Forgiveness: Hurting Together

Forgiveness is a tricky thing. It’s a difficult thing to do and there’s a lot of misunderstanding when it comes to defining it. Like Charity (because it is a kind of Charity) it violates our sense of Justice. It involves giving someone something that doesn’t belong to them. It’s part of the reason why we have trouble owning our trespasses. When I offend my brother or sister, however unintentional, I do not deserve their love.


Another side of the coin is that on some level forgiveness requires co-suffering. We cannot merely forget the offenses made against us. That is simply impossible. We cannot pretend that it wasn’t an offense. That is dishonest. We cannot seek to understand and empathize with it. That only excuses very real grievances and condones evil. We must stand in the full storm of ours and their own pain and decide that we love them anyway. We want them anyway. We will give ourselves to them anyway. It is the only kind of forgiveness that actually heals. This is not to say that we should not empathize with each other and understand one another’s weaknesses. Nor does it mean that at some point we should not begin to forget. It means that first it has to be owned.

Today’s Gospel reading was that of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32). My spiritual father pointed out that this story was first told in a culture far different from we hear in modern America. The cultural context insists on a “Communal” understanding of the forgiveness extended by the father. In forgiving and welcoming his son, he shared in his disgrace and humiliation. In charity, we share in our brother’s poverty and are enriched. In forgiveness, we share in our brother’s shame and we are both redeemed. This may be a somewhat simplistic way to understand forgiveness and only applies to a specific situation (i.e. the offender seeks forgiveness) but I find it useful in my life at this moment and wished to share. God bless.