Forgiveness is an easy concept until someone actually does something very bad to us. Somethings are easy to forgive, while others are a lot harder. While it may be hard to forgive someone, we need to do it not only for ourselves but for the other person as well.
We’ve all done something to offend someone else and have had to ask for forgiveness at some point. We wouldn’t want others who we offended to be angry with us forever, so we should forgive those who offended us as well. Just think how bad the world would be without forgiveness. We probably would’ve blown each other up by now.
When we hold grudges, we bury stress within ourselves and it affects not only our spiritual life, but our physical body as well. Letting go of anger is a very releasing and freeing feeling. Life is too short to hold grudges. It’s just not worth it. Forgiveness can also change the offender.
Mehmet Ali Ağca shot four times at Pope John Paul II and nearly killed him. The Pope later met with his shooter to forgive him face to face. After being released from prison, Mehmet Ali Ağca visited the grave of Pope John Paul II and expressed a desire to convert to Christianity. That shooting affected Pope John Paul II for the rest of his life and yet he still forgave him.
Maria Goretti was a poor Italian 11 year old girl who was involved in an attempted rape by a 20 year old man named Alessandro Serenelli. When Maria fought back, he stabbed her many times. She endured many painful surgeries without anesthesia to try to save her life, but the doctors weren’t able to save her. This was also horrible for Maria’s mother because her husband had already passed away and this left her with five other kids to raise by herself. She would eventually have them taken away from her as well as she could no longer care for them. Maria not only forgave Alessandro before she died, but she wanted him to be in Heaven with her one day. Alessandro was sentenced to 30 years in prison and while he was there, Maria appeared to him in a dream and gave him a flower for each stab wound that he inflicted on her. This started his conversion process. He was later released from prison and begged Maria’s mother to forgive him. She said if Maria can forgive you, how can I not forgive you as well. Eventually, Alessandro joined the Order of Friars Minor Capuchin, and when Maria Goretti was canonized in 1950, he was present at the ceremony.
Jesus came to show us the way to Heaven and mankind killed Him. If God can forgive us for committing that horrible act against Him, we should be able to forgive those who have done bad to us as well. If we can’t forgive others, how could we ever step foot in the confessional again? The answer is we couldn’t. In addition to being sorry for our sins, we have to forgive those who sin against us as well in order to obtain forgiveness for our sins. In the Our Father prayer, we pray for God to forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. We know this prayer by heart and can spit it out easily, but we should take our time and pay attention to the words that we are saying.
Let us embrace forgiveness like Pope John Paul II and Maria Goretti. It’s easy to hold a grudge and not forgive others, but the lack of forgiveness will eventually destroy us. No one said forgiveness is easy, but it’s not only rewarding but contagious as well. Let’s go out and make the world a better place.
