A Time to Say "I'm Sorry"

Shabbat Shalom!

Apologizing must be one of the most difficult things any of us ever has to do. It's hard to humble oneself and tell someone we're sorry for what we have done or said. And yet that is one of the missions and mandates of teshuvah during these Days of Repentance. Judaism teaches that we cannot stand before God until we have made right a hurtful or inappropriate act or word to another human being.

I am grateful to JTA for alerting me about Everett L. Worthington, a professor of psychology at Virginia Commonwealth University and a widely-quoted authority on forgiveness, who has a handy acronym - C.O.N.F.E.S.S. - to map the process which can move us to repentance with another human being and ultimately with God:

C - Confess without excuses;

O - Offer specific apologies;

N - Take note of the pain you might have caused another;

F - Tell the hurt party that you truly value the other person:

E - Equalize; make up for the pain the other person has experienced by making some kind of physical or emotional restitution;

S - Say that I/we will really strive that this never happens again;

S - Ask clearly for forgiveness; in doing so, we acknowledge that we did wrong

There is always a chance, of course, that the person to whom you apologize will not accept your plea. Jewish tradition compels us to try again, and if, after three tries, our heartfelt apology is still not accepted, then it is considered to our credit as if it has been accepted. We need, in other words, try only so hard to convince another person of our sincerity. Once we have done our best and made repeated attempts, the teshuvah is considered complete.

In the best of circumstances, apologizing to another human being is never easy. But before we can beat our breast on Yom Kippur and ask God to "forgive us, pardon us and grant us atonement," we must first seek it from those we have harmed or hurt. For us Jews, this is the week to do it.

L'shanah tovah...

Rabbi Rosen