Bolz Weber Reflection

I often wonder how much more amazing my mother would have been if she had been afforded the opportunity of receiving a proper education. Last but not least, spirituality was highly valued in our home more so than anything else. My mother was a strong woman of faith. She had to be because the deck was stacked against her: she was black, widowed with little education. Though she had those things against her, I believe those same things molded and shaped her to being the influential person she was. My mother seen a lot of hard times, she was no stranger to adversity and obstacles but she always believed in prayer and the fact that the Lord would make a way out of no way. When she had nothing else she had her faith and it made everything alright.

In the book Rediscovering the Power of Repentance and Forgiveness, Dr. Leah Coulter seeks to challenge the conventional Christian approach to forgiveness. Conventional Christianity approaches forgiveness as a Christian duty, and, in many ways, this has been unfair to the victims who have almost been condemned for seeking justice rather than simply forgetting. She asks, "From an all too common Christian view, why must the weight and responsibility of forgiveness be placed on the sinned-against instead of the sinner's repentance?" (Coulter). Therefore, she focuses extensively on the idea of repentance and the duty of the sinner to repent. However, that is not to suggest that Coulter abandons the idea that forgiveness is a Christian imperative, but she attempts to place it within its Jewish context, and demonstrate how other facets of historical Judaism inform the practice of forgiveness and repentance.

In the beginning of the book, that she explained her experience and life, which she was struggling because she showed her emotions

Sometimes, forgiveness is used as an excuse to make the mistakes conducted okay. Eventually, the ones that are forgiven take advantage of the idea of forgiveness. In the memoir, The Glass Castle, the protagonist, Jeannette Walls and her siblings face difficult situations where they're forced to accept and learn from a young age to forgive those who are responsible. Jeannette’s parents struggle with being strong and stable parents for their children, making mistakes that have consequences that affect not only themselves but also the the Walls children. Jeannette chooses to believe that by letting go of the grudges she holds about parent she can avoid a bitter life, even though it is her parents responsible for her pain. Through Jeannette Walls journey she is able to capture the hard reality of forgiveness.

Alexander Popes famous saying goes "To err is human, to forgive is divine" (Line 525). Everyone makes a mistake every once in a while, everybody sins on way or another, and in the end almost all of them seek forgiveness. The very nature of people is to get upset and feel resentful towards those who have done some harm to them in any way. Humans tend to remember the undesirable actions that others inflict upon them. Forgiveness is overcoming the feeling of resentment towards the person who has done wrong to us. In the novel "The Glass Castle" by Jeanette Walls, Jeanette is constantly forgiving her parents for their unsuitable choices; choices that often leave them impoverished, emaciated, and in abhorrent conditions. Jeanette proves that even

Forgiveness, is one of the highlighting themes of The Glass Castle. Jeanette forgiving her parents for their actions allowed her to thrive. In a person’s life, they are most likely going to come across a point in time where they have to forgive someone. Throughout my life, I have been presented with several opportunities to forgive someone. Some of those times, I didn’t forgive. One of the times I had to forgive someone was last year. My two best friends got into an argument. At first, I thought they would work it out since it didn’t seem that problematic. However, I came to find out that the argument was worse than I thought and one of my friends kept accusing of my other friend for things she didn’t do. This led my friend to go through a

I was raised in a Christian household that most people would describe as strict and, even a little harsh but, I know that my parents were only trying to raise me to be a good person. I was taught to have strong, moral values and to be a kind, loyal friend. In times of struggle and torment, I think my best traits stood out when put to the test. My parents helped me learn life-long lessons that will stay with me in everything that I do.

I was blessed to be able to go through such a good school system. Some people complained about going to a private, Christian school, but I really enjoyed it. I do wonder sometimes though what it would have been like to go through public schooling and if that would have changed how I am today. I think the strong morals and values I hold today were largely created by my upbringing. But, I do think I used to simply claim to be a Christian because of my family. If my parents are Christian that must mean I’m a Christian, right? Going to college made me realize that my faith is something that I have to make my own. My faith is not necessarily my parents’ faith. I have to make a decision on what I believe and what I stand for, separate from my family. I remember that around the age of 14 I started to feel distant from God and was not very strong in my faith. Throughout high school I think I had different points of feeling “spiritual highs,” but felt like my faith was lukewarm. Today, I think I am starting to separate my parent’s faith from my own, and starting to make it mine. I feel like this is something everyone has to do at some point in their life. In the past year, and in the past couple months especially, I have had a stronger relationship with God. I definitely don’t feel “strong” in my faith, but I feel like I am growing spiritually. I think being here and the

For example, a shepherd came to a tent - assuming Nadia was inside - and told her to come and see Hamed’s black lamb. However, the sheik was inside the tent, not Nadia, and he banned the shepherd from the oasis as punishment for saying his late son’s name. Upon hearing this, Nadia stubbornly objected, but it did no good as the sheik could do whatever he pleased and did it. After all, he was in a state of depression. Because of that, nobody would listen to Nadia when she spoke of her brother (they were scared they would get punished as well) and the internal peace she had found was withering away. In the evening, Nadia confronted her father saying that her could not take Hamed away from her. She asked her father if he could remember Hamed’s voice and face, but the sheik couldn’t, and he started to cry. Nadia could have screamed or walked away, but instead she said, “There is a way honored father…. Listen.” Why would she have said that if she didn’t care about her father? She could have been much harsher - she could have not helped her father at all - but she chose to because she cared for her father and did not want him to be depressed. What she said is surprising due to her head-strong personality, but it shows that there is another side to Nadia - a softer side. Here we can see that Nadia can be caring at certain

I know now that it’s not what I think. And that’s not bad. It took me a long time to discuss this with my parents. Although, after doing it, I found out they aren’t near as religious as my child-brain saw them as. They were both accepting, simply wanting me to do what I wanted.

Completing my baptism and First Holy Communion, my parents thought they had been doing their jobs, following the Roman Catholic traditions. They believed that I was in no way, shape, or form going to be corrupted by immoral things that go against

I give this movie a six out of five-star rating. How it managed to keep me on the edge of my seat the entire time is beyond me; I am still in disbelief that I was fully engaged for the entire two hours and twenty-six minutes. Although I had heard many great things about the novel, the film exceeded all of my expectations. The Natural teaches many valuable lessons about perseverance, determination, commitment, karma, relationships, and staying young at heart.

Asking for forgiveness and forgiving to many is the hardest thing to do but we must remember in the book of Matthew (18:21-22) Peter said to the Lord: “Lord if another member of the church sins against me, how often should I forgive? As many as seven times?” Jesus said to him, “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times.” In this paper, the chosen case study will give the reader a better understanding of what forgiveness is to Jesus. Forgiveness is a big part of the Bible and if Jesus forgives us of our sins we too must learn to be as forgiving as him.

For my father this has been rather difficult to accept because to him, I have violated my family's beliefs by turning my back on religion and wanting no part of it in my personal life. It is simply something he can not comprehend, to him it means turning my back on my family and everything I have known. Years ago when I was a teenager, I confided in him that I wanted nothing to do with the church anymore and he chalked it up to teenage youth. Nowadays, my interpersonal relationship with my father has been strained because he has finally understood that I had actually been serious all along. In fact, when it was brought up again when I was an adult and when I had given him the same answer

It is also vital to look at Wilson’s view on the practice of forgiveness and how if an individual decides to ignore it, it can place a road block in their process of change. She believes that God speaks about forgiveness for the following reasons:” (1) we are all sinners with whom to relate so we’ll need to become skillful forgivers (2) God makes forgiveness a centerpiece of our healing process because living in un-forgiveness is so much worse (Wilson, 2001).