, just because
forgiveness is soft and gentle. It is the best alternative because it is
the only creative route to less unfairness. Hard as forgiveness
seems at the time, forgiveness has creative power to move us away from a past
moment of pain, block us from an endless chain of pain-giving reactions, and to
create a new situation in which both the wrongdoer and the wronged can begin in
a new way. There is no guarantee, but forgiving is the only door open to possibility.
Forgiveness, of course, is not an easy practice to
master. Sometimes hurts seem too great, betrayals to treacherous, to be
forgiven. Sometimes forgiveness can be mistaken for weakness and
vulnerability, even by those who would forgive.
So, how do we forgive? What does it mean to reconcile
with our "enemy"? Can we learn to forgive those who have hurt
us so deeply that the pain does not seem to go away?
Forgiveness is about being able to accept our human
situation with all the ambiguity and messiness it entails. It's about
accepting the fact that inevitably people do disappoint one another.
Because we are limited in time, in talent and in ability to truly understand
everything about one another, we often miss the mark. Forgiveness means
accepting others ---- and ourselves ---- as human and not divine.
Forgiveness means resisting a defensive response when we are hurt ---- a
response that would mean cutting off the other person. Forgiveness means
risking the pain of living, and holding to a hope that disappointments and hurt
do not have to be the final word.
Forgiveness is a process ---- a journey. As much as we
might like forgiveness to be a "forgive and forget" moment, lives do
not work that way. Old hurts have a way of resurfacing so we are led to
examine a new facet of a wound we had hoped had healed. Forgiveness is a
commitment to face life with a posture that risks rather than protects,
while struggling with the fact that there are times when protection is the wise
choice.
Forgiveness is not passivity. It is an active response
to brokenness. While refusing to return evil for evil, forgiveness can
also be an act of resistance, refusing to let evil continue. Martin
Luther King, Jr.'s tactic of nonviolent resistance is an example of forgiveness
that refuses to let evil continue. By resisting segregation, civil rights
workers were saying no to racism, but by being nonviolent they were inviting
the enemy to join the community. Forgiveness loves the sinner while
saying clearly that the sin is unacceptable.
Are there opportunities for such reconciliation with someone
who has hurt you in the past? Trying a little forgiveness might be
a wonderful 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 summer.
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