| The Theology of ACIM Simplified |
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| The language of A Course in Miracles, though beautiful, is experienced by some students as lofty and dense, particularly in the Text. While I believe there is a purpose to that, I also think some clarity in the theology of the Course can help cut through the wordiness of it. For a more detailed explanation of the Course's ontology, click on Understanding One Mind. God is. God is Mind. God is Spirit. God is Reality. The experience of God is eternal unity, deep peace, and boundless joy. In God, being and experiencing are the same thing. A Part of God’s Mind has decided not to be God. This is not possible, yet it can be believed. To make it believable, and attesting to the power of this Part of God’s Mind, a physical universe of time and space, full of diverse things, beings and identities seemed to come into being. None of this is real, but through the denial of Reality it is experienced as real. To God, this is never real. It is a wisp of a thought that has come and gone, in laughter. How could a Part of God not be God? However, to this Part in all of its many parts, it is very real and serious and heavy. You experience yourself as a part of this Part of God. You live a life separate -- from God, and everything in the world. You are born only to suffer and to die. Because you have chosen not to be whole, you are forever seeking for love and peace and happiness in various forms. You never find it, always having to move on to something else. Being everything God is not, this world is hell. Yet you love it because you made it and it is a part of you. Deep, deep down you feel you have attacked God and you feel guilty. Because you attack, you expect God to attack you back and punish you. You fear God because of this. You cling to your guilt – partly to punish yourself in the hopes that this will mitigate God’s punishment; partly because your guilt goes hand-in-hand with the world you made as “proof” that you have overcome God. To maintain your illusion of separation from God, you deny it by projecting it outward so that it seems to have made you. Instead of you rejecting God, it seems God has rejected you. Instead of you having made attack, it seems the world attacks you. Instead of you being guilty, it seems the world is a “sinful” place. Yet you have done all of this. This is not cause for guilt, for it is not real. But its very unreality does call for correction. And the Correction is always with you. God is still in your mind, because you are still in God’s Mind. This part of your mind always calls to you to return to your natural awareness of Oneness. Only by heeding this Call will you feel whole again. But to do this you have to let go of what you have made to take God’s place and welcome another experience in its place. The physical world you made is in fact neutral. It is a mirror that reflects back to you what you believe about yourself. It can reflect attack, guilt and fear; or oneness and love. What it shows you depends on which part of your mind you choose to listen to: The part that does not want to be Part of God; or the one that calls you to be One with God again. Everyone will eventually choose to be One with God again. The only question is: When? How long do you want to be in pain? There are many means for unlearning all the illusions you have taught yourself about yourself, but they all lead to the same experience of Oneness. A Course in Miracles is a shortcut. It uses the experiences of the miracle, the holy instant and the holy relationship to save time. The Course emphasizes experiencing Oneness over accepting a theology, though the theology is necessary as a context for the experience. |