Forgiveness is illogical and unjust, but the only alternative to endless bloodshed and hatred.
I. "The Sunflower" by Simon Wiesenthal.
A. SS soldier Karl asks for forgiveness.
B. 30 troops had been killed by booby traps in Dnyepropetrovsk,
Ukraine, and so 300 Jews where herded into a three-story
building and set ablaze.
"I am left here with my guilt," Karl concluded at last." In the
last hours of my life you are with me. I do not know who you are,
I know only that you are a Jew and that is enough. I know that
what I have told you is terrible. In the long nights while I have
been waiting for death, time and time again I have longed to talk
about it to a Jew and beg forgiveness from him. Only I didn't know
whether there were any Jews left.... I know what I am asking is
almost too much for you, but without your answer I cannot die in
peace." Simon Wiesenthal, an architect in his early twenties, now
a prisoner dressed in a shabby uniform marked with the yellow Star
of David, felt the entire weight of his race bearing down on him.
He stared out the window at the sunlit courtyard. He looked at
the eyeless heap of bandages lying in the bed." At last I made up
my mind," he writes, "and without a word I left the room."
A. Haunted by the hospital scene, he asked 32 people of various
faiths and backgrounds to comment.
"What would you have done in my place?" he asked.
"Did I do right?"
1) Out of 32 writers, only 6 said he had done wrong.
2) He had no authority to forgive on behalf of others.
3) The crimes were too enormous to be forgiven.
a) "Let the SS man die unshriven. Let him go to hell."
4) The whole concept of forgiveness is wrong.
a) It is merely an act of sensual pleasure.
II. Unforgiveness has a terrible, crystalline logic.
A. In a world of unspeakable atrocity, forgiveness seems
unjust, unfair, irrational.
1) Philosopher Herbert Marcuse said, "One cannot, and should
not, go around happily killing and torturing and then,
when the moment has come, simply ask, and receive,
forgiveness."
B. There is conflict between justice and forgiveness in Christianity.
1) Some, like Luther, assign justice to Caesar and forgiveness
to the church (and individuals).
2) Is it too much to expect high ethical ideas to be transferred
to the brutal world of politics and diplomacy?
III. Comparisons with Bosnia.
A. Forgiveness has one thing going for it - it is the alternative.
1) Where unforgiveness reigns, essayist Lance Morrow has pointed
out, a Newtonian law comes into play:For every atrocity
there must be an equal and opposite atrocity.
2) Serbs are following the terrible logic of unforgiveness.
a) The Nazis tried to "cleanse" the Serbs in WWII.
b) Serbs kill tens of thousands; Croats killed hundreds of
thousands.
3) One major flaw in the inexorable law of revenge: it never
settles the score.
a) The Turks got revenge in 1389, at the Battle of Kesovo;
the Croats got it in the 1940s, now it's our turn, say
the Serbs.
b) If everyone were to follow the "eye for an eye" principle
of justice, said Gandhi, the whole world would go
blind.
c) "As long as you cling to 'justice' you will never be
guiltless of injustice... In reality, insistence on
justice is servitude. Only forgiveness frees us from
the injustice of others." Theologian Romano Guardini
B. Examples of law of unforgiveness in history:
1) "Godfather" trilogy.
2) IRA bombings because of atrocities committed by Cromwell.
3) Republics of Soviet Union.(Chechnya)
4) Iran's plea for apology from President Carter.
IV. Forgiveness in the arena of nations.
A. Germany and reparations to Israel. East Germany followed.
B. 1983 mass by Pope John Paul II in Warsaw, with throngs of
worshippers passing the Communist party's Central Committee
Building and chanting in unison, "We forgive you! We forgive
you!"
C. Civil War in America. Tecumseh Sherman and "scorched earth."
D. Racism in America shows that forgiveness in itself does not
undo injustice. Yet blacks voted for George Wallace.
V. Forgiveness focuses on individual, personal acts.
A. The cure, like a vaccine, must be applied one person at a time.
1) Martin Luther King, Jr., in Birmingham jail.
2) Corrie Ten Boom.
3) John Paul II went into the bowels of Rome's Rebibbia prison
to visit Mehmet Ali Agca, a hired assassin who had tried
to kill him and nearly succeeded. "I forgive you," said
the Pope, as video cameras whirred.
4) There will be no escape until our hearts are changed.
B. The Pope is an image of one who did not survive an
assassination - Jesus.
1) Pilate, soldiers, etc, were "just doing their job,"
similar to excuse of Nazis.
2) The Cross put an end to the law of eternal consequences.
3) The leap from personal forgiveness to corporate forgiveness
crosses a deep chasm.We need only to look at Christian
history after the Cross.
C. Forgiveness can be a powerful weapon in the making of peace.
[see also HolwickID #986 and #17244]
