FORGIVING OTHERS--AND OURSELVES

The Mission is a profoundly religious movie, one that I chose to highlight in this Sunday’s homily for its depiction of forgiveness, reconciliation, healing & transformation. It is interesting to me that the screenplay was written by Robert Bolt, who also wrote the play A Man For All Seasons (he adapted his own play for the movie version). These are two of the most powerful of all scripts in discussion the roles of conscience and religious belief in public and private life: written by a man who was a self-professed agnostic (one who, I am sure, was very dear to our Lord’s heart).

Capt Mendoza’s rehabilitation really begins with a moment of grace, not of “works.” Forgiveness, like all expressions of love, cannot be earned—it is given freely, and must be freely received (or not). Yet it must be validated by the change of life which is the purpose of the gift in the first place: you may be given a boat as a present, but its purpose is not to remain in dry-dock... And so (as James tells us) "faith" without "works" is dead.

All politicians who claim they believe one thing "personally" but will not let that interfere with their involvement in making public policy need to pay attention to the dialogue between More and Cardinal Wolsey in A Man For All Seasons:

Wolsey: ...certain measures, perhaps regrettable, perhaps not...All right, regrettable! But necessary to get us an heir! Now explain how you as Councilor of England can obstruct those measures for the sake of your own, private, conscience.

More: Well...I believe, when statesmen forsake their own private conscience for the sake of their public duties...they lead their country by a short route to chaos.

Then, in the face of the imminent slaughter of native Americans in modern-day Paraguay by the Portuguese and Spanish slave traders, the Jesuits try to decide what to do to defend them. Rodrigo (formerly a mercenary) wants to take up arms; Gabriel (the head of the Jesuit mission) wants simply to die in witness. He says:

If might is right, then there is no room for love in the world. And maybe so, Rodrigo, maybe so. But I don't have the strength to live in such a world.

These are monumentally weighty issues, and Bolt gives them appropriately weighty consideration, with no easy designations of right or wrong (at least, within the confines of the Jesuit community itself). It's the old struggle in Gethsemane--"Lord, shall we take the sword?!" "Not my will, but Thine be done."

How can we factor forgiveness into this equation? I can perhaps forgive what is done to me, but have I the right to speak the word of forgiveness on behalf of others who have not engaged me to speak? Can I require them to forgive, not having experienced the evils and suffering inflicted on them? Can I stand in condemnation of them if they are not (yet) capable of forgiving?

The rabbis have a saying that when a rabbi dies, it's because the discussion and debate on a point of Torah has reached an impasse, and a new voice is needed for the conversation. I have to believe that some such discussion was going on in heaven, and Robert Bolt's was the voice needed to clarify things. What was once said of the great 19th century British educator Thomas Arnold well applies here: "One had better have Arnold's [Bolt's] doubts than many men's certainties."