Our Forgiveness Blog
The Family as Forgiving Community
The central points of the Family as Forgiving Community are these:
1. We are interested in the growth of appreciation and practice in the forgiveness virtue not only within each individual but also within the family unit itself.
2. For family members to grow in the appreciation and practice of forgiveness, that virtue must be established as a positive norm in the family unit. This necessitates that the parents value the virtue, talk positively about it, and demonstrate it through forgiving and asking for forgiveness on a regular basis within the family.
3. For each member of the family unit to grow in the appreciation and practice of forgiveness, that virtue must be taught in the home, with materials that are age-appropriate and interesting for the children and the parents.
4. Parents will need to persevere in the appreciation, practice, and education of forgiveness if the children are to develop the strength of passing the virtue of forgiveness onto their own families when they are adults.
To achieve these goals, one strategy is the Family Forgiveness Gathering, which we will describe next time.
Dr. Bob
Inherent Worth
Inherent worth: the true thought that all persons have a built-in, never-needs-to-be-earned, quality of tremendous value. All people. Even those who are unjust to us. Even ourselves when we are feeling low.
I think that no war (or major conflict in home or neighborhood or community) could ever start if those with the ammunition to inflict harm saw the inherent worth of those on the other side. But, unfortunately, in our imperfect world, and in societies that do not cultivate a deliberate sense of inherent worth of all, cruelties can be perpetrated, even in the name of fairness or “my rights.” The philosopher Blaise Pascal said that if he could prescribe one thing for the human race it would silence—so that we could listen to what is truly important. I think if I were asked that question, I would stay with silence and try to sneak in a second “thing”: the deep understanding that each person, even those who are cruel to us, have immense inherent worth.
Dr. Bob
Helpful Forgiveness Hint
As you consider forgiving another, it is important to first review what it is you are and are not doing. You will not be waiting for an apology from the other. Your forgiveness is not dependent on anyone else’s attitudes or pronouncements. You are free to forgive when you are ready. You may or may not be reconciling with the person. That depends on how the other is now responding to you. You will not be putting justice aside, but instead allowing yourself to have the mercy of forgiveness and the fairness of justice.
You will be offering goodness toward someone who has hurt you, but forgiveness will not make you a weak person through your effort. Mercy comes from a position of strength, not weakness.
Dr. Bob
In Thanksgiving for…….
On Thursday, November 22, 2012, people in the United States celebrate the holiday of Thanksgiving. It is a time of fellowship and cultivating thankful hearts for loved ones. In the United States, the holiday goes back to 17th century celebrations in which settlers from England gave thanks to God for a bountiful harvest.
I am aware that many who visit our website reside in other areas of the world in which Thanksgiving is not celebrated…..but let us not be hindered by such a little detail.
On Thursday, regardless of your country of residence, may I suggest that we all cultivate a thankful heart toward at least one person who has wronged us, toward whom we may have some resentment and bitterness? I am not asking you to be thankful for the wrong-doing. Instead, I am asking you to see the person from a wide-angle lens. See him or her as a person, someone who is more than what was done to you. Try to see something good in the person, a kind act, or a loving word, or some small attempt at compassion toward another. See that goodness and be thankful that the person engaged in it. See the person as a person, capable of good will, as someone who can act unjustly and can show goodness even if the bad and the good are not evenly matched.
Be thankful for the goodness that you see or remember and in being thankful for the act, be thankful for the person.
I am thankful to each of you who will do this. You are making the world a better place by this little act of love.
Dr. Bob
Which Moral Principle Underlies Forgiveness?
Sophia: And which is the most excellent way among civility, respect, and moral love as your basis for forgiving others?
Inez: This one is easy to answer and hard to implement. Moral love encompasses civility and respect in its response and so is the most complete. Civility is the least demanding and also the least complete. I can be civil and rather detached from a person. I can even be civil without respecting the person. Even respect does not go far enough. I can respect a person who is homeless by writing out a check to the soup kitchen. That is a somewhat detached way to treat someone who is deeply suffering. Yet, if I love another, I not only must be civil and respectful, I must be more than that. In the soup-kitchen example, I must be personal with the homeless person by going to the shelter, dipping the ladle into the soup, and serving that person. Moral love asks the most of me.
Sophia: How then do you understand moral love?
Inez: It is different from romantic love or brotherly love or the natural love between a mother and her child. It is the kind of love that “goes to the wall” for the other by being in service to him or her without burning yourself out, of course. That would hardly be love if I destroyed myself in the process. I think it is a paradox. As I become personal with another for her good, I can and do experience a kind of refreshment.
Enright, Robert D. (2012-07-05). The Forgiving Life (APA Lifetools) (Kindle Locations 1789-1801). American Psychological Association. Kindle Edition.
Dr. Bob
