Forgiveness and Reconciliation

Forgiveness and Reconciliation Chapter 10

In Context of Interpersonal Conflict • Both the internal process of forgiveness and the way forgiveness can be aided by communication interaction with the other person • Various forms of communication, both explicit and implicit • Complex role of apology in the movement toward forgiveness

Sometimes our best efforts to prevent conflict or engage in it constructively fail and we are left feeling betrayed, deceived, embittered, or isolated

While forgiveness is not necessarily the last thing we try in a relationship, it often follows an effort, more or less determined, to alter the terms of the relationship that has become the source of disappointment, hurt, frustration, or harm

What is Forgiveness? • Forgiveness is giving up the idea of a better past – William Faulkner • Interpersonal forgiveness can be seen as the decision to reduce negative thoughts, affect, and behavior, such as blame and anger, toward an offender or hurtful situation, and to begin to gain better understanding of the offense and the offender – McCullough, Pargament and Thoresen

What is Forgiveness?, cont. • Is the heart’s capacity to release its grasp on the pains of the past and free itself to go on – Kornfeld • Is an inner process, central to psychotherapy, where the injured person without request of the other releases those negative feelings and no longer seeks to hurt – Martin and Denton

Relational Harm • Occurs across a wide spectrum from regrettable and hurtful messages to psychological and physical violence • Relationships are strained not just by hurtful messages but by unresolved or poorly resolved conflict

Disconfirmation • Particularly harmful form of interpersonal behavior • Happens when a person feels invisible to another, unrecognized, unacknowledged, or without endorsement • It seems as if we don’t exist in the eyes of someone else • Form of psychological abuse with potentially long term consequences that may be more harmful than direct criticism or verbal attack

Physical Violence • Men are more likely than women to engage in physical violence when faced with non-compliant behavior, challenges to their behavior, or questions about their authority

Misconceptions about Forgiveness • Forgiveness does not dismiss or minimize an event or situation • Forgiveness is not indifferent about justice

Forgiveness • Forgiveness is not the same thing as a pardon • Forgiveness requires an act of imagination • Offering forgiveness on behalf of someone else may actually compound the original injury • People should have the right to make a decision about forgiveness on their own behalf

Forgiveness and Reconciliation • Forgiveness and reconcilation are not the same thing • In the context of interpersonal conflict, forgiveness is a process undertaken by one person in relation to another, with or without interaction with that person • Reconciliation is a process of reestablishing relationship, renewing trust, settling differences so that cooperation and a sense of harmony are restored

Forgiveness and Reconciliation, cont • Forgiveness does not necessarily reestablish relationship • Forgiveness is for the benefit of the person who has been harmed • Reconciliation reflects the mutual interests of two parties and embodies a willingness to reengage in the relationship in the belief that further injury is less likely to occur and that the benefits of a new association outweigh the risks

Imbalance of Power • Sometimes it is thought that if you resist forgiveness, you are guilty of moral failure • Forgiveness, if chosen, should never obligate a person to reconcile

Memory • Is absolutely essential to the forgiveness process because it is central to the identity of individuals, peoples, and nations and may reduce the susceptibility to repeated injury in the future

Is Forgiveness a Decision or Process? • An element of decision enters almost every forgiveness process and a process element figures in every decision • You could have a decision to let go or resentment and bitterness rather than waiting for a more or less lengthy process to unfold • Forgiveness is more “an act of will”, temporarily separating reason and feeling

Three step model of forgiveness (page 307) • Guideposts along the Forgiveness Journey (page 308-10)

Eddies • Sometimes we need time to process an injury or hurt • It is best to be patient, to see the eddies as resting places, to have a keen sense of timing, and to watch for a person’s own motivation to return to the flow of life • Sometimes people need to use disassociation, denial, or anger, for example, to protect themselves for a while before reengaging with life after a major violation or betrayal

The process of forgiveness must be intrapersonal – within our own control – to preserve freedom from bondage to the behavior of another human being but that the process may be more interpersonal and require more interaction than we previously thought because our lives continue to intersect, overlap, and collide

Communicating Grievances • How people communicate about their grievances and how they communicate their forgiveness after grievances take place have enormous implications for the future of relationships and the prospect of reconciliation

Limits of Apology • Apologies can be another form of manipulation, put an aggrieved party under extraordinary pressure to respond graciously, or merely serve as a means of self-protection

Three Types of Apology • Expedient apology – the goal is to avoid rather than engage • Compelled apology – offered without adequate understanding of the full effect of one’s actions • Delayed or surrogate apology – the person receiving the apology should be the one to measure its value, not the one offering the apology

Sincere Apology • Apology may not be cleansed of all self-interest, but it can serve a purpose • Apology can be a powerful facilitator of forgiveness • Sincere apology and forgiveness can twine around each other in a braid

Receiving Forgiveness • Sometimes forgiveness can be very hard to receive after we have done the harm • Accepting forgiveness requires we shift our attention from the fear of retribution or guilt over something we have done wrong to the possibility of freedom from this fear • A person hoping to receive forgiveness must wait for the gift of forgiveness to come from the person who has been harmed

Self Forgiveness • This can be very difficult • Not forgiving self may be an eddy that keeps us from interacting with others • Forgiving oneself can be particularly difficult because it first requires that we recognize the two different images of ourself – the person we think we are and the person who caused some harm

Self Forgiveness, cont. • As long as we withhold forgiveness from ourselves, then we can’t possibly be the person who did this deed • Self-forgiveness requires we see these two selves clearly and help them recognize and accept each other

Reconciliation • The process of repairing a relationship so that reengagement, trust, and cooperation become possible after a transgression or violation • It may be good to forgive but not safe to reconcile

Four Key Aspects of Reconciliation • Truth • Forbearance • Empathy • A commitment to remain in the relationship

Truth • The ability to acknowledge, honor, and communicate about what happened and its effect

Forbearance • To forbear means to refrain from revenge or punishment after someone has hurt us or transgressed against us • Forbearance is essential because its opposite in revenge sets in motion a tide that cannot be predicted and that guarantees that people will have an even harder time coming back together in a renewed state of trust

Empathy • Developing and expressing empathy for the offending person • Empathy is rooted in the realization that the one who hurt us remains human and needs our kindness • Empathy recognizes that at some point we may have done to someone else the very thing we are now trying to transcend

Commitment to the Relationship • Our web of relationships bind us together, whether families or communities • A sense of how what happens to one person affects others, places responsibility on us to work things out with one another

Forgiveness and Reconciliation