(photo by Tom Delaney, Sherburne County, Minnesota, 2025)

It may look like a flower at first, but this is actually a very small delicate mushroom growing along our pasture fence line. It’s called an Orange Pinwheel (Marasmius siccus) and definitely catches the eye with its saffron color. This mushroom is famous for its ability to shrivel in dry weather, and then regain its full size and splendor after a rain. It’s a good little case study in adaptation and resilience!

Let’s take another look at what Saint Francis of Assisi had to say about forgiveness in his expanded version of the Lord’s Prayer, entitled Praises. It is worth noting that, unlike other lines of the Lord’s Prayer, Francis of Assisi devoted not one but two sections to the verse, “…as we forgive those who trespass against us.” In his first expansion, St. Francis highlighted the importance of full forgiveness (see “As We Forgive” posted on August 22, 2025 at https://liveandforgive.com/2025/08/22/368/). In his second expansion on this same verse of the Lord’s Prayer, St. Francis writes:

As we forgive those who trespass against us, that we may render no evil for evil, but in Thee may strive to do good to all.

St. Francis‘ expansion makes some points about how evil is involved in forgiveness. He observes that evil is the origin and force involved when a person inflicts a hurt or offense on another person. St. Francis also observes that evil can also be an origin and force in how we respond to that transgression. When we respond in a way that hurts another person – whether the first or adding a third person now to this story – or hurts ourselves, that’s evil too. It’s evil to hurt someone and it’s evil to hurt someone. When that happens, it’s like evil scores twice in the game!

Can hurt feelings turn into evil? We know that hurt feelings, including sadness and anger and aversion toward the person who hurt you, are a natural response meant to remove you from the person and situation in which you were hurt. When that purpose is accomplished, it is time for those feelings to move on so that we can get back to being our healthy and best selves. When those feelings aren’t processed, as in through a forgiveness process like the REACH Forgiveness Process taught in Live and Forgive, those feelings have the power to come out sideways in social situations, friendships, marriages and families, in ways that spread the negativity and can even hurt yet another third person. It’s like a perpetuated chain of hurt and negativity in those kinds of situations.

And let’s not forget the other possibility of those negative feelings taking their toll on your own mental health and even physical health. Negativity is not good for your health, and now science can prove it! You do have a divine, unique and beautiful purpose to “do good to all” that is reflected in your very being (imago dei). When negativity gets in the way of that, or gets strong enough to take away from that, that’s straight-up evil.

St. Francis is saying “Don’t pay back evil with more evil!” You don’t have to do that. You can look at your own hurt feelings and realize that they are terrible (for real), and then take the high road and say “I will not be a person who does that to other people, or myself — I am better than that, and it stops with me!”

You can take those negative feelings left over from what someone did to you, or something that happened to you and hurt you, and instead of letting them get to work to create more hurt, pain, and suffering in this world, you can put them into a process of forgiveness like the research-validated REACH Forgiveness Model taught in Live and Forgive. A good forgiveness process will replace those negative feelings with empathy and positive feelings, and puts a stop on the hurtful person or event having any more impact on you and the world! You’re basically saving the world…think about that you super-hero!

This text is an original work of its author Tom Delaney and was entirely composed without the use of artificial intelligence (AI).

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If your parish or faith community is seeking a deeper experience of healing, mercy, and spiritual renewal, Live and Forgive is here to help. To begin the conversation, email Live and Forgive presenter and facilitator Tom Delaney at tom@liveandforgive.com—Tom will be glad to connect with you in a spirit of welcome, respect, and shared faith.