sorry, sorry... (a sermon on repentance)
This is this week’s sermon, on saying sorry, with thanks to the Chalet School and my Apple Music library. The readings were: Exodus 32:7-14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10.
Oops, sorry!
Sorr-ee.
Uh, Sorry?
Sorry is one of the most flexible words in British English.
It means everything from ‘I just need to acknowledge that it’s impossible not to stand on your toe on this train’ to, ‘Please behave, to ‘That was actually totally your fault’—and if we took the time to parse all the ways that we’ve heard different people say the word ‘sorry’ we’d be here for quite a while.[1] And yet, I wonder what percentage of our usage of the word sorry actually expresses the regret or penitence that the word means?
***
I spent some time this week searching my music library to see how many songs include the word sorry in the title. It was a lot: R.E.M, The Cranberries, Taylor Swift, Elton John, on and on. And if you were to go beyond the titles into lyrics, sorry would feature even more. Perhaps unsurprisingly most of these songs are about relationships, and relationships going wrong. You’re not sorry; I’m not sorry; sorry seems to be the hardest word.
And yet of course, sorry is one of the most important words. It’s vital to relationships——which is why it crops up in so many songs about love. A lot of the jokes about all the different ways we say sorry are funny because we recognise the incongruence—the difference—between that way of saying sorry and the real meaning of the word, sorry.
But when we hear the word spoken and meant. Or when we say it and mean it. That is something else—and we know it. Whether we’re saying it or we’re hearing it, that speaking and hearing is inextricable from our bodies and we express and recognise the truth of the words, ‘I’m sorry’ throughout our whole beings—and that’s true whether or not we are ready to really hear and accept an apology, and to forgive, which is a complex process practically and theologically.
But I want us to recognise that depth and physicality that’s involved in repentance and forgiveness—because I think that this is a part of why sorry is the hardest word.
***
I was re-reading some of my favourite children’s boarding school stories while I was on holiday, and in one of them there is a perfect little description of one of the youngest girls—Robin—learning to apologise.[2] In the story she’s been ‘naughty’ — throwing water out of the window which has soaked the boy who does the odd-jobs — and she comes into the room knowing that she needs to own-up to her aunt, but really not wanting to. She won’t look at her aunt but she can admit her little sins in broken sentences from inside a hug. And in the description of the apology that she has to make to the boy, it’s clear that she’s feeling a mixture of humiliation and shame at having to admit that she behaved wrongly and at having to express contrition for it—wishing that her apology could just be understood and everyone move on without her having to say, ‘I’m sorry’. But her aunt knows that the words need to be said, so that she learns to admit she’s not always perfect—and to experience loving forgiveness.
I’m no longer seven years old and the things that I need to apologise for are substantially bigger and more complicated things than throwing water out of a window—but when I read that passage, I could n feel myself in the little girl’s desperate reluctance to admit her faults and apologise for them.
***
You see, I think that we use the word sorry genuinely—in a way that expresses regret and contrition, in the desire to repair a relationship—very infrequently, given how often we use the word in British daily life.
We resist it because to say sorry genuinely is to admit our imperfections and our failures, and to feel our shames and humiliations, and to be vulnerable in our relationships with other people. We may be sincerely sorry but actually saying it—that is incredibly difficult. And that is true whether we’re speaking directly to the people we’ve harmed, admitting our flaws to the people we’re deeply accountable to (parents, partners, spiritual directors), or admitting it to God in words of confession.
And yet we need to say it and we need to hear it said if reconciliation is to occur. And we need to go through the awkward and painful experiences of saying and hearing genuine expressions of being sorry. And in many of our wider communities, including our Church of England and our nation we need to go through the difficult journeys of collective repentance and reconciliation.
Our readings today tell us three things (well they tell us lots more than that, but I’m focusing on three).
·They tell us that actions have consequences: the Israelites actions in worshipping the golden calf nearly destroys their relationship with God—so repentance is necessary.
They tell us that repentance is possible: Paul describes his own sin and repentance, and the grace and forgiveness he’s experienced
And they tell us of God’s deep desire to encounter that repentance and meet it with his grace, and his forgiveness, enfolding us in his love—in the same way that the shepherd brings the lost sheep back into the fold. A desire so deep that it is strange and surprising.
I want to focus particularly on Paul’s words in his letter to Timothy this morning, as he describes his experience of encountering God’s forgiveness: “the grace of our Lord overflowed for me with the faith and love that are in Christ Jesus.” Paul describes himself has having been a persecutor and a man of violence—and remember he was present at the stoning of Stephen, the first Christian martyr, looking after the coats. It is something he has to admit to and repent of, and he is able to do it in his encounter with God’s grace, mercy and love.
And remember, this is an encounter that God initiates. The God of the parable who seeks out the lost sheep and rejoices at their recovery. The God who is born as a baby in Bethlehem to live among us so that we might encounter his love. God wants us to trust his in grace and his love, to have faith in his forgiveness so that we are able to repent of our wrongs.
***
I think one of the reasons we find saying sorry so very hard is because we often lack the experience of loving forgiveness and grace.
In the school story I mentioned, Robin is able to admit her wrongs and experience full forgiveness within the loving embrace of her aunt, and the acceptance of her penitence by the boy she’s soaked with her water-throwing. Her apology is a necessary part of the resetting of good and trusting relationships, but she knows that she is surrounded by love and trusts the prospect of forgiveness as she goes to confess, even though it is hard for her to do it.
We are not all always so fortunate: all of us will have experiences of apologies met with conditions attached or with rejections, whether as children or as adults. And if we haven’t experienced loving forgiveness in our human relationships, it can be hard to imagine it or coming from other humans, or from God. It can be easy, instead, for the word ‘sorry’ to become a shield or a weapon, rather than a bridge or a doorway into a relationship. But we have to try to move beyond this.
In our present world the reconciliation that is so desperately needed cannot happen without this acknowledgement and expression—and ultimately, acceptance—of sincere apologies. This is the bedrock of repair and reconciliation. And the acknowledgements, confessions and repentances that are needed—involving all of us—do not have the simple lines of action-consequence-repentance that we see in the story of a young girl throwing water over someone, or even in Aaron and the Israelites making and worshiping an idol.
Our understanding and recognition of sin, responsibility and accountability in relation to the various catastrophes and conflicts in which we find ourselves is a process that will take time and reflection and effort. This is as true in relation to the rise of the far right and the realities of life in our own country that led to yesterday’s march in London, as it is in relation to the war in Ukraine or the destruction of Gaza. By living in history in a broken world, we are involved. Yes, the threads of brokenness and necessary repentance in our world are complex, but we can start small and local.
Repentance, in Luke’s gospel is a learning to see and be in the world in tune with God, and as we do, we are able to feel sorry and offer to apologies to those we and our communities have harmed. We feel our way, and do not always see all the threads, which is why our confession gives us the words, “through negligence, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault”, to cover our failure to fully understand and also our desire to repent and see reconciliation.
We have to practice saying sorry genuinely, when we do screw up in the more simple ways—in our families, our workplaces, our congregations and social circles—if we are to be ready to step into the wider work of reconciliation in our world. And perhaps we will not always find simple, loving forgiveness and grace in the world—but we will always find it in God. In our prayer, in our worship, in our communion, and in the repetition of the words of absolution a priest says here every Sunday:
Almighty God, who forgives all who truly repent, have mercy upon you, pardon and deliver you from all your sins, confirm and strengthen you in all goodness, and keep you in life eternal; through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Amen.
[1] Inspiration for the many ways of saying sorry comes from Freddie Allison’s How to Speak British TikToks https://www.tiktok.com/@freddie.allison/video/7475784641664879894 and https://www.tiktok.com/@freddie.allison/video/7485436816745663766 (pls cope with the occasional curse, sorrynotthatsorry)
[2] This is from the Chalet School and Eustacia. Yes, I’ve compressed the Robin’s relationship to Madge Russell, cos ain’t no sermon long enough for the Bettany-Maynard-Russell adoptive family intricacies.