Is it healthy for people to be quick to forgive?

Forgiveness, in my book, is one of the most overused concepts in dealing with so-called "wrongdoers" or folks who perpetrate outright evil. It depowers the innocent and empowers the not-so-innocent.

The basic premise of "forgiveness" is always explained by those in recovery as a means of "letting go" of the pain and rage so that one can have a serene, clean sober life.

Well, my friends, I have a real problem playing with fire just because it makes one "feel better."

Forgiveness is defined first as "absolving" or "granting pardon" for an offense. When one pardons another, he or she basically releases them from obligation or penalty. When one absolves another, he or she frees the other from guilt or blame or responsibility or consequences.

When someone commits an illegal act involving you – battery, abuse – it is not an offense solely involving you, it is an offense against society and the civil and moral rules which govern it. Does this warrant forgiveness or reporting to the police?

Look at it this way, if the person has to deal with the righteous consequences of their actions, they have the opportunity to cleanse their soul, and psyche, and lives from self-centered, thoughtless or immoral tendencies.

Far too  often  perpetrators never take responsibility, never display remorse, never try to repair the damage and never give the impression that their behavior wouldn't be repeated.

Nonetheless, the victim is often nagged  to "forgive".  How is that healing?

Does that not trivialize the hurt the victim is feeling?  People are often urged to forgive the unforgivable in the name of "peace" or "letting go of ugly emotions."

The lack of true remorse beg for no forgiveness.

Telling some one to  forgive is a further insult to the victim. Those who are hurt are  entitled to their feelings and can only  gain strength from standing up to  blase attitudes about evil-doers.

What too many people aren't told by the "therapists", "clergy," and some "12 Steppers" who urge "knee-jerk" forgiveness, is that not holding people accountable, not telling and showing them that their actions have severe consequences, will likely make you feel less important and make your pain feel inconsequential.

Yes, there are things that are unforgivable. Don't let folks bully you into forgiveness when, indeed, it is likely to be a further assault upon your well-being.

What of the greatest betrayals of all , that of a parent. Many in recovery, and out, have sufffered all sorts of abuse from parents for years. Take for example, an adult child dealing with a dying mother, and feeling intense guilt for not having love for the mother. Yet,  trying to be a decent person and showing "that woman" compassion while she was dying.

You  must love her, after all she is your mother right ?  Wrong- Actually, you don't love her. How could you, considering all she did and didn't do. One doesn't love because the other has a 'title' of mother or father or husband or wife . It is still earned. Not by being perfect – no person or parent is – but at least by not being evil.

So many years are spent trying to follow the mantra that you should forgive and will attain peace. To do that you would have to deny the reality of the truth, of the damage to you, of the loss of a childhood, of the work you were still doing to recover and survive as a normal person with a life you could enjoy and make meaningful.

Why do so many of us believe that we have to forgive or we are bad. In reality, is it not more healing to accept that there are some things you mustn't forgive and that love is earned.

Only when we accept these ideas can we truly come to peace with our past. With no forgiveness, you have demonstrated to yourself your own value and the magnitude of the unholy assault on an innocent child.

When people tell you to forgive just so that you can move on or create peace for them – don't give it.

Forgiving somebody when there is no repentance, no true remorse, no true attempt to repair it, no attempt to make things different, I think is absurd. I think it's ridiculous, pseudo-religion.

To say, "I'm going to let this go and not be obsessed with it every day so I can go on and be my own decent person," that seems to me to be emotionally and psychologically healthy.

But to risk further injury or to say, "Therefore there should be no justice," to me is…I see that stuff as blasphemous. When people  say, "I'm in an abusive relationship, he's beating my kids, having sex with the dog, but I'm forgiving him and God says I shouldn't leave," I say, You're using God's name in vain and using the name of God to justify bad behavior.

And there's a lot of that going on, because people don't have the courage to face realities and fight for justice and stand up against evil.

I think standing up against evil is one of the toughest things to do, and most avoid the effort.

Be Strong and  Go  On.

I agree with you on everything you said and it was right on time. And this is exactly why I have had to let go of many relationships where they abused and didnt see it or even care not to but yet called themselves christian. and started doing what was best for me instead of always trying to have peace for them when peace was never allowed for me. I could only do that by letting go of them. If that makes sense. .

Forgiveness is a toughie, or at least it was for me - until I heard it explained this way......

A lady was on Oprah, saying that she has forgiven the man who kidnapped, brutally raped and then killed her daughter.  Everyone one was shocked!  As was I!  But to her, forgiving meant that that person, act, deed, etc., no longer rents %100 of her brain.  Nothing can ever change, but it also doesn't need to occupy her very waking thought.

For myself, that is how describe forgiveness and that has helped me immensely!!

Skye, miigwetch wendaam for this post!

pseu⋅do   /ˈsudoʊ/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [soo-doh] Show IPA

Not at all sure what you are getting at Duckling. Please explain so I can understand. Thanks!!

im not getting at anything but that i like and totaly agree with what skye is saying.  that you know,, religion was created by humans so we can understand spirituality. witch is fine, but sometimes it gets a little turned on its head when people dont realise this so we kind of get pseudo spirituality that goes against the principles becuase it is taught to people wrong.  and my coment is COMPLETLY unrelated to any other desucussion that might have recently taken place, just to make sure know that. I dont make digs. i love you, and dont want to hurt anyone or 'get one over' or what ever, and i greatly apreciate all your sugestions and would like to go as far as to make the principles my personality (but still be human ofcourse, with minor quirks, after all people are not all black and white. (as in figure of speach, not race))
please still love me, please dont think im bad  
at the risk of soundling like a suck up i respect you more than anyone.

its a great word.. but i dont know how to pronounce it.
fs iy dow ?

There is no need to suck up,,, I honestly didn't get what you were referring to and just wanted to understand.

Spiritual Practices:Forgiveness
Enhances:
Freedom

Balances/Counters:
Vengefulness



There are three kinds of forgiveness, all interrelated.

1. There is self-forgiveness, which enables us to release our guilt and perfectionism.
2. There is the forgiveness we extend to others and receive from them, intimates and enemies alike.
3. And there is the forgiveness of God that assures us of our worth and strengthens us for this practice.

All the spiritual traditions raise up the value of forgiveness, but many people still find it to be a nearly impossible ideal. Just start somewhere. Look truthfully at one hurt you have not been able to forgive. Identify any associated feelings you might have, such as anger, denial, guilt, shame, or embarrassment. Imagine what it would be like to live without feeling this offense. Then let it go.

Other steps may be necessary for healing — a confession of your contribution to the conflict, making amends, changing behavior, a commitment to the community — but giving up your claims for, and sometimes against, yourself is where you have to begin.

 
Why This Practice May Be For You

We all know the obvious symptoms that could be relieved by forgiveness — feeling so wounded that we want revenge, constant brooding over a long list of petty grievances, feeling so guilty we don't know how to approach someone we have offended, worry that the hurt could happen again. Bitterness and stubbornness can also be signs that forgiveness is called for, especially when these attitudes are associated with a need to be recognized as the one who is right.

In contrast to these limiting behaviors, which usually erect walls between ourselves and others, forgiveness is freeing. It means that we can move out of our previous position and move on with our lives. Best of all, it enables us to be reconciled with our neighbors and with God so that once again we feel part of the greater community of the spiritual life.
 
Quotations

Without forgiveness, life is governed by an endless cycle of resentment and retaliation.
— Robert Assagioli quoted in Gospel Days by Joan Chittister
 

Perhaps forgiveness is the last thing mentioned in the Creed because it is the last thing learned in life. Perhaps none of us can understand the forgiveness of God until we ourselves have learned to forgive.
— Joan Chittister in In Search of Belief
 

If you want to see the brave, look at those who can forgive. If you want to see the heroic, look at those who can love in return for hatred.
— The Bhagavad Gita quoted in Legacy of the Heart by Wayne Muller
 

The practice of forgiveness is not only, or even primarily, a way of dealing with guilt. Instead, its central goal is to reconcile, to restore communion — with God, with one another, and with the whole creation.
— L. Gregory Jones in Practicing Our Faith edited by Dorothy C. Bass
 

Never forget that to forgive yourself is to release trapped energy that could be doing good work in the world.
— D. Patrick Miller
 

Forgiveness is something freely granted, whether earned or deserved; something lovingly offered without thought of acknowledgment or return. It is our way of mirroring the goodness in the heart of a person rather than raising up the harshness of their actions....it allows us to live in the sunlight of the present, not the darkness of the past. Forgiveness alone, of all our human actions, opens up the world to the miracle of infinite possibility.
— Kent Nerburn in Make Me an Instrument of Your Peace

 
The capacity to forgive is the capacity to let go of ego.
— David Richo in Shadow Dance
 

The whole witness of Jesus' life and death is to the unfathomable depths of God's forgiveness. English poet and artist William Blake cites the capacity of Jesus to forgive another, and to reenter vulnerably into the deepest relation with another, as the strongest evidence of his being God in the flesh.
— Douglas V. Steere in Dimensions of Prayer
 

The practice of forgiveness is our most important contribution to the healing of the world.
— Marianne Williamson in A Return to Love
 

Forgiveness seems to remain a theme waiting to be explored in depth in our present age. This deep and extensive kind of loving of enemies, while it has long roots in our tradition, seems to have become a theme of special urgency in our contemporary world.
— Wendy Wright in The Rising
 

Forgiveness is a complex experience that changes an offended person's spiritual feelings, emotions, thoughts, actions, and self-confidence level. I believe learning to forgive the hurts and grudges of our life may be an important step for us to feel more hopeful and spiritually connected and less depressed. These changes improve our health and give us more energy to create a better life for ourselves. They allow our bodies to function in an optimal way.
— Fred Luskin in Forgive for Good

Look to see where Religious people are right
People are spiritally sick
Humility be4 Knowledge
There is a right way to use our self will and a wrong way to use our self will
Proverbs 3:5 -5

Trust in the LORD with all your heart
and lean not on your own understanding;

Being an abuse surviver myself.. I have come to know these as my truth.... hope they answer some of your questions... Today, I have won!!! I am no longer the victim, I am the Victor!!

Thank you so very much for relating this story.  You have given me a working and living definition of "forgiveness."  It is about setting ourselves free -- not about setting someone else free.  Susan Lauren

I've recently lost my A.A. sponsor who had an impact not only as the best man at our wedding. Retaught me after a car accident, how to speak, read and writed again. the biggest thing I learned from is:
Learn to love,
Learn to live,
Learn to love life well.
Then Do It!

Being His proxy a week sunday, he held on untill I arrived and after hearing my voice, took only two breaths and died.

I understand I must go on, and spread the message of hope, I did go to a different A.A. meeting friday. I only cry alone.
It's the comfort of these halls I need the most. Life still goes on.
Today, it's not how so much as if. but will, if only to inspire others to reach out to the strength the unity brings to others in need.

forgiveness of anothers wrongful acts on onesself.

without giveing forgiveness we keep the hate of another in our minds and hearts -yet it only hurts us. without giveing forgiveness how can we ever want for forgiveness from another.
nonforgiveness is the "they know not what they do father" mentality of humans who do not understand pure love of all things good or bad without judgement.

are we so powerful by our own athority to pass judgement on another for being right or wrong? forgiveness without return or outcome is letting go of a hurt given to you by another in hate -if you would love to hold onto that hate and bottle it up for use later just never learn how to forgive.

for myself i would rather get rid of the hate and resentments and move onto loveing and careing for all no matter what there issues may be -because you only recieve what you give out,  plus its not really nessesary to always be right in our sick minds and by doing so we make ourselves even sicker. negitive and hateful thinking puts our minds in a place where
in serenity we just dont want to be. 

life is like thin ice on a pond - walk across it with a heavy heart and you crack the ice and drown -walk on it lighthearted and you cross safely and get to enjoy what is on the other side.

Hi again.

For me, today I am struggling with forgiveness.

Today it is the first year of my 23 yr old son's death. His father and I are divorced. To say this man made my life a living 'hell' is putting it mildly. I was so beat down by he and his wife at my son's wake and funeral, and I won't even go into the detail of what happened after. All i have left of my child is a hat, and his first big book.

Forgiveness, I believe is a process. Did I try to make ammends to him in the past? You betcha. Did he accept it? No. That was ok, the program teaches I was cleaning up my side of the street. I believe by this outpouring of my heart you can see how hurt I am, my family is torn to shreds, all over unforgiveness.

Last night I got on my knee's and prayed for the ability to forgive him and those whom hurt me at a time when I needed support. Hardly nobody at my son's wake knew I was even my child's mother. I agree with much of what skye has said.

I suppose forgiveness comes easier for others, for me, in this case, there is no turning back. The damage is done forever. I am still angry, hurt and today I mourn.

At times I wonder....what was worse? losing my child to this disease or dealing with unforgiveness. like kicking a dog when it is down? Process, it is a process! For me.

I refuse today to be bullied into anything, perhaps the anger drives me to feel this way. I am just sharing my experience.

I want to forgive, I pray for it, yet it has not came to fruition. Just my 10 cents worth. Hugs, Carrie

From YouTube: Jason Upton Faith click to  listen

Forgiveness- For you to give, or not Part 2

My life and may  I say again my life, has placed me in a postion of belief that some "sins" are unforgivable.

Now I don't want to get into a heated religious debate, for this is the world wide web. We come from various religious and spritual backgrounds, there may even be a few athiests among us.

Our christian God says there is but only 1 unforgivable sin and that is blasphamy of the Holy Spirit. My mortal being however places a few more sins on the unforgivable list.

There are times I believe that forgiveness ought to follow a sincere apology, and not preempt it. Times when I have neither forgiven nor condemned, my response being that of silence. And there are yet those times when I personally have chosen not to pardon or absolve my offender by  granting my forgiveness.

This in no way means I have not let go or moved on, or that I will continue to allow the perpetrator to invade my every waking hour. I have just chosen not to grant free pardon.

Seems to me, in this world, we demonize "not forgiving" as much as we idealize "forgiving".
  
The therapists caution us that faliure to forgive will only doom us to be victims for the rest of our lives.
The church , well it seems to take the green approach saying failure to  forgive recycles evil.

Nearly all Christians agree that repentance and forgiveness of others are key elements of forgiveness, and that forgiveness comes from God.

Yet there are others who argue that forgiveness itself is a sin, an insult to the martyrs, an affront to God’s equally important command to pursue justice.

Justice and mercy. They pull us in opposite directions, yet God demands both from us.

It is only human to feel the twin demands of justice and mercy, it's our capacity to exercise both is what makes us fully human. But we must choose a path in this world, and I choose to err on the side of justice. If anyone must balance the scales on the side of mercy, let it be God.

Not to sure I agree totally with this. There are  things that I have had to forgive of others that i did not choose to have happen to me. This is all just a bit to generalized me thinks.

Wow Hvnzent... I am finding it a little hard to swallow that someone would say we choose to be hurt. So,,, um,, that little child that was sexually and physically abused chose that? The husband or wife who was verbally attacked for years chose that? The woman or man that was raped, the families that were ruined by booze, alcohol, gambling, infidelity.. they chose that?

Sorry,,,,, but I am shaking my head in bewilderment at that one.

I'm sorry I forgot to post that I did not write that, I found it at a site that I go to for spiritual guidance, I guess I should have posted that, I just thought it was an interesting perspective. I think it was Professor Paul Tillich of Columbia University. I also don't think he was talking about innocent children when he made this statement, I think he was referring to adults with issues in this subject. Again I apologize for not stateing that earlier. Next time I will be more careful with my post.

Personally, I believe that you forgive as much as you can so that you can live your life without misery. 

I didn't use children as the only example and this children grow to be adults,,,,, that's if they survive the abuse.

I understand what you're saying, I am an adult that was sexually abused as a child. Maybe I got something different from that reading. I think I may have only had a one track mind when posting it, thinking only of people that have a tendency to be used as door mats.I also appreciate you're opinion on that statement, I didn't look at it that way till now, sometimes I dont see things the way others see them, thankfully we have these post to learn from each other.