en journalist Lydia Houghton interviews Christian author, speaker and theologian Amy Orr-Ewing, ahead of the release of her new book Forgiveness: Reclaiming Its Power in a Culture of Outrage and Fear.
LH: Why do we need another book on forgiveness?
AO-E: I’ve been working in apologetics for around 26 years. I would say it was around about just before the pandemic, that I began to really see the rage and division in the culture.
Particularly amongst students and young people who didn’t know the Lord, I saw this outrage about either true or perceived injustice: whether it was colonisation or homophobia, or all the things that young people were really concerned about and really aggrieved about – [this sense] of victimhood and grievance.
And as someone who’s involved in evangelism, part of what you’re praying about and thinking about when you’re trying to answer people’s questions, and also present the Christian faith, is: How do we answer this? What is really going on here?
And it began to strike me that in cancel-culture and that, kind of, very left-wing identity-politics-grievance culture, [there was this idea] that “injustice matters at such a profound level that it makes me really angry”. And I began to point out that if you’re an atheist, that doesn’t actually, really, make sense; if you’re just a bunch of cells and atoms, then the level of the rage you feel about injustice doesn’t make sense – it only really makes sense if we’ve been made in the image of God.
And then a bit later I also became involved in abuse advocacy: taking egregious moral wrongdoing seriously on the part of people who’ve been sexually abused or abused. And realising, okay, there’s this apologetic strand here that injustice and evil and moral wrongdoing really, really matter. And the Christian faith makes sense of that – of how bad and serious sin and evil are.
But in that context, when you began to try and present the cross and speak about forgiveness, there was this sort of intuitive feeling that forgiveness by necessity would undermine the seriousness of moral wrongdoing. So it was in trying to present the gospel that I began to really think that a lot of how the church was speaking about forgiveness or how Christians were perceiving forgiveness was, kind of, “letting people off ”, [deepening] harm – being forced to, sort of, forgive your perpetrator so that they could then carry on harming other people. And it struck me that some apologetics needed to be done around what forgiveness is and what it isn’t.
So I had the opportunity, in 2023 I think, to speak at the National Prayer Breakfast in Parliament and to make the case for the Christian faith. Basically, what I tried to do in that message, as an evangelistic message, was to say: It is both true that moral wrongdoing and harm matter very, very much – much more than atheism can account for – and it is also true that we desperately need grace and forgiveness in our cultural moment. Could it be that there is such a thing as forgiveness that doesn’t minimise harm, abuse, and moral wrongdoing? And if it were true that such a thing exists, that could be the key to solving not just our individual division but the massive divisions in the culture.
And then I made the argument that it would have to be something massive, something on a cosmic scale, that could achieve that – and I think that’s what the Christian faith offers, and it’s the death of the Son of God in history. So it’s the crucifixion of Jesus for sin. And so it kind of began there.
It struck me that everywhere I brought that message, it sounded astonishing to people. And that told me that we have been framing forgiveness in a way that perhaps engaged with post-modern culture where everything is very permissive; or perhaps even framing forgiveness in a way that made sense in, sort of, “wellness culture” where people don’t want to be holding onto bitterness – like a sort of psychological personal thing. But it struck me that the substitutionary atonement, the message of the cross, needs to be proclaimed afresh in our day in a way that connects with people’s deep sense that harm and horror really matter.
And so that’s what the book is trying to do. It’s the old message, but in today’s moment.
LH: And that’s so necessary, isn’t it. It’s fantastic that you’re bringing this book in and addressing forgiveness in this cultural moment – which is something I wanted to pick up on. You write, “In our individual lives, our national life, and this cultural moment, many of us are particularly aware of loss, harm, injustice, and the trauma and damage they cause.” You mentioned working with abuse survivors; in addition to this, was there any particular “event” which made you think, “I need to write a book on forgiveness”?
AO-E: Two things, if I may, to answer that question. That’s almost like a summary of what I’m trying to do in the book.
So, on the trauma front, I think working with survivors of sexual abuse and advocating for them. And becoming much more aware of what trauma is and what it does to the body, and then engaging with some of the literature within trauma studies, some of which suggests that forgiveness is really helpful – like it’s a helpful thing if you’re a trauma survivor and you are able to get to the point of forgiving your perpetrator – but other literature [suggests] it’s actually harmful, particularly when it’s weaponised against the survivor to make them forgive too quickly, that can cause further harm. So that whole strand, again, really struck me that that process that actually often Christians do – we’re like, “Just forgive and get on with it” – actually doesn’t allow the survivor the time or space to fully account for the full scale of the horror. So again we’re minimising evil and sin, and we’re actually then making the cross smaller, ultimately, and cheapening forgiveness, cheapening the death of Jesus. And so in the book, I [explore] this whole idea within trauma studies which talks about the need to “bear witness”: a trauma survivor needs others to actually bear witness to the horror. And this sense that in Jesus’ death on the cross, God bears witness in His own body to the horror of sin and evil and how dark and awful it is, and then of course pays that price by substitution. So there was that strand of just being alongside survivors of abuse.
And then I think the other strand was the division in culture and how, you know, on the left wing, we’ve got – as I’ve already talked about – identity politics and cancel-culture and, you know, this kind of grievance and victimhood narrative. But actually, on the right wing, as well, of politics now, we’re seeing this rise of a, sort of, reaction to that, which also needs to be challenged; the right-wing and the ultra-sort-of “nationalism” sometimes that we’re seeing is also challenged by Christian atonement and forgiveness theology. And so I’m trying to say that the kind of political ideologies of our day that are bringing about massive division – both in the church and in the world – whether we’re personally drawn to a more kind of left-wing progressive thinking or a more kind of right-wing thinking, that Christian forgiveness challenges both. [Christian forgiveness] challenges the cruelty and the superiority, that narrative of nationalism, that “We are the best,” and “We are looking to this powerful figure, or these sort of ‘super leaders’ who will [lead] us through with cruelty and strength.” Forgiveness challenges that and says “No”. Or whether we’re looking at the cancel-culture of the left wing. And so it’s bringing a Christian challenge to the political debate of our day as well.
LH: Christians rightly talk a lot about forgiveness, obviously – as you’ve said – it’s at the heart of the gospel, but potentially what we forget is that justice is also at the heart of the gospel. Can you summarise what a Christian’s view on justice should be? And is a Christian right to long to see justice carried out?
AO-E: Absolutely. I mean, I think the instinct in us where we see egregious harm in the world, if we’ve been made in the image of God, which we have – whether we believe in that God or not, as human beings, we have been made in His image – and so we will have this instinct that is a deeply human instinct to seek justice. And that finds explanation in the Christian faith, in the Biblical worldview. And at the cross, it finds a [beautiful] resolution because Jesus in His death on the cross is a propitiation. He actually takes upon Himself the justice of a loving God, on behalf of those who’ve been harmed by injustice in the world and actually pays that price and penalty. And I think that is such a powerful and true message for our moment where people are longing for justice.
And so the instinct to care that things are set right is also looking to the final judgment where the justice of God will ultimately be revealed on that day of judgment, too. And so yes, I think as Christians it’s right to long for judgment.
But of course the cross also offers mercy and it offers us mercy in a way that doesn’t minimise the harm that’s happened to us or the harm that we’ve done. And that’s why the gospel is such beautiful and powerful good news. But we have to capture that again and speak of it in a way that does it justice – does the message justice in our world.
And one of the things I touch on in the book, as well, is the difference between forgiveness and reconciliation and how often a sort-of category mistake is made by Christians between those two things and how at the cross, obviously, Jesus offers us forgiveness, but there needs to be repentance on our part to receive that forgiveness and for reconciliation with God to be possible. And so then we look at how we work that out in our own journeys as Christian disciples, when we think about forgiving others who’ve harmed us; because, of course, forgiveness isn’t just a gift we receive from Jesus – it’s something then we’re also called to live out in our own Christian lives.
Forgiveness: Reclaiming Its Power in a Culture of Outrage and Fear by Amy Orr-Ewing will be released on 20 April 2026 and is available for pre-order now.
