Beyond the Reach of Forgiveness

Alexander Pope told us “to err is human, to forgive divine.” 

It is a comforting platitude that looks great on coffee mugs and T-shirts. Yet, I have always felt that a touch of clarification was needed: To err is easy, to forgive often seems impossible. 

One need only glimpse at the daily headlines to confirm my admittedly dour addition. Israel seemingly cannot forgive Hamas’ recent addition to the unceasing attacks of its neighbors, while Hamas and its allies are equally unforgiving of Israel’s decisive response. Ukraine is reluctant to forgive Putin’s unprovoked attack, while Putin remains unforgiving of western support of Ukraine’s surprisingly adamant resistance.

While these two international conflicts dominate our media, a deeper dive into the state of the world reveals a depressing number of “pools of intractable differences” separating “us” and “them,” supporting Kipling’s lament; “East is east, and West is west, and never the twain shall meet,” without divine intervention. Assuming, that is, that we were to agree on whose divinity takes precedence. A detente history tells us is unlikely.

Would that we were able to take comfort by focusing our attention closer to home. But we can’t. Our government is more reminiscent of scuffles on an elementary school playground than a forum for reasoned debate designed to succor the needs of “we the people” -  “Yeah, our team has only 3 felony convictions. Your guy has 34 and counting!” How about “You will both stay after school and write ‘I will play nice with others’ one hundred times on the blackboard and then clean the erasers.” Jeeez.

While the big picture would suffice to drive us to drink, the smaller image is no guarantee of inner peace. I heard a couple of years ago of someone somewhere in the various webs of extended families in which I am embedded had actually created a list of people forbidden to attend their funeral! True story, the details of which I have thankfully repressed, but talk about “beyond the reach of forgiveness!”

I came to my personal mantra of Distilled Harmony: Foster Harmony, Enable Beauty, Distill Complexity, and Oppose Harm,  partly in the hope that it would minimize discord in my life. And to a certain extent it has. But there is a potential fly in the ointment - oppose harm. 

In every conflict I have enumerated in this post - international to interpersonal - the bugaboo of “us versus them” raises its ugly head. The “other” becomes the party whose harm we must oppose, and that opposition - depending upon degree - often places them “beyond the reach of forgiveness.” 

In family court they call those “irreconcilable differences.” And while the precise percentage of marriages that end “beyond the reach of forgiveness” is debated, it is a number that every couple tends to ignore when headed for the alter. Less visible, but equally distressing are relationships within families and among friends that end in fractures where opposing some perceived harm prevents the fostering of harmony. These situations often evolve when an individual either sees themselves as harmed by another, or wishes to protect another individual from harm, and so must place the “source of harm” at least “beyond the reach of forgiveness” and perhaps beyond anything. The internet calls one form of this negative cycle “ghosting.” You simply make the harmful other “disappear” - a rather totalitarian solution.

“Well, Schrag, thanks for ruining my day!”  I know, I know, and I am truly sorry. But I do have some positive suggestions.

First, both Pope and Kipling lay this conundrum on the shoulders of divine intervention, and if you have influence in that arena, please feel free to utilize it. However, here are some more secular suggestions as to how we might deal with instances in our lives that may have somehow crept “beyond the reach of forgiveness.”

While Google has removed its classic mantra “Don’t Be Evil” from its corporate code it seems a good idea for us to revive it in ours. And couple it with this: Don’t Escalate. Bite back the “deserved” response. Or to steal a phrase from the medical community: primum non nocere, or “first, do no harm.” More simply, chill.

Next let me steal my email signature which you usually see when The Wall is sent to you:

“Who we are is a quality of the moment. What we have done in the past cannot be undone, and what we have promised for the future remains but a promise. So live each moment in the awareness that it defines you.”

To condense that for this particular post: Let bygones be bygones. Don’t dwell on the past, live face to the future.

Internationally, those issues are pretty much beyond our control except as we seek to influence those who do have an impact. For us here in the USA, that remains a question for the ballot box and your checkbook. In those instances, I do come back to Distilled Harmony, and seek, to vote for and support, to what extent possible, candidates who advocate inclusiveness and loving kindness and eschew conflict and denigration. 

Sometimes a tough task. And tho’ a true child of the sixties who has carried my share of signs in the streets, I have lost touch with the more overt manifestations of discord on college campuses where I spent most of my life. The intent always seems to rail against those one has declared to be “beyond the reach of forgiveness.” A strategy based in intimidation and conflict - signposts on the very road to a world “beyond the reach of forgiveness.”

Interpersonally, I, to re-emphasize, will revert again to my email signature, and while not denying my past, occasionally spectacular, stumbles, will seek to do better in the all important, and uniquely controllable, present.