The rocky path to forgiveness

Only wimps forgive.

That’s what Robert Enright heard when he first proposed to study the application of the biblical concept of forgiveness to social problems.

The professor of educational psychology at the University of WisconsinMadison had this idea: Teach prisoners how to forgive those who have wronged them and they in turn may seek forgiveness from their victims.

The reaction from the academic community was, in essence, baloney. In an article written for “Christianity Today,” Enright is quoted as saying, “Academic eyes would glaze over 90% of the time. Nine percent had hate-filled eyes. One percent was delighted.”

Twenty years ago, even the delighted 1% wouldn’t give him research money for such a program. People were offended by the idea of spending money to teach prisoners how to forgive. If anything, they reasoned, prisoners should be asking society for forgiveness.

Colleagues warned Enright that if he persisted with his interest in studying forgiveness he would have trouble for the rest of his career. For the better part of a decade, it looked like they were right.

Then a story about Enright and his passion for the study of forgiveness appeared in the Chicago Tribune, prompting more than 300 calls.

Mendota Mental Health Center in Madison, Wis., proposed an idea: Teach criminals how to forgive and see if they develop the empathy needed for them to seek forgiveness from their victims.

Enright founded the International Forgiveness Institute in 1994. As interest in his research grew, the Templeton Foundation sponsored a research symposium called “The Science of Forgiveness” in 1997, dedicating $5 million to 29 studies.

A year later, the Campaign for Forgiveness Research -- co-chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu, former President Jimmy Carter, Robert Coles, Ruby Bridges Hall and Elisabeth Elliot -- formed to raise another $5.5 million for future studies.

Of the research done by Enright and his colleagues, psychiatrist Richard Fitzgibbons has said, “[It] may be as important to the treatment of emotional and mental disorders as the discovery of sulfa drugs and penicillin were to the treatment of infectious diseases.”

Studies have shown the successful role forgiveness can play in reducing heart disease; prolonging the lives of cancer patients; restoring broken marriages; reducing vengeance that leads to criminal acts; and improving many other medical and social situations and events.

But forgiveness is not, Enright advises, a quick fix. It is hard work. It takes time, courage, commitment and strength.

It’s not for wimps.

Enright derived his understanding of forgiveness from Hebrew, Christian, Islamic, Confucian and Buddhist religious traditions, as well as from philosophical, psychological and developmental principles.

Forgiveness, he believes, is moral, a “turning to the ‘good’ in the face of wrongdoing.” It is goodwill, including “restraint from pursuing resentment or revenge” and perhaps even “contributing to the betterment of the other.”

It is paradoxical, in that a person is healed as he forgoes resentment and revenge, even as the wrongdoer’s actions deserve them, and offers mercy, generosity and love when the wrongdoer does not deserve them. It is beyond duty, freely chosen to overcome a wrongdoing with good.

Simply, forgiveness is “one person’s moral response to another’s injustice.” Enright distinguishes it from reconciliation, which he describes as “two parties coming together in mutual respect.”

Forgiveness can and does transpire entirely independently of a perpetrator.

In the 1992 movie “Unforgiven,” Clint Eastwood’s dark study of vengeance and revenge, there is a scene in which seasoned gunslinger Will Munny says to a wannabe, the Schofield Kid, “Hell of a thing, killin’ a man. Take away all he’s got and all he’s ever gonna have.”

“Yeah, well,” the Kid replies, “I guess he had it comin’.”

“We all got it comin’, kid,” Will Munny says.

The realization that we all need forgiveness is a part of the process of forgiving.

Through research, Enright and his colleague Gayle Reed have developed a model for the process, which they and others use to teach forgiveness as a psychological health intervention.

Their model has 20 steps within four clear phases. Enright and Reed call them uncovering, deciding, working and deepening.

In the first phase, a person faces up to the emotional pain brought on by being wronged. Characteristic feelings such as anger or hatred are confronted, and healing begins.

Realizing that to continue to focus on the wrong and wrongdoer will cause more suffering, a person can begin to explore the idea of forgiveness and take steps toward it, setting aside thoughts or intentions of revenge.

The work phase includes the acceptance of the pain caused by the wrong. Enright makes it clear that “this must not be confused with any sense of deserving the pain but rather a bearing of pain that has been unjustly given.”

The person bears the pain, choosing not to pass it on to others, including the perpetrator. This phase may or may not include reconciliation, depending on circumstances.

Finally, the injured person begins to experience emotional relief. He may find meaning in his suffering and have more compassion for himself and for others and may find a new or renewed purpose in life. He is healed.

Not everyone takes a shine to Enright’s ideas. In an essay titled “The Sin of Forgiveness,” Jewish commentator Dennis Prager takes issue with the idea that “victims should be encouraged to forgive all evil done to them because doing so is psychologically healthy.”

To forgive in order to feel better, even when a person does not “deserve to be forgiven, and ... may not even be sorry” is, Prager says, a “feel-good doctrine of automatic forgiveness” and “selfishness masquerading as idealism.”

From a Christian perspective, William R. Crouch, pastor of Fountain Spring Church, thinks Enright misses the mark.

“Forgiveness has everything to do with faith,” says Crouch, “and nothing to do with feelings. [It] is a decision of the will. Forgiveness is the road for the strong, not the sentimental, sloppy or weak. It’s not the easy way; it’s the hard, steep, rocky road to higher ground.”

Christians, he says, are taught to forgive “because that is what God requires. It just so happens that our loving Father always knows what is best for his own.”

The apostle Paul wrote to the church at Rome, “Do not take revenge, my friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: ‘It is mine to avenge; I will repay,’ says the Lord.... Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”

To forgive isn’t to wimp out on justice. It’s to trust God and leave vengeance to Him.

* MICHELE MARR is a freelance writer from Huntington Beach. She can be reached at [email protected].

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