The Challenge of Forgiveness

“To understand everything is to forgive everything.” Buddha

One of the most difficult challenges you might encounter in your life is forgiving those who hurt you without necessarily forgetting the events of the past. I was thinking about this during one of my trips to El Salvador. I traveled with a delegation from Santa Clara University to the commemoration of the 25th Anniversary of the killing of the Jesuits at the University of Central America. The massacre involved six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her teenage daughter. My colleague Margaret Russell,  a scholar of U.S. constitutional law and civil rights, puts it in this way: “I view the opportunity to remember these martyrs as a kind of ‘cleansing moment’ in the struggle for social justice . ‘Cleansing moments’ is a phrase used by Myrlie Evers, widow of assassinated U.S. civil rights leader Medgar Evers, to describe the transcendent power of both historical memory and legal redress in reopening past human rights cases not only to identify perpetrators, but also to recognize and heal the societal wounds inflicted by human rights abuses.”

When I read her opinion piece at the San Jose Mercury News, I was challenged to think not only of those moments in history when entire communities suffer from severe oppression, but also to those ‘cleansing moments’ in my life when I have to hold together memory and forgiveness as a way of moving forward toward healing and reconciliation.

In the Buddhist tradition, forgiveness is linked to “understanding,” meaning not forgetting, but investigating the source of suffering. As the investigation of your own suffering begins, the suffering of others comes into the picture as well. The challenge is not to see yourself as separate but as part of a net of interconnectedness that ultimate seeks liberation from suffering. What do you need to hold in memory and forgiveness in your life? What kind of challenge do you face as you investigate your own source of suffering?

Try this:

• Take a few minutes, breathing in and out, to come back to your center.

• As you are breathing in, ask yourself, “What is this?  What am I sensing right now?”  Notice all the sensations, feelings, emotions. Hold it in the space created by your breathing and lovingkindness.

• After listening and seeing clearly what is, breathe out all the tension and communicate your gratitude for the new insight.

• When you are ready, write down your insights about the nature of your challenge regarding forgiveness, and the steps you will take to remove the obstacles toward transformation.

Peace, Juan