Forgiveness has been defined as the willingness to abandon one’s
right to resentment, condemnation, and revenge toward an offender or
group who acts unjustly. Dr. Marilyn Armour, a family therapist who
worked with Holocaust survivors in order to find out what these survivors had done to make sense of what had happened to them, writes:
“The whole idea of forgiveness is an intentional act by the victim. It’s
not something that just happens.”
Forgiveness doesn’t mean that there will be no consequences.
Forgiveness doesn’t mean letting an abuser continue abusive patterns.
Forgiveness means, instead, that we turn our resentment and our desire
for revenge over to God. If not, the anger, the bitterness, the resentment, and the hatred will make whatever that person or persons did to
us even worse.