I'm not sure who recently posted, but thank you for bumping this thread.
I read the responses, and am overjoyed by what I see. It isn't snide anger, no one saying, "well, you should be sorry!"
And the Christian responses, to me, display Christ. One apologizes for demanding that another lives to their expectations, realizing that they had replaced God. One apologized for being christian but gossiping about others, realizing their own sin, and humbling themselves.
Here's the thing, it's pretty clear that Jesus came to bring hope, healing and freedom and we, the church, his followers have sucked all the fun out of that. We've taken the hope out of hope and continued wounding the wounded and piled chains on slaves. I am so sorry.
This one realizes their difference between Jesus' approach, and theirs.
So many apologized for acting in arrogance, acting to exclude, to exalt the self, and apologize as much to Christ as to others.
In response, I saw this:
I apologize for all the times I feared you when you revealed yourself to be a Christian. I apologize for all the times I rejected your thoughts and opinions just because you are a Christian. I apologize for all the times my beliefs in universal unity wavered. I apologize for all the times my patience gave out.
I think we have a lot more to offer one another and a lot more to gain from coming together then we have by staying separated and pulling apart. Hopefully one day we will all come together under the umbrella of love.
She admits her part of it, her unfairness, and rather than simply accept and apology, offers hers in kind.
I am not Christian. I am sorry that I rolled my eyes when I saw the name of this site. I am sorry that I judged every Christian on the planet to be the same.
I remember the first time I saw it, I had tears in my eyes. It was the first time I have never had to feel like I was on the defense. It was the first time I have seen a Christian apologize, rather than accuse or demand repentance.
It's not perfect:
I love the idea of this. But I don't see it working.
There was a confession booth on my campus, and they asked if we had anything we felt Christians had wronged us with. I told them I felt like I'd been kicked out of my church for being gay, at a time I was struggling with it, and two of them visibly recoiled.
There is nobility to the intent of this. But seeing that recoil of disgust, like I'm a leper, that kicks hard enough I'm shut off to the message. Can Christians really confess these sins before they repent? Words are lovely and words are good, but they are only words, and an apology is always too little, too late. What's the point of confessing or apologizing as long as you go on, unchanging? I don't see the rhyme or reason.
When I go to groups that work for social welfare--Invisible Children, runaways' shelters, whatever--it's never the Christians giving their heart and soul. I see secularists burning themselves out to save the world while the religious skip out with apologies and excuses and talk that they can't do it all, only God can really solve problems. Is there a point to all these words? Are they anything but a way to pretend you're changing? I don't see the apologies as anything more than words. When do I get treated as an equal? If Christians number so many in the world, when do they stand up and finally make a real difference? Why don't you ever do more than apologize and talk?
This sounds like anger. It's not. It's anguish. You're bailing out the Titanic with a little tin bucket.
Having been there myself, those are pretty deep wounds, and are always threatened to be re-opened by those that claim that I am not Christian, a lonely place to be, and something I talk about to God a lot.
But it's a start. It's a beginning, and in a world that is so cold to one another, and something that I even feel overwhelming on this board from time to time, using a bucket to save the Titanic is better than doing nothing at all, or worse, putting more holes in the boat.
Some of the responses ask harder questions:
Your banner says “Please help us to discover how we can do better.” Okay. This a wonderful start, and it’s just a start. Too often an apology is a cheap substitute for actually fixing the problem. Talk is cheap. As an atheist my moral principles come from inside myself rather than from outside, and I’m tough on myself when I screw up. I have to make amends rather than merely apologize. An amend is to repair what I broke, return what I took, heal what I injured. Not only does an amend make things right, it’s a lot of work and it keeps me from repeating the offense much better than just an apology.
If you as a Christian apologize for something that other Christians have done, or your religion in general has done, what, if anything will be your personal amend? Will you work hard to get other Christians to stop those offenses, fearlessly getting in their faces? Will you petition your church to take a strong and active stand for eradicating the offensive practice? If your apology is about yourself but still is vague and general like “I’m sorry I have been a self-righteous jerk,” what will be your specific personal amend? Will you seek out the particular victims of your unkindness to make actual amends? Will you successfully avoid repeating similar behaviors in the future? Or will your apology soothe your conscience just enough so that you can resume your old habits?
An apology is vibrating air. An amend is tangible action. You are what you do, not what you say. Congratulations on a good start. If you follow through with making real changes, your life, your principles and your religion will have real, solid meaning.
At first, my response is, "wow, dude, chillax. Don't bite the person's head off for an apology." However, looking at the deeper meaning, I am brought to think of when someone has really hurt me, or stabbed me in the back. The offender then returns, and says, "Sorry", and acts like that makes it all better, like it is magically erased. Do I forgive? Certainly, but that doesn't mean the hurt is still there, the breach of trust is still there and has to be earned back, and realizing that a simple "sorry" sometimes isn't enough, and the offender has to truly understand on what level they hurt you, how deeply, to know that pain and hurt, and acknowledge it.
And that isn't easy. That's really, really hard. You have to face some ugliness about yourself, and worse, how you may have offended God himself.
I see this as a gift. It allows us to understand the depth of God's forgiveness, to not take it for granted but truly know how much mercy and understanding we have been granted. We come to understand the depth of God's love, that doesn't stop or cease or is withheld no matter what we do, and how much it surpasses us, so much so, that I can't truly comprehend it. And it humbles us before mankind, apologizes for exalting ourselves, when we should be acknowledging God's mercy which we don't deserve, God's forgiveness which we could never earn, our thankfulness for love which we don't deserve and are given anyway, when approaching anyone, knowing ourselves to be no better than anyone else, and acting as such.
This is what I have been praying for lately, for healing among the people, and seeds have been planted. We must only nurture them now by offering our part of the problem, and acting upon the acknowledgment, living the apology to others, and to Christ.
