Dr. Laura is completely off her rocker!!!

[TomS]

In other words we cannot expect God to forgive us for our heinous acts until we forgive others.

I can't agree with this. God knows that we are incapable of perfection as long as we are in our mortal body. I think that He will forgive us if we ask for His help and truly, sincerely try.

This is hard, just like loving our enemies.

And may the Lord forgive me, but pretty well impossible for me!

[尼古拉前执事]

Tom, this is something that becomes easier through frequent confession and discussing these issues with a priest that cares to take the time to explain how you can grow in Christian love to do these hard things.

The graces of Confession are both powerful and wonderful.

[Methodius]

Amen!

[Gregory2]

I thought it was common knowledge that Dr. Laura was off her rocker.

[尼古拉前执事]

Nah, most of the time she is right. She sometimes plays a tough love angle too much, but she seems to have her heart in the right place, being pro-family, pro-life and pro-morality.

[Mor Ephrem]

In the Syriac version of the Lord's Prayer (in other words, the exact words Jesus used), the translation is, literally: forgive us our debts, as we have also (for we have also) forgiven our debtors. Not only is it a matter of our asking God to forgive us to the degree that we forgive others, but the Lord's Prayer implies that we have forgiven others before we ask for forgiveness. This squares with our Lord's teaching that if we are bringing our gifts to the altar, and remember a grievance we have with our brother, we are to delay offering our gift until we reconcile with our brother, and then we are to offer our gifts.

I can't agree with this. God knows that we are incapable of perfection as long as we are in our mortal body. I think that He will forgive us if we ask for His help and truly, sincerely try.

We are incapable of perfection as long as we are in our mortal body, but Christ bids us to "Be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect". Certainly, we cannot do it by our own power; we can only do it with God's Grace. But if we truly and sincerely try, asking always for His help, He always willingly forgives us when we go wrong.

[Seraphim Reeves]

I would agree with Dr.Laura, in so far as too many people take the concept of forgiveness way too frivolously. It's easy to "say" people are forgiven, than to actually forgive - let alone with the kind of liberality that Christ says is necessary if we are to receive the remission of our own sins.

However, I disagree with the Judaistic notions underpinning her thought (she converted to Judaism some time ago), which recognize no urgent need to forgive one's enemies. Forgiving is not the same as forgetting (in the sense of becoming imprudent, particularly if someone still insists on posturing themself as your enemy), but it is not optional if we ourselves are to be forgiven. Talmudic Judaism, otoh, is a religion with liturgically enshrined curses, kabbalistic rabbis in Israel even going to the point of performing a sorcerous "cursing" rite against the Pope when he visited Israel some years ago.

(note: some confuse the Church notion of "anathema" with the concept of being "accursed" - this is a miconception/mistranslation. The word "anathema" literally refers to being "cut off and held up to God", for His Judgement. Strictly speaking, all that is outside of the Church, or placing itself outside of the Church, is anathema - when doctrines have been anathematized officially, along with their ardent supporters, we find not a "cursing" but a holding up of such ideas and persons up to God's judgement, recognizing clearly that their persons and ideas are outside of the fold of the Church.)

Seraphim