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I am often asked how I can have faith in the inherent worth and dignity of every human being. If someone abuses you or others repeatedly, seriously, are they still persons of worth? Here’s my quick summary of conclusions I’ve come to, over many years of thinking about these questions. Believing in the inherent worth and dignity of someone does not mean that anger is somehow “wrong,” or that all actions are equally “right.” Belief in worth and dignity does not mean that you “have to” forgive in the absence of changed behavior. You may, at some point, decide to give up anger and even hatred for the sake of your own emotional health, even in the absence of changed behavior — but I think that’s different from forgiveness, which comes only when there’s some genuine understanding and a choice to change and often, also, the choice to make proportional amends, on the part of the person whose actions you found hurtful. Even when someone’s behavior is hurtful to another, the belief in inherent worth and dignity even in that person is what makes me decide not to treat the person out of vengeance but only to stop the behavior and help establish consequences in proportion to and appropriate to the wrong. Thus, the person can be reported to authorities, such that our legal system’s consequences would apply — but responding in kind with abuse or torture would be something I’d avoid — for my own sake and for the sake of building a more humane culture. Belief in worth and dignity of others is far more about how I will behave than it is about what quality exists in the other. Even those we call “abusers” — people whose habitual actions hurt others — are human beings, and if we treat them as subhuman, it’s my belief that diminishes us more than it punishes them. But giving consequences to others for hurtful behavior, and establishing boundaries that protect ourselves and others, is not the same as treating someone as subhuman.
includes contributions by Lois Kellerman, Don Montagna, and Jone Johnson Lewis – Ethical Culture Leaders A practical guide to the steps in seeking forgiveness — an example of applying ethical philosophy to the practicalities of living. Some words about forgiveness and ethics, from Felix Adler’s An Ethical Philosophy of Life, Book III, Chapter VI: “The Meaning of Forgiveness”
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A suggestion for summer reading: The Anatomy of Peace from the Arbinger Institute. I found it quite engrossing — a slightly different way to get to the “how-to” of “bringing out the best in others” — by seeing the individual worth or “personhood” of everyone, and reacting out of a “heart at peace” rather than a “heart at war.” I’ve particularly enjoyed hearing the audio version of the book, though found it a bit difficult to visualize some charts that were described, so also have a copy of the dtb (”dead tree book”).