On the cross, Jesus asked God to forgive those who put him there.  ... He could have said so many things after he said, "Father, forgive them." But he said they don't know what they're doing. There's a certain — as philosopher Rene Girard would call it — "contagion" in mob  violence that will kill someone to make their own group anxiety go down. Jesus sees their action in a larger frame.   And maybe that's instructive in trying to love the most difficult people in our lives. To see their action in a larger frame of being a deeply wounded person.

Rev. Fred Harrell