Our Forgiveness Blog

The Culture of Playing Pretend

While watching a college football game yesterday, I began to focus on the commercials.  One showed a confident, strutting person, who seemed to have it “all together,” climb into a car, pet the steering wheel as if some kind of spiritual height had been reached, and the message was delivered to the viewer: If you want to be “all together,” if you want to reach the spiritual heights, you must—-must, with no exceptions—desire this car, covet this car, go into debt to buy this car.  This car is your life!

Then there was a video of some kind of bun with melted cheese and bacon on it.  The cheese was bubbly, the bacon sizzling and crisp.  The video was in slow motion as camera panned ever closer to the heavenly bun.  You must—-must—-desire this confection, covet it, go into dietary debt to buy it.  This bun is your life!

And we almost insist that the sellers make such commercials before we buy.  Go ahead, trick me first and then I will buy.  Create the fantasy.  I live for fantasy.  Fantasy is my life!

And so it goes.  I began to wonder.  Have we created a world of fantasy, not only in books or films but also in our-everyday-life-as-a-lived-fantasy?  Go ahead, trick me.  And so, do we do this with regard to the injustices of life now?  Do we deny serious wrongdoing as we go about filling our pain with the bun or even, on rare occasion, with the new car?  I am not all that hurt…..no, really……pass the buns.

Do we also engage in the opposite of this?  Do some create false injustices and play the role of victim to garner sympathy………and power?  After all, if in the world of fantasy, I can falsely accuse you of harming me and you falsely believe it, then I am controlling your behavior.  I win……at least temporarily in the world of fantasy.

Such fantastic fantasy, I think, keeps us from forgiving.  On the one hand, as we deny that we are in pain, then there is no one to forgive.  As we deny that others are manipulating us by playing the victim card and controlling our behavior, then there is no injustice to stand against, to correct, to courageously confront with the truth.  There is no one to forgive.

Oh well, this is all too strenuous for me anyway.  Perhaps I am wrong.  If you have the time, would you please pass that bubbling bun?

Robert

Standing Up for Justice

Some have said that forgiveness can make a person weak, reduce the resolve to fight for what is right.  Yet, it seems to me that the opposite is true.  We become better at discerning what is right and wrong in our world when we forgive because forgiveness occurs precisely in that time in which we have been wronged and now we are injured.  The more that we struggle with our injuries from injustice, then the better we understand what injustice is, which can strengthen our insights into justice itself.

As we then understand the serious consequences of injustice, this may strengthen our resolve to fight for justice in a challenging world.  After all, as we see the injuries that the self and others can suffer from others’ wrongdoing, then we may be motivated to lessen those injuries by trying to lessen the injustices.  We then become fighters for justice.

The mistake is when we think in “either-or” terms: Either we forgive or we seek justice, but we must not do both.  This is faulty reasoning.  What other virtues must occur strictly in isolation from the other virtues?  If I am patient, must I refrain from kindness?  If I am courageous, must I throw wisdom out the window?  No.  The virtues are meant to complement one another: Forgiveness and justice; forgiveness and courage; forgiveness and the wisdom to know when to start forgiving.  Together, these virtues help us to avoid extremes such as forgiving and then putting up with nonsense and doing so repeatedly.

Forgive and stand up for justice.

Robert

International Conference on Forgiveness for Peace to Be Held in Jerusalem, July 12 and 13, 2017

Come, and deepen your understanding of forgiveness.  Come, and join us for the Jerusalem Conference on Forgiveness for Peace on July 12 and 13, 2017.

To forgive is to work toward reducing resentment and offering goodness of some kind to those who have not been good to you.  To forgive is not to give in to injustice or to excuse wrong-doing.  Forgiveness is from a position of strength, not weakness.  As forgiveness frees a person from debilitating resentments, then he or she has more vitality to see clearly and to pursue a better way with family, community, and the larger society.

Day 1 concerns interfaith dialogue among Jewish, Christian, and Muslimxperts discussing what the term “to forgive” means within their own belief system and how that knowledge of forgiveness can be used to

enhance interfaith dialogue. Internationally notable speakers will participate: Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (this year’s recipient of the Templeton Prize), Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Archbishop of Manila, the Philippines, and Dr. Mustafa Ceric, Grand Mufti Emeritus of Bosnia.  All are world-renown within their own faith

community.

Day 2 focuses on forgiveness education with educators from Belfast, Athens, Lebanon, the US, and the Galilee or Jerusalem areas discussing how they implement forgiveness education for children

and adolescents.  You may gain insights on how to bring forgiveness within your own family and community.  There will be opportunities to: 1) hear personal testimonies of those who have forgiven much and 2) share your own view.

The conference will take place at the Notre Dame of Jerusalem Center. More information is on our website at the top of our homepage.

Robert

Is There Such a Thing as Self-Forgiveness?

When you self-forgive, you are practicing the virtue of mercy toward yourself. And this next point is very important: You continually extend virtues toward yourself, such as being fair to yourself (the virtue of justice), taking care of yourself (the virtues of kindness and wisdom), and being patient with yourself when you are learning new things in life. If you can practice all of these virtues toward yourself, why would anyone want to bar you from the most important of the moral virtues: loving yourself in the face of disappointment, disapproval, and in extreme cases, self-hatred?

Robert

Enright, Robert (2015-09-28). 8 Keys to Forgiveness (8 Keys to Mental Health) (p. 181). W. W. Norton & Company. Kindle Edition.

One Reason Why We Need Forgiveness Education: People Misunderstand What Forgiveness Is

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.

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 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 years old, 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