I read the Laura Parrott Perry thoughtful posting on forgiveness and felt a pull to add to the conversation. I see forgiveness as a process. When I am harmed and tell the one who harmed me of how I feel, if the transgressor offers up a sincere, heartfelt apology, forgiveness automatically wells up, practically unbidden. And since my father never asked for forgiveness I haven’t forgiven him – nor can I, since he’s dead.
I often turn to the wisdom of Dr. Judith Lewis Herman and her book Trauma and Recovery* for subjects like this. Here’s what Herman has to say:
[The idea] of forgiveness often becomes a cruel torture, because it remains out of reach for most ordinary human beings. Folk wisdom recognizes that to forgive is divine. And even divine forgiveness, in most religions, is not unconditional. True forgiveness cannot be granted until the perpetrator has sought and earned it through confession, repentance and restitution.
Genuine contrition in a perpetrator is a rare miracle. Fortunately, the survivor does not need to wait for it. Her healing depends on the discovery of restorative love in her own life; it does not require that this love be extended to the perpetrator. Once the survivor has mourned the traumatic event, she may be surprised to discover how uninteresting the perpetrator has become and how little concern she feels for him, but this disengaged feeling is not the same as forgiveness. (p. 190)
Herman’s forgiveness trifecta is right on: confession, repentance and restitution. In all the “forgiveness” stories I’ve heard from survivors in my writing workshops, every once in a while I hear a perpetrator confessed, a few say there was repentance, but I don’t believe I’ve heard of any restitution. What would that look like?
I’ve worked hard to purge and heal from the rage, guilt and shame of incest, which has delivered me not to a place of forgiveness but rather to a place of acceptance. This acceptance is a releasing of the yearning for the past to be different. Ultimately this acceptance offers me a solid sense of peace and reconciliation: I was born to a father who was unequipped to be a loving father and a mother unable to protect me. That’s just the way it was.
*Published by BasicBooks. a division of Harper Collins, 1992
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