TruthBook Religious News Blog

March 23, 2008

Act can free you from the pain that holds you captive, some say

By Cheryl Sherry
Post-Crescent staff writer

The Rev. Dottie Mathews never will erase memories of being abused by three close relatives beginning at age 13.

Nor can she forget the man she first saw as rescuer, who later perpetrated and compounded the abuse during their marriage. It was a time she describes as tragic and horrific, not only scarring her but also her three children.

Mathews has, however, chosen to forgive.

What is forgiveness?

Forgiveness, as defined by Webster, is the act of giving up the resentment held against an offender.

While forgiving someone who has done you wrong is essential to mental health, forgiveness can be a difficult thing for people who aren't clear about its purpose.

Carlos Herrera, Hispanic ministries coordinator at St. Therese Church in Appleton, points to Jesus' sacrifices, the ones being celebrated today by Christians, as a path toward finding forgiveness even in the most difficult of circumstances.

"If we forgive each other we are also part of the new power of love that the Lord risen has given us," Herrera said. "Therefore we will be apostles of the resurrection, with joy, hope and forgiveness."

Mathews' road to forgiving those who hurt her took more than 20 years and involved taking responsibility for her life.

"My healing involved years of counseling, diving into spiritual practices, shedding buckets of tears, borrowing hope and strength from a community of support when I became shaky — but with all that I trudged forward and moved toward accepting that my past will never not be my past," she said. "The only thing I had any control over was the future I might live."A skilled counselor helped Mathews know she did not bring those past events upon herself. "But that's what children do," she said. "When I realized I didn't make those things happen to me I remember that being very freeing."

Benefits of forgiveness

The need to forgive is often intertwined with other struggles in life, said family therapist Lynda Savage, owner and director of the Center for Family healing, a mental health outpatient clinic in Menasha. Savage also is founder and director of Practical Family Living, a nonprofit Web and radio Christian outreach.

"One needs to hear the person's genuine concern and hurt, anger and loneliness before you say forgiveness is part of your healing, a part of your adjustment, a part of your goal of getting through this," Savage said. "Forgiveness is a part of the process of understanding letting someone off the hook and no longer blaming lets you off the hook and become more free to get unstuck from their pain and hurt."

The practice of forgiveness not only has been shown to reduce anger, hurt, depression and stress, it also leads to greater feelings of hope, compassion and self-confidence. Practicing forgiveness leads to healthy relationships and physical health.

"Living in a state of un-forgiveness is living in a state of stress," Savage said. "And when you are living in a state of stress your body is emitting all kinds of things that we call hormones that are the fight or flight kind of hormones. …That type of stress is hard on your body, hard on your heart. … It's a physiological thing as well as a spiritual thing."

Acting out bitterness

In 2006, the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State University conducted a study on whether child abuse and child neglect caused crime. The findings suggested criminal behavior increases not only with the incidence of maltreatment but also with the severity of maltreatment. Until a child comes to terms with the experience, accepts it and learns to forgive the abuser for what they did, they will never be able to disassociate themselves from the experience.

Many of the troubled and at-risk teenage boys who live at Rawhide Boys Ranch south of New London have been hurt by life, said clinical supervisor Mark Tegtmeier. "They come out of some difficult family situations such as abuse, neglect, family conflict; there are a lot of addictions, a lot of blended family issues as well as many others."

Rawhide is a Christian-based organization that works to equip at-risk boys to become responsible young men through family-centered care, treatment and education. Therapeutic treatment addresses their emotional needs.

Forgiveness, Tegtmeier said, is essentially wiping the debt clean. "You're saying that that person is released and you are letting go. It's a very freeing experience for those that do. A lot of the boys realize they can have peace in their hearts and they can stop feeling revenge or retaliation toward someone that's hurt them. It's a tremendous feeling of release and just a liberation that they experience."

A softer side

There is no universe in which Mathews' abuse or the suffering of others is acceptable, "but it is up to me to say I don't have to carry it around anymore," she said. "I don't have to be identified as their victim anymore. But it took me a lot of years and a lot of tears and a lot of counseling and enormous love for my children, which was the motivator.

"There's a Buddhist writer, Pema Chodron, who says when you can touch the center of your sorrow and let it soften you then can be useful in helping to heal the world. Don't hide from it. Don't deny that it happened, but really go there and touch it and realize this is the truth and allow it to soften you.

Forgiveness, Mathews said, is "acknowledging my past will never not be my past, so tomorrow I can move on. And that one I can do something about."

Labels: Cheryl Sherry, Dottie Mathews, forgiveness