Forgiveness: Not Just for Religious Spaces Anymore

“To err is human; to forgive, divine,” wrote Alexander Pope in 1711. Whether it is divine or not, a vast body of research shows forgiveness is a powerful tool that fosters mental and physical health. For that reason, professors around the country are lobbying to teach forgiveness through a secular lens in non-religious settings like schools, The Washington Post reports.

Suzanne Freedman, a professor of education at the University of Northern Iowa, believes that in light of “the increase in school shootings, bullying, violence and discrimination experienced by children and adolescents,” schools are failing to keep pace with the increased trauma and deep wounds young people are grappling with. They need tools to help students cope. Enter forgiveness.

Freedman is part of a research team led by Robert Enright, a professor of educational psychology at the University of Wisconsin at Madison, who has invested three decades of work into helping young people cultivate forgiveness. The team has developed workbooks and curricula used by educators and students around the world.

Why forgive?

The benefits of forgiveness have been empirically demonstrated through research. Enright notes that there are “now well over a thousand scientific papers on the psychological impact of practicing forgiveness.” Here are just a few of the evidence-based benefits:

• People who choose to forgive are less anxious, less angry, have lower blood pressure, lower cholesterol levels, and sleep better, according to Karen Swartz, the director of the Adolescent Depression Awareness Program, a project of Johns Hopkins Medicine.
• Children who learn how to forgive are better adjusted socially and have higher levels of self-esteem than those who don’t, studies show.
• Kids who forgive even perform better academically than those who do not.

Forgiveness in action

Enright has taken his work around the world, notably to Northern Ireland, a country torn apart by decades of religious and sectarian warfare. Mount St. Michael’s Primary School, a Catholic school near Belfast has partnered with a Protestant school in the area, offering to forgiveness education to an integrated class of 7-to-9-year-olds.

“We really need this over here,” said St. Michael’s Principal Philip Lavery said. “We teach children how to read and write, but we have to spend more time teaching them how to live, how to be members of a society.”

By all accounts, it is working. One young participant wrote in their forgiveness journal, “We need to learn this to be friends,” while another noted that only through forgiveness and altruistic love “can we leave the past behind us.”

How do you go about forgiving?

The first step is to acknowledge the pain and hurt another caused, and to recognize the anger it left in its wake. Enright stresses that it is important not to sweep negative emotions under the rug. Only after acknowledging them and making a conscious choice to forgive does a teacher encourage kids to reframe their view of the offender.

What works in N. Ireland works in Iowa

Professor Freedman spent a year teaching forgiveness to fifth graders at a low-income school in Waterloo, Iowa. She gave her students dollar store “magic glasses,” to “expand their view of the person who hurt them, to see that there are reasons for their behavior, they are not just a monster, but a complex individual,” deserving of kindness and respect.

Freedman stressed that we don’t forgive for the sake of the offender but for ourselves and our own mental well-being. Amiaha Weatherly, one of her former students echoed the truth of that statement: “When I forgave this person for the things they did to me, it felt like weights coming off my shoulders. I felt like a completely different person.” Weatherly added, “I tell my friends to forgive instead of holding grudges because everyone is human and humans make mistakes. That helped me forgive someone I have been fighting with for years.”

Another former student, Shyanne Sporrer, now a grad student in educational psychology at the University of Northern Iowa, used to view forgiveness as a sign of weakness that lets the wrongdoer off the hook. The class transformed her opinion, enabling her to see that holding onto a grudge makes one weak rather than strong, perpetually locking one in the role of the victim.

“Forgiving does not mean you are giving up power,” Sporrer noted. “On the contrary, when you forgive, you are the person who is in control. By forgiving, you can empower yourself to move forward from the anger and resentment to be a better version of yourself.”

Limits to forgiveness education

Frederic Luskin, PhD, the director of the Stanford University Forgiveness Project, cautions that forgiveness must be treated carefully with very young children, who must first do the work of developing healthy ego boundaries and a sense of right and wrong.

“You want to teach kids that whatever happened to them is wrong,” explained Luskin. “By no means does forgiveness minimize the hurt and loss. It’s only when kids can articulate the harm, can say why it is wrong — before then forgiveness is not appropriate.”

Otherwise, there’s a risk that a child might internalize blame when someone wrongs them, especially if that person is an adult in a position of power. True forgiveness can only occur when you know you have been wronged and then freely choose to release your anger and bitterness about it.

Forgiveness and social justice

Luskin explains that forgiveness work is “an ongoing struggle that often entails grappling with profound injustices within society.” He has been working with MBA student Jonathan Adanene, who started an after-school program for 9-13 year-olds in inner-city Minneapolis after George Floyd’s murder.

“We spend a lot of the class talking about who they forgave and how it made them feel,” Adanene said. “Many of them never even heard about forgiveness before, and they don’t see a lot of it in their lives.” Adanene shared that the cycle of retaliation and gun violence in the Black community there has been painful to watch. “Kids tend to hang onto things too long. I want to help them to break that cycle.”

Adanene has been encouraged by the young people in his group. Eleven-year-old Jameer, inspired to forgive his brother and mother after a fight, exclaimed, “It’s just amazing. I’ve never been so happy in my life.”

To help support the project, Adanene designed a T-shirt emblazoned with his philosophy. On the front: “Choose forgiveness.” On the back are the words, “Forgive others, not because they deserve forgiveness, but because you deserve peace.”

Read the full Washington Post article here.

 

Schiffman, Richard. “Moving lessons on forgiveness out of religious spaces and into schools.” The Washington Post, 27 Jan 2023, https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2023/01/27/forgiveness-teaching-schools/.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash