April 2009

From Your Minister

Forgiveness

During her sabbatical, our senior minister, Jane Rzepka, has asked a variety of her colleagues to share their thoughts in this space. This month, Laurel Hallman, minister at large, of the First Unitarian Church of Dallas, Texas, and candidate for UUA president, is our “guest minister.” Visit Elect Laurel Hallman for UUA President.

It is “the generational grudge” or “leftovers” from a relationship gone bad. It is as small as a slight at work and as large as systemic oppression. It catches us by surprise, using up space in our minds. It is a knot. It is a frozen place deep in the heart and soul that won’t budge.

As I have moved from the simple affirmations and aphorisms about forgiveness from my childhood, I have found myself surprised by what life has had to teach.

First:

Once I had to admit to a group of people that I had handled very badly a situation that involved them. After much discussion, I said—somewhat to my own surprise— “I’m sorry that happened. This is new territory for me. To be the kind of leader I want to be I will risk making mistakes, but this has been a big one.”

“In fact,” I said, “I’d like to apologize ahead of time for what I’m sure will be missteps in the days to come.”

Fortunately for me, they laughed. We parted with a good basis for our relationship going forward.

I’ve thought a lot about that day. I have realized the idea was new for me. “I am going to screw up. It goes with the territory. It’s part of this adventure.”

What, up until then, had felt like a push to be better, do better, get better, had become the rather liberating realization that if I lived authentically I was certain at times to fall short of my own hopes and the hopes of others for me.

Admitting that became freedom itself.

I know my reader. You’re not going to consider “asking for forgiveness ahead” as a carte blanche to do what you want, no matter how hurtful.

I know who you are.

But if we Unitarian Universalists have made any progress on issues of gender, sexual identity, race—or problems of simply living together as families and friends—it has begun with the acknowledgement that we will screw up and we will need forgiveness. Only then will we be able to see our way clear to change our behavior.

Second:

If you can’t forgive, you are still in bondage. That’s the odd thing about forgiving. It is largely letting go. Not that we haven’t been damaged. Not that it doesn’t matter. Not that what has happened isn’t painful. We have been damaged. There is not a person reading this who hasn’t been scarred. Evil is real. Systemic oppression is real. People hurt. Life itself is unfair.

But the starting place for forgiveness is to remember that this is now. It is possible to get in the habit of accumulating grudges and wounds and have them be so much a part of the fabric of our lives that we can’t see when changes have occurred, or the grudge isn’t worth it any more. Life goes on. People change. Systems shift. It’s best to keep that possibility at least in our back pocket so we don’t miss it when it occurs.

A man who was asked by a fellow Holocaust survivor whether he had forgiven the Nazis said, “I am consumed with hatred for them.” His friend replied, “In that case, they still have you in prison.”

Third:

Rachel Naomi Remen once said that forgiveness had been difficult for her because she had always thought of it as a lowering of standards.

I have learned forgiveness is not one act. It is a relationship. I remember saying to my son, “I’d like to do that one over.” Sometimes I had overreacted. Sometimes I hadn’t really communicated what I meant. Sometimes I just wanted to back up and be clear about what he needed to know about civility.

That habit of wanting to do-over in a calmer moment was a way of putting what had happened in context. It was the relationship that was forgiving.

So what about strife worldwide? Do these principles hold on a global level?

William F. Vendley, the Secretary General of Religions for Peace, says that in difficult negotiations he always starts with the children. People can move forward in negotiations when they can remember the children. In South Africa, Bishop Tutu has provided a model of reconciliation which includes confessions of atrocities heard by the victims—empowering both victims and perpetrators to be full participants in the society going forward.

Human beings are capable of great harm, intentionally and as the result of unintended consequences. Knowing that, we still must love broadly, forgive freely, and reconcile as if we were all one family. Which of course we are.

This sermon is adapted for Quest from a chapter in Reaching Deeper: Selected Sermons by Laurel Hallman. Published by Xlibiris, 2008, a copy has been donated to the CLF Library (or (617) 948-6150) and it is available for purchase at Amazon.com and The First Unitarian Church of Dallas.