New Ideas
A Thought Experiment for You: A World Without Forgiveness and Mercy
It is the year 2525 and somehow the word “forgiveness” has been dropped from the vocabulary of every person on the planet. The word “mercy” was dropped long before that. Justice first, justice last, justice foremost is the unchallenged thought of all. If justice gets a bit out of hand, that is just collateral damage to be corrected some time in the future so we can all move on with our business now.
If someone steals because he was hungry, then he knew the rules. Punish him.
If an adolescent is too depressed to study, then she knew the rules and so fail her. Trying to understand her or to sympathize with her is to let her off too easily. What if we let off others, too, who are anxious or abused or troubled? There would be chaos.
Rules are rules and as we know rules prevent chaos and lead to an orderly society. We want a clean, sanitized community and taking time to heal people’s emotional wounds can be so messy. And besides, there is no rule in our rule book that says we are obligated to clean up the messiness of sadness or loneliness or alienation. One person’s loneliness is another person’s blissful, refreshing solitude.
If you are kind to those who are not kind to you, then you are weak and are letting that person walk all over you. Be strong. Walk away. You will never regret it.
Pass by that child on the street who just ran away from a father who abused her. She might cry and disrupt those who are on their way to important meetings to make the world better. She will get over it.
The crying infant can wait. We have to teach it—it—to delay gratification.
You don’t agree with me? I have a committee that does agree and you will be hearing from them in due course. It will be better for you if you adjust to the right way of thinking so we just can all get along.
So, how are you liking the world without forgiveness and mercy so far? What will you do to plant a bit more of forgiveness and mercy into the world…….today?
Robert
Forgiveness, Free Will, and Materialist Theories of Personhood
Those who hold to materialist theories such as Democritus in ancient Greece, E. O. Wilson in biology, and B. F. Skinner in psychology would argue that free will is an illusion because we are formed not by our free-will choices, but instead by forces that are strictly composed of matter such as atoms colliding or natural selection, or by social forces outside the individual person such as economic structures or rewards and punishments. See Consilience, by E. O. Wilson, 1999, New York, NY: Vintage, and Beyond Freedom and Dignity, by B. F. Skinner, 1971, New York, NY: Bantam.
I acknowledge that matter and social forces influence us, but they alone do not or even primarily shape us. If there is no free will, then you cannot say whether one thing is morally right and another morally wrong. If you reflect on it, you cannot say someone did wrong, moral wrong, if he is not responsible for his behavior. The legal system, for example, implicitly rejects materialism every time it says, “The defendant is guilty.” The defendant is not guilty if his genes or the principles of operant conditioning made him behave as he did. Would any materialist continue to be a materialist if his or her daughter was raped and the defense attorney said, “Rape is not morally and legally wrong. Society reinforces men for being aggressive, and he was only responding to this conditioning. My client therefore is innocent of all charges, and I ask dismissal of them all”? Either you accept free will as legitimate (and morally condemn rape, for example) or you lose your moral voice in standing up against moral atrocities.
Footnote 3, Chapter 1, The Forgiving Life by Robert Enright (APA Books, 2012)
A Future with Forgiveness Education in World Conflict Zones
Within world conflict zones, we would like to see at least two generations of students (a 24-year vision) introduced to forgiveness with an increase in the developmental challenges for the students each year. By the end of secondary school (post-primary, high school), the students should have a strong foundation in understanding the term forgiveness, know the nuances of forgiving and receiving forgiveness, and have insights into how to give back to the community. It is our hope that they might consider giving back to the community by introducing others to the concept of forgiveness and its application within friendship, family, and community groups.
Might these students, once they are adults, begin to see that all people possess inherent worth? Might it be a contradiction to one’s own identity to disparage people from “the other side” just because of where they were born, what they believe, or the color of their skin?
Excerpt from the book, Forgiveness Therapy, by R. Enright & R. Fitzgibbons. American Psychological Association, 2015.
Three Reasons Why “Quick Forgiveness” Is Not Phony
An observant reader asked me recently if our Forgiveness News section might be comprised of many stories in which people are “faking forgiveness” so that they get national and international recognition from the media. After all, the person reasoned, for a few moments their images, words, and actions are in front of thousands or even millions, depending on which media sources carry the story.
While quick pronouncements of forgiveness might lead some to doubt the sincerity of the act, we have three counter-arguments in the debate.
1) We must realize that some people are “forgivingly fit,” in that they practice forgiveness regularly in the smaller injustices of life. Such practice readies them for when the tragic injustices come. In other words, years of practice accumulate and aid the forgiver now in the new, gargantuan challenge to forgive, say, the murderer of a loved one. As we watch the person forgive, we do not see the years of practice underlying the act and so we wonder about the sincerity, which is very real because of the practice.¹
2) Sometimes, our psychological defenses come to our aid when tragedy strikes. These defenses shield us from the intense anger which could emerge now. Yet, after a while, as the defenses begin to weaken, the anger arises afresh and so the initial pronouncement of forgiveness, when the angers subside, is not the final word on the matter. In other words, there still is forgiveness work to do, and this is not dishonorable. Forgiveness is hard work and requires re-visiting from time to time regarding situations we thought we had long-ago forgiven.
3) For reasons that are unclear to the social scientific community, some people, despite not having practiced forgiveness over and over, do forgive seemingly spontaneously. Their psychological defenses are not masking deep anger. They forgive in a thorough way on the first try. This seems rare, but it does happen.
Phony forgiveness? No, not necessarily. What might appear on the surface as phony could be heroic forgiveness forged in the daily struggle to overcome the effects of injustice.
Robert
Mercy on the Hurting
Suppose that each of us had a little red light on the top of our heads. Further suppose that whenever we are feeling beaten down by the injustice of another, that little red light started to blink.
What do you think? Do you think there then would be mercy in the world as we, each of us, responded to the one whose light-of-pain was going off?
We all kind of hide behind a veneer of civility—well dressed, well mannered….and sometimes dying even a little bit inside.
No one sees the “dying even a little bit inside” because it is hidden. Others really do not want to see it……It is an inconvenience to see it.
Yet, it is there…..for all of us at one time or another.
That little blinking red light would be a sign to us that we are all hurting. It would be a concrete sign that mercy is necessary….even more so than civility.
That little red light would be our teacher….and perhaps soften our hearts…..and help us to learn that offering mercy should be our first response, not our last one after we all dress up in our finery, with our impeccable manners…..that keep the hurting invisible to us.
Try to see that little blinking red light on the top of each person’s head today even if it is not there. Try to see it anyway.
Robert
