Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Forgiveness?

It is so uncommon to ask for forgiveness these days. When I do something mean, I usually don't say 'Please, forgive me'. I say 'I apologize' or 'I'm sorry, okay?'. But being sorry and asking for forgiveness isn't the same thing. By apologizing you express how you feel about the particular deed. But if someone has been a D-bag to me, I'd be more interested in his caring about how I feel that how he or she feels. That's how I see it - by apologizing you express your regret, but that doesn't imply you care about whether this other person is actually over the event. I feel that's saying something about the times we live in.


I think that asking for forgiveness is so scarce nowadays, because it's so hard. It requires a hell lot of courage to come to someone to say 'my regret doesn't matter, I hope your mind is at peace and you don't have to go over what has happened'. It's a chivalrous thing to do. We prefer to just say 'I'm sorry, okay?' because that was our holy right (all the every-man-is-created-free blabber) to do the wrong thing, but hey, we're sorry, business done, period.


Today made me think of the moral and historical forgiveness. Can we bear the guilt of our ancestors? Is it the right thing for me to ask you for forgiveness if my grand dad dumped your grand mom? What about Holocaust? Does every German person need to ask for forgiveness of other nations for nazism? 


I think it's a matter of how much you identify with your countrymen. I've never felt that I need to particularly forgive if a German says that he's sorry for how the history turned out. But then again, there are people who cry in the instances like that. People who hug, and yes, they forgive, forgive, forgive. 
It made me think about whether it's really troubling my mind that my grand father had actually killed someone. It's not. But maybe one day if I meet any Russians, I'll go like 'You know, your ancestors messed up the history of my nation. But I ask you to forgive me because a member of my family has once killed two of your countrymen'. I think I'll be alright with that. Morally.


What strikes me is how amazing it is that I can be friends with a person whose ancestors hated my ancestors. That I can marry a person from a country that was an enemy of mine. That if we forgive each other historically, we can form a family and see that everything eventually leads to peace.


Song of the day: Unfold - Marie Digby (it's pop. I KNOW)


Verse of the day: He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.  Micah 6:8

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