WEEKLY COMMENTARY: It's YOUR Choice: Anger or Forgiveness

So, how do we forgive?  What does it mean to reconcile with your "enemy"?
Can we learn to forgive those who have hurt us so deeply that the pain does
not seem to go away?

Forgiveness is not a weak substitute for revenge, just because forgiveness
is soft and gentle.  Actually, 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 responses, 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 possibilities of renewal.

Forgiveness, of course, is not an easy practice to master.  Sometimes hurts
seem too great, betrayals too treacherous, to be forgiven.  Sometimes
forgiveness can be mistaken for weakness and vulnerability, even by those
who would forgive.

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 understand everything about one another,
we often miss the mark.  Forgiveness means accepting others ---- and
ourselves ---- as human, and not being divine.  Forgiveness means resisting
a defensive response when we are hurt ---- a response that effectively cuts
off the other person.  As much as we might like forgiveness to be a
"forgive and forget" moment, our lives do not work that way.  Forgiveness
loves the sinner while saying clearly that the sin is unacceptable.

In the summer of 2004,  my wife and I spent a week living on a Blackfoot
Indian reservation in western Montana.  We were members of a volunteer
project sponsored by a national organization that gives a helping hand to
needy communities.  It was a little like CPC's high school mission trips,
except ours was not church-sponsored.

We spent time with some very friendly Blackfoot Indian families, and were
invited to their community meetings.  One night, a tribal elder shared a
lesson  I still remember, even to this day.  But could this lesson really
be relevant to my wife and me, whose real home is so far from the
reservation?

                "An old Indian grandfather said to his grandson, who came
                 to him with anger at a friend who had done him an injustice,
                 .  .  .  .  'Let me tell you a story.' "

                 "I, too, at times, have felt a great hate for those who have taken
                 too much, with no sorrow for what they do.  But hate wears you
                 down, and does not hurt your enemy.  It is like you taking poison
                 and wishing your enemy would die.  I have struggled with these
                 feelings many times."

                 He continued .  .  .  "It is as if there are two wolves inside me.
                 One is good and does no harm.  He lives in harmony with all
                 around him, and does not take offense when no offense was
                 intended.  He will only fight when it is right to do so,and in the
                 right way.  He saves all his energy for the right fight."

                 "But the other wolf, ahhh.  He is full of anger.  The littlest thing
                 will set him into a fit of temper.  He fights everyone,all the time,
                 for no reason.  He cannot think because his anger and hate are
                 so great.  It is hopeless anger for his anger will change nothing."

                 "Sometimes it is hard to live with these two wolves inside me,
                 for both of them try to dominate my spirit."

                The boy looked intently into his grandfather's eyes and asked,
                 'Which one wins,Grandfather?'

                 The grandfather smiled and quietly said . . ."The one I feed."
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*These thoughts are brought to you by CPC's Adult Spiritual Development
Team, hoping you will pursue some personal spiritual growth this summer.*
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