{"id":144,"date":"2016-01-11T17:38:18","date_gmt":"2016-01-11T17:38:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/?p=144"},"modified":"2016-01-11T17:38:18","modified_gmt":"2016-01-11T17:38:18","slug":"forgiveness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html","title":{"rendered":"Forgiveness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cForgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.\u201d  Those are powerful words within the Lord\u2019s Prayer.  Christians are taught to seek forgiveness from God as they forgive those who have transgressed against them.  This concept of forgiveness is seen throughout the West and East.<br \/>\nBhudda said that remembering a wrong is like carrying a burden in the mind.  Other Eastern scholars a have likened   holding on to someone\u2019s past wrong to ingesting poison. The point is we need to let go of any reason for negativity.<br \/>\nThe bottom line always lies in the Golden Rule.  Do unto others as you would have done unto you. We all make mistakes and when we do we want them to be forgiven. Shouldn\u2019t we extend that same courtesy to others as well?<br \/>\n One of the most powerful examples of forgiveness is the forgiveness shown by those in Charlotte last year when a young confused boy killed nine church members including their Pastor.  It took great strength for the surviving families to say uniformly that they were devastated by the loss but that they forgave the young man who they welcomed into their church only to have him kill most of those inside.  I don\u2019t know if I have that strength but I do understand that holding on to hate would burden my mind and would be like a poison festering within.<br \/>\nLet us focus upon forgiveness. Let us first and foremost forgive ourselves and know that we are loved and are always worthy of God\u2019s love. This should help us to understand that we are all loved and should all be forgiven. It is not easy being on the path to enlightenment but the hard work is always rewarded with real progress.  Please listen to the Lord\u2019s Prayer and focus upon forgiving those who hurt us just as we are forgiven by the Lord for our sins.  It will take us one step closer to the freedom that we seek.<\/p>\n<p>Amen   <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cForgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.\u201d Those are powerful words within the Lord\u2019s Prayer. Christians are taught to seek forgiveness from God as they forgive those who have transgressed against them. This concept of forgiveness is seen throughout the West and East. Bhudda said that remembering a wrong is&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":584,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Forgiveness - East Meets West<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, nofollow\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Forgiveness - East Meets West\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cForgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.\u201d Those are powerful words within the Lord\u2019s Prayer. Christians are taught to seek forgiveness from God as they forgive those who have transgressed against them. This concept of forgiveness is seen throughout the West and East. Bhudda said that remembering a wrong is&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"East Meets West\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-01-11T17:38:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"douglasdavis\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Seekerdwd\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Forgiveness - East Meets West","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"nofollow"},"og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Forgiveness - East Meets West","og_description":"\u201cForgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.\u201d Those are powerful words within the Lord\u2019s Prayer. Christians are taught to seek forgiveness from God as they forgive those who have transgressed against them. This concept of forgiveness is seen throughout the West and East. Bhudda said that remembering a wrong is&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html","og_site_name":"East Meets West","article_published_time":"2016-01-11T17:38:18+00:00","author":"douglasdavis","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@Seekerdwd","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html","name":"Forgiveness - East Meets West","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/#website"},"datePublished":"2016-01-11T17:38:18+00:00","dateModified":"2016-01-11T17:38:18+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/#\/schema\/person\/74b0561da40967894b7244d22cfafd54"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/2016\/01\/forgiveness.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Forgiveness"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/","name":"East Meets West","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Douglas Davis","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/#\/schema\/person\/74b0561da40967894b7244d22cfafd54","name":"douglasdavis","description":"Douglas Davis is a father, husband, writer, corporate consultant and business coach. He is the author of the book. \"In My Contemplation: the Musings of a Resonance Seeker.\" He received a B.A. from the University of Illinois in English and Mass Media Communications and a J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center. Whether it is through the parameters of a business setting, spiritual setting or practical day to day living, his goal remains the same which is to help people bring out their best selves. He has recently published an e-book entitled, \"In My Contemplation\" which is available now on Amazon.","sameAs":["https:\/\/x.com\/Seekerdwd"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/author\/douglasdavis"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/584"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=144"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":145,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/144\/revisions\/145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/eastmeetswest\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}