Saying For Today: In some mysterious way, forgiveness depends on us, and this is part of the Truth of our Oneness. To forgive you, means God is forgiving you. To forgive you, means I, too, am being forgiven.
LOTUS OF THE HEART
Living in Love beyond Beliefs
EVERYONE IS WELCOME HERE
*Grace, Toshihiro Oshima, Flickr
Thus with my lips have I denounced you, while my heart, bleeding within me, called you tender names. It was love lashed by its own self that spoke. It was pride half slain that fluttered in the dust. It was my hunger for your love that raged from the housetop, while my own love, kneeling in silence, prayed your forgiveness.
*Kahlil Gibran, The Forerunner: His Parables and Poems
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Richard Rohr, a Contemplative, Interspiritual Catholic, speaks of nonblaming and graciousness of heart-mind. He refers, in Everything Belongs, to memories of confession in childhood. The other teenage boys and he would line up to confess to a young Irish priest. The older priest, Richard describes as - “the old Irish monsignor [who] was terrible.” The older priest would yell at the boys. The younger priest spoke positive things about the Divine Love and affirmed to the boys how important their lives were. Rohr writes, “We'd make up sins just to go in there and talk to him.”
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The nurturing, non-blaming attitude is seen in a Jesus saying. Jesus speaks about our sharing in the grace of forgiveness:
And when he had said this, Jesus breathed on them and spoke to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. If you release the sins of any, they are released; if you withhold this release, it is withheld."
*John 20.22-23
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Rohr writes: “Forgiveness is God's entry into powerlessness, as we see in the image of the cross.” So, we participate in forgiveness for others by accepting their and our powerlessness, and in this spiritual confession, we find the power of sharing in freeing one another through Grace. In some indefinable way, God has invited us to share in one another's forgiveness. In some mysterious way, forgiveness depends on us, and this is part of the Truth of our Oneness. To forgive you, means God is forgiving you. To forgive you, means I, too, am being forgiven. Why? Grace is undifferentiated Beauty, One Sun with a myriad rays of Light.
