In thinking about Forgiveness Sundays, something I regularly see on social media posts, tweets, etc. involve somebody asking forgiveness and not being forgiven by the person(s) they seek forgiveness.
When it came to saying “I’m sorry,” my parents had two (2) rules –
- You had to mean it
- You had to know what you were apologizing for
Sounds easy enough. In some cases, it was obvious to my parents if one of us didn’t mean it. For the second one, if you don’t know why you are apologizing, it’s hard to be sincere. This is a tough one to give examples. We couldn’t just say “I’m sorry” without explaining what we were sorry for.
The below comments take into account the rules above.
If you say you are sorry enough, you will run into times where the person won’t accept your apology. It won’t matter how much you mean it.
You can’t force somebody to accept your apology. If you mean it, that’s what important regardless of if they accept it or believe you.
On the other hand, if you make a habit of pretending to apologize without meaning it, don’t be surprised if people stop believing your apologies.
I generally go with the premise if somebody offers me an apology that they mean it.
