Forgiveness as Displacement Release: Resentment as Wrong Attractor, the REACH Model as Return Path, and the Geometry of Letting Go

We apply the Displacement Framework to forgiveness, formalizing resentment as a wrong attractor and forgiveness as displacement release — not condoning the wrong action, not reconciliation, not forgetting, but releasing the resentment wrong attractor so that D(xi_injury) can decay without requiring the other party to change. Seven formal propositions plus the Resentment Accumulation Theorem are derived: injury as interpersonal displacement, resentment as wrong attractor (with breakeven time T* = d0/delta derived), the formal independence of victim displacement reduction from perpetrator accountability, forgiveness as displacement release, the REACH model (Worthington) formalized as a five-step return-path engineering sequence, self-forgiveness as self-directed resentment release (linked to the shame wrong attractor), physiological Phi reduction via forgiveness (cortisol, HCV reactivity, inflammation, mortality reduction per Lawler-Row), and collective forgiveness as community return-path infrastructure (Truth and Reconciliation, restorative justice).

The limits of forgiveness are formally analyzed: ongoing injury, forced forgiveness deepening the resentment wrong attractor by adding guilt over not forgiving, and the political instrumentalization of forgiveness as displacement of accountability. 38 citations including Enright, Worthington, McCullough, Lawler-Row, Luskin, Tutu, Braithwaite, Murphy, Strawson, Herman, and Trivers.