By Fr. Adolf Washington
Two friends were walking through the desert. They broke into an argument; and one friend slapped the other. The one who got slapped was hurt, but saying nothing, he wrote in the sand: “Today my best friend slapped me.”
They kept walking, until they found an oasis, where they decided to take a bath. The one who was slapped got stuck in the mire and began drowning, but his friend saved him. Being saved from near drowning, he wrote on a stone: “Today my best friend saved my life”.
The friend who had slapped and saved his best friend asked “when I hurt you, you wrote in the sand and now, you write on a stone, why?” The friend replied “when someone hurts us we should write it down in sand where the winds of forgiveness can erase it. But, when someone does something good for us, we must engrave it in stone where no wind can ever erase it.”
Forgiveness is a decision not an emotion. It heals both; the one hurt and the one who causes hurt. To decide to forgive, one needs to see God in others. Mother Teresa wrote “To be able to love one another, we must pray much, for prayer gives a clean heart and a clean heart can see God in our neighbor. If now we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten how to see God in one another.”
The Bible is replete with exhortations to forgive. St. Paul writes “Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you” (Colossians 3:13).
Each one of us are a forgiven people since God unceasingly forgives us. We become forgiving people when we realize this unceasing forgiveness God has for us.
We are invited to be imitators of a forgiving God in that “He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous”. (Matthew 5:45)
Forgiving is an attribute of the courageous. Whatever religion we profess, if we want to truly love, we must make forgiving a habit.
Marriages break-up, parent-children relationships are threatened, friendships split, and employer-employee relationships are strained when there is no forgiveness.
How much have you forgiven?