Archive for June, 2024
A close cousin of mine has a terrible habit. “Please forgive me for this,” he begs me before criticizing me more. How can one forgive someone who plans out their meanness in advance and then acts on it? This kind of thing is difficult for me to forgive.
I can appreciate how frustrated you are. The relative clearly knows that this will cause you pain, but still proceeds. It is evident that he knows this could hurt you because he would not have asked for your forgiveness in advance. This is an obvious issue of injustice for you. Given the circumstances, it would be wise to attempt to forgive him even if you know it might take longer due to the continuing unjust context. At the same time, try to exercise justice, after you have a forgiving heart, so that you can ask for fairness in a temperate and gentle way.
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Forgiveness can be different things to different people. Why bother saying it has an essence for everyone everywhere in the world?:
You are approaching forgiveness from the viewpoint of philosophical relativism. With this approach, then there is no possibility of doing forgiveness research because you could not possibly derive a measure of forgiveness since everyone has an idiosyncratic opinion of it. If forgiveness is a moral virtue, then is it the case that all moral virtues are relative? If so, then what is justice? If a person robs a bank and claims it is just because the bank has a lot of money and will not miss $1,000, does this make it fair? Is the person exercising the moral virtue of justice? If our world is orderly and if moral virtues have coherence, then they have essences and this would include forgiveness.
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I have heard that forgiveness is not a moral virtue but instead is a psychological skill in which a person reduces resentment toward an offender. Why do you call it a moral virtue?
All moral virtues are concerned with goodness toward others. For example, justice is to be fair to others. When we forgive, at least on its highest level (whether or not a particular person reaches this level), we are offering kindness, respect, and even love toward those who have been unfair to us as forgivers. Given this willed goodness toward an offending person, this is a quintessential sign of goodness. If forgiveness is only being less resentful toward an offending person, this could be achieved, for example, by seeing that person as so less than human that you feel sorry for this person, thus reducing resentment. This seems too narrow and reductionistic.
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I know you say that forgiveness and justice should grow up together, but I still am not convinced. Isn’t it the case that as I forgive and soften myself toward the one who injured me, I become less motivated to do the hard work of justice-seeking? I say this because a little anger in the heart can toughen the heart to move forward with the quest for fairness.
You make a good point that mild and short-term anger can motivate a person to seek fairness. Here is another perspective: As you forgive, you seek the good of the other person who hurt you. Part of this seeking after the other’s good is to assist that person in growing to be a fair person. So, the short-term anger is good for motivating the injured person to stand up for his rights. The longer-term forgiving is good for motivating the injured person to help the other be fair for that other person’s sake.
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Can you recommend a film with a theme of forgiveness for my 12-year-old athletic son? He loves sports and has been hurt by his father.
I would recommend the film, Field of Dreams, in which Kevin Costner reconciles with his estranged father at the end of the film. You can use this to discuss with your son the beauty of forgiving his own father, without putting pressure on him to forgive.
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