Dear Emily, A woman once wrote that her son isn’t yet ready to forgive his estranged father. Neither can I....
I am nearing the age when my father died, and here I am figuring out how I’d cope when that time comes.
Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice!”
Forgiveness is a virtue that is so fundamental, yet so challenging to practice. We are confronted by questions like, how can we forgive if the offender does not even acknowledge his/her wrongdoing? Do we forgive and forget? Should forgiveness bring with it the restoration of justice?
One afternoon toward the end of 2011, I answered the door to receive a FedEx package that arrived overnight from Los Angeles. The name belonged to someone I had known a long time ago.
One of my professors in Gonzaga University, Dr. Shann Ferch, did his doctoral dissertation on touch and forgiveness. He has spent much of his professional and personal life proclaiming the power of forgiveness in and through touch.
A few hours before catching my flight home from San Francisco, I found a message on Facebook from a long-lost friend. She asked if I was the same person who had lived in Hawaii Kai and moved to Concord.
Some people are in jail and most of us are not, that is obvious; but beneath the surface are others who are imprisoned by fear, sickness, resentment and ill will.
In the metaphysical world, we believe our souls choose where on earth we are going to be born, who our parents and siblings will be, and what lessons we have to learn after experiencing a previous lifetime.
I forgive, I forgive. Now I can receive. The Holy Scripture emphasizes that we must forgive 70 times seven, which really implies that many people try to forgive but never really do. They will often say, “I will forgive but I will never forget,” which, to me, is just saying they haven’t really forgiven. For it is only when you have ultimately forgotten that you have truly forgiven.
