A while back I interviewed Michele Perry where she made a plea that the standard Christian response that ‘you need to forgive’ is a little too simplistic. In there she referenced a video of a pastor making confession (part confession) and all the support / understanding / forgiveness for the ‘misdemeanour’ going his way, while the voice of the victim was pretty much silenced… The ‘Christian’ expectation is ‘forgive and get on with it’.
I come back to the Lord’s prayer. If Scottish ‘Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors’; and if English ‘Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us’. (Surely the Scots don’t favour the ‘debt’ cos it has a monetary application?)
Either way it is not ‘forgive our debtors as we know they were somewhat damaged so I understand that they were not reacting cleanly, so I give them a whole load of understanding…’ Now that is true, but not the focus. The focus is ‘they owed me something’, ‘they crossed boundaries and so disrespected my space’, and in the prayer no allowances are made for how they approached the situation with their own wounds. It is name it for what it was. I consider that too often we rush from – yes that is what you experienced but forgive, and do not allow the process.
Monica Lewinsky later came to realise that the approach from the then president was abuse. Not primarily at the sexual level (consent?) but at the power level. President of the USA and an intern… not exactly level ground. Same goes for parents to kids – not equal. (BTW maybe David’s relationship with Bathsheba would be viewed that way in our culture…)
Forgiveness is central – after all ‘and if you do not forgive (and I take that at the root level of ‘release’ being the same word to untie a boat and let her sail) neither will your Father in heaven forgive you’. That’s pretty heavy… but the pathway is ‘they crossed boundaries, they owed me’ not one simply of ‘I need to get over this’.
I think if we insist on a simple forgive with no process there will remain a trigger in place. We meet another person, another situation and all of a sudden we are off on one. Why? Probably because the situation reminds us (consciously / subconsciously) of the former scenario where the boundary was encroached on / they did not give us what they should have.
So some honesty, not total 100% accuracy is needed. They owed me, they trespassed! And this is so often true of parents, or those who were older and in authority.
Quick forgiveness insisted on… probably no great solution.
And finally… come on all you readers of this post. Just consider for a moment how reflective and even pastoral I am. (A brief fleeting moment!)