A Spiritual Book On Truth

Many spiritual seekers have come across A Course in Miracles at one point or another in their life. Many have picked up the book along the way and started reading it, only to put it back down again, whereas others continue to study it over and over again, passage after passage.

The views of readers about the channeled book are diverse. But people's opinionated judgment perhaps only underlines the deep truths the book holds and the resistance they might create in those people who are unwilling to face them.

"The main message of the book is that the world is an illusion, which you and I find extremely difficult to understand," says Ignatius Udunuwara, an Economics teacher who also facilitates A Course in Miracles classes and has spent a month at Kenneth Wapnick's Centre for Peace. "That's why it's unpopular. It has sold over a million copies, and it still continues to sell. But lots of people get disillusioned with it, because they struggle to make that shift from the body to the mind."

"The Course in Miracles is there to discover that you are not what you think you are, that you are something much greater. You are a perfect being. We like to think that it's a quality of virtue to humble ourselves. But if you can discover who you are, then you have the world at your feet."

Some people have described it as a new spiritual version of the bible. The Course in Miracles doesn't believe in sin. Instead it says that you are God's perfect creation, and therefore you are God. As you can witness, it stirs up quite a few religious beliefs, and religious people may even call it blasphemy. But to fully understand the book you have to read it. "You have to read it to understand," says Ignatius. "Otherwise you're just listening to someone else. Several people have made various comments about it, but there are many roads that lead to Rome. But which part of Rome are we going to? Nobody asks that question. I can say that I have been to London, but I haven't seen every part of London. When you talk about God, you are talking about a part of God. The Course says that there is only one truth, but there are many roads to find that truth."

Strangely enough, the two people who wrote A Course in Miracles, Helen Schucman, who received the channeled messages and William Thetford, who helped Helen type up the notes (Professors of Medical Psychology at Columbia University's College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City), were anything but spiritual. Their relationship with each other was difficult and often strained, and they were concerned with personal and professional acceptance and status. Helen even described herself as conservative in theory and atheistic in belief, yet she continued to take down the teachings she received from an inner voice, which she later identified as Jesus' voice. This also plays a big part in the reason why the book doesn't mention its authors, but instead states "Foundation for Inner Peace". Helen always made clear that she wasn't the author of the book, and that all she did was hear a voice, and take down the notes. But Helen wasn't the only one who was taken by the channeled text. Kenneth Wapnick, a clinical psychologist, who met Helen and William, decided to make A Course in Miracle available to the general public by editing the notes and made the book part of the rest of his life, now working and teaching out of his retreat centre in New York.

"The Course in Miracles is actually a spiritual, and not a religious path," says Ignatius. "Being spiritual means, that it is about You. It's not about love. It's about how to discover love and to remove the obstacles. We think we know all about love. I could be a highly qualified psychologist in relationships, but I have no idea what love is. I can claim from an academic point of view to know how to have good relationships. But if a relationship is not based on love, then that relationship is going to crash."

"The most interesting experience I've had is to study this course and try to fathom its meaning. It is so powerful. I have tried many times in the last twenty years to give it up. But I can't stay away for a day or two. I have to come back to it!"

The book's title isn't necessarily about experiencing "miracles" in your daily life. The miracle happens in your mind. To bring about a miracle is to recognize who you are, by removing every layer and fragment and to be still and let God take over, trusting the real Self.

A Course in Miracles offers a lesson per day for a whole year (365), and a textbook that goes with it, which is recommended to be read concurrently. The manual for teachers, which makes up the third part of the book, is as interesting as the Course itself, if not even more capturing. "How many teachers are required to teach the Course in Miracles?" asks Ignatius. "It says, only one, and that's you. When you teach the course in miracles, you are really teaching yourself. Learning Is teaching."

Furthermore, among topics like 'God', 'the ego' and 'love', the Course delves deep into important issues, such as 'time' and 'reality', which, according to the book, do not exist. "The present is constantly changing," says Ignatius. "So in other words, you and I don't understand the meaning of the word present. If you read Eckhart Tolle's book, The Power of Now, he says, ‘You must learn to live in the present.' It's one millionth or billionth of a second. To be still means to get into the present. The course calls it The Holy Instant. The ego, your personality, fluctuates between the past and the future. This is what you call thinking, moving between the past and the future. So in the present you don't think, in actual fact you're just recalling your memory and moving between the past and the future. The Course makes it very clear that you don't think, because the only real thought is that you're a part of God. That is the only thought! Because you have no idea what Heaven is. You might think that one day you go to some fancy place called Heaven. But Heaven is now. This moment is Heaven."

"When the course says that there is nothing out there, I begin to understand what it means, that it is not real, that it is my imagination. I can look from a philosophical and scientific angle, and I can comprehend that there is no reality to life. What you call life goes from birth to death. This span of time we call life. So when I'm dead, my life is finished. If I am not born, my life has not begun. You and I identify life in terms of time. But if you read the Course, you will find that there is nothing called time. You are eternal, you are infallible. You never die, you're immortal. So there is nothing called death, there's nothing called time or space. When you understand that, you begin to realize that your understanding was very shallow and hollow. You don't look at people and pass judgment, because you realize that your whole thinking is very hollow. So how on earth can you judge other people? There is only one truth, there is only one God, and you were created by God."

Ignatius Udunuwara facilitates A Course in Miracles classes at the New Age Shop in Hong Kong every other Saturday.

Famous quotes from A Course in Miracles

Seek not to change the world, but choose to change your mind about the world

The ego cannot survive without judgment

Love will immediately enter into any mind that truly wants it

What is healing but the removal of all that stands in the way of knowledge

Anger involves projection of separation, which must ultimately be accepted as one's own responsibility, rather than being blamed on others

Only those who give over all desire to reject can know that their own rejection is impossible

There are only two emotions, love and fear. Choose who ye shall serve.

The ego lives by comparisons

The ego seeks to divide and separate. Spirit seeks to unify and heal

Related links: Foundation for A Course in Miracles