Untangling the Forgiveness Idea

It took years for me to completely let go of my own definition of forgiveness and accept the new definition that Jesus gave us in A Course in Miracles.

Untangling the Forgiveness Idea

Oh my gosh! It took years for me to completely let go of my own definition of forgiveness and accept the new definition that Jesus gave us in A Course in Miracles. Of course, like most people, I started with the idea that someone was guilty, but I would forgive the jerk anyway . . . maybe . . . if I decided he deserved forgiveness… but I wouldn’t forget. Forgiveness used to be a messy process for me, with many uncertainties and never really satisfying.

Slowly, though, I began to accept the new way to forgive. One of my favorite forgiveness passages from the Course comes from Lesson 221.

“Forgiveness recognizes what you thought your brother did to you has not occurred. It does not pardon sins and make them real. It sees there was no sin. And in that view are all your sins forgiven. What is sin, except a false idea about God’s Son? Forgiveness merely sees its falsity, and therefore lets it go. What then is free to take its place is now the Will of God.”

This just didn’t make sense to me at first. I would look at what was happening and wonder how I could believe that nothing had occurred. It sure seemed like stuff occurred. I understood that forgiveness is not about making something real and then trying to overlook it. At least I understood all the individual words in that sentence. I even understood why the old way of forgiving could never work.

There Is Only Innocence

What I have finally come to understand is that everyone, including me, is innocent. I don’t care what is said or done in the illusion; there is only innocence. Nothing can change this because God created us innocent, and so that is what we are. Everything else is a lie. Lies will not deceive me. Whatever I see that is not innocence is a deception. I can choose to place my attention on what is not real, or I can choose to place my attention on the truth. It is the difference between choosing ego or choosing God.

Now that I know that all is innocence, forgiveness is no longer confusing. I don’t have to decide if the other person is innocent and under what circumstances he may be guilty. I don’t have to figure out how he is innocent or how I can logically move my judgment from guilt to innocence. None of that is an issue. There is no question of guilt or innocence. There is only innocence. The only real question is whether I want to see the innocence or have I found some value in guilt.

Like everyone else, I have had some situations in my life that seemed very hard to forgive. Those were the times when I valued the guilt more than I valued my peace. I had this happen at work. Someone came to work for us that I found irritating. It seemed that everything she said and did was an attack, and I felt justified in my grievance. Fortunately, I have had enough peace in my life to seriously miss it when it is gone, and so I knew I had to forgive.

Finding It in My Own Mind

I read about forgiveness, and I prayed. I wrote about my successes and my problems with it. Slowly, like peeling away the layers of an onion, I started removing all the blocks that kept me from understanding what was surely obvious; all of those blocks were put there by me to prevent forgiveness. As I became more and more willing to forgive, the Holy Spirit was able to heal my mind, and I returned to peace.

In the process of doing so, I realized that the very things I disliked about this person could all be found in my own mind. One thing that annoyed me about her is that she couldn’t accept help because she was always justifying her own behavior. It was my job to train her for the position. How could I do that if she wouldn’t accept my help? I had been doing this job for over 20 years, and she had been here for less than two months, and she was arguing that I was wrong and she was right. Really?

With Healing Came Clarity

With the healing of my mind came enough clarity to see that I was doing exactly the same thing. I was asking the Holy Spirit for another way to see. I was reminded of her innocence, that she is part of the Christ Mind just as I am. But then I would think of something she said or did, and resentment would muddle my mind, and I would argue for her guilt.

Now when I think about it, I have to laugh. I was arguing with Holy Spirit, basically saying that I was right and He was wrong. How was this any different than what she was doing with me? My arguing with Holy Spirit about guilt and innocence was much more absurd than my co-worker arguing with me about who was right about a test procedure. It took a while for me to accept that she did nothing to me, so there was nothing to forgive, but only because I was so busy projecting onto her that it took some time to realize that I wasn’t actually judging her but myself.

She also had an annoying habit of always needing to be seen as the best. This made me crazy for a while until I became willing to see her differently. Then the Holy Spirit reminded me that what I saw was either love or a call for love. I realized that her need to be seen as better than everyone reflects her fear that she isn’t good enough.

Again I See it in Myself.

Then, of course, I saw this in me. My willingness for healing allowed the Holy Spirit to show me that my insistence she was wrong was a reflection of my own fears of not being appreciated and respected. How dare she see herself as knowledgeable and as capable as me? What gives her the right? As I saw this in myself, it was embarrassing at first, but then it was a relief. Thank goodness I finally found the block to forgiveness.

It might seem as if it will take forever to forgive all the wrong thoughts in the mind. But there is a place in the Course that talks about how all things are the same. This is what makes forgiveness possible, I think. I don’t have to forgive each little thing on its own; this anger needs to be looked at and the truth discerned, that hatred examined, and a decision made.

Once, a priest told me it was acceptable to think about “sinning” and planning to “sin” as long as I never got around to the action of “sinning,” I was ok. He was wrong. There is no difference between what I think, what I say, what I do, and what I perceive; there is no difference between thinking about a chair, sitting in a chair, throwing a chair, or the chair itself. All of those things are simply forms of an idea.

It Is Simple

Now it is simple. It is an idea that needs forgiveness, just an idea, and not a million forms of that idea. In fact, the idea of a chair is no different than the idea of a tree, the idea of my son, or the idea of death. They are all forms of the same idea of separation. Separation ideas are all the same, one not being bigger, more important, more evil, or more blessed than another. They are simply ideas of separation. All need to be forgiven through forgiving the idea of separation. The idea that they are many and varied is a trick of the ego to keep us endlessly distracted.

Because the world is ultimately the one idea of separation, I cannot hold onto the value I placed in any one seeming part of it and expect to be in peace. If I think my relationship with my children is special and must be defended, I am still in hell. If I think that my body is valuable and must be defended, I am still in hell. I am still in hell if I think my reputation is at stake. Anything that holds me apart from my brother holds me apart from God, keeps me in hell. It is something that must be forgiven.

Right now, I can envision only a pale shadow of the peace of God, the loveliness and the holiness that, even at this moment, surrounds me. But with my willingness to forgive all illusions, I begin to understand that there is only one illusion to forgive, the illusion that separation is real. I return again and again to the lesson that there is only one problem and one solution, and that solution is in my mind. Thank you, Holy Spirit.

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