The Paths of Forgiveness
Three caveats to start out... First, this will be the last post about my tattoo for a while I think. Second, I know this is the same photo as my last post. Third, content warning...There’s discussion of clergy sex abuse.
A few days ago, I got pulled in by a clickbait headline from the New York Post’s twitter feed that said, “Pope calls sex abusers ‘children of God’ deserving of ‘love.” The comments on the twitter post were both completely understandable because of the Catholic church’s horrific actions over the decades around this but also predictable based on people simply reading the headline and not the article itself (or the interview on which it was based).
Pope Francis was responding to the following question:
I would like to ask a question on the topic of Christian love for those who have committed sexual abuse. The Gospel asks us to love, but how do we love at the same time people who have experienced abuse and their abusers? God loves everyone. He loves them, too. But what about us? Without ever covering anything up, of course, how do we love abusers? I would like to offer the compassion and love that the Gospel asks for everyone, even the enemy. But how is this possible?
He responded this way:
It is not easy at all. Today we understand that the reality of abuse is very broad: there is sexual abuse, psychological abuse, economic abuse, migrant abuse. You refer to sexual abuse. How do we approach, how do we talk to the abusers for whom we feel revulsion? Yes, they too are children of God. But how can you love them? It’s a powerful question. The abuser is to be condemned, indeed, but as a brother. Condemning him is to be understood as an act of charity. There is a logic, a form of loving the enemy that is also expressed in this way. And it is not easy to understand and to live out. The abuser is an enemy. Each of us feels this because we empathize with the suffering of the abused. When you hear what abuse leaves in the hearts of abused people, the impression you get is very powerful. Even talking to the abuser involves revulsion; it’s not easy. But they are God’s children too. They deserve punishment, but they also deserve pastoral care. How do we provide that? No, it is not easy. You are right.
I wanted to share those in full because I think it is only fair that we don’t pull just a few lines out just to get clicks on a story (cough...NY Post... cough). The headline from the Post implies that Pope Francis didn’t acknowledge the reality of the abuse and the hurt and the suffering that the abusers and the church as a whole has inflicted and also that he did not acknowledge the reality of the consequences of the actions of the abusers. (Side note - it is easy to pick on the Catholic Church here, but more and more is coming out about how other branches of the church have done the exact same thing - covering up abuse, shuffling abusers around, and ignoring the victims).
But Pope Francis does get to the heart of one of the most vexing parts of the Christian faith - the radicalness of forgiveness and grace. Does the grace of God cover everything that a person can do? Or are there actions that are so heinous or so widespread that nothing can be done? Is there a point when a person is no longer considered to be one created in the image of God?
As I have been chewing on this the last few days (and also sharing in worship yesterday about the ways in which we make radical steps towards one another in times of conflict and disagreement), I went back to the same photo that I used in my previous post. The contrast in this photo speaks to me of the challenges of forgiveness.
We can engage forgiveness as if it is a fixed and rigid process that definitely has dead ends like the bricks in the background. I know I have wrestled with this in my own life - are there things that God won’t forgive? Are there things for which I cannot forgive myself? Are there things I cannot forgive in others? And, based on many conversations over the years, I am not the only one who asks these questions.
Or we can approach forgiveness like the labyrinth. It isn’t a simple straight-line process and there are many twists and turns. But if we stay with it, we will get to the heart of God just as the path of the labyrinth will always take someone to the center. In this case, forgiveness is something that is possible but it takes time and it takes work to get there. And paths of forgiveness are both for the one who took the action and the one who was hurt by it. The one who was hurt has their own path toward forgiveness just as the one needing forgiveness has their own separate path as well.
It is important to note that forgiveness doesn’t always mean reconciling or renewing the relationship. This could be due to safety, depth of the hurt, or a host of other things. But the work of forgiveness is often about coming to the point where the inflicted hurt no longer controls our lives and one can move on. In that way, the labyrinth is an appropriate metaphor as there is not only the journey in, but also the journey out with its own twists and turns until moving out into a new, wide, and open space.
There is also the reality of justice and punishment both in God’s eyes and in our “earthly” life. For those who abused children in the Catholic Church (or other organizations), consequences are a necessary reality. For other actions, there are similar realities. But I do feel that there is a distinction between justice and forgiveness.
So to go back to Pope Francis’ response. I think he’s absolutely right - forgiveness is hard work and there isn’t a simple and clear answer. But what I do know is that God weeps with those who are hurting and with those who have been wounded. God grieves the things we humans do to one another. And somehow God’s forgiveness is greater and wider than we can imagine. I am grateful that God’s forgiveness is more the path of the labyrinth rather than the rigidity of the bricks.