I'd like to preface this quote with a clear statement that justice and forgiveness aren’t mutually exclusive. Forgiveness is what individuals do for themselves, and justice is what communities do for each other. It’s both/and:
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“Maybe retaliation or holding on to anger about the harm done to me doesn’t actually combat evil. Maybe it feeds it. Because in the end, if we’re not careful, we can actually absorb the worst of our enemy and, on some level, even start to become them.
So what if forgiveness, rather than being like a [weak] way of saying ‘it’s okay’, is actually a way of wielding bolt cutters and snapping the chain that links us. Like it is saying, ‘what you did was so not okay that I refuse to be connected to it anymore.’
Forgiveness is about being a freedom fighter. And free people are dangerous people. Free people aren’t controlled by the past.”
- Nadia Bolz-Weber
So what if forgiveness, rather than being like a [weak] way of saying ‘it’s okay’, is actually a way of wielding bolt cutters and snapping the chain that links us. Like it is saying, ‘what you did was so not okay that I refuse to be connected to it anymore.’
Forgiveness is about being a freedom fighter. And free people are dangerous people. Free people aren’t controlled by the past.”
- Nadia Bolz-Weber
