Christian Forgiveness and Snape (was Would Harry forgiving )

[Jen Reese]

No: HPFGUIDX 164450

> Magpie:
> Yes. You can be both. Sometimes the two things go together well. It 
> seems like second nature to Dumbledore to be isolated, watching 
> from a bird's eye view, and yet also feel his compassion gives him 
> understanding of what everyone's going through. I think his "weak 
> and foolish" confession is what he'd *like* to say his flaws are, 
> not what they really are (at least not the way he's presenting the 
> weakness as foolishness). 

Jen:  Whatever Dumbledore calls it, it's pretty harsh to stand there 
in front of someone and talk the way Dumbledore talked.  To tell 
Harry not only his views on Sirius and Snape right after Sirius 
*died*, but to go on and on about how his main flaw was caring about 
Harry too much when he's standing there hurting Harry in that very 
moment...!

Dumbledore is asking for it here, he's expecting big repurcussions.  
Harry can't really make a choice until he knows *everything*, the 
fact that Dumbledore has these thoughts about Sirius and Snape, that 
he identified his caring as a flaw, that he made choices about 
Harry's life that may not have been what Lily and James would have 
wanted could they have imagined what would occur!  So Dumbledore 
wasn't even considering what Harry's dead parents would have wanted 
for him--what parent could choose blood protection over love, warmth 
and real home?  He's telling Harry he made a choice based on the 
information he had at the time and what *he* believed was right.  And 
I believe he shut off his compassion for Harry to make that 
choice, 'the twinkling light that usually shone from Dumbledore's 
eyes seemed to have gone out', and attempted to replace it with 
compassion for the WW.

The audacity of what he's done, and the fact that he justifies his 
reasoning for it makes it even more unbelievable.  But Dumbledore 
failed, didn't he?  The fact that Harry can still trust Dumbledore 
and care about him is a testament to Harry, not Dumbledore, because 
Harry hears between all the jibber-jabber that no matter what 
Dumbledore believed he should have done, he couldn't stop himself 
from caring deeply about Harry in the end.  That's Harry's power to 
me, right there, a perfect example of how he doesn't operate like 
*most* people would in that circumstance.  

Jen