In the opening of his short story, The Capital of the World, Ernest Hemingway notes that there is a joke in Madrid, Spain about how common the name Paco is.
A father came to Madrid and put an advertisement in the personals of the local newspaper, El Liberal. The column read: “Paco, meet me at Hotel Montana noon Tuesday. All is forgiven. Papa.” The joke goes that a squadron of the Civil Guard had to be called out to disperse a large crowd of eight hundred young men who had answered the advertisement.
I get the joke; there are a lot of Spaniards named Paco. But there is perhaps an overlooked, camouflaged, poignant meaning in this story: A multitude of men, a multitude of individuals, sensing, knowing, feeling the haunting need to be forgiven.
Well-known psychiatrist Dr. Karl Menninger once said that if he could convince the patients in psychiatric hospitals that their sins were forgiven, seventy-five percent of them could walk out of the hospital tomorrow. Menninger Clinic of Houston treats such psychiatric issues as anxiety, depression, trauma, addiction, personality disorders, bipolar disorder, gender issues, sleep issues and suicide attempts. Just imagine, looking at the exhaustive list above, three-fourths of those cases are due to a patient feeling unforgiven. Unforgiven for what? Unforgiven for how long? Unforgiven for how much?
Nearly four hundred years ago, the poet John Donne poetically tells “God the Father” the extent of his own sins:
“Wilt thou forgive that sin where I begun, Which was my sin, though it were done before? Wilt thou forgive that sin, through which I run, And do run still, though still I do deplore? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more.
“Wilt thou forgive that sin which I have won Others to sin, and made my sin their door? Wilt thou forgive that sin which I did shun A year or two, but wallow'd in, a score? When thou hast done, thou hast not done, For I have more.”
For the Church, Lent is a time of introspection, reflection, perhaps abstinence, but particularly for repentance— for desiring forgiveness—for hungering for wholeness. Lent is a time we still stand on this side of Easter, still in the shadow of the Cross, which is God’s answer to our need for forgiveness. But I suppose that one need not be a part of the Church to so desire, to so hunger. Every child is God’s child. Every person is one who can inherit the praise of the Psalmist: “O Lord, you are so good, so ready to forgive, so full of unfailing love for all who ask for your help.”
I remember hearing of a mother whose son had died far too soon. One night, in a dream, an angel appeared to her, asking, “If you could have your son back for just one hour, which hour in his life would it be?”
She first thought of how he had won honors graduating first in his class at the university. She also thought of the time he had returned from war service, decorated for his sacrificial heroism. No, she thought, not even at those cherished times; but the time he, a small, redfaced, sobbing child had fled to her lap for a reassuring hug, saying he was sorry for some small, destructive mischief he had done.
I can just imagine all of us reading the personal: “Meet me tomorrow noon, all is forgiven, God”; and “streams in the countless host, singing to Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, Alleluia! Alleluia!”
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