Proper forgiveness

There is a lot of forgiving going on in some circles – especially as related to the crimes of Maciel and the duplicity of the Movement in covering it up. In that light, I would like to recall some of the essential elements about forgiveness, which is a requisite for authentic Christian life.

“…Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us …”

We cannot be fully reconciled with God without forgiving those who have hurt us in any way. That is clear. The problem seems to be in defining who forgives whom. Let’s take a story about a drunk driver who runs over a little girl in his neighbourhood. She hasn’t been killed but will be a paraplegic for life. Where does forgiveness come in?

We begin by asking who was harmed: the child was harmed, her family was impacted, the driver’s family is impacted, and the wider community is wounded. Each of these four elements are required to forgive – with it being hardest on the little girl. She may have to make repeated acts of forgiveness (which are acts of the will) as she ages, when her limitations present a new suffering to her. (i.e. her forgiveness realising that she cannot play on the playground any more will be different from when she discovers that she cannot bear children, etc.)

The family will have a difficult time with the tragic turn their whole lives will take and the neighbourhood will grieve the whole thing. The driver’s family will forgive something different: they will have to deal with the shame and what his incarceration does to the future of them all.

But this is where we are blindly moving into the ridiculous: for the family of a classmate of the injured girl to come forward forgiving the man for injuring the girl is out of place. Surely they cannot condemn him (no one can!) but it is not their place to officially extend forgiveness. How would the family of the victim feel about a quote in the local paper that says as much? It would simply be odd, out of place, perhaps painful for them to read. It would be more absurd for the family of the driver to forgive their son for hurting the girl. That is not appropriate to them, although they also cannot condemn him.

Do you see how the acts of forgiveness towards Maciel on the part of members of the Movement appear? They say, we must forgive – he’s only human. This is not only bad theology but out of place and painful to the victims of Maciel. It’s like a foreign government official extending forgiveness to Usama bin Laden for the 9-11 tragedy. The members of the Movement must forgive Maciel’s deception and abuse of their own good will, but it is absurd for them to think they are to forgive his molestation of the young and abuse of the funds entrusted to him for the good of souls.

Now, even forgiveness (for which the victims will require grace to extend) doesn’t preclude justice. I’ve understood it that Pope John Paul II went to visit Metmet Ali Agha in prison specifically to offer his forgiveness for his assassination attempt. It seemed to be a very remarkable moment. Evidently, Agha asked if he would intervene so that his prison sentence could be shortened. The pope said absolutely not. Just because he forgives doesn’t mean that the consequences of the action are mitigated. In heaven yes, but not here – or there would be no order.

It has been posited for years that Maciel had committed crimes: pederasty, abuse of funds, use of illegal drugs (as well as medicating in-house without proper prescriptions). Of course I’m not privy to all depositions – so there may be more. Then there are the crimes of sacrilege which are too numerous to list. There must be accountability for all of these things -- especially if others in the Legion enabled these crimes. Despite the effort on the part of many to be heroic Catholics, I would say that short-circuiting justice is absolutely unchristian – and it must stop.

Our love of souls and desire for a purified Church demand that forgiveness be undertaken in the proper way. It doesn’t hinge on apologies – although they often help a great deal. It doesn’t require confrontation, although some will pursue such a thing. It requires careful deliberation of the first-hand injury and no more. To forgive the injuries done to others only increases their burden, adds to their pain, and ultimately insults the whole purification process.

Please spare us the misplaced absolution, and tend to your own wounds. When they are cared for properly, we will have that many more wise souls in our midst that can help the confused flock at this difficult time.

One addendum: I never recommend over-hasty forgiveness. Taking the time to name and grieve a wound is essential to really digging out the injustice. We cannot hide behind knee-jerk absolution which is actually a form of denial. That said, there are extraordinary stories of heroic and complete forgiveness in the blink of an eye, but such examples are rare.

Comments

[Mary Ann]

Wonderful post. We have no right to forgive in the name of another, nor to forgive crimes done to another. It is a gross injustice to presume to do so. If we care to forgive Maciel for the scandal to us, then we should be sure to take some scandal. Otherwise, as you said, forgiveness is simple denial, and a denial of justice to those injured. It compounds the injury, and prevents redress.

[anon]

I believe the following explains part of why the LC/RC members have a hard time facing the whole truth about all of this; that it is so much bigger than Fr. Maciel.

The Truths We Want to Deny by Sharon Begley

If someone’s self-image as competent and smart is challenged by the truth that he made a mistake, he is more likely to deny the truth.

A man who resented his parents’ favoritism toward his younger brother was receiving psychotherapy in Boston for relationship problems. His therapist thought they were making progress, but she knew a problem loomed. Pregnant, she worried that her fragile patient might view her maternity leave as abandonment or rejection. She held off revealing her situation until she was six months along, last year. “Have you noticed anything about me?” she asked. The patient said he had not, so she told him she was pregnant. Looking at her bulging abdomen, he said she couldn’t be; he was a keen observer of women’s bodies and had made a habit of scrutinizing her because he worried this would happen. No, he said; you’re not pregnant.

Denying the evidence of your eyes is the most extreme form of the coping mechanism called denial. But denial comes in milder forms as well. Parents refuse to believe their child is on drugs; that baggie under his bed contained oregano. A husband maintains his wife cannot be cheating; those late nights she spends with a friend are purely platonic. A wife denies that her husband is gay; he’s just been too tired for sex with her these last few years…

…People resort to denial when recognizing that the truth would destroy something they hold dear(RC/LC/MM). In the case of a cheating partner, denial lets you avoid “acknowledging evidence of your own humiliation,” says New York psychoanalyst Leon Hoffman. Short of catching a spouse in flagrante delicto, evidence of infidelity is usually ambiguous. “It’s motivated skepticism,” says psychologist Peter Ditto of the University of California, Irvine. “You’re more skeptical of things you don’t want to believe and demand a higher level of proof.” Denial is unconscious, or it wouldn’t work: if you know you’re closing your eyes to the truth, some part of you knows what the truth is and denial can’t perform its protective function.

One thing we all struggle to protect is a positive self-image. “The more important the aspect of your self-image that’s challenged by the truth, the more likely you are to go into denial,” says Ditto. If you have a strong sense of self-worth and competence, your self-image can take hits but remain largely intact; if you’re beset by self-doubt, however, any acknowledgment of failure can be devastating and any admission of error painful to the point of being unthinkable. In their new book, “Mistakes Were Made,” psychologists Carol Tavris and Elliot Aronson argue that self-justification and denial arise from the dissonance between believing you’re competent, and making a mistake, which clashes with that image. Solution: deny the mistake…

http://www.newsweek.com/id/34765/page/1

[Sarah]

Hi!
I also like this post very, very much. Also that you said that the proper reaction is not confrontation, which I chose to do the last days;(.
Yeah... most RC-members spoke of forgiveness the first day the info popped out.They want to go on. It is good, but I feel so odd. There are rumors that Maciel had a Multiple Personality Disorder, which actually could be true. What makes me feeling strange is, that I tries to discuss that with my favourite condecrated via mail by using information from books etc. And she wrote back that now is the time to focus on other things: doing good, helping the church, etc. Ok she is right, but I want to deeply understand what happened, you know? I have the feeling no one else tries to analyze this and wants to come to a conclusion. I am so confused. I can speak best with ex-RC members and with atheists, isn´t that pathetic? What is this? I don´t know what to think. May be I am too harsh on RC, I don´t know?
God bless!