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For the want of apology a trial was lost. For the want of a trial a job was lost. For the want of a job... an income was lost. For the want of an income a house was lost. And all for the want of an apology. So said food-blogger Jack Monroe who won a libel action against Katie Hopkins last year. If only Miss Hopkins had said sorry, the case needn’t have gone to court. Now she has put her family home on the market. In 2015 she wrote, of a Muslim family she defamed, “You want me to apologise for my views? Never!” Though eventually she had to. I find this reluctance curious, even from someone so breezily outspoken. From a purely pragmatic point of view it seems a lot cheaper and easier to issue an apology than lose a home. It isn’t always, of course. Sometimes we fear legal liability. The last thing you’re supposed to do after a traffic accident is say sorry, lest you suggest you were at fault. I know someone who jumps to blame the moment he hears an expression of regret: sadly, with him I’ve learnt to be wary and defensive. Or we may shun an admission of weakness. My impression is that this can be much harder for men: do we put too much burden on our sons to be right? Or perhaps on our daughters to take the blame, sometimes almost for speaking or breathing. Paradoxically, it’s a sign of great strength and confidence to say, I did wrong and I am sorry; I would undo it if I could and hope never to do it again. We may dread sorry not being enough. Last year I was berated furiously for fifteen minutes for an ill-considered article I wrote over twenty years ago, almost my first attempt at journalism, in great haste and relying on research I had reason to believe was reputable. I regretted it almost as soon as I’d filed it, and was very sorry to see it in print. But the more I apologised the angrier he became. It seemed there was nothing I could do to appease. And yet an apology can be an immensely powerful thing: bringing forgiveness; mending friendships; most significantly perhaps, letting go of the past. It liberates the offender as well as the offended. The latter, because apology enables forgiveness: the former, because it allows acceptance. A friend I’ve lost touch with hated Christianity because of the General Confession. The first thing the Church makes us do, he complained, is grovel in self-hatred. No. Almost the first thing is an act of self-acceptance. We have erred and strayed from Thy ways like lost sheep. And yet we’re still loved. Our relationships restored. And we can start a new life from today. Therapists, counsellors, best friends – my mother – all teach us: the most liberating and powerful thing we can do is be able to forgive ourselves. There’s not one of us who wouldn’t live our past differently if it were our future. And that’s exactly what apology allows.