Ecstatic Forgiveness

Ecstatic Forgiveness November 6, 2015

In his fascinating Gifts Glittering and Poisoned, Charon Ross summarizes John Milbank’s claim that forgiveness is an ecstatic act. Forgiveness, Milbank says (Being Reconciled), seeks “ontological harmony.” Forgiveness is never merely “‘disinterested benevolence’ but involves the forgiver abandoning himself and severing himself from himself for the sake of the forgiven” (Ross, 127).

Ross elaborates: “Milbank observes that such a severing of the self for the sake of the other in the name of forgiveness corresponds to a ‘relational ecstasis‘ or ecstasy, that is exemplified in the gift of the Eucharist. In the crucifixion, Christ utterly emptied himself of himself for the sake of fallen humanity. He was pierced (literally and figuratively) and he allowed himself to be severed in order that his beloved (humanity) might be joined to him and redeemed. Through the ecstasis of this forgiveness, the debasing ecstasy of the spectacle became the blood of the New Covenant. The New Covenant signifies an ecstasy, for, as Milbank observes, to forgive out of ecstasis is ‘to restore that order of free unlimited exchange of charity which is interrupted by sin. Thus, ecstasis is not a charity that comes to us through an economy of exchange, but through a pure and prevenient grace that exists before we even recognize that it has been offered” (127).

Ross links this ecstasy of forgiveness with Thomas’s insight into the ecstasy of the Eucharist. For Thomas, ecstasy happens when one goes outside himself to be in another; a lover divides himself to dwell in his beloved. In the Eucharist, the recipient finds his life in Christ who offers Himself. Ross explains that, “for Aquinas, the Eucharist pertains to an ecstasy that transforms the believer by piercing his old self and drawing him into love for Christ that transforms him into Christ. This transformation is ongoing; as the believer consumes Christ, he is drawn more and more into the ecstasy of Christ’s forgiveness” and so comes to embody that forgiveness (128).

Forgiveness involves a double ecstasy: The forgiver empties himself of claims against the forgiven, gives himself up for the sake of the forgiven; and at the Eucharist, the recipient comes more and more to inhabit Christ the source of all forgiveness, and so comes to the reality Paul describes: It is no longer I who live, but Christ in me. It is no longer I who live, but forgiveness in me.


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