The forgiveness that renews marriage

Every marriage has wounds. What saves love is not never making mistakes, but learning to ask for forgiveness and to forgive.

Saint Paul gives couples advice worth its weight in gold: “do not let the sun set on your anger” (Eph 4:26). And he adds: forgive one another, as God has forgiven you in Christ (Eph 4:32).

Pope Francis, in the exhortation Amoris Laetitia (no. 133), recalls three words that keep a home standing: please, thank you and sorry. They seem small, but they carry humility, gratitude and reconciliation.

Forgiving is not pretending nothing happened, nor accepting disrespect. It is deciding not to turn the other’s mistake into a weapon forever. Sometimes forgiveness comes quickly; sometimes it is a path we ask God for every day.

A practice for couples: before going to sleep, each one says one thing they are grateful to the other for and, if needed, asks forgiveness for something that happened that day. Then pray an Our Father together, slowly, paying attention to “forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us.”

To pray as a couple

Lord, You who united us, heal what pride and weariness have wounded between us. Give us humility to ask for forgiveness and generosity to forgive. May our love always begin again in You. Amen.