Author Archive: directorifi
Jerusalem Conference on Forgiveness for Peace
The Jerusalem Conference on Forgiveness for Peace, scheduled for July 12-13, 2017, is the first ever forgiveness conference to be held in the Middle East. It is being organized by Dr. Robert Enright, whom Time magazine called “the forgiveness trailblazer,” and an international team of religious and secular leaders.
Day 1 of this 2-day conference will include speakers from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam discussing what it means to forgive in each of those religious traditions, the importance of forgiveness, and how to better interact with others through forgiveness. Internationally-known speakers include Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, this year’s recipient of the Templeton Prize, and Dr. Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti Emeritus of Bosnia.
Day 2 will help us learn how to better understand what forgiveness education is and how to bring forgiveness to our children and adolescents in school and at home. Speakers include educators from Northern Ireland, Greece, Israel, Lebanon and the United States.
The conference is open to all who wish to obtain a deeper understanding of forgiveness across the three Abrahamic faiths and who have an interest in bringing forgiveness to the home, school, and other community organizations.
Early Bird Registration is now available at $150.00 but ends October 31, 2016. For more information or to register, click the link below.
What is emotional imprisonment toward oneself?
Sometimes we harbor deep resentment over a long period of time because we think we are somehow getting back at those who have wronged us as we keep the anger deep inside. Yet, in my own experience, those who hold onto that anger are punishing the self more than the other, who may not care that you are so angry. When a person deliberately keeps such anger inside, he or she is keeping the self in an emotional prison which eventually could rob that person of happiness. Forgiveness is one important way of letting that anger out, which then can increase happiness.
Do you use the same forgiveness model when working with people of faith, such as Christians? Especially, those who believe you are to forgive immediately? Also, what is your approach to self-forgiveness? Or do you believe self-forgiveness from a Christian perspective? These questions are based on Biblical scripture Matthew 18:21-35
Our process model of forgiveness can be used with people of faith by adding themes common to that faith. For example, suppose a client is in the Work Phase of the forgiveness process. The task is to see the inherent worth of the one who offended. The counselor could ask, “Is the person who hurt you made in the image and likeness of God?”
There is no Christian imperative to forgive immediately. When Paul tells us not to let the sun go down on our anger, the Greek is parorgismos, an intensive kind of anger that could include revenge-seeking. He is not telling us to forgive immediately.
Increased Quality of Life
The term quality of life refers to an overall positive sense of comfort, contentment, or happiness with one’s life as it is experienced right now. Quality of life encompasses one’s physical strength and health, one’s psychological adjustment to life’s challenges, the fulfillment of one’s purpose in life, and the amount of support that one senses from important others in one’s life. Forgiveness can increase benefits in all of these areas in people who take the time to work through the process.
In one rather dramatic example, Mary Hansen and I helped terminally ill cancer patients to forgive those who had hurt them in the short time of four weeks. This brief time period is unusual, but in this case, the people knew that they were dying, their energy was fading, and so they did the intensive work of forgiving those in the family toward whom they were still fuming. Some of the patients had held on to this unhealthy anger for decades.
Upon forgiving those who had been very unfair to them, these courageous people reported that their overall quality of life, including how they were feeling physically, was significantly improved. They even reported that their purpose in life became clearer to them because they were leaving their families more settled, more at peace because of the forgiveness that they were offering as they were dying. We saw how their actual physical condition deteriorated over those four weeks while, at the same time, their overall well-being— their reported quality of life— kept increasing. Forgiveness helped these individuals to die well.
Robert
Enright, Robert (2015-09-28). 8 Keys to Forgiveness (8 Keys to Mental Health) (p. 5). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.
How can you discipline a child and use a sense of forgiveness in the discipline?
Discipline can include pardoning a child on occasion. For example, suppose you tell the child to stay in his bedroom for a half hour because he hit his brother. After 20 minutes you can go into the room and let the child know that you will not be asking him to spend the rest of the half hour in the room. You can say, by way of instruction, that you are showing mercy on the child. Mercy is going beyond what is fair. You then could ask that child to go and have mercy on his sibling, the one whom he had hit earlier. Pardon and forgiveness are not the same thing, but they are related. As another example, you can discipline a child and tell her this, “Even though I am sending you to your room and even though I am disappointed in what you did, I still very much love you as a person, as my child.” You are acknowledging her inherent worth as a person despite your being angry at the moment.
