WEST GOSHEN TWP, PA—Everyone, it seems, has an opinion regarding a president’s authority to pardon himself for wrong doings of a pardonable sort. Ever the contrarians, we do not have an opinion in this regard. Lucky you.
We do, nevertheless, believe that pardons, by whomever they are issued, resemble charity: they ought to begin and most frequently end at home. If, as we are told, we cannot love anyone unless we can love ourselves first, how can we forgive anybody if we cannot forgive ourselves first?
We can’t. That’s how. And if, as we are told, the faults that we hate most in others are the ones that we see in ourselves, we cannot forgive those faults in others unless we pardon ourselves first. Capisci?
Hence, National Pardon Yourself Day, a day when we can say “Pardon me” or “I beg your pardon” and really mean it. A day for replacing “my bad” with “I’m good.” Or, as we used to say, “I’m OK, You’re Not.”
Your ability to pardon yourself is unlimited and doesn’t require an act of contrition or slavish penance. Pardons are given, not earned. No fawning or obsequiousness here; and if anyone claims that only god can grant pardons, tell the fool that you can’t pardon a sin you haven’t committed.
For those who like happy endings, we are pleased to report that today we pardoned ourselves for forgetting that it was our 39th wedding anniversary. We felt like shit for a few moments until we pardoned ourself. There was no choice. We’d have felt like shit the rest of the day otherwise.
As they say in Rome, “De Indulgentiis incipere domi.”
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