Misconceptions

Does Forgiveness Victimize the Victim?

In the latest round of false criticism against the moral virtue of forgiveness, we find this: Forgiveness places an extra burden on victims because they already are burdened by injustice.  Now asking them to forgive or even assisting them in forgiveness adds a new challenge, a new burden and this is unfair.  Leave the victim alone, is the advice.

Let us examine this claim of a new unfair burden in forgiving.  Suppose that Person A deliberately hits Person B’s knee with a baseball bat, breaking the knee.  Person B has a burden: the broken knee and the resentment toward Person A.

If Person B now wishes to take seriously the responsibility for physical healing, should this person now go to the emergency room and endure the bright lights and the MRI and the surgery and the physical rehab?  Or, would this be too much of an added burden for Person B.  Perhaps it is unfair to encourage Person B to seek medical help……if we follow the logic of the forgiveness criticism.

Yet, this added burden of medical care, which can be a challenge, is hardly a burden relative to living with a broken knee that may not heal well with the resultant pain and limp that may last indefinitely.  The “burden” of healing is not nearly as troublesome as the burden of neglect of the injury.

Now let us turn back to the argument against forgiveness.  Let us even stay with the baseball bat incident.  Person B not only has a broken knee, but now also a broken heart from the shocking and unexpected incident.

 

Is it a burden to assist this person in healing the broken heart?  Should we just let the victim be?  Should we just let the victim live with the broken heart…..perhaps for the rest of the person’s life?

Do you see how this latest criticism against forgiveness is false?  Do you see how the major problem is the error in thinking by the critics and not in forgiveness itself?

When a person is morally injured, it seems to be charitable to offer healing.  Yes, healing can be challenging, but ignoring healing can be much worse.

Robert

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What Is Meant by “Forgiveness and Justice Occur Together”?

In many of my writings, I make the point that when you forgive, you also should seek justice from the one who hurt you.  As an example, if someone continually verbally abuses you, it is good to ask that person to stop the abuse.

One person recently asked me if he now must—-must—-seek justice even if it is not expedient or helpful to do so.  As an example, suppose you have a boss who is annoying but not abusive.  Suppose further that your pointing out the annoyances will harm your position in the company.  Are you morally obligated to seek justice as you forgive?  No.  As with your choice to forgive or not, it is your choice whether or not to seek justice.

We need to keep a balance here.  There is no rule that says when you forgive you must not seek justice.  There is no rule that says when you forgive you must seek justice.

Instead, use your wisdom and sense of fairness as you ask yourself: Should I be seeking justice in this particular case?

If seeking justice is the reasonable option, it may be best first to forgive so that you do not approach with deep anger the person from whom you will be asking fairness.

Robert

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Misunderstanding Forgiveness as One Reason Why We Need Forgiveness Education

Too often in society the word forgiveness is used casually: “Please forgive me for being 10 minutes late.” Forgiveness is used in place of many other words, such as excusing, distorting the intended meaning. People so often try to forgive with misperceptions; each may have a different meaning of forgiveness, unaware of any error in his or her thinking.
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Freedman and Chang (2010, in the Journal of Mental Health Counseling, volume 32, pages 5-34) interviewed 49 university students on their ideas of the meaning of forgiveness and found that the most frequent understanding (by 53% of the respondents) was to “let go” of the offense.  This seems to be similar to either condoning or excusing.  Of course, one can let go of the offense and still be fuming with the offender.  The second most common understanding of forgiveness (20%) was that it is a “moving on” from the offense.  Third most common was to equate forgiveness with not blaming the offender, which could be justifying, condoning, or excusing, followed by forgetting about what happened.  Only 8% of the respondents correctly understood forgiveness as seeing the humanity in the other, not because of what was done but in spite of it.

If we start forgiveness education early, when students are 5 or 6 yearsold, they will have a much firmer grasp of what forgiveness is…..and therefore likely will be successful in their forgiveness efforts, especially if these students are schooled not only in what forgiveness is but also in how to go about forgiving.

 

Robert Enright
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More on Why We Need Forgiveness Education

On the Psychology Today website, I recently posted an essay entitled, Why We Need Forgiveness Education.  One person’s comment on this piece does seem to suggest that, indeed, we need forgiveness education starting at a young age.  The commentator’s point is that forgiveness is costly, perhaps too costly for some.  Forgiveness becomes so costly when a person now senses the obligation, upon forgiving, to stay in a relationship that is highly abusive.

The assumption that a forgiver, because of forgiveness, now must stay in the deeply hurtful relationship is not correct.  Forgiveness does not obligate a person to remain in a hurtful relationship.  The assumption equates forgiving and reconciling and they are quite different.  Reconciliation is based on trust as two or more people come together again.  One can forgive from a distance without reconciling, if the other may do harm and is not trustworthy based on past and current behavior.

If we all had forgiveness education from childhood through adolescence and then applied the learning in adulthood, the assumption that equates forgiving and reconciling would not come up.  The lesson would have been learned in school……a long time ago.  Yet, current educational practices rarely make room for forgiveness education.

It seems to me that much of the misery in our own hearts could be eliminated if we took the time to learn the lessons of forgiving.  Such lessons would question those assumptions which keep us from forgiving because we falsely see danger in the act of forgiveness when that danger actually does not exist.

We need forgiveness education for our little ones…………now.

Robert

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……….But…..Forgiveness Adds an Extra Burden to the Abused Person

“Forgiveness is fundamentally unfair.  Here we have a deeply abused person and now we ask her, in her woundedness, to reach out to one who hurt her.  She now has two burdens, the original abuse and having to forgive.  Please, let us first help her with the wounds from the abuse and put forgiveness on the shelf for her sake!”

So goes the most pervasive criticism of what forgiveness is and what it supposedly does in 2016.  This criticism is likely to change over time and a new one emerge because, well, that is the way it is with forgiveness.  There always seems to be one major criticism that is in season and acts as a barrier to forgiveness.

Thirty years ago, that in-season criticism was the equating of forgiving and reconciling.  Once the logic was worked out that forgiving cannot be the same as reconciling, that one faded.  After all, forgiveness is a virtue (as is justice and kindness and patience); reconciliation is not a virtue, but instead is a negotiation strategy of two or more people coming together once again in mutual trust.  One can forgive and not reconcile.  Thus, they differ.

Let us now turn to the current in-season criticism of forgiveness.  Yes, forgiveness is a burden if:

………we pressure someone into forgiving;

………we tell the person that the only motivation for forgiving is to be good—-very good—-to the person who was not good to the one who might forgive;

………we critically judge the would-be forgiver for not forgiving.

Yet, we can unburden the forgiver, as well as forgiveness itself, when we realize that:

………forgiveness is the forgiver’s choice.  It is not our place to pressure someone to forgive (or not to forgive).  Give the person freedom to make the decision;

………there are many motivations to forgive.  One healthy motivation that often exists early in the process is the desire to be free from emotional pain.  The forgiver is motivated to become emotionally whole.  The forgiver, at this stage of the process, is not so interested in doing wonderful things for the one who was not wonderful.  These are very different motivations and need to be distinguished, especially early in the process;

………it is wrong to condemn a struggling person who is ambivalent about forgiveness.  Maybe the person needs more time; maybe the person needs more information about what forgiveness is (and not the colloquial misunderstandings that cloud the understanding).  Again, it is the choice of the one who was abused.

When we unburden the abused person by clarifying these issues, then it is clear that we are not placing a new burden on the person by discussing forgiveness.  Notice that I did not say “suggesting forgiveness.”  Let us discuss and then let the person decide.

So, what will be the new criticism of forgiveness that could block, without justification, a person from exploring forgiveness?

Robert

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