The truly humble person receives forgiveness with deep gratitude and even joy. In contrast, the proud person—like the servant in today’s gospel—experiences forgiveness as humiliating and thus seeks to humiliate his fellow servant, in turn. The really proud person is actually incapable of receiving forgiveness and this, perhaps, helps explain why the devil was never forgiven. In between the humble and the proud person, is the one who struggles to accept forgiveness from God because of a subtle form of pride that poses as sorrow for offending God, but is actually more regret for having let oneself down—thus an inability to forgive oneself. Lent is an opportune time to reexamine our own experiences of forgiveness so as to ascertain where we are on this pride/humility continuum. For, until God’s forgiveness awakens gratitude, joy, and a firm resolve to avoid sin, we are still in the grip of pride’s enslaving chains and closed to the transforming fullness of God’s forgiving love.