I and others in my family discuss this with local priests every time they give a sermon on forgiveness, and that’s about every other week. I attend many churches in my area, and ALL of them give the forgiveness sermons but NEVER the sermon about sincere sorrow, repentance and reparations, EVER. The last time I heard a priest discuss those topics was in highschool, now quite a while ago.
**ALL of them give the forgiveness sermons but NEVER the sermon about sincere sorrow, repentance and reparations, EVER.**
Our priest went further. He talked about the forgivesness, and then he talked about how we could really show the Lord (and the person we had hurt) that we were sorry.
It included everything from the Sacrament of Reconciliation including the penance. Additionally he added to not talking about how a person wronged us, and to put their picture (or a note about the wrong) behind a picture in our house. Then every time we walked past that picture we could put our hand on the frame and pray for that person.
He included a couple of other suggestions which I am not remembering right now, but it was excellent because it went further than just forgiveness.
Another thing is to talk to the individual in person if you can saying, “Please forgive me.” rather than the usual “I’m sorry.” The “Please forgive me,” puts the ball back in their court and offers them an opportunity to forgive and to also ask for forgiveness.