U.S. House Minority Whip Steve Scalise is on the hunt for forgiveness.

I hope he finds it. If he does and then accepts what happened to him as the act of a deranged individual, then he’ll likely be an even better man for it.

Scalise was gravely injured when a gunman opened fire on him and other Republican members of Congress who were practicing for a baseball game planned against Democrats.

The gunman was killed in a fire fight with capital police. Scalise, meanwhile, fought for his life. Happily, he is still recovering.

Scalise said he found additional strength while talking to the pastor of one of the predominantly African-American churches that were burned in Louisiana. He said the pastor imparted wisdom, saying that he — the pastor — had forgiven the individual who has been charged with torching  the churches out of hate.

The gunman who opened fire in Arlington, Va., in June 2017 at GOP House members also was filled with hate. According to The Hill: “I’ve never internally fully forgiven the shooter from the baseball shooting and it’s something I struggle with as a Catholic. I mean, part of my faith is forgiveness and I’m, I’m working to get there, and it was actually helpful to talk to him afterward about,” he continued. “And if we agreed to talk some more — I asked him if we could talk some more and he wants to so we’re going to do that.”

I wish Rep. Scalise well in his search for forgiveness. If he adopts it, I would consider him to be a better man than many of us.