I would like to take a moment to talk about forgiveness.
My niece is pregnant!
Pregnancies are life events that fill us with joy. They are like gifts sent down from God. Unfortunately, they are not looked at that way by the world when they are inconvenient or unplanned. I’m going to do my best to tread lightly as I talk about this.
My niece was the product of an unplanned pregnancy when her mother was 16 years old. Her birth mother and father decided to get married and raise her. But being born into that type of situation is not easy. Her mother and father separated a few years later. Now, my niece finds herself in the situation of being pregnant at a more appropriate age, but not at a convenient time in life. She lives with her boyfriend and has just been receiving an advancement at work. Life is just starting to work out.
The news of the pregnancy didn’t arrive to us with balloons and confetti, but rather with the dilemma of whether or not to keep the baby. Should she abort the baby? One of the first people my niece told was her father and his x-girlfriend who played the part of a quasi-stepmom most of her upbringing. Their first recommendation from them was to abort the baby. As you can imagine, this created a pretty significant controversy between family members.
My niece needs to own her choices whatever they may be. But, as my wife and I discussed this situation and the choice of abortion my wife said, “If she aborts that baby, I will never talk to her again.” I stopped her and I said, “Nicole, she is your niece. She is going to make choices in life we don’t agree with. Whatever those choice are we need to be forgiving.” I believe Nicole could see what I was saying and replied, “Well, it will be hard to be in the same room as her if she does that.”
I see where my wife is coming from. The tender feelings of a mother who wanted the experience of baring her own children. Those feeling run really deep. We wanted kids and could not have them. We have known so many families that want children and couldn’t have them. We believe that that pregnancy is a life. We strongly feel as though abortion is murder. There are a lot of reasons to be passionate against abortion.
I believe it is human nature to say things we don’t really mean. Would you really never forgive them. Would you really never talk to them again. Would you really shame them, disown them, hate them, or whatever it is we say when we are in a moment of anger. It is human nature to feel as though wrongs are unforgiveable.
Abortion: An Assault on the Defenseless (churchofjesuschrist.org)
I believe that we are instructed to forgive all men (and women). It is God who will judge them. But we can still love them.
I only write about this because as I thought about forgiveness my heart became tender. Deep in my heart I want those around me to love one another.
The scriptures are littered with storis of forgiveness.
- Parodical Son
- Woman caught in adultery
- People of Ammon
- Sermon on the mount
- Jesus on the Cross
- Alma the Younger
President Hinckley said: “The great Atonement was the supreme act of forgiveness. The magnitude of that Atonement is beyond our ability to completely understand. I know only that it happened, and that it was for me and for you. The suffering was so great, the agony so intense, that none of us can comprehend it when the Savior offered Himself as a ransom for the sins of all mankind.”
The only reason I exist today is because God had the mercy to forgive me. And though my sins were as scarlet, I was made white as snow through the blood of Jesus Christ.