Guilt is identification with past error.
There is a vicious circle between spiritually-unaware thoughts and emotions.

The purpose of atonement is to dispel illusions, not to establish them as real and then forgive them. (A Course in Miracles)

Spiritual awakening is not possible if the illusions of the world remain real for you. Salvation is, rather, a shift in perspective about the nature of reality itself.

If we judge someone as guilty, we are identifying that person with our own judgement about a past error. The error then becomes so real that the human being before us is reduced to a word: “jerk”, “liar”, “untrustworthy”.

Make such a judgment real and you will be unable to forgive. While you may talk of forgiveness and, on some level, you may think you are trying to get there, you cannot forgive as long as a guilty perception remains real to you.

When people say they are “trying to get to a place” to “be able to forgive”, all that they are saying is that they do not forgive. Sadly, this person is unwilling to look beyond error to see and accept a sacred soul. The past is a mental judgment and the future goal is an excuse to deny love.

Atonement is seeing love as real and anything not love as error to be corrected. Only love can correct error. Therefore, love is the only correct response to everything. We continue tomorrow and each day after that.

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