The expression of forgiveness for a murderer who has done nothing to indicate remorse or contrition for an act of unmitigated evil is noble. But nobility is a strange moral concept. It’s what we perceive when a person or group deliberately sacrifices its own good — and the more radical the sacrifice, the nobler the act. The solider who dies saving his platoon is noble. So is a father who sacrifices his own life to save the life of his son. Most noble of all might be God sacrificing his own son — and the son’s acceptance of his own sacrifice — to redeem the world. It’s most likely this ultimate noble sacrifice — God’s act of gratuitous, unmerited love for humanity, which lies at the core of the Christian religion — that inspired the victims of last week’s shooting to summon up the strength to offer their own expression of gratuitous, unmerited love for the gunman who took so much from them.
As I said, it’s extremely impressive. Undeniably moving. But truth be told, it also left me feeling more than a little frustration at the parishioners who expressed it, and irritation at those many white Christians who praised the victims for refraining from lashing out at the source of their victimhood. Is it really so much less admirable to respond with righteous rage to a deadly assault on one’s own good? Is it really so much more commendable to respond to an act of merciless violence with passivity and acceptance?
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