It is sentimentalism to trivialise evil
SIR – It is disappointing to see Melanie McDonagh fall prey to the new theological sentimentalism in claiming (Charterhouse, May 19) that “The requirement to forgive sinners is not contingent on them being repentant.” The whole of Scripture, Old Testament and New, is against this view, and it is surely a perverse twisting of the Lord’s Prayer to suggest that in asking for God’s forgiveness “as we forgive those who trespass against us” we can think of ourselves as not repentant. Similarly, it is no good her citing Our Lord’s prayer to his Father to forgive his executioners, since he says that “they know not what they do” (Luke 23:34) – that is, they acted as they did not out of conscious, deliberate wickedness but from the (mistaken) belief that they were doing God’s will. The same applies to the stoning of Stephen, which she also cites; surely Saul would have said (in repentant tears, later) that he thought he too was doing God’s will.
