A piece by Simon Jenkins in The Guardian drew attention to the speed and seriousness with which the Korean chief executive of Jeju Air, Kim E-bae, apologised for the crash of one of their planes on 29th December and the death of 179 people. He bowed deeply and said, “Regardless of the cause, as CEO, I feel profound responsibility for this incident.” In a very different way, Russia’s Vladimir Putin managed to say how sorry he was to hear about another plane crash, this time of an Azerbaijan Airlines flight in Kazakhstan on Christmas Day, but he took no responsibility for what has been widely accepted as a Russian missile attack.
Saying sorry is a big part of being a Christian. We say it in church every Sunday, and in between, if we so wish, we can go to a priest for confession. Of course, it is meaningless if you just say the words, but if you think through what we are actually saying, it is very powerful, it can change us:
“…we have sinned against you and against our neighbour,
in what we have thought, in what we have said and done,
through ignorance, through weakness, through our own deliberate fault.
We have wounded your love and marred your image in us.
We are sorry and ashamed..”
It can be amazingly positive to say sorry, even – maybe especially – when it is difficult. According to a piece on the website of the Harvard Business School, an apology can bring huge benefits:
“An apology can often be the first step to better understanding in a damaged relationship. It says that you share values regarding appropriate behaviour towards each other, that you have regrets when you don’t behave according to those values (intentionally or unintentionally), and that you will make greater efforts to live up to your shared standards of behaviour.”
It reinforces who we are and restores relationships. “When one person can take responsibility and apologise for their portion of harm, it may open up communication and allow the other party to apologise as well. To truly heal a relationship, it is powerful for people to exchange apologies. Each person acknowledges their responsibility.”
So why is it so hard for our leaders and politicians? “The message of the Korean airline”, says the article, “is that people not only need apologies, they are likely to respect them. There is nothing nobler than sincere regret.” The Guardian cites a case in point: Lord Carrington felt obliged to resign as Foreign Secretary over the UK’s failure to prepare for a possible invasion by Argentina of the Falkland Islands. It was an honourable decision.
And yet more recently Boris Johnson showed no inclination whatsoever to resign from the same public office, when he declared that Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was visiting Iran “simply teaching people journalism” – a statement her family and her employer both said was untrue, and for which she was imprisoned for “propaganda against the regime”.
“Mistakes in public life are sufficiently common to merit apologies”, says Simon Jenkins in The Guardian. “Offering them might make the public less cynical towards those in power.”
So maybe Elton John got it right after all: “Sorry seems to be the hardest word.”
Read the Guardian article here.