To forgive is merely to remember only the loving thoughts you gave in the past, and those that were given you. ²All the rest must be forgotten. ³Forgiveness is a selective remembering, based not on your selection. ⁴For the shadow figures you would make immortal are “enemies” of reality. ⁵Be willing to forgive the Son of God for what he did not do. ⁶The shadow figures are the witnesses you bring with you to demonstrate he did what he did not. ⁷Because you bring them, you will hear them. ⁸And you who keep them by your own selection do not understand how they came into your mind, and what their purpose is. ⁹[The shadow figures] represent the evil that you think was done to you. ¹⁰You bring them with you only that you may return evil for evil, hoping that their witness will enable you to think guiltily of another and not harm yourself. ¹¹They speak so clearly for the separation that no one not obsessed with keeping separation could hear them. ¹²They offer you the “reasons” why you should enter into unholy alliances to support the ego’s goals, and make your relationships the witness to its power.
³Without exception, these relationships have as their purpose the exclusion of the truth about the other, and of yourself.
How can the Holy Spirit bring His interpretation of the body as a means of communication into relationships whose only purpose is separation from reality? ²What forgiveness is enables Him to do so. ³If all but loving thoughts have been forgotten, what remains is eternal. ⁴And the transformed past is made like the present. …⁸That is why Atonement centers on the past, which is the source of separation, and where it must be undone. ⁹For separation must be corrected where it was made. (A Course in Miracles, T-17.III.1;2:3;5:1-4,8-9. See also ACIM Text Made Simple.)
The ego uses time to make separation seem real. It retains ‘memories’ of the past yet tells us that the past cannot be changed. It deals with this conundrum by projecting the past onto present relationships. The guilt harbored in memories of the past is thus assigned to the perceived ‘other’ in the relationship. This allows the ego to assign guilt on the ‘other’ as a means of relieving its own guilt. Yet the guilt is not relieved but only hidden out of consciousness.
The Holy Spirit uses time for a different purpose. He helps us look at the memories from the past and remember only the loving thoughts. By forgiving, or letting go of the unloving thoughts, the relationship is purified of the ego’s projections from the past. Only Love is remembered now; the unloving thoughts harbored in the past are forgotten. We recognize the Love that is our brother and our Self. We remember together the oneness of Love and awaken with him in God’s Love.
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