Tagged: “Enright Forgiveness Process Model”

You emphasize anger in your forgiveness model.  Yet, I am not feeling anger. I am feeling pain.  Might you have missed this in your model?

I agree with you that pain occurs after being treated unjustly.  I think the sequence is as follows: 1) Someone is unfair to you; 2) Next comes shock or even denial; 3) Then comes pain, as you describe; 4) If the pain does not lessen or if you have no effective way of reducing and eliminating the pain, then you may become angry.

That anger can be at the person for acting unfairly, or at the situation, or even at the pain itself that resulted from the unfair treatment.  It is the anger, if it abides and deepens, that can lead to health problems (fatigue, anxiety, and so forth).  So, I emphasize anger within Forgiveness Therapy because it, in the form of excessive anger or resentment, can be dangerous to health, relationships, and communities.

My anger is not completely gone.  Does this mean I have not forgiven the person?

Forgiveness does not proceed perfectly and often the outcome is not perfect.  If you have done the work of forgiving and if your anger no longer controls you, then I would say that you have forgiven even if you have some anger left over.

Apart from the idea that we are all made in the image and likeness of God, how can non-believers see the worth in other people?

Aristotle makes a distinction between potentiality and actuality.  If it is the case that all people have free will, then even when people behave badly, then they each have the potential to change, to actualize that potential and become better people to others.  According to the philosopher Kant, all people are ends in and of themselves and so should be treated as such.  The philosopher, Margaret Holmgren, argued for the position that all people, based on Kant’s idea, are worthy of respect.  So, there is room in different philosophies for the view that all people have worth.

In your book, Forgiveness Is a Choice, you state that one purpose of forgiving is being open to reconciling with the other person.  I am assuming that you mean a receptivity to reconcile rather than an actual reconciliation as part of forgiving.  Is this correct?

Yes, that is correct.  As people forgive, they usually are open to reconciliation if and only if the other, who has been deeply hurtful, has changed.  So, the receptivity is more of an internal response at first, a waiting to see how the other changes.

Why do you think that people just assume that you can be part of their life again once you forgive them?  To be honest, this kind of assumption annoys me.

I think people assume that they can be part of your life again, once you forgive them, because they are equating forgiving with reconciling.  As you probably know, one can forgive and not reconcile, especially when the offending other person refuses to change unjust and hurtful behavior.