Friday, December 25, 2009

Saying Sorry - About Forgiveness

Our senior mobile home park has a table in our community mailroom that is a trading-center. You leave something you no longer want or use; you feel free to take something someone else has left.

This past week, I picked up the November Saturday Evening Post. Now, I have not read the Post in years. I thought it went out of business. I brought it home. I ended up reading it from cover to cover.

One article, "Saying Sorry," by Mitch Albom, is worth your reading, and you can click on the article title at the start of this paragraph and read it online. How's that for service?

I loved how Rabbi Albert Lewis explained his theory of forgiveness. I loved his explanation of their tradition, when at a friend or loved one's coffin, of asking for forgiveness for anything we might have done in our lifetime to that person. The Rabbi, however, took it a step further. He could not see waiting for a person to die before forgiving them. So he made it a practice of doing it during his lifetime.

What I especially loved, and I really want to adopt his habit, was the way he chose to defuse differences before they even began... he did it when the difference of opinion first became apparent. You must read his words because I cannot put it better than he did.

Father, thank you for giving me the chance to read this article, for understanding more about forgiveness and about forgiving, and bless the person who left the magazine for you to guide into my hands, and to share with others.

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