Trigger Warning- Sexual Abuse Discussed. Also Forgiveness

Let's talk about forgiveness. It's Sunday, after all, and religions seem to be of the opinion that forgiveness is a really Big Deal. Especially the Christian religions. 
How many of us remember chanting the Lord's Prayer? Hell, we had to say it at school when I was a child, right along with the Pledge of Allegiance. That's why my generation turned out to be so patriotic and god-fearing. 
Hahaha.
The version of the Lord's Prayer that I learned used the word "trespass" instead of "sin" in the part about forgiving us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. 
My grandfather had a sign on his river lot that said "No Trespassing" so I was somewhat confused about that for a long time. I can't remember when I got it all straightened out in my mind but eventually I did. 
There's a lot packed into that line though. Asking god, Jesus, whoever, whatever, to forgive us our sins, to begin with. The concept of making little children believe that they're already sinning is pretty sick in my opinion. I was a very serious child and at an early age I was constantly worried about everything in the world and one of those things was that I was not as good as I should have been which is so ridiculous. I was the best little girl in the world. There's a whole lot more that goes into that whole situation but suffice to say, I was probably born feeling guilty and the Lord's Prayer reassured me that indeed I was. Of what, I do not know, but surely something. Lots of somethings, probably. And then there was the part about how we should forgive those who trespass against us. 
What? I mean, a child really does not have the concept of anyone trespassing against them except for maybe a friend taking their favorite marble or something. Were we supposed to just forgive them for that and let them keep it? Meanwhile, the real sins against children are most often committed by the adults around them, the very people they are taught to respect and obey whether parents, teachers, or clergymen. Which is incredibly difficult as a child to understand, if not impossible. 
Now I'm going to get real personal here. Even though I knew that what my stepfather was doing to me was not at all right, I had no words or knowledge or concept to frame that not-rightness as something evil. It took me years and years and years to finally admit to myself and then to others that what he had done had been abuse and that I was not the only child in the world who had been abused. I knew from my mid-teens, I think, that what he'd done had affected me in many ways, and none of them good and slowly I began not just to fear him but to hate him. 
Years later, when I was in therapy with a very good therapist, we discussed the concept of forgiveness. Forgiveness is a big thing in our culture, our Christian culture and even a newer-age culture. You gotta forgive so that you can heal. I have no idea how many times I was told this and in the sexual abuse survivors group I went to, many of the women repeated this caveat and said that they had forgiven their abusers. Meanwhile, over the weeks and months and year or so I attended that group, I came to realize that their so-called forgiveness certainly had not healed them. And when I discussed this with my beloved therapist she said quite calmly that there were two things that survivors of abuse did not have to do.
1. Confront their abuser.
2. Forgive their abuser. 
Eventually, I did confront my abuser but only via phone and that was a short call. Just long enough to tell him that I remembered what he had done, I knew what he had done to my brothers, and that what he had done was unforgivable. 
And in my mind, I feel the same now. 
"Don't forgive for the abuser, forgive for yourself!" is the advice so often given. And for the life of me, I cannot figure out how that works. First of all, some things are absolutely unforgivable. Should Hitler be forgiven? And if so, what the fuck does that mean? I get so confused. I've been told that forgiving someone doesn't mean that what they did wasn't wrong, just that you...what? Can let go of it? 
How do you let go of someone who killed six million Jews and who knows how many other people? Why would you want to? You have to remember. You have to. It must be remembered.

And of course I'm not comparing what Hitler did to what a pedophile does. But. If you added up all of the numbers of victims of pedophiles whose lives were irrevocably damaged, it would be well into the millions. And just as the families of the Holocaust victims suffered because of Hitler, the families of the victims of pedophiles have suffered too. The thing that has brought me the most anguish in my journey as a child sexual abuse survivor is the knowledge that because of what was damaged in me as a child has affected how I have been a mother to my children and how I have been a wife to my husband. Because of what happened to me as a child, barely older than Maggie is now, I have coped in ways that were not healthy to me or my family. I feel no need to list those things. I am not proud of many of them. But I assure you- it's a long list. 
And how can I forgive the man who generated this grave unfairness that has affected those I love the most? 
What does the Bible say about the sins of the father? 
"The Lord...visits the iniquity of the fathers on the children and the children’s children, to the third and the fourth generation. (Exodus 34:6-7 = Deuteronomy 5:8-10)"

I beg to differ. I think it passes down way farther than that. 

Look- I'm as apt as the next person to forgive something that someone we love does or says that may have hurt us in some way. Even deeply. We are humans. We make mistakes. And yes, I would like to be forgiven for doing those things too. But if we forgive these things, are forgiven of these things, there is an implied message that the sin will not be repeated. That an effort will be made to make reparations. But sometimes, that is not the case. Not the case at all. 
And as I see it- there's no purpose in ginning up forgiveness for that which is quite literally unforgivable. I think of the abused woman whose husband tearfully begs forgiveness every time he's physically assaulted his wife. What good does it do to her to forgive him?  Believing that forgiveness is somehow holy or simply the right thing to do puts her in a position in which she will be assaulted again. 
I had a friend who did that. She finally, finally, made her way to leave her husband and yet, at the end of her life when she was suffering from dementia, he abused her in ways that I cannot bear to think about. I will never forgive him either. He's dead now, and although I do not believe in an afterlife, I would wish that he burns in hell. 

As I see it, some people do not deserve forgiveness. Perhaps I am just a horrible, angry person. 
So be it. 

Tell me- what do you think about forgiveness? What does it mean to you? Is there something I am missing about it? 

Well, Happy Sunday from the Church of the Batshit Crazy.

Love...Ms. Moon