When going through the process of forgiveness, do the feelings of anger that inevitably interject themselves compromise or jeopardize (guess what show I was watching when I wrote this) the whole process?
Dr. David Stoop (Forgiving the Unforgivable) asserts that not only is it alright to get angry, anger is a necessary part of the process. You may remember that in an earlier blog Bishop Jakes described anger as a “catalyst for catharsis”. For a number of years my wife Vicki was a grief counselor for a local funeral home and ministered to approximately 1000 individuals or families. She often commented that the first step in healing was to allow the bereaved to express anger and grief over their loss.
Dr. Stoop applies that same concept to forgiveness: “In order to process our grief, we must experience both anger and sadness, and in order to forgive, we must grieve. So anger is part of the process of forgiving.”
