Simon Wiesenthal spent many years searching for Nazi war criminals who were responsible for the holocaust. When he was a prisoner in a Nazi forced-labor camp, he was ordered to visit an SS trooper who was wounded and dying in a hospital. Knowing he was going to die, he wanted to clear his conscience by confessing his sins of shooting and burning up Jews in the Ukraine. The dying officer begged Wiesenthal, a Jew, to forgive him. Wiesenthal listened, turned, and walked away without a word in reply. After the war Wiesenthal sent the story to 32 leading religious leaders asking them whether he did the right thing. The majority agreed that he did the right thing by not forgiving the Nazi.

Though some do not forgive because they do not believe in forgiving, true Christians do believe in forgiveness. In the Apostles' Creed they confess that they believe in "the forgiveness of sins."