I Forgive You, Goodbye

What Reconciliation Is and Why It's Not Always Appropriate

Note: This is the third article in the series on forgiveness. It focuses upon reconciliation, particularly interpersonal reconciliation (as opposed to systemic or issues such as racial reconciliation). If you’re new to this series, please visit No Trifling Matter to read the prior articles.

My cousin Nikki says I’ve always been able to see the good in other people. She says I get it from our grandmother. To prove her point, Nikki tells the story of the time we were staying with our grandmother and went down the street to play with another girl our age. We were getting along just fine until the girl suddenly started calling us names. When we told our grandmother the story, she asked what we did in response. Nikki responded: “I want to fight her. I might go back down there and fight her.” Then my grandmother turned to me and asked how I felt. I shrugged and said, “Well, she was nice until the end. I might play with her again.”

I still have a penchant for seeing the good in other people. Being a psychologist with a gift for discernment means that I can often tell when someone’s behavior is rooted in unresolved pain. And my own research on forgiveness and reconciliation, together with my twenty-year meditation practice, have helped me to intentionally cultivate a forgiving disposition. But these days, I do not mistake forgiveness for reconciliation.

Forgiveness and reconciliation are two distinct processes. To reiterate from last week’s article, forgiveness is the inner work that we do to release the hostility we feel toward a person whom we perceive as having wronged us. Forgiveness is a process that can take time, even when we desire to forgive. It is not an obligation, but it is necessary for maintaining close relationships.

The reality is that we forgive (and are forgiven) more times than we can count in many relationships. Sometimes, though, harm is serious enough to do significant damage or to rupture relationship. In those cases, forgiveness is not enough. Reconciliation is needed. Reconciliation is the process through which we restore relationship that has been broken. Whereas forgiveness is one-sided, reconciliation requires the participation of both (or all) parties involved in a conflict. The victim’s work is healing and forgiveness. But reconciliation places a big demand upon the wrongdoer. For them, it requires accountability, repair, apology, and change. In other words, it requires repentance.

Repentance, then, is more than saying, “I’m sorry.” It is committing to a process of transformation in order to reduce the likelihood that we will commit the same harm again. In I Bring the Voices of My People, I describe repentance this way:

Repentance is a central theme in both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, where it is also translated as conversion, indicating that the two concepts are linked. Biblically and theologically, repentance has a double meaning. It signifies a turn away from sin (and a commitment to refrain from, or forsake, further sinning) and a turn toward God. The Hebrew words translated as conversion–shuh, strephein, epistrephein–“connote the alterations in people’s thoughts, feelings, and actions as they turn from idols to the true God or when they repent, that is, return to the covenant relationship with God. The Greek counterpart, metanoia, connotes a change in direction. In America’s Original Sin, Jim Wallis states, “In Scripture, repentance means literally to stop, make a radical turnaround, and take an entirely new path. It means a change of mind and heart and is demonstrated by nothing less than transformed behavior. Repentance means we now have to think, act, and live differently than we did before, when we were still under sin.”

In her book, On Repentance and Repair, Rabbi Danya Ruttenberg draws upon the work of 12th century Jewish philosopher Maimonides to identify five steps of repentance: (1) naming and owning the harm; (2) starting to change; (3) making restitution and accepting consequences; (4) apologizing; and (5) making different choices. True repentance is much more than saying, “I’m sorry.” In fact, notice that apology comes only after the person has accepted responsibility for their actions and begun the process of making amends. Moreover, while repentance is the work to be done by the wrongdoer, the amends must be victim-centered, that is, they must be an attempt to ameliorate the damage incurred by the victim, whether that is emotional, physical, financial, or spiritual.

Forgiveness and reconciliation are often weaponized by abusers as well as by people who refuse to accept accountability for their actions. They use them to guilt victims into maintaining relationship with them, even though the relationship puts them at risk for continued harm. But for reconciliation to happen, the harm must end, and the wrongdoer must demonstrate significant and sustained progress toward repentance before the relationship is restored.

And let’s be clear: not all relationships need to be maintained. Sometimes we can forgive a person who has wronged us and decide that we do not need to restore the relationship. Maybe it is because the person has not truly repented, or that their attempts are not enough for us to feel asssured that they have changed.

Sometimes, though, we may choose not to reconcile even when both victim and wrongdoer have genuinely committed to their processes of healing and forgiveness, repentance and repair. Because sometimes, our healing and repair work transforms us so completely that we no longer fit each other’s lives. Our relationship has run its course and we focus on living our separate lives.

We can forgive, repent, and reconcile. But we can also forgive and say goodbye.