Given the students' outstanding reputation in school, these revelations came as a shock. As I probed further into the parents' relationships to God and one another, it became clear that neither parent really understood or had experienced God's forgiveness in Christ, nor did they ever forgive one another. Hurt upon hurt made a divorce seem inevitable. It soon became clear that when disciplinary issues came up at home, neither of them ever communicated forgiveness to the children, either. After all, they couldn't forgive each other.
Guilt is a real, objective matter.
When we violate the law of God or disobey his commands, we incur guilt. More often than not we associate this with a feeling of pain in our conscience. But feeling or no feeling, where guilt is present, be sure that the urge to atone for guilt is also present in some form. There are many ways of atoning for guilt. St. Paul, in the Epistle to the Romans, identifies two general methods.