Reflection on Forgiveness and Religion, July 22, 2014
Today is
momentous. The 2’s make sense. 2 is a pair, and two 2’s is also a pair. I woke this morning grateful not to be in a
mental institution! Sleep really does
help to pull things together, assign meaning.
Then I poured two separate cups of coffee. My roommate was not at home. I must not feel alone any more.
I wrote many
months ago that forgiveness is allowing someone to be fully human, without fear
of reprisal. It is allowing the ice to
melt, and then swimming in the soft, harmless water of memory. How can I be angry with anyone who has
earnestly and out of love tried to help?
I forgive me and I forgive anyone else whom I perceived to be
manipulative or untruthful. Whether
real, illusory, or some variant of the two, the release is the same. Forgiveness is not absolution. It is not a permission to turn from the truth,
especially the ugly, simple truths, such as imperfection, ego, or the blunders
of human nature. What looks inelegant
today might eventually be seen as a new dance move.
I wish justice
would be more closely linked to the truth about humanity. Maybe fewer of us would be shouting for blood
every time we screwed up. There is a
reason that those we might characterize as abhorrent (or similar such terms) do
what they do, whether criminal or not.
Calling them abhorrent only serves our egos, and perhaps as a warning to
others that nonconformity will not be tolerated. This is not a message to send. Do no harm, this is the message. I guess that means I can’t follow through on
my threat to kick someone’s ass. Yeah,
like I would have.
Why do I feel
so whole, so calm, today? People lie and
then deflect their lies because of insecurity about their future. “This is illegal in California and Georgia.”
I heard that just before starting down the rabbit hole. Illegality does not make something inherently
wrong. It was a too-long journey,
designed to help a man who had forgotten who he was - me. Because I knew something was amiss, and because
I sensed an unsolicited invasion of privacy based on circumstantial information
- information that nonetheless fairly accurately
described a drug-using me as a man whose moral compass had apparently gone
askew, and aided and abetted by another man, now forgiven - it all became a
game of hide-n-seek, of clay to be molded.
“You don’t want to end up like him, to make his same mistakes.” This is
what I heard. Though I never would have
even entertained such a mistake, I can see why folks thought as they did. Like father, like son. J As an aside, I hope that man can forgive me
from beyond the grave. He knows
everything that needs to be forgiven. It
was rather brilliant, some might even say supernatural, such was the winding
path I created to lead myself out of this Forest of Darkness, to use my own
metaphor from childhood, while finding courage enough to go back in, if need
be. I knew what I knew, and then was
made to doubt. I feared talking because
I would appear insane. It seemed like
folks feared me, unnecessarily. I felt
judged and manipulated - my entire sex life under the microscope, eyes
ever-watchful. That with which I had
never had issues became symbolic of barbarism, or of something unclean and
prohibited, of harmful to self and others, of sin, that man-made concept used to
control others.
I had never
realized the full extent of the negative impact of religion on the psyche. Others did not realize the full impact of
secretive therapy on an unwilling, or rather, uninformed and unknowing, target. (Seriously?
That’s how it felt, anyway.) In
reality, it was just me being sexual and loving it, fully. “It never goes away,” a friend once said to
me. He was right. We must embrace all of ourselves, fully,
without judgment and without harm to self or others. (I’ve said this over and over - just look at
past writing - so that is proof enough that I believe what I believe and need
not keep repeating it.) Religion has had
even worse effects on others. I’m lucky
to escape relatively unscathed - and trust that that will prove to be the case
in the long term. Reform the religion,
getting back to basics, keeping it simple, but do not prosecute any man
victimized by it. Hurt people hurt
people, so address the hurt. Prosecution
is for persecutors.
This is an
incomplete picture, full thoughts and experiences funneled from pen to
page. Writing is a summation, a winnowing
of rich and complex expressions of that which is. Sometimes vague is the only option. There is much I don’t know.
I feel whole
and calm because I realize that my truth has always been within me.
Never shy from
the truth.
