The words of our Lord cannot be ignored: “And when you are praying, let go if you have something against anyone in order that your Father in heaven may let go of your transgressions for you” (Mark 11:25). … So long as I cling to another’s fault, I perpetuate it. The malice has left the other person and now lives in me. True, I have been wronged, perhaps thoughtlessly, perhaps with deliberate intent. Yet I am a victim in a more profound sense, because evil passed from the other to me. What was expressed momentarily in an action or a series of actions is now enshrined in my unforgiving heart. Until I let go my grievance the malice remains active. Whenever I [do not] make space for God in my heart, it will invade.
In the Our Father we pray, “Forgive us as we forgive” (Matthew 6:12). All prayer is a process of letting go past grievances. Seldom easy, rarely instantaneous, but always necessary. One does not go far on the journey of meditation before becoming aware that the ability to meditate is closely allied to one’s willingness to be at peace with all.
Michael Casey
Toward God, p. 109
