A recent Costco Connection article entitled All Apologies lists six components of a good apology from Roy Lewicki, professor emeritus of management and human resources at Ohio State University’s Fisher College of Business:

• An expression of regret
• An explanation of what went wrong
• An acknowledgment of responsibility
• A declaration of repentance
• An offer of repair
• A request for forgiveness

It’s a good list, but we see it violated all the time. The funny thing is when it is violated, everyone knows the apology is phony or less than complete whether they could recite the six things or not.

The biggest non-apology apology of late has been the Houston Astros in general and their owner, Jim Crane, in particular. The Astros were stealing opposing pitchers’ signs and relaying pitch information to batters. They won the 2017 World Series doing that. Here are some key observations in an article by Jeff Passan of ESPN:

• In the span of 27 minutes at a news conference, he [Jim Crane] claimed his team’s routine cheating during its 2017 championship season didn’t impact the game, declared he shouldn’t be held accountable for the organization he runs, …
• Amid his attempts at apologizing were clear signals that his contrition went only as far as his ability to absolve himself of wrongdoing.
• Crane — endeavoring to explain away the Astros’ illicit use of a center-field camera to decode catchers’ signs that were then relayed via banging on a trash can to alert hitters as to the pitch type about to be thrown — said with a straight face: “Our opinion is that this didn’t impact the game.” When pressed on what exactly he meant by that, Crane said: “I didn’t say it didn’t impact the game.” He had, of course — 60 seconds earlier, for those curious about the capacity of Crane’s short-term memory. And it did, clearly, as his team’s shortstop, Carlos Correa would later admit.

At a minimum, to go back to our original list, there’s no acknowledgment of responsibility, no repentance, no offer of repair, and no request for forgiveness. Missing at least four out of six!

As I said, it’s a good list, and we rarely see it executed in the public eye. May we as believers do better!

Yet now I am happy, not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret, but worldly sorrow brings death. (2 Corinthians 7.9, 10, NIV)

If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. (1 John 1.9, NIV)