Reverend Thomas Disrud

First Unitarian Church
Portland, Oregon

September 22, 1996

"In a dream I walked with God through the deep places of creation, past walls that receded and gates that opened,… until, around me, was an infinity into which we all flowed together and lived anew, like the rings made by raindrops falling upon wide expanses of calm dark waters…. I don't know who-or what-put the question. I don't know when it was put. I don't even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer Yes to someone- or something- and from that hour I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life in self-surrender, had a goal."

Forgiveness. It is not an easy subject.

As a minister I get to hear lots of people's stories, and forgiveness comes up in many of cases. The inability to forgive or be forgiven is something that causes a great deal of pain and grief, no matter what the particulars of the situation might be. It is a way that the events in our life hold onto us and won't let us move on. Life doesn't always go as we would like it to go. We all have the ability to give much to others and also to hurt others, weather we want to or not.

Relationships can be broken in many ways:

A spouse breaks a vow.

A friend lets you down.

A parent expects too much of you.

A child can't be there when her aging parents need her.

A sibling feels like you stole attention from him.

Restoring the relationship may happen over a difficult but honest conversation. Others can't be made right no matter how much is tried. Sometimes things can't be forgiven.

In the movie "Love Story," Ali McGraw says to Ryan O'Neal: "Love means never having to say you're sorry."

I think she's wrong. Love means the ongoing willingness to forgive and go on. To not forget about what has happened but to always be open to the possibility of healing, of renewing relationship.

Whatever the details of the situation, we carry losses and regrets in our lives. Disagreements can lead to years or even decades of estrangement. Violations that we cannot understand haunt us for a lifetime. Things happen in our lives and we wrestle with them, trying to go on with life, but unable to let them go, to give or receive forgiveness, to find peace.

Forgiveness is complicated. If we have been wronged, we don't want to put ourselves in that situation again. What will others think of us if we forgive? Are we letting them off the hook? And if we have hurt someone, we may feel guilty and angry at ourselves.

Finding the path to forgiveness can be a long, painful process that requires us to look deep inside ourselves. It requires us to look at who we are in relation to another person and to the world. It requires us to look at what we have done or what has been done to us, and then to work to make it right. This is not easy. We are all capable of doing wrong to another.

And in the process of examining our life, we don't know where we will end up. We may decide in the process of discovery that we need to change some things in our lives, and this change can be painful to undertake.

But the alternative can be more painful. If there's one thing I've learned as a minister it is how necessary forgiveness is, to work to mend broken relationships and to not be consumed by the brokenness. And I say that knowing how difficult it can be. We all have relationships we would like to change, to make better. For many of us the wounds can be deep and can cause pain that can be hard to live with. We have sorrows that are still ungrieved. We have things that we would do differently if given the chance. Facing these sorrows and finding peace and moving ahead can be very painful.

Tonight is the holiest night in the year for Jews. It is Yom Kippur, the day of atonement. The high holy days in the Jewish tradition begin with Rosh Hashanah, the new year, and now climax with Yom Kippur. Before the new year can begin, it is necessary to look over our lives for the past year and to make amends and ask forgiveness for what we have done.

If you break down the word atonement it is at at-one-ment. This is the day when we are at one with God, the day when we look at the past year and atone for the wrongs we have committed. We look back, we take stock, we make amends, we recovenant with God and begin again in love. It is a time of turning our life around, of putting ourselves on a new course. It is a time to ask God to forgive us. It is also a time to be the most aware of God's love and its transforming power.

When I look at our culture, Yom Kippur seems a little out of place. Having a time to look at our lives and to atone for the things we have done to other people seems a little unusual.

Look at the political landscape in our country. It is now the norm to personally attack your opponent. Instead of debating an issue, you launch a personal attack. You smear your opponent, even if the charge is only partly true. Even if someone is there to call you on it, you are aware that the perception is the thing that sticks. The damage is done and you don't have to take responsibility. You may win, but at a cost. Of course the same can happen to you.

In a column a few months back, Ellen Goodman decried the lost public art of saying I'm sorry. She spoke of the public discourse in our country and how we are not remorseful when we hurt someone. She speaks of politicians who take a cheap shot at somebody else, then says in response to criticism something like, "I don't believe the term I used was wrong, but if it offended anybody, I'm sorry." Translated that says: I'm not sorry, so deal with it. The other popular one is the I misspoke defense. Instead of taking responsibility for the statement, we simply hear that "It was a slip of the tongue. I didn't really mean anything by it."

She calls them "un apologies" that don't clear the slate. They add to the grievance.

What this does is send a message to all of us - particularly our children, that it is fine not to make amends but to let the hurt stand. There is no need to mend a relationship after it is broken or damaged. You just go on. The other person is left to deal with it alone.

And from my memories as a kid, that sounds pretty good. My memory of saying I'm sorry as a child was that it was hard. I did not want to say that. But I also remember that it was the quickest way to get out of a situation. So, I would say I was sorry, if I was or not. This was particularly the case if my mother was around. Over the years, I think I've learned that I can hurt others but also that I can be hurt and that it is the right path to make amends when I am able to. It is the way that relationship is restored.

In a strip from the comic "For Better Or Worse", the character Eli says this: "An apology is the super glue of life. It can repair just about anything."

He may be right. This is not easy work. In fact, it is some of the most difficult work we can face. But it is also work that can be transformative.

Beverly Flanigan is a professor and therapist who specializes in forgiveness. In her work, she charts out what can be a complex process of making amends, thoroughly examining what has happened and then finding forgiveness. It is not something that always happens.

First we need to get as clear a picture of the situation as we can. We need to see ourselves for who we are - what we have done or what has been done to us. We then need to see what changes we have to make, we have to rebuild our assumptions about ourselves and see ourselves in a clearer light. We also need to determine how far we can go. If we have been abused, we can't risk our safety. We cannot forget.

Before we make amends, we have to get clear about what we have done and to take responsibility for it. This is a process of going inward, of looking at our lives and working on the things we would like to change. Saying I'm sorry doesn't take the past away, it does not take away the guilt, but it does get you back on track. It means taking responsibility for what has happened and deciding to not do it again.

Twelve step programs can teach us a great deal with this. A critical step is to make amends for the wrongs we have done to others. This is not an easy step but it is a necessary one. What have I done to others and what do I need to do to make amends. What, if anything, can I do to heal a broken relationship.

And what if we are not able to forgive someone for what they have done? This can be difficult. Am I putting myself at risk to be hurt again if I forgive someone for what they've done? Why should I make the effort to forgive?

I know that at times in my own life it has been much easier to see myself as a person who was wronged and to shape my identity around that wound.

Sometimes it has seemed almost easier not to forgive. It gave me a cruch of sorts. I'm not saying here that it is my fault if someone does something bad to me. I'm saying that that injury can be perpetuated if I am not able to move past it and start to see myself as more than the thing that has happened to me. Or if I have hurt someone, all I see is the part of myself that can hurt and nothing more. If I'm such a bad person, then why bother to do anything good?

This can be a very stuck place. It can feel imprisoning. It is like the past has a hold on us and we can't get away. We may even seek forgiveness but can't find it. We search for the path and it isn't there.

At some point we have to be able to invite the power of forgiveness and let it enter. It is not a rational thing. It comes out of a longing for healing and the desire to move forward. It is an invitation to reconciliation.

The act of forgiveness is a way of releasing ourselves from a destructive hold the past has on us. This letting go allows us to move on. When we are able to open ourselves to the power of forgiveness, we open ourselves to something that that is greater than our own making. Its power is rooted in love. It is love that takes us beyond ourselves and allows us to create and preserve community.

This is the power of love that transforms and heals. There is a release. It is a way we are reconciled to ourselves and to life. It is opening ourselves to a grace that flows in the world and is larger than ourselves.

Reinhold Neihbuhr said: "Forgiveness is the final form of love."

It means that despite what has come between us, we can attempt to be together, to respect each other, to heal our divisions.

Earlier this month, I heard the story of a woman named Marietta Yaegar of Detroit. She was in Oregon on the day Douglas Wright was executed. He was the first person executed in the state in over 30 years. She told the story of her 7-year-old daughter being kidnapped and murdered during a family vacation. She told of the hatred she felt for the person who had done this. She spoke of the feeling that she could have killed him with her bare hands because the anger and rage was so potent.

She spoke of an awareness that her life was consumed with hate and desire for revenge and that she was being eaten up by this hate. How she was dying too. She spoke of the growing awareness that her life was being taken away just like her daughter's life had been.

And then she spoke of a turning. She said she realized that if she was truly going to honor her daughter's life, she had to work for defending and creating life and not focus on revenge and more violence.

She now is a leader in a group of family members of victims who are against the death penalty. She honors her daughter's life by challenging violence.

And by telling her story, she was honoring her daughter. The pain of that loss was evident, but is was also clear that she had moved to a place where she was coming not from a place of revenge but from a place of honoring her daughter's memory.

Turnings like this one are rooted in grace. It is not easy to understand how it happens or why. It simply does, and is a gift that is open to all of us. It is a choice to say yes to life and to follow that yes where it takes you. There is an awareness of a loving force in the world and allowing yourself to be embraced by that love.

It can happen in community, where we are able to see ourselves in relation to the whole. It is a place where we bring our whole selves, all our brokenness, all our wants, our whole capacity to do good and to love, and our whole capacity to destroy and hurt others. And in this, our pain turns; it changes. It is not taken away, but we are able to see ourselves as a part of something larger. We are still responsible for the things we have done, but they, too, are seen as part of something larger. Just as we all have the ability to hurt others, we can also help other, and be forgiven and go on with life.

Forgiveness is an act of recovenenting with something larger. It doesn't mean forgetting the past, but means coming together and being willing to be transformed and starting anew in love. It is time of letting go and moving forward.

It is a pragmatic hope - that you don't just start over, forgetting the past, but that you look to the recreation of the world with hope, with persistence. That you don't give up. The world, in constant motion, recreates itself, and we are all part of that recreation, building bridges with one another, reaching out to those around us. Healing relationships and going on.

It is a time to answer Yes, and to live that Yes in all we do.

May this be so.

Benediction

May the world open itself to you. Know that you are forgiven. Know that you are loved. Amen.

Let us pray:

God of life, help us be one with all creation.

May all that we are be welcome at the table,

our longings, our fears, our faults.

Forgive us for the injuries we do to others,

help us to turn and to reach out to those we harm.

Help us to forgive, that we may be open

to the transforming power of love.

Help us to work to build communities of faith that embody the transforming power of love.

May we be healed. May we be whole.

Amen.

Benediction:

As you leave this place:

Know you are forgiven. Know you are loved. Go in peace.

Copyright © 2000, Reverend Thomas Disrud. All rights reserved.