We continue our deep dive into THE HEART OF CATHOLIC PRAYER.
***
Why does Jesus give this excruciatingly difficult command to forgive everything we have against anyone? Two reasons:
1. We’re not God
and
2. We will destroy our lives if we don’t.
Here’s the deal. We can refuse to forgive [Insert Impenitent Jerk’s Name Here] till the day we die. The actual, practical, real world result of this will be a) nothing happens to Impenitent Jerk as a result of our unforgiveness and b) we are consumed with bitterness.
It is simply false that clinging to unforgiveness will somehow empower us to Do What Needs to Be Done. This is like confusing idling your motor at 3000 RPM with driving. Unforgiveness is a purely destructive waste of time. It is the ultimate Faustian rip-off, stealing our soul and giving us nothing in return. We not only commit the sin of usurping the place of God, we also have no effect whatever on the sinner while we eat ourselves alive with pointless, utterly unproductive, and impotent rage. It’s like drinking poison and expecting the other guy to die. The truly Christian thing is to act in whatever practical and just way we can and then hand the sinner over to God with the words, “I forgive that person in the name of Jesus Christ.” It isn’t easy and even worse, must be done thousands of times.
You may well ask, “Who then can be saved?” A reasonable question since, left to ourselves and our own strength, the answer is “no one.” But as the Son of Man said, “With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible” (Matthew 19:26). We are not left to our own strength and we can ask the help of God’s mighty Holy Spirit to empower us in the lifelong work of growing in forgiveness and mercy. This is what the awesome power of the sacraments (especially Reconciliation and Eucharist) is, in no small part, ordered toward helping us to do.
Forgiveness of that miserable swine who did that awful thing to you sounds like death—and so it is. But, as with all Christian death, it ends not in the grave, but in Resurrection and Ascension. The world is replete with examples of its awesome power when we see it, from John Paul II forgiving the man who shot him to Holocaust victim Corrie ten Boom forgiving the sadistic concentration camp guard who sought her out after the war. That is how victims of sin are set free to start new and happy lives liberated from the power of their victimizer.
One good way to start this process is by putting our own sufferings in perspective in the grand scheme of things. Most of the sins committed against us are small ones and we can start there. Jesus tells the parable of the Unmerciful Servant (Matthew 18:23-35) as a sort of capstone to his discourse on how we should conduct our affairs on a daily basis. The central point of the parable is that compared with what the King sacrifices in showing mercy to his servant–a guy who owed him millions of dollars–our day-to-day grievances against one another are usually pretty small beer. We who have not endured what Jesus endured can, among other things, find the help of the Spirit to forgive our Mickey Mouse trials in life and slowly build up the strength to forgive the big sins we have had to endure at the hands of others, just as we ask Jesus to forgive our great sins. Think of it as training for a marathon. People don’t just get up off the couch and run 26 miles. They start small with short runs. We can start small with small acts of forgiveness.
The servant who asks forgiveness for his own Mt. Everest of debt while denying it to the poor schmoe who owes him a couple of bucks is just not serious. If he is not serious about forgiveness, he shall receive mercy according to how serious his request really was—a dreadful prospect. The point is, in the words of the Catechism (CCC 2843) that “[i]t is not in our power not to feel or to forget an offense; but the heart that offers itself to the Holy Spirit turns injury into compassion and purifies the memory in transforming the hurt into intercession.”
The bottom line and paradox of the mercy of God is that there is no limit or measure to it. Like the ocean, we could not possibly exhaust it. But, like the ocean, we can only get wet if we get in it. Merely looking at it or wishing to be wet will not do. So the smallest effort at extending mercy will be rewarded by our God, yet he will not rest until we are as immersed in and overflowing with mercy as he is. For God is, in George MacDonald’s phrase, “easy to please, but hard to satisfy.”[1] Take a step toward forgiving that guy who gave you a wedgie forty years ago and all the angels in heaven will rejoice. But that will be because you have taken the first, not the last, step toward full union with the Blessed Trinity who is “the source and criterion of truth in every relationship” (CCC 2845). He will never leave you where you are until you are as fully happy as he means you to be: full of the love, joy, peace—and mercy—of God.
[1] George MacDonald, Donal Grant, Chapter 46. Available on-line at http://www.classicreader.com/read.php/sid./bookid.1206/sec.46 as of March 5, 2011.
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One Response
Forgiveness is not just about the person being forgiven but the person doing the forgiving. It’s liberating for the person doing the forgiving. They are moving forward, not letting the past injury define them. It’s healing and liberating.