10. Question: If a person feels that God is all forgiving, won't that make it easier for the person to commit mistakes?⁹

Sri Chinmoy: You feel that if one goes to the Father after committing something wrong and sees that he is forgiven then he will be tempted to keep doing wrong things, with the feeling that he will always be forgiven. Now even the human father, not to speak of the divine Father, Almighty Father, will tell the child, “Look, you have done something wrong, you have struck another child. Just because I love you I have forgiven you, but you cannot go on doing wrong things.” If the child for a second time strikes another child and then comes back to the father, the father will protect the child. Afterwards, secretly and silently the father will say, “This is the second time that I am telling you the difference between good and bad, but it is not entering into your mind.” Each time the father will forgive but at the same time he will try to convince the child that he is doing something wrong. Gradually the child’s aggressive qualities will enter into the father, and consciously or unconsciously the child will feel that he has been doing something wrong. Then he will throw his mistake into the father’s protection.

But in the case of the spiritual Father, the divine Father, it is different. When the aspirant makes a mistake and runs towards the spiritual Father, the spiritual Father will protect the child, the aspirant, without doubt. Then immediately the Father will try to enter into the heart of the aspirant with Light. The human father will scold secretly, but the divine Father will not scold; He knows that scolding is of no use. He tries to see what is wrong in the aspirant. He sees that darkness is there, ignorance is there, and says, “Now, if I enter into the aspirant with Light, the Light will chase away the darkness. Then the Light will illumine the ignorance and transform it into knowledge and wisdom.” This wisdom will make the aspirant feel that he should remain peaceful, calm and quiet, and not run into conflict or strike anybody. The divine Father accomplishes this with Light, inner Light, by pouring inner Light into the aspirant. The human father will protect openly and then scold secretly because the human father does not have that pure Light, divine Light to illumine our darkness or chase away the wrong forces in us.

In both ways the temptation will be conquered: the divine Father will conquer it through Light, and the human father through strict discipline. But that does not mean that we will continue committing mistakes and then go to our Father for forgiveness, because some day we will shed bitter tears if we hear somebody say that our Father was partial to us.