On a recent trip to a multi-faith retreat center in Sherborn, a group of Boston University students gathered near a chaplain who explained the consequences of choosing not to forgive.
“If you’re connected to revenge,” said Peace Abbey Chaplain Dot Walsh, “you create the disconnect [of] unifying people.”
In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings one week ago, forgiveness may be the answer, said BU professor Ruth Henderson, who has offered an interdisciplinary class on forgiveness since fall 2005 in the Metropolitan College Prison Education Program.
The course, “The Experience of Forgiveness: Psychological, Sociological and Spiritual Perspectives,” introduces college students to the approach of forgiveness by examining personal experiences while reading works of prominent figures such as Martin Luther King Jr., Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama. Aside from inmates in the Prison Education Program, the course is being taught to MET students.
“Forgiveness is not a theory, it is an experience,” she said in an email. “It is more than an intellectual activity, it involves the heart . . . the soul and . . . it is also a sociological phenomenon.”
The class, which has 11 enrolled undergraduate and graduate students this semester, also meditates together and takes field trips to places such as the The Peace Abbey in Sherborn. Henderson said she created the course to help students recognize how forgiveness can have an impact on society and to help students with their own spiritual development.
“Most university courses don’t offer students the opportunity to engage in this kind of reflection,” she said.
The meditation helps teach the class about experiences in forgiveness by relieving tension, said MET graduate student Helena Castanheira.
“As a group, we have learned to connect to the other’s experience and let go of all the tension,” she said in an email. “It was a very good revelation that this type of behavior can in fact be learned.”
MET night student Ken Tebbetts said the class uncovered and enabled him to exercise some concepts related to forgiveness.
“Listening is really important to problem resolution,” he said. “Giving things the right amount of time is important to forgiveness, also. This class gives me the opportunity to practice them.”
Henderson said although she does not expect those victimized by the Virginia Tech shootings to be thinking of forgiveness yet, they will only witness transformation if there is a “psychological response to what occurred.”
“If people respond by becoming increasingly . . . despairing, we, as a society, will only spiral down,” she said. “If, however, those who’ve suffered from this tragedy are able to grieve properly, then those who were deeply injured can find ways to move beyond the tragedy in a peaceful manner.”
Tebbetts said he appreciated the course’s interdisciplinary aspect because the healing element of forgiveness affects everyone and can be related to major events such as the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and Hurricane Katrina.
“I think we all have our own genocide,” Tebbetts said. “At some level, everyone’s had something horrific happen to them or their people, and it takes a long time to heal from that.”
Staff reporter Andrew Benjamin contributed reporting for this article.