The Fifty Miracle Principles of A Course in Miracles
by Kenneth Wapnick
 
 

Principle 26

Miracles represent freedom from fear. "Atoning" means "undoing." 
The undoing of fear is an essential part of the Atonement value of miracles.

To look with the ego's eyes really is the same as to look with the eyes of fear. We would never try to attack or hurt others if we were not afraid of them. By choosing the Holy Spirit instead of the ego, we are really choosing love instead of fear.

"Atoning" means "undoing," which is another word for "correction." Basically, when we atone for our sin, we undo the belief in it. We do not make it real and then try to undo it, which of course is the way the world --  the theological, psychological worlds, etc. --usually proceeds. There are two sections, "The Unreality of Sin" (text, p. 376; T-19.III) and "Sin versus Error" (text, p. 374; T-19.II), that point out that you deny the reality of sin by changing it to a mistake. As the Course teaches: Sins are punished, mistakes are corrected.

This does not mean that you deny what you see. You do not deny what you read about in the newspapers or what people have done. What you do is shift your interpretation from sin, which is always a projection of our own belief in sin, to a mistake that has to be corrected, which is our own as well as the other person's. Once again, sins are punished by the ego; mistakes are corrected by the Holy Spirit. And, thus, they are undone.