[HPforGrownups] Re: Forgiveness

[k12listmomma]

No: HPFGUIDX 188699

>    Now, if JKR says that Morty could repent, I'll put that in the same
> file as Dumbledore being gay; interesting to see what was in JKR's mind,
> but it's not present at all in the text.
>
>    Bart


But didn't in canon Dumbledore say something in a conversation to Harry 
about "it's our choices that make us what we are" in an earlier book? 
Clearly, young Riddle was not a psychopath, was he? I don't see in the books 
where the student Tom Riddle (preHorcrux) was anything but a normal child. 
Instead, he made a conscience decision to learn about, study and research 
Horcruxes, and made a conscience effort to apply that knowledge to achieve 
his goal. He murdered because it was a step to get what he wanted with the 
Horcruxes, and he considered the deaths a "necessary ingredient", the same 
way that he just expected Wormtail to just lob off his own arm for his 
regeneration potion in the graveyard. I don't see an illness where Voldemort 
is just excused because he's mentally ill- I see a Voldemort who is reaping 
the rewards of having made Horcruxes- a conscience decision to rip his own 
soul. That is where forgiveness can come in, because he could be sorry he 
made those bad choices in life. There could have been, in canon, a part of 
his soul left of the original young Tom Riddle, a part of him left from 
before all those murders and crimes against humanity. He could have been 
sorry he murdered his father, or someone in the long list of people he 
killed. He could have been sorry he killed a young mother, the innocent kids 
on his way the to Potter house, any number of innocent bystanders whom he 
hadn't intended to kill. Any tiny shred of remorse would have been a step 
forward...and forgiveness has to at least offer it, even if it is refused 
and salvation is not to be realized because the condemned refuses to the 
very end to repent or accept that forgiveness.

Shelley