Recently, when California State Sen. Roy Ashburn announced he was gay, after having opposed every gay rights measure in the state Senate since taking office, some community members expressed their disdain.

“Don’t for one minute think that because he’s out he’s a friend of the community,” wrote one community member. “Sorry, not impressed,” wrote another. “He has done more harm than good with his past votes.”

But while Ashburn has indeed done harm and while hurt and anger are understandable, is shaming him effective?

After all, shame is what motivated him to avoid voting for any measure that might lead to being outed.

“That was terrifying to me. It was paralyzing. So I cast some votes that have denied gay people of their basic, equal treatment under the law,” he has confessed.

Only someone who was deeply demoralized could choose to deny himself and others in this way, and if we, as a community, shame him, we deny ourselves the opportunity to develop compassion for ourselves and each other.

Extending an olive branch to Ashburn would not negate what he did, and it wouldn’t mean we wouldn’t hold politicians accountable for their actions. It would simply free us as a community from resentment.

Some say that the GLBT community has already taken too much lying down and that we need to send a message we’re not taking more. But, paradoxically, having compassion for those who perpetrate injustices against us is not weakness; it’s strength. Of course Ashburn’s actions anger us and expressing our anger constructively, through activism on our community’s behalf perhaps, is useful, but there are countless examples to illustrate the fruitlessness of vengeance – our national response to the September 11 attack for instance; but it is the examples set by those who forgive that offer hope we will not continue in a cycle of an eye for an eye.

Take, for instance, the Nickel Mines, Pa., Amish community’s response to the schoolhouse shooting of an entire classroom of children, in 2006. Instead of reacting to the atrocity, the community deliberately chose to forgive the perpetrator and his family. “Letting go of grudges” is a deeply-rooted value in Amish culture, an Amish leader explained. “Willingness to forgo vengeance does not undo the tragedy or pardon the wrong, but rather constitutes a first step toward a future that is more hopeful.”

Think also of the way many in the Jewish community have been able to forgive Nazi oppression during the Holocaust. “My forgiving of the Nazis is a gift of freedom I gave myself,” wrote Auschwitz survivor Eva Kor, “a gift of peace for myself. It is also a gift of peace for everybody who wants it. Both peace and war begin in the heart and mind of one person. Pain and anger are the seeds for war. Forgiveness is the seed for peace.”

Forgiveness, of course, doesn’t come easily, and it may not even be volitional. But cultivating an attitude of forgiveness creates an environment in which people are able to admit their mistakes, however egregious, and move on in the right direction. Ashburn is not the first person to oppress us, nor will he be the last. But if we harbor grudges we only hurt ourselves.

Let’s not condemn a fellow GLBT person who had already sentenced himself to a living death, because only our forgiveness offers hope of progress.