Questioner: Most of us are familiar with the Christian teaching that we should forgive. But when we've been hurt in some way, we may wonder why we should even try to be forgiving. The normal thing is to feel some kind of resentment, is it not?

Speaker: Well, I'm sure that you know people who have had unhappy experiences and feel resentful as a result. But have they been willing to forgive the other fellow?

Questioner: Not generally.

Speaker: Would you agree that here's the point where we have to start—that right in the beginning we have to be willing to forgive?

Questioner: Yes.

Speaker: Christ Jesus spoke about forgiveness quite a bit throughout his teaching. And, of course, he practiced it. When Peter asked him how many times he should for give his brother, he replied (Matt. 18:22), "Until seventy times seven." And when he was about to be crucified, he said of those concerned (Luke 23:34), "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do."

We can see from the whole of the healing and teaching ministry of Christ Jesus that day by day he viewed surrounding circumstances from a much higher standpoint than others.

Questioner: What sort of a higher standpoint are you referring to?

Speaker: He saw beyond the mere outward appearance of a situation. He didn't ignore injustice or evil of any kind, but he must have known that evil done by others was the result of ignorance of their own true nature. His work was based upon the awakening of these individuals to their true selfhood.

And we certainly don't ignore evil in Christian Science, just as you wouldn't teach your children to ignore a mistake in mathematics. The way to solve a situation is not to react as the servant of that situation but to lift thought above the apparent presence of evil, no matter how cruel and how real it seems to be, and love your way through it—to so live love that resentment just can't be part of your consciousness, your thoughts.

Questioner: This seems very difficult to me. It seems as if it is a compromise.

Speaker: I'm not saying that this is a very easy path to take, but it's certainly not a compromise. When there seems to be resentment and bitterness expressed toward you, it never seems very easy to take a stand to love the individual.

And you can't do it if you're trying to work it out from your own human standpoint. But as you lift thought above the human details, you feel the touch of the Christ, and that enables you to see the true man who is right there behind your human picture of him.

Mary Baker Eddy writes in "Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures" (pp. 476. 477): "Jesus beheld in Science the perfect man, who appeared to him where sinning mortal man appears to mortals. In this perfect man the Saviour saw God's own likeness, and this correct view of man healed the sick."

Questioner: are we dealing with two aspects of the individual-—the ideal and the human self?

Speaker: In Christian Science we come to see that the ideal—to use your word—the perfect image and likeness of God, is here right here and now. It's an ever-present evidence of man's indestructible relationship with God. The spiritual fact regarding man is for us to see, to learn about, to acknowledge. And in the proportion that we live in accordance with the laws governing the real man, we see this man becoming apparent in our human experience.

Questioner: But how can I look upon somebody who has just injured me or made a decision that is going to affect me or my family and see him as the ideal man?

Speaker: It depends how you look at him. If you look at him according to the mere human appearance of the situation, then you're acting as the victim or servant of the situation instead of as the master of it. You become the master if you recognize that in spite of that unhappy picture, right there is the ideal man. This ideal man is the man made in God's image and likeness and therefore is spiritual and perfect. He cannot give offense or bear resentment. Let me just give you a specific illustration.

When I was actively engaged in the legal profession, a case arose in which the client became obliged to pay a sum which was considerably greater than what he'd anticipated paying in a particular transaction.

Now, I had spent a great deal of time on this case and had advised him in a certain way but he hadn't acted on that advice. Because of that, I felt quite justified in blaming the client himself for his difficulty. He in turn was endeavoring to find some way out and was blaming me. As a result of this, there was resentment on both sides.

This unhappy situation took up a great deal of my time and thought, and I found that even when I was trying to work on other things, this worry and resentment was occupying me.

Then one evening I went out for a walk. I prayed about this whole situation and realized that it just had to be dealt with, properly and thoroughly. I then recognized that besides resentment, I had a strong feeling of self-justification—that I wasn't at fault. I felt I was righteously resentful of his attitude.

And so, thinking prayerfully, as we learn to do in Christian Science, I came to recognize his true identity as the image and likeness of God, divine Love. This prayer revealed that I had to open my thought more to see the spiritual facts that were there all the time to be acknowledged. I began to love the man instead of resenting what he was doing.

Questioner: But this truly wasn't all your fault. He was provoking this attitude, wasn't he?

Speaker: Yes; but prior to this, I had been acting as the victim of the situation. And through this prayer I realized that I could act as its master. The solution of the situation wasn't to be found outside the realm of my own thinking; it didn't depend upon what the other individual did. It depended upon my own acceptance of the spiritual facts as they really existed. It's the presence of the Christ, the activity of the Christ, Truth, in human consciousness which awakens us to see the true, spiritual, indestructible facts about any given situation. And the Christ was lifting me up to become aware of this. I finished my walk feeling happy and free.

I didn't see this fellow for another two or three weeks, perhaps; then he came to see me. As he walked in, he had a smile on his face. There were smiles and friendliness on both sides. He hadn't come to complain at all. He had brought me some new work to do, another case to handle for him. And that was completely the end of the situation.

Questioner: Then, in a sense, what you're saying is that man's true individual identity is never in conflict with another.

Speaker: Exactly. That is the basic spiritual fact. But it's no use saying that all is well if we're entertaining resentment and bitterness toward another, no matter how justified that may seem to be. But the minute we turn away from these attitudes and start to look toward the spiritual facts of man's perfect, indestructible nature as a child of God and let these facts into outlives and live by them, working in harmony with another as God's idea, then not only are we blessed but the other one is blessed too.