Tagged: “Enright Forgiveness Process Model”
I am a parent with a child who is angry. This started when my husband divorced me. I say my child is angry because of rather quick temper tantrums. Yet, when I talk with him about his anger, he is in denial, telling me that he has no anger. What advice do you have for me to begin helping him to see that, indeed, he is angry, actually quite angry?
First, I think you need patience with your child. He is deeply hurt because of the divorce. I say that because you say his temper tantrums began in the context of the divorce. Rather than discussing his anger, I recommend that you gently talk with him about his wounded heart. Give him time to see that he is deeply hurt by his father leaving. Once he can see this, then talking about forgiveness is a next step. Once your child has the safety-net of forgiveness (that can lessen hurt and anger), he then likely will be open to seeing that he is angry and that there is a solution to it–forgiveness.
I am a survivor of sexual abuse by my father, who is a pedophile. While I have healed fairly well from this (through therapy, medication, etc.), and pray every day to forgive him, I often struggle with feeling guilty over not visiting him at the nursing home where he currently resides. I pray every day for him, and sincerely do not wish harm to him. I fear that if I don’t visit him, I am not fulfilling Christ’s commandment to forgive him. Yet, I fear that visiting him might bring up some painful psychological memories, might put me back into a brief depressive/anxious state, and could lead me to an episode of Atrial Fibriliation (which for me seems to be provoked in times of extreme stress). A sibling of mine has been trying to get me to go visit my dad, and is of the belief that if we don’t visit him (“I was lonely and you visited me”, from Matthew 25), we might go to hell. Any wisdom you can share?
A key issue here is this: You are thinking that to truly forgive your father, then you must visit him in the nursing home. Further, you believe that if you do not visit him, you are disobeying Christ’s commandment to forgive him. Here is my view: To forgive is a process that unfolds over time as we work on that process of forgiveness. You are working on this process of forgiveness by: a) praying every day for the grace to forgive him; b) praying for your father; and c) wishing no harm to him. All of these are part of the forgiveness process in your case as a Christian. You need not reach complete forgiveness right now in that you have to behaviorally reach out to your father with a visit. I say this for this reason: Your **intentions** toward your father are good in that you pray for him and wish no harm to him. Further, your reason for not visiting him is honorable in that you need to protect your cardiac system. In other words, if your intention for not visiting your father in the nursing home is to punish him, then this would indicate that you are not yet forgiving. This is not the case for you. You have a good reason for not visiting right now because you have to protect your health. If, in the future, you think you are open to such a visit and, at the same time, you truly believe that your physical and emotional health are protected as you visit, then you could re-think your current decision. For now, I see no bad intentions at all on your part and so please keep praying for your father and for the grace to forgive and go in peace knowing you are doing the best that you can under the circumstances.
I have a friend who is constantly saying that he is “transcending his anger.” In other words, when he feels angry, he stays in the moment, observes the anger without reacting to it, and then it goes away. He says that forgiveness is not necessary as a way of dealing with his anger. What is your opinion of this as an approach to rid oneself of angry feelings?
If the anger is temporary and likely will fade on its own, then patience and being aware of that anger may be antidotes to the current unpleasant feelings, including his response of not behaviorally reacting to the anger. On the other hand, if the anger is caused by the injustices of others and if that anger has been with him for weeks or months or even years, then this kind of awareness and “staying in the moment” likely is not curing the anger. In other words, his “transcending his anger” is a short-term adjustment to the anger, but when he is not practicing this “transcendence” the anger may be resurfacing. It is under such circumstances that forgiving (presuming he was deeply hurt by others’ injustice) may add to the healing of the current anger. I say this because forgiveness does not just manage the anger in the present moment. Instead, forgiveness can actually reduce the anger to manageable levels and keep it away.
I am in graduate school studying to be a mental health professional. Held in high regard is the issue of insight. The point is to break down the psychological defenses so that the person now is aware of what is causing the anger or the anxiety or the discontent. How does forgiveness compare and contrast to the call for insight?
In our Process Model of Forgiveness, we have four phases. The first phase asks the client, when that client is ready, to see the amount of anger in the heart, caused by other people’s unfairness. There is more to this phase than just this, but my point is that we do make room, lots of room in fact, to explore the psychological defenses and to gradually see how current and persistent anger is connected to unfairness toward the client that might have occurred many years ago. Yet, awareness or what you are calling insight is only the beginning of Forgiveness Therapy. In other words, as a person now sees the depth of anger, what does the person now do to get rid of that anger? We find that insight is not enough. It is in deliberately reaching out to those who acted unfairly with the moral virtue of forgiveness, this has a way of softening the heart and thus reducing the anger to manageable levels. In other words, when deeply hurt by others, the inner trauma is not reduced to an important degree without forgiveness, which the client must freely choose for the self.
When we forgive, do we forgive situation or persons?
If forgiveness is a moral virtue in which we are good to persons who are not good to us, then this is a focus exclusively on persons and not on situations. If you think about it, how can you practice moral goodness toward a situation? You cannot be good to a tornado or to a traffic jam. If persons are responsible for the traffic jam and if they are acting unfairly in some way, then you can forgive those persons, but you do not forgive the situation.
