We see all these well-intentioned people bound by their past pushed towards inevitable disaster. It takes an hilarious falling to temptation, a sad death, and a near calamity to show them that the future can be better than the past, that grace includes everyone, and that life is too short and too precious to be wasted on hostilities. Interestingly, both the main characters have a past to overcome and something for which they must forgive themselves. The restrictive, self-righteous Reynaud must overcome his denial and admit he has failed in his marriage, that the wife who left him shall never return. Even Vianne, who literally carries the ashes of her wandering gypsy mother with her as she wanders rejected from town to town to town, learns that she can also can be freed of her past and find an accepting, continuing community who will not reject her, that she does not have to drag her own daughter through the same rootless existence her mother dragged her.
Grace triumphs over law, humility over pride, and love over self-righteous exclusion.
You have to be willing to offer it. You have to be willing to receive it. You have to be willing to let go of the past and the privileges you may think it confers on you. Forgiveness is about creating a new future not bound by the past. It is about letting go of our right to judge, as if we had that right even towards those who have damaged us.