Tagged: “goodness of forgiveness”

Regarding forgiveness, do you, personally, have any doubts about its effectiveness?

Because forgiveness is a moral virtue, as with all moral virtues such as justice and kindness, it is good in and of itself.  Therefore, I am confident that to forgive is a moral good.  Yet, I do have doubts, but not about forgiveness itself.  My doubts instead are with how people imperfectly understand what forgiveness is or have errors in trying to apply it.  For example, if a person thinks that to forgive is just to move on and forget the other person, this is not what forgiveness is.  The misunderstanding, of course, is not the fault of forgiveness itself.  As another example, if a person spends only 2 hours forgiving someone who was brutal to him when he was a child, this is an error of not taking sufficient time to forgive.  Again, this is not the fault of forgiveness itself.  So, in summary, my doubts are in human imperfection not being able to lead to an effective forgiveness response.  I have no doubts about the goodness of forgiveness itself.