Archive for April, 2026

How can I help others learn to suffer well when they are treated badly?  I am concerned because, if I open up a heart-wound in a friend by talking about suffering well through forgiveness, how can I help close the wound in the heart so that he does not emotionally bleed to the point of an emergency?

I recommend the following six approaches: 1) Be sure you are very clear about what forgiveness is and is not.  Too often, people reject forgiveness because they misunderstand it, equating it with “just letting it go” or “just moving on.”  Be sure the person sees that forgiveness is a moral virtue in which he willingly tries to be merciful to the other without excusing or abandoning justice; 2) Give him time to reflect on what forgiveness is and is not, and to make an informed, free-will decision to move forward with forgiveness; 3) If he decides to try forgiveness, start with a person who was only a little unjust, toward whom your friend has some annoyance, but not frothing hatred; 4) # 3 could take some time if your friend is unfamiliar with the forgiveness process; 5) After #4 is completed, ask if he wants to continue.  If so, then have him choose another less serious case of injustice and forgive that person; 6) Over time, as he becomes more proficient at forgiving, he should be able to forgive the person who has deeply wounded his heart because he knows the forgiveness pathway and has practiced it.

In chapter 10 of your book, Forgiveness Is a Choice, you say this: “Knowing how to forgive is also preparation for the injuries and pain that will come in the future.”  That seems kind of pessimistic.  Should I be living my life, always looking over my shoulder, trying to find the next person who will treat me cruelly?

The point of the sentence is this: We are in a fallen world in which people are not always at their best.  Because of this, our being treated unjustly by others is to be expected, and so we should be prepared for that.  We have to be temperate (balanced, not extreme) on this so that, as you say, we are not constantly looking over our shoulders for the next injustice.  Yet, we do not want to be intemperate in the other direction either.  In other words, we do not want to deny the realities of this world, so we need to be prepared for injustices that likely will come.  If we do not learn to forgive, we may be defenseless when faced with deep resentment.  How do we get rid of it?  If we have no clue, this gives others who treat us badly too much power over our wounded hearts.  If, instead, we realistically and temperately learn to forgive, then we are ready to do the work of reducing that resentment when the injustices against us come and are serious.

Is There Ever an Obligation to Forgive?

Mikhail Nilov , Pexels.com

So often people exhort others not to force others to forgive.  The current advice so often seen in print is this: Forgiveness is the choice of the forgiver, not the demand of the one who acted unjustly.  Yet an article published in Acta Analytica on February 10, 2026, by Sam Ridge, entitled “The Right to Forgiveness,” challenges the current norms.  He makes the interesting claim that if a person promises to forgive, then this becomes an expectation.  As an analogy, if Harold promises to mow a neighbor’s lawn by Saturday and then does not follow through, there remains an expectation that the lawn will be mowed by Harold.  It is similar with forgiveness.  For example, if a father asks his daughter, “Why were you out so late last night?  It is ok to tell me.  If I do not like your answer, I will forgive you.”  The promise creates the expectation that it will be kept.  The challenge, then, is this: Forgiveness is not solely in the hands of the forgiver; it can become an obligation to the other person if a promise is attached to the forgiving.

The article can be read here:

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12136-026-00676-4

I want to learn more about this agape love you mentioned in your earlier answer about finding meaning in suffering through forgiveness.  If I wanted to learn more about agape love, could you recommend a couple of readings on the topic?

Yes, I would recommend Gene Outka’s classic book Agape and this journal article:

Enright, R.D., Wang Xu, J., Rapp, H., Evans, M., & Song, J. (2022). The philosophy and social science of agape love. Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology, 42(4), 220– 237. https://doi.org/10.1037/teo0000202

Thank you for your response to my question about suffering.  Ok, you have convinced me that we can find meaning in our suffering.  So, my next question is this: What do you see that people learn when they forgive?

When people forgive, they learn more deeply about mercy, and if they keep at it and practice forgiveness, they can learn to love more consistently and more deeply.  After all, the highest form of forgiveness is to offer agape love to others, and this can take time to learn and master.  Yet, with the practice of forgiveness, people can learn to appreciate this form of love and to apply it consistently in their interactions with others.