If I have a guilty pleasure it is American day time TV 'chat shows' – of which Maury Povich hosts maybe the definitive version. In between paternity testing half the country and occasional can you tell if its a man or a woman drag queen challenges, Maury often gives various unfaithful partners the chance to surprise their loved one with a confession of their infidelity live in from on an international audience. Because nothing ensures that you will be forgiven for your actions like publicly humiliating your partner on the telly.

But forgiveness is what is being sought. It is rarely granted, and goes down very badly with the audience who have come to see the digital equivalent of a man in the medieval stocks. But then it is rarely truly asked for – forgive me often means something else entirely in this genre.

Forgive me because it was 'a mistake' -

Forgive me because it didn't mean anything.

Forgive me because I won't do it again.

Or, if all else fails, forgive me because you made me do it and its all your fault really.

None of these of course is really a request for forgiveness at all, in fact each of these is an attempt to avoid the need for forgiveness. Because they are saying, there is nothing really to forgive (if you look at it MY way). If only you would understand. But understanding why or how something happened may make forgiveness easier, precisely because there is less to be forgiven, it lowers the hurdle. Seeing the person who has hurt us as human, being able to empathise with them may make forgiveness easier, but it is not what forgiveness itself is about.

Understanding is not the same thing as forgiving. Nor is forgiveness saying well its OK, or it doesn't matter. It does matter. That's why forgiveness is necessary. If it didn't matter, or wasn't your fault, or could have happened to anyone or so on, then there is nothing to forgive. Forgiveness is a decision to move forward even though it matters, even though it can't be understood or sympathised with.

Forgiving is not something only reserved for the aftermath of accidents either. Notice that in the OT Joseph forgives his brothers even though he is explicit that they INTENED to do him harm. Forgiveness is about 'onpurposes', although of course forgiveness of planned and calculated actions may be much harder.

Most importantly, perhaps, forgiving is not forgetting. Forgiving is about remembering but being able to move forward. It is about learning to live with what Rowan Williams calls the wound of knowledge.

But when we are asked to forgive, we can't help perhaps but feel that we are being asked to pretend it doesn't matter or to pretend we can forget.

And these are some of the reasons that forgiveness is a scandal. Why it is so problematic, and why Maury's audience boo off the pentient(ish) and howl derisively at any mention of forgiveness. You can't trust him girl friend, kick him to the curb. He'll only think he can get away with doing it again. We may well agree with them. If forgiveness is offered too readily, we may feel that justice is being lost, that people are getting away with it, if we forgive, and that therefore forgiveness is dangerous or irresponsible, especially if it is unlimited as Jesus seems to call for.

Today of course is 9^th of September – or 9/11 in the US. The 10^th anniversary of an attack on thousands of people going about their daily business. And the starting point for a series of military and intelligence operations that have impacted on the lives of millions across the world including members of the armed forces and others from this community, and for our own family here in this church.

What might it mean to speak of forgiveness in the conversation about these events? It sharpens Peters question, which is essentially about where the limits of forgiveness are. Certainly it would take a brave person, whatever their role, to talk about forgiving Osama Bin Laden, or from another perspective, forgiving George Bush, or the Taliban or Al Qaeda.

It is not, I hope, though, simply cowardice on my part that means that I don't want to explore those ideas much further this morning. It is more that none of these things are for me to forgive. It is not my forgiveness to offer or withhold and forgiveness is not something we can require of others any more than the guests on Maury Povich.

Last week's reading contained a version of one of Jesus' most difficult sayings – If you retain the sins of any they are retained in heaven, if you forgive them they are forgiven in heaven. One implications of this strange and unsettling statement seems to be that even God recognises that forgiveness is not his sole possession – that the only ones who have the right to forgive and to say what gets forgiven is those who have been harmed in the first place. It is not for a third party, perhaps not even for God, to forgive the wrong done to someone else. Perhaps this is also why it is difficult for governments or the media also to speak of forgiveness on behalf of others. It is their forgiveness to offer.

And yet where communities have found the courage to address such questions, where some have spoken up for the power of forgiveness to transform, not to maintain, unjust situations, most notably in South Africa and to some extent in Northern Ireland, they have found the ability to move past an ever increasing cycle of violence, and have found this a better route forward than a strict application of justice.

One of the many moving stories to come out of the Truth and Reconciliation process in SA concerned a black woman whose son had been killed by a state police officer enforcing apartheid laws. As his case was heard, and he confessed to the killing and expressed his sorrow and remorse on hearing of the families pain and grief, the boys mother made a powerful statement to the tribunal. She asked that no sentence be passed on her son's killer. She said that she did not want the incident to claim two lives. She could have called for his death in response to the death of her son. Instead she called for him to live his life in memory of the life of her son. Not only did she call for his release, but requested that he look to her as a mother. She said because of him I do not have my son any more, so he will have to take my sons place, and live his life for my son's memory.

Most of us of course may suspect that we would not have the ability to live in relationship with someone who had done us so much harm. We may secretly suspect that such stories are nice romantic anecdotes but are no way to live in the real world, and that these would be dangerous ideas if applied more widely.

Again forgiveness is a scandal. But wherever we may end up in our thinking for Christians, our starting point is that forgiveness is something we have already received. This is the unique contribution that Christianity offers to the conversation. We are called to forgive for all the same good reasons as anyone else, and we may have the same doubts, objections and caveats as anyone else, but with the added anchor point. We have been forgiven, seventy times seven. We would always want that path to forgiveness to remain open to us.

Forgiveness may be a scandal, but the challenge of the gospel today is clear. We who have received mercy cannot withhold mercy from other. We who have been forgiven, are called to forgive.

It is for each of us to discover for ourselves the limits of forgiveness in our own lives and circumstances, but wherever we end up on that journey, we all start from the same place. Dwelling within the mercy and forgiveness of God.

Amen.