Author Archive: directorifi

A Day Discussing Forgiveness in a Maximum Security Prison

In late August, my colleague, Gayle Reed, and I visited a maximun security prison to discuss forgiveness. The point was not to focus on those in prison seeking forgiveness for their crimes, but instead to help each of them to begin forgiving those who have abused them prior to their serious crimes. Many of these men have been deeply abused by others, but this becomes invisible as the focus is on their crimes and rehabilitating them for those actions.

Yet, this next point seems so little understood: Those who perpetrate crime so often have an anger, a hatred, a fury within because of the injustices they have suffered, often long before they lash out at others. If it will diminish, this kind of fury within needs major surgery of the heart. All the rehabilitation in the world, if it only focuses on their bad behavior, will do nothing to cleanse the heart of fury. Only forgiveness therapy will do that—and this idea of “only forgiveness therapy” came from one of the counselors at the prison, who supervised a forgiveness group for 6 months.

The day at the institution was special for us as we saw the men’s hearts melt at the realization (over 6 months of forgiveness therapy) that they have been deeply hurt by others, not only perpetrators of hurt onto others. They gained the insight that their own anger, rage, and fury built up to such an extent that it came roaring out onto others. As one man said, “Forgiveness is the enemy of hatred.”

Another man had this remarkable insight that anger, which is displaced onto unsuspecting other people, leads to the victim possibly passing that anger to another person, who may pass it on yet again. At some point, he reasoned, someone has to stop the passing on of anger and forgiving can do that job. He said this: “When another is in pain, they are on the hook.  Then they put you on the hook. hen you put others on the hook.” He was clearly seeing that his anger was passed to his victim(s).

After our meeting with the men who took part in the 6-month forgiveness group, several of the men came up privately to me. Each one had tears in his eyes and whispered that he needs to forgive himself now. They are having a hard time living with themselves.  The remorse was genuine and the pain real.

After 30 years of studying forgiveness and seeing the scientific results of a significant reduction in anger by those who forgive, I am confident that as the people in prison (both men and women) learn to forgive, their anger within the institution may diminish, making their prison home safer for everyone, including the officers and all who attend to them.

This is a new idea for corrections. May it be a standard idea within a decade.

Robert

It seems that there are many people who are angry at God. Their anger is real and something to be overcome for a better relationship with God. Do you suggest that they forgive God? In my understanding, the loving and holy God cannot do anything unjust, so it is challenging for me to conceptualize how people might be forgiving God. However, their anger is real and something to be resolved—that’s the key and real issue stimulating the idea of forgiving God. Thank you for your wisdom.

The late Lewis Smedes in his book, Forgive and Forget, suggested that God is big enough to take our resentment and our forgiving.  I am a great admirer of Dr. Smedes, but I think he got this one wrong.  As you say, a perfect God cannot be unjust.  If we presume otherwise, this can open up many errors in theology.  For example, God is imperfect in this scenario and so why follow the imperfect?  God is capable of sin in this scenario.  Would you want to worship a sinful being?

Instead of forgiving God, I recommend working on acceptance—-acceptance of God’s will. Sometimes this involves suffering, but out of suffering can come strength, patience, and a deep empathy for those who suffer.

As I was thinking about forgiving people who have hurt me, I began to realize that sometimes the central person I have to forgive is myself. Is it acceptable to consider forgiving myself?

Yes, and the process of forgiving yourself is described in detail in my book, 8 Keys to Forgiveness (W.W. Norton & Company, 2015, available at amazon.com). The difference between forgiving others and forgiving yourself is that in forgiving the self, you also need to go to those who were hurt by your actions and ask for forgiveness. So, you forgive (the self) and seek forgiveness (from others) in self forgiveness.

Does forgiveness always start with feelings of anger? What about feelings of disappointment? For example, someone is angry when robbed by a stranger. In contrast, a mother is disappointed with a teenager who promised to clean her room, but did not.

Forgiveness does not begin with our own emotions. Forgiveness begins with an injustice by another person. Sometimes we react with anger, at other times with disappointment, and at other times with sadness and mourning. Even if we do not feel any of these emotions, if a person has done wrong, you are free to forgive if you choose to do so.

When a person forgives and really understands the importance of forgiving, do they then have an obligation to pass on the importance of forgiveness to others?

Because forgiveness is a choice, I do not think that we should put pressure on those who forgive to now go and become teachers of others. I do think that it is reasonable to let those who forgive know that helping others to now forgive is good, if this resonates with the person. In my own experience, I see people, who develop a pattern of being persistent forgivers, often do have an internal self-chosen obligation to teach and help others.