Quotes about Forgiveness

The number of people who have fled the church because it is too patient or compassionate is negligible; the number who have fled because they find it too unforgiving is tragic.

The spiritual future of ragamuffins consists not in disavowing that we are sinners but in accepting that truth with growing clarity, rejoicing in God's incredible longing to rescue us in spite of everything

Even if we come back because we couldn't make it on our own, God will welcome us. He will seek no explanations about our sudden appearance. He is glad we are there

The Christian with depth is the person who has failed and who has learned to live with it.

More than three hundred years ago, Claude de la Columbiere, commenting on the dinner Jesus attended in the home of Simon the Pharisee, wrote, "It is certain that of all those present, the one who most honors the Lord is Magdalene, who is so persuaded of the infinite mercy of God that all her sins appear to her as but an atom in the presence of this mercy.

Any church that will not accept that it consists of sinful men and women, and exists for them, implicitly rejects the gospel of grace.

The demands of forgiveness are so daunting that they seem humanly impossible. The demands of forgiveness are simply beyond the capacity of ungraced human will. Only reckless confidence in a Source greater than ourselves can empower us to forgive the wounds inflicted by others. In boundary moments such as these there is only one place to go—Calvary.

healthy guilt is one that acknowledges the wrong done and feels remorse but then is free to embrace the forgiveness that has been offered. Healthy guilt focuses on the realization that all has been forgiven, the wrong has been redeemed.

Come, all you who are wiped out, confused, bewildered, lost, beat-up, scarred, scared, threatened, and depressed, and I'll enlighten your mind with wisdom and fill your heart with the tenderness that I have received from my Father." This is unconditional pardon. The sinner need only live confidently in the wisdom of tenderness.

Grace abounded more because I could find it in the darkness as much as in the light.

When fierce mercy transforms our lives, the bewildering words of Julian of Norwich, "Sin will be no shame but honor," become luminously clear, as does the baffling observation of the spiritual genius Anthony deMello, "Repentance reaches fullness when you are brought to gratitude for your sins.

What I created today was a god, but it was not You. Forgive this sin of mine, I pray.