The Limits of Forgiveness

Several weeks ago I wrote a post touching on how evangelical teachings on forgiveness make things easy for sex offenders and hard for their victims. Generally, evangelicals believe that those who repent should be forgiven unconditionally, and that those who have been victimized need to forgive those who hurt them and avoid becoming “bitter.” You can see how this might play out in the case of sexual abuse. But in the comment section, several readers pointed out the limits of evangelical forgiveness.

Reader Gimpi1 had this to say:

To me, it seems that forgiveness is link ed to authority. Men are much more likely to be forgiven than women. Pastors can pretty-much demand forgiveness. Since the victims of sexual abuse are generally lower-status than their assailant, the victim is seen as equally, if not more at fault. The victim can’t claim the privilege of rank.

Also, people so focused on forgiveness, conservative Christians are a pretty unforgiving lot when it comes to people who aren’t members of their tribe. Forgiveness appears to follow along sectarian and political lines.

Reader Mariana put it like this:

Another part of the problem is that the principle of forgiveness appears to be applied unevenly.

– To males in positions of power, it is deployed immediately and multiple times (a la Gothard).
– Women don’t seem to have as easy access to a clean slate, at least in practice, if not in theory.

It’s not directly comparable in the situations that Libby brings up about assault/rape victims in this post, because “being bitter” or having PTSD is supposedly still actively sinning, but I’m imagining a case in which there’s a consensual affair with adults. I can’t imagine the whole community embracing the harlot with open arms like they expect these rape victims to embrace their assailant.

So let’s talk about this, shall we? I’m trying to think through all of the things at play.

I was taught that women who had premarital sex could be forgiven for their sin, and I’ve heard it taught in some circles that they could become “born again virgins.” However, I was also taught that having premarital sex will prove damaging to your marriage down the road, and it was very strongly implied that we should feel sorry for people who married non-virgins, because theirs is a tough road to walk. So while you could be forgiven for premarital sex, you would in some sense be forever tainted.

There’s also the idea of having a powerful testimony, though. Christians with past lives of sex and drugs were a testament to the power of Christ to change lives, and were held up with high esteem by the church—and this was not limited to males. But usually these individuals were either leaders themselves or were put on the stage by leaders as a testament to the power of Christ. I don’t know how having a “powerful testimony” played out for individual Christians in day-to-day interactions with the body of believers.

Of course, being a victim does not give one a testimony unless that testimony is about overcoming bitterness and anger to forgive the offender. This mean that an offender may have a testimony while a victim may not, at least as long as she “struggles with bitterness.”

I don’t feel like I saw enough of the inner workings of the church to say for sure the role gender plays in forgiveness. My parents stayed on the outskirts of our church’s politics and periodically talked about switching to home churching instead (though they never followed through). But being a pastor or an elder or holding some other position of authority—positions usually reserved for men in evangelical and fundamentalist circles—does give one added credibility and a more extensive platform.

There’s also the fact that when it comes to sex, men are typically referred to as “being led astray” while women are referred to as “leading others astray.” This rule is not absolute, and there may be cases when women are described as being led astray, but in general men are seen as tempted and women are seen as temptresses. This means that in a case where a woman is a victim of sexual abuse, she will always be asked what role she played in her own abuse. There is a de facto assumption that she must have done at least something to bring it on. This does not necessarily mean that the offender is absolved from blame, but it does mean that the victim is typically made to share the blame.

This gendered understanding of sexual crimes plays a role in how forgiveness is meted out between victim and offender. Indeed, in evangelical and fundamentalist circles it is well night impossible for a victim to be without blame. Even without the seemingly ever-present victim blaming, whether a woman forgives her offender or becomes “bitter” is considered as closely as the offense itself. This means that the victim is frequently viewed as just as much in need of forgiveness as the offender.

How about the rest of you? How do your own experiences match up to all of this? Is forgiveness gendered in evangelical and fundamentalist circles? How much does whether an individual is forgiven affected by their position of power or the lack thereof?