Ask Dr. Forgiveness
Why do you use stories when teaching children to forgive?
We deliberately use stories so that the child or adolescent is placed into a safe environment. It is not the student, then, who first has to confront wrongdoing. The student gets to quietly observe others who experience injustices and find a way to work out of the pain by forgiving. The story characters, then, serve as role-models in a non-threatening context. Once the students learn what forgiveness is (and is not) and sees how story characters forgive, and the consequences of doing so, then they might be interested in trying to forgive. It is their choice.
Is forgiveness only for those who believe in God?
Because forgiveness is a virtue, which is concerned about goodness, then it has similar qualities as justice or patience or kindness. Can someone who does not believe in God be patient? What about being fair? Can someone who does not believe in God practice the human qualities of justice and patience and kindness?
The answer seems to be an obvious yes. Therefore, it follows that those who do not believe in God can practice the virtue of forgiveness as well. Different belief systems will be more or less supportive of your forgiving and will have different practices and rituals for forgiving, and will challenge you to go more deeply into forgiving, but the action of forgiving itself is a human action and not one isolated to certain persons with certain beliefs.
I come from a culture which highly honors parents. One of my parents was so mean to me. I am thinking about forgiving, but it seems disrespectful. After all, if I forgive, I am saying that my parent did wrong and that is disrespectful in my culture. Do you have any suggestions for me?
When you forgive, you do not disrespect the one you are forgiving. On the contrary, you begin to see the other as having intrinsic (built-in) worth. As you forgive, you see that you can respect the person-as-person, not because of what was done, but in spite of this. Try to keep a distinction in mind between actions which can be wrong and persons who still can be respected in spite of the actions.
Forgiveness asks too much of victims. Why should victims now have to do all this work?
If someone breaks your leg, is it inappropriate for you, the victim, to go to the emergency room, endure surgery, and struggle with the physical rehab? It is the same with forgiving. If someone breaks your heart it is reasonable to do the emotional heart surgery that is forgiving.
With all this talk about forgiveness, I am not thinking that forgiveness is a choice but an expectation from others. How can I avoid that pressure?
The first step is to realize that others may be creating this expectation for you, as you are obviously aware. A second step is to realize that most people do not necessarily mean to put pressure on you to forgive. As a third step, if people do put pressure on you to forgive, please realize that they have your best interest at heart but may not be going about it in a way that is helpful for you. When pressured, please realize that to forgive can take time and you cannot always respond positively and quickly to those who have hurt you.
