Ash Wednesday 2016

I've thought a lot about the central message of the gospel on Ash Wednesday.  To pray and, more than that, to repent, without anyone to watch.

And approve.  And encourage.  And forgive.  And soothe.  Overall to approve.

A lot of things in the last year have converged in my mind tonight to make me think of how to live it better.

The letter I wrote to two friends trying to explain a guilt for a crime I didn't think anyone else would understand.  A thing that was not so much a sin as a failure to do a kindness.  A kindness that I knew would look like insanity to my companions but knew in that moment to be right.  They only received it months later and wrote back with forgiveness and a question mark, knowing it wasn't really there's to give but wanting it for me anyway.

I told them, lightly, that they wrote just in time to remind me of it.  When the sting was gone enough that I could look at it more squarely.  Without drowning in guilt I couldn't explain properly.

That's one of the reasons people apologize.  They are drowning in guilt.  Saying it makes it easier.  Putting it in words makes it manageable.  What can be spoken can be managed.  Probably untrue, but it feels true.

I read a review of Adele's new album that pointed out the problem with a woman who "must have called a thousand times / to tell you I'm sorry / for breaking your heart."  Saying simply: that's too many times.  They don't want to talk to you.  If you're the one who hurt them, then the kind thing, the making-amends thing, is to back away.  Not demand reconciliation.  That's what a thousand calls is.  Not just a woman drowning in guilt, but a drowning woman demanding you give her your life vest.

I'm not saying you shouldn't.  But if you're the one who wrecked the boat, you don't get to be self-righteous about who gets in the lifeboat.

There's a television show called Finding Carter that started unbelievably strong and went off the rails pretty quickly and nearly got it back then just took a nosedive.  It's about a teenage girls who gets arrested for a misdemeanor and finds out her fingerprints match those of a kidnap victim.  Her "mother" kidnapped her, and her real family is taking her back.

But then there's so much drama, and the kidnapper is acquitted, and everyone somehow becomes deeply judgmental that the biological mom and the non-kidnapped daughter refuse to forgive the kidnapper.

You shouldn't have to be kind to the woman who ruined your life and actively put your life in danger.  You should be allowed to cut ties.  The person who hurt you should give you that kindness.

The last book of the Divergent series described it possibly best.

To me, when someone wrongs you, you both share the burden of that wrongdoing - the pain of it weighs on both of you. Forgiveness, then, means choosing to bear the full weight all by yourself. Caleb's betrayal is something we both carry, and since he did it, all I've wanted is for him to take its weight away from me. I am not sure that I'm capable of shouldering it all myself - not sure that I am strong enough, or good enough.

Not everyone shares my love of Veronica Roth, and especially since the movie it is compared very negatively to The Hunger Games which I actually think is LESS well-written.  But didn't she nail this?

Asking for forgiveness is inherently selfish.  It can be done for the right reasons, and I believe that the majority of people deserve it.  No.  That is cowardice.  I believe that all people deserve it.  That is one of my core beliefs, deep down in my soul.

But ask for it quietly.  And you must accept that someone might not be ready to give it.

If you can do this, let the person you hurt refuse to take away your pain without fuss or complaint -- without loud lamentation that turns public sentiment from them to you, if you can be that strong and carry that hurt and panic: then perhaps you will glimpse the faintest edge of the truth of how much God loves you.  How powerful He is to forgive.

Because we hurt Him so profoundly with every wrong we do.  And He forgives us utterly.  He bore all our penance.  What we offer Him is for ourselves, our own healing, our own reminders not to repeat.

So repent quietly, without asking others to shoulder any of your pain.  Ask God what will heal your soul, not what will make you feel less pain for your actions.