I used to harshly judge people who, after having knowingly enriched themselves in an unethical system, call out that system and try to lock the door behind them - hypocrites!

But they are far better than the alternative majority, who knowingly enrich themselves in the same unethical system and wholeheartedly support it.

Sincere whistle blowers should be welcomed, whatever form they take.

And those called out by the whistle blowers should be judged, held accountable, and then forgiven.

I recently remarked to a friend and her 19-year-old daughter that Kevin Spacey was one of my favorite actors, and I hated how his life had tarnished.

The daughter responded with horror that I could even intimate tolerating, much less liking, anyone who had molested a teenager.

I responded, more vehemently than I'd intended, that I do not condone sexual harassment or abuse in any form. But Kevin Spacey and others have been punished and shamed for their wrongful lifestyles by and in the public court; and, if they truly see the error in their ways and work toward correcting them, they should be forgiven.

"Not Forgotten," I clarified. "Forgiven."

"That's the problem with this country," I said, more to her mother this time. "Despite all its Christian chest beating, it refuses to Forgive."

"Forgiveness is the whole reason Jesus died on the cross, for Christ's sake!" I continued, barely keeping myself off the soap box. "But the tenet of Forgiveness has been abandoned by the most vocal followers of Christianity, if they'd ever really adopted it in the first place."

Oh, what Jesus could (re-)teach us if he sacrificed himself to the world today!

The same people would crucify him, using distortions of his own teachings to do it.

The same people would deny him, preferring privacy to the stress of bad press. (At least they won't be facing death by lion if they choose otherwise.)

The question is: Are the rest of us sufficiently primed to hear and heed his leadership after 2000 years of its influence the first time around?

Seems it’s easier to hope than to forgive. 'Least we've got that going for us ;-) .