In this morning's talk I want to go to the very beginning of A Course in Miracles and
correct what has been a misunderstanding of many students, and actually there are very,
very few things that I regret that Helen and I did when we edited the Course for its final
edit preceding its publication. But it's that original beginning, not the original beginning,
because actually it was not the original beginning but what it is now the published beginning
of the Course, I think leaving it as it is, is a mistake and I want to discuss that with
you this morning. The Course says, "This is a course in miracles. It is a required course.
[And] Only the time [in which] you take it is voluntary." This was originally part of
a larger passage, or a larger message to Helen, that was actually a joke in which Helen said
to Jesus as she was taking the Course down in the early weeks, "I'm assuming this course
is an elective," referring to what occurs in college curricula when we have certain
courses that are required, that are necessary for us to graduate, and then there are those
courses that are elective; that we choose to take simply because we have an interest
in it. And so Helen was being cute with Jesus saying, "I assume this is not required but
an elective; namely, I could choose not to take it at any time." And so Jesus' response
was to say, "No, I'm very sorry, Helen dear, but this is a required course." And what he
meant by that was that, "This is what you and Bill asked for when you pledged yourselves
to find the other way of relating, and this is your answer and so it is a required course,
meaning it is a required course for you and Bill." When the context is removed it makes
it sound as if everyone must take A Course in Miracles, "it is a required course," and
that would be the farthest thing from the truth, and certainly would be directly antithetical
to the whole spirit of the Course. And when one looks at the opening pages of the teacher's
manual one finds that Jesus is saying that A Course in Miracles is only one form among
"many thousands," that's the phrase, "many thousands," of the universal course. And all
the different forms of the universal course in one way or another, each one has the same
theme: God's Son is guiltless and in his guiltlessness is his salvation. That is expressed in every
authentic course in salvation, regardless of its teaching or its form. And so that idea
is extremely important so for students of the Course so they avoid falling into the
trap of what we used to refer to in the good old days as spiritual specialness, where I'm
a student of A Course in Miracles and that makes me special and that makes me better
than anyone else. I remember in the very early years Helen, Bill, and Judy Skutch and I had
gone to another city to present the Course and talk about it, and one very serious and
earnest man showed us a table or chart that he had made that he was going to present to
all the Christian churches he could find that would let him in the door. And this was a
place where he was going to tell them, "Here's where Jesus corrected all of your mistakes."
In other words, putting side by side the orthodox teachings of the various Christian churches
and setting them alongside the corrections that the Course gives us. Fortunately Helen
stopped him (at least she stopped him then; I don't know what happened afterwards), but
that's the kind of thing you want to avoid as a student of this course, to feel that
just because you are a student of this course that that makes you better than anyone else.
The Course never says it is better than any other spiritual path. I think one can safely
say of A Course in Miracles that it is unique and it is different from any other spirituality,
contemporary or ancient, and I think this is a justifiable statement. But to say it's
different or unique because it says some things that no other spirituality says, East or West,
and certainly the whole package in which it puts its teaching is decidedly different.
But that doesn't make it better or it doesn't make it worse. It doesn't make other thought
systems wrong because they don't say, for example, that God did not create the world
or that Jesus is not the only Son of God; we all are equal members of the Sonship. That
doesn't mean that that thought system or thought systems or spiritualities that disagree with
the Course in form are necessary worse or wrong. It just means from the perspective
of the Course they would be mistaken, just as from the perspective of people who believe
in the Bible, as an example, would find the Course mistaken on its good days. On its bad
days, of course, it would be seen as the work of the devil. It is extremely important to
avoid that kind of specialness. There's a passage in "I Need Do Nothing," in Chapter
18, which was originally a personal message to Helen in which Jesus said to her, "Don't
take a path that works for others when this one has been given to you." And once when
I was with Helen, when she was having a real emotional tirade against someone that she
felt was distorting the teachings of the Course and using them for his own purposes, she heard
Jesus say to her, which she then related to me, "Don't take another's path as your own
but neither should you judge it." In other words, you should respect and honor other
spiritualities and other religions because they, if they are followed with dedication
and consistent purpose will lead people home, but you should not abandon this path, which
is yours. In other words, be faithful to the Course; follow it as best you can but don't
attack or judge others who don't agree with you. And I think that that's a very, very
wise guideline for all of us to carry with us and to realize that the Course is not required.
It may be required for us if we feel it is our path, but that does not mean it's required
for the world. The Course is really meant for one person only and that's it's the one
who is reading it and studying it, and when that person completes the curriculum and accepts
the Atonement for him or herself then that person recognizes that there is only one Son
of God, only one teacher of God, and there's only one universal course though its forms
may be many. As the Hindus have taught us for centuries, truth is one and the sage,
but the sage is known by many names.