Forgiveness

David Blight, writing about Frederick Douglass meeting his former enslaver: “In much of Christian tradition—in which Douglass had learned to think and write—the forgiver often forgives for his own sake, not to excuse the oppressor.”

I’m not firmly a Christian these days, by but I think about these concepts a lot. I’m not sure why I still aspire to this kind of moral attitude. I certainly cannot expect it of others, least of all somebody as badly wronged as Douglass has been. I barely practice this level of grace myself. And yet I suspect it is what my goal should be.