A Course in Miracles Text Q&A on Preface & Introduction, How It Came

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you read the corresponding chapter and section in the Text of the Second or
Third Edition of A Course in Miracles published by the Foundation for Inner Peace.

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section III: Shadows of the Past

Read ACIM Chapter 17, Section III (pages 354-57)

To hear the Holy Spirit, what do we need to do?

Paragraphs one and two explain why it is so important for us to step back from our usual way of thinking and invite the Holy Spirit into our mind. We remember to do this when it fully sinks in that what we think we know about ‘reality’ is not true. Being a ‘know it all’ just keeps us a prisoner to the ego thought system of separation. To consistently hear Holy Spirit, who does know reality, we need to make it a regular habit of remembering, “Nothing I see… means anything.” (WB Lesson 1) and, “My meaningless thoughts are showing me a meaningless world.” (WB Lesson 11)

We need to be willing to remember that on our own we know nothing and it is only the Holy Spirit Who can show us the difference between truth and illusions. That is why Jesus tells us, “Forgiveness is a selective remembering, based not on your selection. For the shadow figures you would make immortal are ‘enemies’ of reality. Be willing to forgive the Son of God for what he did not do. The shadow figures are the witnesses you bring with you to demonstrate he did what he did not. Because you bring them, you will hear them. And you who keep them by your own selection do not understand how they came into your mind, and what their purpose is.” (1:3-8)

Why do irritating people show up in our lives?

In this fantasy world it certainly does not appear on the surface that the ‘shadow figures’ (the irritating and guilty ones that show up in our lives) are there by our own selection. It appears to us that it is just the opposite — that we are suffering (or are unhappy) because of their terrible behavior and that they certainly did not come into our lives by our invitation. But now Jesus is telling us that we invited them there because, “They represent the evil that you think was done to you [in the past]. You bring them with you only that you may return evil for evil, hoping that their witness [seeing their guilt] will enable you to think guiltily of another and not harm yourself. They speak so clearly for the separation that no one not obsessed with keeping separation could hear them.” (1:9-11)

When we join with the ego thought system, the more someone seems to match our need for a target on which to project our guilt, judgment and hatred, the more we are attracted to that person. To the ego, this is the perfect relationship. That is “why whatever reminds you of your past grievances attracts you, and seems to go by the name of love, no matter how distorted the associations by which you arrive at the connection may be.” (2:5) We see what we want to see and ignore what doesn’t fit our wishes of what we want to be real.

As we forgive, what happens to these ‘shadow figures’?

This is why Jesus is teaching us, “To forgive is merely to remember only the loving thoughts you gave in the past, and those that were given you. All the rest must be forgotten.” (1:1-2) As we continue to forgive by seeing through Christ’s vision instead of what the body’s eyes are showing us, we free ourselves from making these ‘shadow figures’ real. We see what they are for: “Without exception, these relationships have as their purpose the exclusion of the truth about the other, and of yourself. This is why you see in both what is not there, and make of both the slaves of vengeance.” (2:3-4)

Why does Jesus tell us that this world is a world of vengeance?

Jesus has told us many times in many ways that this world is a world of vengeance. (See Workbook Lessons 22 and 26) We conveniently forget that the thoughts of differences we are believing in are meant to be replacements for God’s Thoughts. We conveniently forget that making separate bodies real in our minds is trying to replace God’s oneness.

Unless we learn what is really going on at unconscious levels with all our relationships, we will not see a need to change our mind. Jesus wants us to recognize our unholy relationships (ones in which we see guilt and deem worthy of judgment) and forgive these insane ideas. That is why Jesus tells us, “Time is indeed unkind to the unholy relationship. For time is cruel in the ego’s hands, as [time] is kind when used for gentleness. The attraction of the unholy relationship begins to fade and to be questioned almost at once. Once [the unholy relationship] is formed, doubt must enter in, because its purpose is impossible. The ‘ideal’ of the unholy relationship thus becomes one in which the reality of the other does not enter at all to ‘spoil’ the dream.” (4:1-5) In the ego’s unholy relationships, the face of Christ is not what it is wanting to see. That would spoil the dream of separation. That would spoil the ego’s idea of ‘bliss.’

Even though our grievances may be hard for us to look at, Jesus is giving us a great gift when he shows us how the ego thought system works in our minds and what the ego’s real motivations are. It is only when we recognize the ego’s attraction to holding grievances when it shows up in our mind and see these thoughts for what they are that we will be willing to let the Holy Spirit reverse our thinking.

What happens in our relationships when we join with the Holy Spirit?

When we join with the Holy Spirit, only the loving thoughts are remembered. “Let Him uncover the hidden spark of beauty in your relationships, and show it to you. Its loveliness will so attract you that you will be unwilling ever to lose the sight of it again. And you will let this spark transform the relationship so you can see it more and more. For you will want it more and more, and become increasingly unwilling to let it be hidden from you. And you will learn to seek for and establish the conditions in which this beauty can be seen.” (6:7-11) These conditions are met when we are willing to focus on our brother’s kindnesses instead of counting up the hurts he gave. The more we focus on the love in our brother, the more we are letting in the truth. The more we let go of the past, the more we are freed from the bondage of our illusions.

What do we want to see? Am I joining with ego or Holy Spirit?

It all comes down to which thought system we value the most. What do we want to see? We cannot see the truth about our brother and see him as guilty at the same time. When we focus on his ‘guilty’ behavior and see him as a body, we are not seeing his eternal Spirit. We are not seeing the face of Christ. We are not seeing his true Reality as changeless Love in the Mind of Love. When we focus on one, the other disappears. “Which one you choose you will endow with beauty and reality, because the choice depends on which you value more. The spark of beauty or the veil of ugliness, the real world or the world of guilt and fear, truth or illusion, freedom or slavery — it is all the same. For you can never choose except between God and the ego.” (9:3-5)

This understanding is very significant. We are learning to recognize that there are only two thought systems and we are always choosing between one or the other. We can apply this learning to our daily lives. As we go through each day, we can learn to ask ourselves frequently, “Which thought system am I believing in right now? Am I joining with God or the ego?” This habit stimulates stepping back and questioning our habitual thoughts.

Stepping back from our habitual thoughts opens the door to letting Jesus in to heal our addictive habit of joining with ego thoughts. Jesus tells us, “My holy brother, I would enter into all your relationships, and step between you and your fantasies. Let my relationship to you be real to you, and let me bring reality to your perception of your brothers.” (10:1-2) Jesus is asking us to join with him and let him into our minds. Letting Jesus in requires a willingness to be quiet and listen. It requires a willingness to lay ego thoughts down. We can’t have both at the same time. As we ask Jesus to enter and really mean it, he will light our minds with peace gentleness and love. He will show us the goodness in every brother and extend God’s peace through us. He will bring our weary minds to a place of rest and quiet. He tells us, “Let me enter in the Name of God and bring you peace, that you may offer peace to me.” (10:8)

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section II: The Forgiven World

Read ACIM Chapter 17, Section II (pages 352-54)

What is the effect of believing in a world of separate bodies?

In the fantasy world of the ego we look out on a crazy world, a guilty world, a world where nothing is exactly like us. In a TV sitcom a few years back I remember a ‘joke’ line that went like this: “Sometimes I think that everyone in this world is crazy except you and me. And there are times I am not sure about you.” Everyone laughed at this, but this line in the script reflects very well the way ego thoughts work in our minds. In order to maintain separation, the ego must focus on differences, conflict and division. The ego must project guilt onto others who we perceive are different from us. We project the crazy thoughts onto others who we see as not like us.

When we do this we are not realizing that what we are seeing is merely the effect of joining with the insane ego mind. In the last section Jesus explained to us, “When you become disturbed and lose your peace of mind because another is attempting to solve his problems through fantasy [the ego], you are refusing to forgive yourself for just this same attempt. And you are holding both of you away from truth and from salvation.” (T-17.I.6:5-6) The ego sees fantasies through the thought system of separation. The Holy Spirit reflects the truth — the awareness of unity and oneness — which brings us joy and peace. Joined with the Holy Spirit, we feel safe and abundant. Joined with the ego we feel distrusting, judgmental, fearful, unsafe and lacking. We do not feel peaceful or happy.

What happens when we are willing to look past bodies to see the face of Christ?

In the Clarification of Terms, Section 4, Jesus tells us, “A world forgiven cannot last. It was the home of bodies. But forgiveness looks past bodies. This is its holiness, this is how it heals.” (C-4.5:1-2 italics added) Here we have the key to being able to experience the forgiven world. In the forgiven world we have learned to look past bodies to see the face of Christ. In this section Jesus tells us, “Nothing that you remember that made your heart sing with joy has ever brought you even a little part of the happiness this sight will bring you. For you will see the Son of God. You will behold the beauty the Holy Spirit loves to look upon, and which He thanks the Father for.” (1:5-7)

Where does our true happiness lie?

Because we want to be happy instead of judgmental and fearful, we are seeing that we truly want to join with the Holy Spirit. We are seeing here that this is where all our true happiness lies. We see that the Holy Spirit is God’s gift to us to return us to our natural state. “He was created to see this for you, until you learned to see it for yourself. And all His teaching leads to seeing it and giving thanks with Him.” (1:8-9)

How does Jesus describe the forgiven world?

Many people have asked, “How do I know if the thoughts in my mind are coming from the ego or the Holy Spirit?” Here we see that if it is focusing on what bodies say and do it is coming from the ego. If it is looking past bodies to the face of Christ, it is coming from the Holy Spirit. The ego sees separation and differences. The Holy Spirit looks past every form to the eternal truth in everyone. Jesus reminds us, “This loveliness is not a fantasy. It is the real world, bright and clean and new, with everything sparkling under the open sun. Nothing is hidden here, for everything has been forgiven and there are no fantasies to hide the truth.” (2:1-3)

As we open to the Holy Spirit’s instruction, what happens in our mind?

Because we want to be happy, this is the focus of all our learning now. Our one goal now is to forgive, or let go of the world of differences we saw before. We now see that it is just a fantasy world and has no meaning. We would practice daily joining with the Holy Spirit to let all our false notions be undone. “The Great Transformer of perception will undertake with you the careful searching of the mind that made this world, and uncover to you the seeming reasons for your making it. In the light of the real reason that He brings, as you follow Him, He will show you that there is no reason here at all. Each spot His reason touches grows alive with beauty, and what seemed ugly in the darkness of your lack of reason is suddenly released to loveliness.” (5:2-4)

What determines whether we hear the Holy Spirit or not?

In the light of this understanding, we cannot continue to say that we do not have the Answer to our perceived problems. The Answer is always right there in our minds, waiting patiently to heal our insane perceptions. It is only our willingness to hear the Answer that determines whether we hear the Holy Spirit or not. Jesus encourages us to be willing to look upon the world with forgiving eyes. “For forgiveness literally transforms vision, and lets you see the real world reaching quietly and gently across chaos, removing all illusions that had twisted your perception and fixed it on the past.” (6:2)

It is through joining with the united mind of the Holy Spirit that we let go of seeing a world of separation. It is through the Holy Spirit that all perception of guilt is removed. The Holy Spirit comes from our true Self in a form that suits our present need. “Go out in gladness to meet with your Redeemer, and walk with Him in trust out of this world, and into the real world of beauty and forgiveness.” (8:5)

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section I: Bringing Fantasy to Truth

Read ACIM Chapter 17, Section I (pages 351-52)

How do we make every relationship holy?

Bringing fantasy to truth has the effect of making every relationship holy. Holy means whole. When we have the goal of truth, we bring every special relationship to the Holy Spirit to be shown the truth of wholeness, or oneness, behind every illusion of separation. With Holy Spirit we see that “... what is done in dreams has not been really done.” (1:5) We see that dreams of lives in bodies do not change reality at all. Nothing has happened to change God’s one Son, Who is still united with God.

Why is trying to change our reality from wholeness into separate pieces so painful?

When we wish to see illusions, or fantasies of special, unique, individual bodies, we will see them because of the power of our wanting. Yet we cannot distort God and stay within the realm of Reality. Because in truth, we are eternally in God and of God, we cannot really change anything because God is eternal and does not change. In this section Jesus is bringing to our awareness that trying to change our reality from wholeness into unique, separate pieces is a painful experience. Jesus tells us, “Very simply, your lack of faith in the power that heals all pain arises from your wish to retain some aspects of reality for fantasy. If you but realized what this must do to your appreciation of the whole! What you reserve for yourself, you take away from Him Who would release you. Unless you give it back, [what you have reserved for yourself alone] it is inevitable that your perspective on reality be warped and uncorrected.” (3:3-6)

As long as our perspective on reality is warped and uncorrected, we will feel lonely, deprived and afraid. We will feel depressed and lacking. We will experience this until we are willing to let our mind be changed with the guidance of the Holy Spirit. “Tolerance for pain may be high, but it is not without limit. Eventually everyone begins to recognize, however dimly, that there must be a better way. As this recognition becomes more firmly established, it becomes a turning-point. This ultimately reawakens spiritual vision, simultaneously weakening the investment in physical sight.” (T-2.III.3:5-8)

Until we are willing to forgive, or let go of illusions, we will continue to try to make our illusions true. We will try to change the illusions to make them into a better dream that is more to our liking. To this Jesus tells us, “When you try to bring truth to illusions, you are trying to make illusions real, and keep them by justifying your belief in them. But to give illusions to truth is to enable truth to teach that the illusions are unreal, and thus enable you to escape from them. Reserve not one idea aside from truth, or you establish orders of reality that must imprison you.” (5:4-6)

Why is forgiveness, or letting illusions go, so important to our happiness?

As Course students, this is an important concept to understand. Before we fully ‘get it’ that forgiveness really means letting illusions go, we will be tempted to change what we see in the outer world instead of realizing that the only meaningful change happens in our mind. Letting our fantasies of uniqueness and specialness be brought to the truth of our eternal sameness as Love is the only meaningful answer to every problem we may think we have.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section VII: The End of Illusions

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section VII (pages 347-350)

Why is the special relationship an attempt to re-enact the past and change it?

For the last few sections Jesus has talked about the importance the ego places on special relationships in its role as a substitute for God’s Love. In this section, he goes on to show us how, underneath the gloss of our special relationships, we are really attempting to redeem the past through vengeance and retribution. He tells us, “For the special relationship is an attempt to re-enact the past and change it. Imagined slights, remembered pain, past disappointments, perceived injustices and deprivations all enter into the special relationship, which becomes a way in which you seek to restore your wounded self-esteem.” (1:1-3)

In Section V we learned that the special relationship was born of the hidden wish for special love from God and that, because God could not give this, we renounced God’s Love and made up our own substitute — the special love relationship. Our substitute for God is what the ego thought system is. We could never leave God in truth, but in our dream of separation, we imagine it really happened.

The special relationship — our substitute for God’s Love — was born out of hatred and vengeance for not getting what we wanted, so naturally, hatred and vengeance are reflected in our dreams of specialness. We dream a dream of vengeance against God because of ‘past’ hurts. Because it is a dream of hurt and deprivation, we ‘remember’ past hurts and try again and again to change the dream to restore our wounded self-esteem. Jesus tells us, “What basis would you have for choosing a special partner without the past? Every such choice is made because of something ‘evil’ in the past to which you cling, and for which must someone else atone.” (1:4-5)

Because we have tried to leave God, we have deprived ourselves of our awareness of our real power. In this state of mind, we dream a dream of deprivation and then try to blame what we now see as ‘outside us’ for all our imagined problems. In the dream we try to take vengeance on those we see in the dream, not realizing we are only taking vengeance on ourselves. We do not realize we are at war only with ourselves.

The good news is we are only dreaming of depriving ourselves, and it will last only as long as we insist on clinging to our dream of deprivation in an endless search for the specialness we think we lack. Jesus makes it clear that it is not in our best interest to continue this alliance with the ego thought system when he says, “For the ego remembers everything you have done that has offended it, and seeks retribution of you. The fantasies it brings to its chosen relationships in which to act out its hate are fantasies of your destruction. For the ego holds the past against you, and in your escape from the past it sees itself deprived of the vengeance it believes you so justly merit. (3:5-6)

It is truly a happy discovery that we do have the choice to wake up from or let go of the dream of vengeance and deprivation. Jesus tells us, “There is no fantasy that does not contain the dream of retribution for the past. Would you act out the dream, or let it go?” (4:2-3)

What are we hiding from ourselves when we seek the special relationship?

It’s important to remember that God’s Son, which we are, is an extension of Him. He gave all of His glory to His creation, so God’s glory is ours. To find completion, we need only accept the glory of God that is already ours. When we seek the special relationship, we are denying that glory in favor of a substitute. What we hide from ourselves is that our substitute is actually vengeance against God for not giving us the specialness we have asked for. When we don’t forgive our illusions, we are not wanting to give up the search for specialness because it would mean giving up vengeance for not getting what we want from God. Vengeance is the ego’s idea of salvation, its substitute for Atonement.

While we value the illusion of specialness, we will not experience the full enlightenment of the holy instant. Our attachment to our illusion of specialness is like a veil drawn across our vision, which interferes with our awareness of the truth the Holy Spirit is offering us. “The illusions you bring with you will weaken your experience of Him for a while, and will prevent you from keeping the experience in your mind.” (7:4) We cannot hang on to our illusions and know the truth. Truth and illusions cannot coexist.

Why is it inevitable that we will experience the holy instant in its fullness?

The good news is that we will experience the holy instant in its fullness because, “What God has given you is truly given, and will be truly received. ...And everything the Holy Spirit teaches is to remind you that you have received what God has given you” (8:1,8) As we learn from the Holy Spirit to forgive the illusions we hold against our brothers, we will learn that we have been forgiven for our illusions. And this is the way that guilt is undone in our tortured minds. Forgiving illusions brings the peace of mind that replaces all the unrest and dis-ease that was there before.

It is the Holy Spirit’s gift of the holy instant that restores God’s Kingdom to us. It is our job to accept the Holy Spirit’s gift. “Seek and find His message in the holy instant, where all illusions are forgiven. From there the miracle extends to bless everyone and to resolve all problems, be they perceived as great or small, possible or impossible. There is nothing that will not give place to Him and to His majesty.” (11:1-3)

The title of this section is “The End of Illusions.” Here we are told exactly how to end, or forgive all illusions. Our job is to accept the gift of the holy instant from the Holy Spirit. The holy instant brings with it an awareness of our true relationship with God. In our relationship with God, no illusions can enter. We would have no other gods before Him. We see that God’s holiness is ours. We see that there is no separation from the one Love that includes all and is all.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section VI: The Bridge to the Real World

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section VI (pages 345-347)

When we equate ourselves with the ego, does it seem ‘natural’ to search for a special relationship?

Jesus starts this section with an important insight: “The search for the special relationship is the sign that you equate yourself with the ego and not with God.” (1:1) At unconscious levels, we know that we are defying God’s oneness when we value the body by identifying with it as what we are and what others are. When we equate ourselves with the ego, we think that identifying with the body instead of the ‘allness’ of God is freedom instead of bondage. We willingly forget that only God’s Love is synonymous with true freedom.

As students of the Course, Jesus is teaching us how to let go of the ego so that we can be free of the pain and suffering that the ego brings with it. Until now, we have been thinking that cultivating special relationships was important and needed in our lives. We have thought that having special people, special places and things in our life was the only way to be happy. We are now learning to reverse this perception. With Jesus’ instruction, we are learning how to see all of our relationships the way the Holy Spirit sees them.

What are we shown when we learn to receive the holy instant from the Holy Spirit?

In paragraph three he tells us, “There is a way in which the Holy Spirit asks your help, if you would have His [help]. The holy instant is His most helpful aid in protecting you from the attraction of guilt, the real lure in the special relationship.” (3:1-2) When we learn to receive the holy instant from the Holy Spirit, we are shown the Great Rays instead of the body. We are shown the face of Christ instead of perceiving differences. We are shown the purity of innocence in our brothers where we once saw anger and guilt. We are shown the strength of God’s oneness instead of the weakness and vulnerability of separate bodies.

Just imagine how happy our lives will be as we continue to consistently practice allowing Holy Spirit to guide our perception of every brother! Just imagine receiving the holy instant and being bridged into the real world instead of continuing to identify with the ego! We certainly have an exciting time ahead of us with the Holy Spirit as our Guide!

Jesus knows we need a lot of encouragement to change the way we are seeing. We need a bridge to the real world, where seeing separate bodies is not valued or wanted. To help us in our letting go or forgiving process, Jesus is very specific in explaining what really happens with the special relationships we imagine to be real: “On this side of the bridge you see the world of separate bodies, seeking to join each other in separate unions and to become one by losing. When two individuals seek to become one, they are trying to decrease their magnitude. Each would deny his power, for the separate union excludes the universe. Far more is left outside than would be taken in, for God is left without and nothing taken in.” (5:2-5)

What is it like as we continue to let the Holy Spirit undo our false beliefs?

Jesus explains what it is like as we continue to let the Holy Spirit undo our false beliefs, our ideas about what is real: “For a time the body is still seen, but not exclusively, as it is seen here. The little spark that holds the Great Rays within it is also visible, and this spark cannot be limited long to littleness. Once you have crossed the bridge, the value of the body is so diminished in your sight that you will see no need at all to magnify it. For you will realize that the only value the body has is to enable you to bring your brothers to the bridge with you, and to be released together there.” (6:2-5) Once we join with the Holy Spirit in our one true purpose, we can be assured that the Holy Spirit will provide the means for it to be accomplished.

As we are willing to be led from littleness to magnitude, we receive the change of mind that brings us to our true purpose. Here is the change of mind that brings us everlasting joy, everlasting peace. Here we have the answer to the way to approach ‘life’ while it still appears that we are here in this world. We see clearly that the bridge the Holy Spirit brings is just a change of mind, just a change in what we want to see. As we let our minds be changed by the Holy Spirit, our frame of reference becomes transformed to see our unity with Love’s reality instead of focusing on unique, special bodies. Jesus tells us, “This [the ego’s] frame of reference is built around the special relationship. Without this illusion there could be no meaning you would still seek here.” (7:6-7)

Jesus reassures us that, as we continue on Holy Spirit’s bridge of return to Reality, we may experience some disorientation, but that the Holy Spirit will always be gentle. “Time is kind, and if you use [time] on behalf of reality, it will keep gentle pace with you in your transition. The urgency is only in dislodging your mind from its fixed position here. This will not leave you homeless and without a frame of reference.” (8:2-5) Waking up to reality in Holy Spirit’s hands is gentle and peaceful. As we learn to let the Holy Spirit turn every special relationship into a holy relationship, we come to what Jesus calls the happy dream of awakening to the truth. (See Text Chapter 18 Section V on page 382)

What help does the Holy Spirit need from us in order to do His job?

Through the Holy Spirit, we learn to love our true Reality instead of the specialness we sought before. But in order to do this, the Holy Spirit needs the following help from us: “Whenever your thoughts wander to a special relationship which still attracts you, enter with Him into a holy instant, and there let Him release you. He needs only your willingness to share His perspective to give it to you completely. ... Out of your recognition of your unwillingness for your release, His perfect willingness is given you. Call upon Him, for Heaven is at His call. And let Him call on Heaven for you.” (12:1-2, 5-7) As we recognize our complete dependence on the Holy Spirit, we gradually allow ourselves to be carried. We allow the Holy Spirit to do His job. We stop trying to do it for Him. We allow ourselves to be bridged to the real world. We trust that the ride will be filled with gentleness and peace.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section V: The Choice for Completion

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section V (pages 341-344)

What are the unconscious motives behind our special relationships?

In this section Jesus brings to our attention the hidden, unconscious motivations which lie behind our experience of this world. It may be uncomfortable to look at this, but to free ourselves from the bondage of the ego, we need to become aware of the hidden thoughts of guilt and attack that accompany believing in the reality of this world. If we truly want to free ourselves from the bondage (pain, anxiety, despair, guilt and attack) of the ego thought system, we must face the fact that we are joining with the rejection of God’s oneness when we continue to believe in the reality of this world of separation and differences. (See 1:1-3)

We need to recognize the real motives behind our special relationships. Without the help the Course offers us, we would continue with our same old patterns, wondering why love seems to come and go and why we return to a lingering sense of emptiness and a feeling that there must be something more. We need to understand that God’s Love cannot be found in special relationships. In fact, special relationships are an interference contrived by the ego to keep us from joining in the oneness of God’s all inclusive Love. Jesus knows it is very important for us to see what is really going on behind the appealing, but constantly changing forms of specialness we perceive in this world. That is why he says, “For this world is the opposite of Heaven, being made to be its opposite, and everything here takes a direction exactly opposite of what is true. In Heaven, where the meaning of love is known, love is the same as union.” (3:6-7)

Why does Jesus say that the ego’s hatred truimphs in the special relationship?

Jesus explains the essence of the ego thought system in paragraph four: “It is in the special relationship, born of the hidden wish for special love from God, that the ego’s hatred triumphs. For the special relationship is the renunciation of the Love of God, and the attempt to secure for the self the specialness that He denied.” (4:1-2) The ego is the thought system of rejecting God because God would not give the special love it asked for. The special love relationship is the ego’s chief mechanism for hiding the intense hatred and accompanying guilt that must come with the denial of union or the denial of Love.

To replace God, the ego made up a fantasy world which excluded God and seemed to satisfy the wish for specialness. Because specialness is the opposite of union, it inherently requires separation (uniqueness and differences). It requires the denial of God’s oneness. This separation from God is really hell, but the ego goes to great lengths to disguise this so that we think separation or specialness is Heaven. “For the ego would never have you see that separation could only be loss, being the one condition in which Heaven could not be.” (4:4)

What is the difference between how the Holy Spirit and ego sees completion?

In paragraphs five through eight Jesus explains how we are all looking for completion. “To everyone Heaven is completion. There can be no disagreement on this, because both the ego and the Holy Spirit accept it.” (5:1-2) He also shows us the important difference between how the Holy Spirit sees completion and how the ego sees completion. “The Holy Spirit knows that completion lies first in union, and then in the extension of union. To the ego completion lies in triumph, and in the extension of the ‘victory’ even to the final triumph over God. In this it sees the ultimate freedom of the [separate] self, for nothing would remain to interfere with the ego.” (5:4-6)

Jesus goes on to elaborate on how each separate-self identity innately feels a sense of lack and, as a result, tries to find completion in another, better self. “The ‘better’ self the ego seeks is always one that is more special. And whoever seems to possess a special self is ‘loved’ for what can be taken from him. Where both partners see this special self in each other, the ego sees ‘a union made in Heaven.’ For neither one will recognize that he has asked for hell, and so he will not interfere with the ego’s illusion of Heaven, which it offered him to interfere with Heaven. Yet if all illusions are of fear, and they can be of nothing else, the illusion of Heaven is nothing more than an ‘attractive’ form of fear, in which the guilt is buried deep and rises in the form of ‘love.’” (8:1-5)

So we are seeing here that every special relationship is a substitute for God’s perfect Love. It is born out of the fear of loss that is inevitable when we believe we have separated from our Source. When we believe we are individuals, separate from God, we are believing in littleness and denying the grandeur of our unity with our Creator. We are hiding from our Father in false images of littleness (individuality) and burying the guilt we feel in the appealing images of special relationships. “The real purpose of the special relationship, in strict accordance with the ego’s goals, is to destroy reality and substitute illusion.” (9:4)

In order for our individuality to be real, God must be obliterated because individuality (separate minds) cannot exist in oneness. Being complete opposites, both cannot be true. Thus the individuality that the special relationship witnesses to is the acting out of the sacrifice of God at the altar of specialness. The idol of a separate self we have made not only obliterates our awareness of God, but also obliterates our awareness of our true Self. We literally do not know our Self when we are searching for specialness. “Separation is only the decision not to know yourself.” (15:3)

Believing in the little image we have made of our self, we feel weak, vulnerable and inadequate. We hate this little image we made so we are constantly searching for a replacement, something that will seem to give us more value — the specialness we are craving. Specialness now seems to be the source of power in place of God. Specialness triumphs over God, making Him helpless to satisfy our perceived needs. Instead of looking to God, our real Source of strength, we look for power in special relationships.

Because special relationships cannot truly replace our real power, they never satisfy. And thus we spend our earthly lives in a never ending ritual of searching for completion. It is never ending because we are searching for completion in a world of separation, where it cannot be found. Of this sad search Jesus tells us, “The special relationship is a ritual of form, aimed at raising the form to take the place of God at the expense of content. There is no meaning in the form, and there never will be.” (12:2-3)

What does it take to wake up to the reality of Heaven?

In paragraphs 13 through 17 Jesus emphasizes that waking up to the reality of Heaven requires being willing to see that images of separation (separate forms) are illusions. This means remembering that everything we see with our body’s eyes is not real. As long as we insist on making illusions real we will not remember God and we will feel lack of peace. Jesus brings up a very important idea to help us free ourselves from hell when he tells us, “Salvation lies in the simple fact that illusions are not fearful because they are not true. They but seem to be fearful to the extent to which you fail to recognize them for what they are; and you fail to do this to the extent to which you want them to be true. And to the same extent you are denying truth, and so are failing to make the simple choice between truth and illusion; God and fantasy.” (14:1-3)

When we give reality in our mind to what we see through the body’s eyes, we are making the decision to forget our one Self and replace Heaven with illusions of specialness. Jesus encourages us to make another choice when he says, “This year is thus the time to make the easiest decision that ever confronted you, and also the only one. You will cross the bridge into reality simply because you will recognize that God is on the other side, and nothing at all is here. It is impossible not to make the natural decision as this (that nothing at all is here) is realized. (17:1-3)

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section IV: The Illusion and the Reality of Love

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section IV (pages 337-340)

What is the difference between the illusion and the reality of Love?

In this section we learn why the meaning we give to the word ‘love’ in this world is not what Love is in truth. The world does not know what true Love is and what true Love does. That is why Jesus tells us, “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all of the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. It is not necessary to seek for what is true, but it is necessary to seek for what is false. Every illusion is one of fear, whatever form it takes. And the attempt to escape from one illusion into another must fail. If you seek love outside yourself you can be certain that you perceive hatred within, and are afraid of it.” (6:1-5)

If we are Love and Love is all there Is, we do not have to seek for What we are. Once we see our replacements for Love as just an attempt to deny what Love is, we will recognize that every illusion is one of fear, no matter what form it takes.

In Reality, Love is universal because there is nothing other than Love. Love’s substitute is seen as nothing and nowhere. The special love in this world is seen as impossible and is not taken as anything that could be real.

What is the purpose of the special love relationship?

In this world, because we have rejected Love as Love is, we think we are separate from Love. Because we are rejecting the Love within us, we feel a lack. We then begin looking for a substitute for God’s Love in what we perceive as special love. Jesus tells us, “Yet peace will never come from the illusion of love, but only from its reality. Recognize this, for it is true, and truth must be recognized if it is to be distinguished from illusion: The special love relationship is an attempt to bring love into separation. And, as such, it is nothing more than an attempt to bring love into fear, and make it real in fear. In fundamental violation of love’s one condition, the special love relationship would (try to) accomplish the impossible.” (6:6, 7:1-3)

In God’s perfect Love, all is an extension of one, unified Love. Nothing is separate from Love, which is indivisible. There is no uniqueness, no specialness, no distinguishing differences. The ego thought system is based on the rejection of the unity of Love. When we make ego thoughts real through image making, we are rejecting or making a barrier against Love because we are not accepting the oneness of Love.

Jesus encourages us to look at the real motives for the ego’s form of love so that we see it for what it really is and will gladly let it go. He tells us, “The special love relationship is an attempt to limit the destructive effects of hate (rejecting or hating the oneness of Love) by finding a haven in the storm of guilt.” (3:1) When we do not accept Love as Love is, we are judging against It and with this judgment comes guilt. That is why Jesus then says, “It (the special love relationship) makes no attempt to rise above the storm (of guilt), into the sunlight. On the contrary, it (the special love relationship) emphasizes the guilt outside the haven by attempting to build barricades against it, (guilt) and keeping within them (the barricades of special love).” (3:2-3)

In this world the seeming value of the special love relationship is in the sense of safety from the ego’s hatred. Jesus tells us this false sense of safety will never work. He says, “For it is the attempt to balance hate with love that makes love (Real Love) meaningless to you.” (1:8) When we forget what Love is, we forget our real Identity as one in Love. We forget that only Love could ever be real. We feel lost and alone. We feel a sense of lack or that something is missing from us. We do not feel complete. We then try to fill that sense of incompleteness with all the forms of special love we find in this world in order to be happy. These forms of special love show up in our lives when we look for outer approval or when we seek for special things and certain special people to make us happy.

What does special love deprive us of?

To help us let go of valuing special love, Jesus tells us, “Every illusion you accept into your mind by judging it to be attainable removes your own sense of completion, and thus denies the Wholeness of your Father. Every fantasy, be it of love or hate, deprives you of knowledge for fantasies are the veil behind which truth is hidden. To lift the veil that seems so dark and heavy, it is only needful to value truth beyond all fantasy, and to be entirely unwilling to settle for illusion in place of truth.” (10:2-4)

How do we transform our special relationships into holy relationships?

Students reading this section may be tempted to ask themselves, “What about the people I consider ‘special’ in my life? Am I to have no relationships at all? What about my partner or my parents or my children? How does this work in the context of what Jesus is telling us in this section?”

The ego’s way of seeing guilt and differences in others that we perceive as outside us is the way we keep the illusion of separation intact. The reversal to this thinking is to open our minds to the Holy Spirit, where we will be reminded of the face of Christ behind the veil of every body. So instead of seeing differences, we now see the one face of Christ. (Another way to do this is to let the veil be lifted to become aware of the universal peace that is always there behind every form of uniqueness.) We allow the Holy Spirit to remind us that in truth, we come from one Source and are still united with the one Mind of God. We remember that the differences we see are simply illusions. This is how we transform our special relationships into holy relationships. We allow ourselves to be lifted outside the context of the ego thought system.

In a holy relationship we see that there are not different kinds of love. We see that we all are the same Love. We include everyone equally in the one Love that we all are equally. We pay less attention to behavior and more attention to what is Real beyond what bodies say or do. We do not make the ego thoughts real. We may still observe them, but we let ourselves rise above them to see the Love that is real.

Why is it so important to change our minds rather than change the outer form?

Remember we are going through an ‘undoing’ process of changing our minds about what we are seeing. We are in the process of recognizing our substitutes for the Reality of Love. This process of undoing all the meaning that we give to the things of this world means that we do not try to change the outer form — we merely change our minds about what we are experiencing with the body’s senses.

During this process of undoing, we learn to think differently about our relationships. We learn to think differently about everything we see in this world of specialness. Instead of making ourselves guilty for believing in the world, which is what the ego does, we step back and let the Holy Spirit, our true Self “drive the bus” of our mind. We take a back seat and follow. We join with the peace of unity instead of the conflict that comes with making differences appear to be real. We relax and place trust in God instead of placing our trust in the ego’s fearful dream of separation.

In this section Jesus tells us, “To lift the veil that seems so dark and heavy, it is only needful to value truth beyond all fantasy, and to be entirely unwilling to settle for illusion in place of truth.” (10:4) In truth, we are whole. There is no lack in us. We have and are All That Is because God creates only wholeness. “Whom God remembers must be whole. And God has never forgotten what makes Him whole. In your completion lie the memory of His Wholeness and His gratitude to you for His completion. In His link with you lie both His inability to forget and your ability to remember. In Him are joined your willingness to love and all the Love of God, Who forgot you not.” (11:10-14)

As we continue to reinforce the truth instead of illusions, we gravitate to the mindset of the holy instant instead of continuing to believe in the fearful stories of the ego.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section III: The Reward of Teaching

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section III (pages 334-337)

How are we learning to accept the comfort of Love from our inner Teacher?

This section can be tricky to understand unless you realize that Jesus uses the word ‘you’ to refer to both your true Self, the Holy Spirit, and to the separate ‘self’ we believe we are. In the first paragraph he says, “You may have taught well, and yet you may not have learned how to accept the comfort of your teaching.” (1:2) Another way to say this is, “You (the Holy Spirit in you) may have taught well, and yet you (the individual self you think you are) may not have learned how to accept the comfort of your (true Self’s) teaching.

For example, you may have had an experience when you saw past the outer appearance or behavior of someone to the innocent, loving Self that they really are. In that moment you saw them not as separate, but the Love in your heart reached out and joined with the Love in them. In this moment of lucidity, you disregarded the body’s perceptions and let the comfort of your true Self shine through, showing you that you and your brother share the same Love. In this moment you were experiencing the comfort of Love which came from your inner Teacher.

Even if it lasted only a brief moment, it is a reminder of the comfort you could give and receive as an extension of the Love of God. You have been taught what true comfort is by your true Self and you extended that comfort to your brother. This comfort that comes from your inner Teacher is experienced as deep peace and quiet joy. It is clearly a comfort that comes from beyond the thought system with which you identify when you see yourself as a body in a world of form.

This is an example of how it is possible for the Holy Spirit to teach the comfort of Love through us even though we have identified ourselves with the ego thought system. This teaching is clearly the opposite of what we learn from the ego. The Holy Spirit, our inner Comforter, remains in our mind though we are unaware of It because we deny Its presence. Jesus tells us, “And it must be that what you taught came from yourself. Yet this Self you clearly do not know, and do not recognize It even though It functions.” (3:5:6)

How do we listen to the truth that is beyond the ego thought system?

The Holy Spirit comes from beyond our current thought system. That is why it is so important for us to give time to quiet our minds of ego thoughts and open up to the part of our mind in which truth resides. To encourage us to listen to the truth of what is beyond the ego thought system, Jesus tells us, “If you will consider what you have taught, and how alien it is to what you thought you knew, you will be compelled to realize that your Teacher came from beyond your thought system. Therefore He could look upon it (what you thought you knew) fairly, and perceive it was untrue. He must have done so from the basis of a very different thought system, and one with nothing in common with yours.” (1:3-5) Realizing our true Self is there in our minds and listening to this Self helps us realize that our illusions are untrue and opens the door for pain and suffering to be replaced by peace and joy.

A Course in Miracles is a gift to us from Jesus to help us see that our illusions about ourselves are untrue. Because we have chosen to believe in our illusions, we have forgotten What we are. He tells us, “This is a course in how to know yourself. You have taught what you are, but have not let what you are teach you.” (4:1-2) Here we are learning that what we taught ourselves about what we are is really not part of us, but just a false image.

How do we separate ourselves from illusion and not from truth?

Jesus tells us, “What you accept into your mind does not really change it. Illusions are but beliefs in what is not there. And the seeming conflict between truth and illusion can only be resolved by separating yourself from the illusion and not from truth.” (4:8-10) Here we see that our job is to separate ourselves from the illusion, not from truth. We do this by not relating to the illusion as what we are and what is the truth about us. We do this by forgiving illusions, which is the title of this chapter. Forgiving illusions means letting them go because we see that they are not real. We see that they are just the ‘image making’ that comes from joining with the ego thought system.

Why are we to accept our true Self as the only part that is real?

Paragraphs 5 through 9 are particularly helpful in showing us all the help we have to wake up from our dream of separation from our true Self. Jesus encourages us to accept our true Self as the only part that is real. He says, “...the Holy Spirit is part of you. Created by God, He left neither God nor His creation. He is both God and you, as you are God and Him together.” (5:1-3)

What does Jesus mean when he refers to “our creations”?

In paragraph five Jesus refers to “our creations.” In this world, we typically think of our creations as something we create in the world of form. To clarify this, it is helpful to refer to page 461 of the Workbook for Students, Part II: 11. What is Creation? Here Jesus says, “Creation is the sum of all God’s Thoughts, in number infinite, and everywhere without all limit. Only Love creates, and only like Itself. ...Forever and forever are God’s Thoughts exactly as they were and as they are, unchanged through time and after time is done. (1:1-2,5) ...God’s Thoughts are given all the power that their own Creator has. For He would add to Love by Its extension.” (2:1-2) So here we see that when Jesus talks about our creations, he is talking about extending God’s Love without trying to change It.

In paragraph 5 Jesus tells us, “They (your extensions of Love) are quite real, as part of the Self you do not know. They (your extensions of Love) communicate to you through the Holy Spirit, and their power and gratitude to you for their creation they offer gladly to your teaching of yourself, Who is their Home.” (5:7-8)

What do our extensions of Love teach us?

Because we continue to be a part of God, our true Self is always extending Love, which is what Love does in order to be Itself. These extensions of Love teach us What we are. That is why Jesus tells us, “...the witnesses to your (true Self’s) teaching gave gathered to help you learn. Their gratitude has joined with yours and God’s to strengthen your faith in what you (your true Self) taught. For what you (your true Self) taught is true. Alone, you (your false individual self identity) stand outside your teaching and apart from it. But with them (your extensions of Love) you must learn that you but taught yourself, and learned from the conviction you shared with them (your extensions of Love).” (6:4-8) Because nothing is outside of Love, and Love is constantly extending Itself, It is constantly Being Itself when It is extending Love. As we return to extending the Love we are, we remember our Self.

That is why Jesus tells us in paragraph 8: “Each one builds this bridge, which carries him across the gap as soon as he is willing to expend some little effort on behalf of bridging it. His little efforts are powerfully supplemented by the strength of Heaven, and by the united will of all who make Heaven what It is, being joined within It. And so the one who would cross over is literally transported there.” (8:3-5) We have all the help of Heaven to help us become aware of Where we truly are — in Heaven — and What we truly are, Which is the extension of God’s one, seamless Love.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section II: The Power of Holiness

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section II (pages 332-34)

How are we to see everyone?

We are being taught to remember that everyone is holy, which is saying that everyone is included in God’s wholeness or oneness. Everyone is really the same even though we are making up stories of differences. In paragraph one of this section Jesus explains that the extension of holiness (which is the same as wholeness or oneness) is how the miracle extends to all the Sonship. Extending holiness is the same as recognizing holiness (or wholeness) where we once saw differences and individuality. This is the change in perception that comes from the Holy Spirit or the Spirit of Wholeness. This change in perception is what Jesus describes as a miracle.

Why do we see differences?

In paragraph two Jesus talks about the tendency to fragment. This is the same as the tendency to hallucinate separation or differences where there is really only oneness. Jesus explains our motive for seeing differences when he tells us, “And this is but a way of avoiding, or looking away from the whole, to what you think you might be better able to understand. For this is but another way in which you would still try to keep understanding to yourself.” (2:2-3) We identify with this world because we like the differences we have made up and we want to make it understandable. We want to make it appear to be our reality. We value having something we can call ours alone.

The good news is that we can’t separate from our real Self, which continues to remember the truth. This is why Jesus tells us, “And so there must be Something in you that does understand.” (2:8) That Something is the Holy Spirit in our minds.

How do we see that all differences are equally unreal?

In paragraphs three and four it is helpful to remember that a miracle is when we allow the Holy Spirit, our real Self, to change our perception from thoughts of differences into an awareness of holiness or oneness. That is why Jesus tells us, “The recognition of the part as whole, and of the whole in every part is perfectly natural, for it is the way God thinks, and what is natural to Him is natural to you. Wholly natural perception would show you instantly that order of difficulty in miracles is quite impossible, for it involves a contradiction of what miracles mean.” (3:3-4) With the Holy Spirit we come to recognize that the differences we see in illusions are all equally unreal.

Attempts to understand reality or holiness with ego reasoning will never succeed because they are always based on the false premise that separation is real. On our own we could not become aware of the truth that lies beyond illusions because, in truth, we could never be ‘on our own.’ It is only our true Self, the Holy Spirit, that brings us the change in perception that Jesus calls a miracle. It is the Holy Spirit that brings us to the awareness that in truth minds are joined in the one Mind of Love. “When you have made this joining as the Holy Spirit bids you, and have offered it to Him to use as He sees fit, His natural perception of your gift enables Him to understand it, and you to use His understanding on your behalf.” (4:4)

If we allow the Holy Spirit to show us the holiness in every brother, we will see it. We cannot see wholeness and separation at the same time. When we let go of our understanding or believing in what we see with our physical senses, we leave an opening for the truth of wholeness or holiness to enter. “Bid Him welcome, and honor the witnesses who bring you the glad tidings He has come. It is true, just as you fear, that to acknowledge Him is to deny all that you think you know. But what you think you know was never true.” (6:5-7)

Why do we want to see past this world to Reality?

Believing in the false world of individuality is the same as interpreting against or denying God’s Love. We have thought that we made a world that would make us happy, but it is really a disaster. Everything in it begins to decay and crumble the moment it is made. Everything is constantly shifting and changing so there is nothing we can really trust. It is because of our faith in this false world we made that we have so little faith in the Voice that God gave us which tells us that, “Reality is safe and sure, and wholly kind to everyone and everything. There is no greater love than to accept this and be glad. For Love asks only that you be happy, and will give you everything that makes for happiness.” (8:6-8)

We are being called to put the ideas the Holy Spirit is giving us to use. “For these ideas are mighty forces, to be used and not held idly by.” (9:5) As we practice letting the Holly Spirit guide our perception, we learn to recognize the weakness of attack (separating from oneness) and the power of holiness (recognizing our oneness with God.) As we practice we will experience the joy of God more and more and will be increasingly willing to listen to the Holy Spirit’s Voice. Jesus tells us, “This is a year of joy, in which your listening will increase and peace will grow with its increase.” (7:1)

How is every perceived problem solved?

As we practice taking every problem we may think we have in the dream of separation to the Holy Spirit, we learn to relax and quietly step back from thinking we know anything about solving our problems. We open our minds and leave a clear and open space for the Holy Spirit to enter. It is here that every perceived problem is solved. It is here that we find certainty. It is here that we find peace.

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section I: True Empathy

Read ACIM Chapter 16, Section I (pages 330-32)

What is the ego’s idea of empathy?

In helping us look at the ego thought system with the Holy Spirit, one of the key sentences in this section is, “Having identified with what it thinks it understands, the ego sees itself and would increase itself by sharing what is like itself.” (2:4) That is the ego’s idea of empathy. Because the ego is the idea of being separate from Love, of course it relates to stories of suffering, sacrifice and deprivation. It loves these stories because they increase its sense of a separate ‘self.’ They increase its sense that it has really made its world of specialness, of individuality, real. If we consistently practiced seeing past these stories with the help of the Holy Spirit, the ego would disappear.

How do we empathize with strength instead of weakness?

Jesus tells us, “To empathize does not mean to join in suffering, for that is what you must refuse to understand. That is the ego’s interpretation of empathy, and is always used to form a special relationship in which the suffering is shared.” (1:1-2) This is like the saying that if someone has fallen down into a well, it is not helpful to him to jump down into the well with him. But it is helpful to hand him a rope so he has a means to get out of the well.

When we join with the Holy Spirit’s form of empathy, we do not decide on our own what true empathy means. Jesus tells us, “You are the learner; He the Teacher. Do not confuse your role with His, for this will never bring peace to anyone. Offer your empathy to Him for it is His perception and His strength that you would share. And let Him offer you His strength and His perception, to be shared through you.” (5:6-9)

It’s important to remember that the ego always wants to reinforce our belief in separation because that is what holds the ego in place. The Holy Spirit always returns us to the awareness of our unity. When we joined with the ego thought system, we believed we were a separate self identity which we thought was our “reality.” This is why we cannot know true empathy on our own. We need help from outside the ego thought system. This is why it is so important to learn “that to recognize and accept the fact that you do not know is to recognize and accept the fact that He does know.” (4:4)

Jesus tells us very specifically how to do this when he says, “If you will merely sit quietly by and let the Holy Spirit relate through you, you will empathize with strength, and will gain in strength and not in weakness.” (2:7) To receive the Holy Spirit’s guidance we need to be in peace; we need to take time to quiet our minds and be receptive. The ego’s first impulse will always be to reinforce separation. Our vigilance to not follow this first impulse but to step back and open our minds to the Holy Spirit’s guidance allows us to be taught what true empathy is.

He tells us, “Focus your mind only on this: I am not alone, and I would not intrude the past upon my Guest. I have invited Him and He is here. I need do nothing except not to interfere.” (3:9-12) As we diligently practice this stepping back and not interfering, we will experience the Holy Spirit’s empathy through us and thus learn what it is. The form in which this empathy is expressed will vary according to each situation but the feeling of unity will be the same. As always the Holy Spirit will use every situation to teach us of the reality of oneness, if we let Him.

The ego thought system is belief in weakness — separation from the strength of Love. The ego uses relationships in order to reinforce belief in weakness and loss. But we are told here that the opposite is true. “The meaning of love is lost in any relationship that looks to weakness, and hopes to find love there. The power of love, which is its meaning, lies in the strength of God that hovers over it and blesses it silently by enveloping it in healing wings.” (6:1-2)

What is everyone’s true need?

In this world of separation, it appears that we have different needs. The truth is that we all have only one real need and that need is to return to remembering our one identity as one Self in the Mind of God. When our brother asks us to empathize with him by reinforcing his belief in weakness, he is asking a foolish thing, even though he does not realize its foolishness at the time. It is only the Holy Spirit in our mind that can recognize the difference between foolish needs and our only one real need, which is to wake up from the trap of belief in individuality. In our current state of mind we do not realize that our belief in weakness, lack or loss is inherently tied to our belief in specialness or individuality. That is why Jesus tells us, “No needs will long be left unmet if you leave them all to Him Whose function is to meet them. That is His function, and not yours.” (7:4-5)

What is Jesus’ advice regarding all our relationships?

The Holy Spirit remembers we are all one and that we all still remain the same as we were created by God. We could never be weak in truth and we could never get sick and die. As we learn to step back and not think we know anything on our own, we leave room for the Holy Spirit to work through us. That is why Jesus gives us this advice in reference to all of our relationships: “What you give through Him is for the whole Sonship, not for part of it. Leave Him His function, for He will fulfill it if you but ask Him to enter your relationships, and bless them for you.” (7:8-9)

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Chapter 15: The Holy Instant

Section XI: Christmas as the End of Sacrifice

Read ACIM Chapter 15, Section XI (pages 327-329)

What does Jesus say is the true meaning of Christmas?

In this section Jesus describes Christmas as the time of awakening to the Christ in our mind. He tells us, “The sign of Christmas is a star, a light in darkness. See [the light] not outside yourself, but shining in the Heaven within, and accept it as the sign the time of Christ has come.” (2:1-2) The time of accepting Christ within brings with it the end of belief in deprivation, the end of of our belief in separation from Perfect Love, which is all inclusive and everywhere.

The time of accepting Christ is the same as accepting the holy instant, which is the time of the Great Awakening to the truth that we are still one in the Mind of God. We are still one, as God created us. And because we are one, this includes everyone we see in our dream.

Why is accepting the Christ in everyone the same as joining with our Father?

Jesus tells us, “Those who receive the Father are one with Him, being host to Him Who created them. And by allowing Him to enter, the remembrance of the Father enters with Him, and with Him they remember the only relationship they ever had, and ever want to have.” (9:4-5) This means that accepting the reality of the Christ in everyone is accepting the only relationship that is real. And this relationship has nothing to do with bodies or individual personalities. But it has everything to do with joining with the oneness of our Father in the one Mind of Love. Jesus tells us, “In the holy instant the condition of Love is met, for minds are joined without the body’s interference, and where there is communication there is peace.” (7:1)

What is the real reason why we feel lonely and deprived?

The opposite of accepting the truth of the one Christ Mind is belief in being separate from Love’s oneness. It is belief in separate bodies. It is the belief in loss, deprivation and death. Jesus says, “As long as you perceive the body as your reality, so long will you perceive yourself as lonely and deprived. And so long will you also perceive yourself as a victim of sacrifice, justified in sacrificing others. For who could thrust Heaven and its Creator aside without a sense of sacrifice and loss?” (5:1-3)

In the previous section Jesus showed us how, when we think we would be losing something if we let go of our belief in a world of separation, we think that joining with Love’s oneness would be a sacrifice of something that we still want. In this section he elaborates on this. “You who believe that sacrifice is love must learn that sacrifice is separation from Love. For sacrifice brings guilt as surely as Love brings peace. Guilt is the condition of sacrifice, as peace is the condition for the awareness of your relationship with God. Through guilt you exclude your Father and your brothers from yourself.” (4:1-4)

What happens when we learn to accept peace instead of the conflict that comes with believing in separate bodies?

As we learn to accept peace instead of the conflict that comes with believing in separate bodies, we will remember our relationship with the truth about every brother. We will remember our relationship with God. We will find true communication. With belief in the reality of separate bodies and a whole world where everything is separate and distinct comes interference to true communication. Accepting true communication reestablishes that minds are joined and could never be separate.

Why was the Prince of Peace was born?

“The Prince of Peace was born to reestablish the condition of Love by teaching that communication remains unbroken even if the body is destroyed, provided that you see not the body as the necessary means of communication. And if you understand this lesson, you will realize that to sacrifice the body is to sacrifice nothing, and communication, which must be of the mind, cannot be sacrificed.” (7:2-3)

What is Jesus teaching us about true communication?

Here Jesus gives us a different way of looking at the idea of communication. In this world of separation, communication seems to be able to occur only between what separate bodies say to each other. It seems that we need the body’s senses in order to communicate. Jesus tells us,” The lesson I was born to teach, and still would teach to all my brothers, is that sacrifice is nowhere and Love is everywhere. For communication embraces everything, and in the peace it reestablishes, Love comes of Itself.” (7:5-6) As we learn to accept the oneness and inclusiveness of true communication, we will never experience loss or deprivation. We would laugh at such a silly idea.

How do we truly celebrate Christmas?

It is uplifting to approach Christmas in the way Jesus talks about in this section. Instead of using the holiday as a reason to focus on the things of the outer world, it can now be used as a reminder to “accept it as the sign the time of Christ has come.” Christ is within everyone’s mind and the time is now to become aware of what has always been there. We do this with the Holy Spirit.

Jesus says, “This Christmas give the Holy Spirit everything that would hurt you. Let yourself be healed completely that you may join with Him in healing, and let us celebrate our release together by releasing everyone with us.” (3:1-2) We release everyone by not believing in separation and seeing them as they really are now… in the Mind of God. In this way we are reminded that we are shining in the Heaven within, with them. That is how we can use Christmas as the end of sacrifice.

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Chapter 15: The Holy Instant

Section X: The Time of Rebirth

Read ACIM Chapter 15, Section X (pages 324-326)

What does Jesus mean by ‘the time of rebirth’?

In paragraph one we see that the time of rebirth is the time of awakening to the truth of our union in the Christ mind, or awakening to the awareness of “the perfect union of the Father and the Son.” (1:1) It is the Holy Spirit in our mind that uses both time and season (what we made up) to return us to seeing our union rather than seeing separation. If we are to be released from our belief in separation, we need to release the idea that it would be a ‘sacrifice’ to let go of making separation, or separate bodies appear to be real.

What delays our rebirth?

Sacrifice means to exclude or be without something that is of value to us. To exclude means to judge against or separate from. When we sacrifice (or exclude or judge against) our awareness of our oneness with the Father and the Son, we will feel deprived and guilty. With guilt, which comes with sacrificing or excluding our awareness of union, comes fear. This ‘attraction of guilt’ (1:2) delays our rebirth, but this need not be.

What gift was Jesus born to give and receive from us?

The opposite of exclusion is inclusion. Inclusion means to join with or be one with. Inclusion means union. Jesus tells us in paragraph three: “For in our union you will accept all of our brothers. The gift of union is the only gift that I was born to give. Give it to me, that you may have it.” (3:3-5)

How are we able to recognize innocence in everyone?

The holy instant is a moment of forgiveness, when we let go of judgment. We let go of guilt. We are thus able to recognize the innocence in our brother and ourselves. We are seeing the Son of God truly and because we are seeing him as God created him, we are seeing him with all the power of God. Because there is no judgment in the holy instant, there is no separation and we are able to include everyone in this vision of innocence. That is why Jesus says, “To see me is to see me in everyone, and offer everyone the gift you offer me.” (2:4)

In paragraph four Jesus is telling us that salvation is very simple. We can let the time of rebirth, the time of Christ, be now. This can be done in an instant because it simply requires a change in perception from belief that separation is real to accepting the oneness of God’s Love. What makes this shift in perception appear to be difficult is our underlying belief that the ego offers us something that we want. Because we think we want the ego’s ‘gifts,’ we think that to join with the Love of God would require the sacrifice of what we treasure in the world.

Why does Jesus say that the idea of sacrifice is central to the ego thought system?

Jesus wants us to understand how central the idea of sacrifice is to the ego thought system. We don’t realize that what we are treasuring is really nothing. So we are valuing nothing and rejecting God’s gift of all that is real. We are host to the ego when we believe the world has something of value that we want. It then seems that to accept God’s Love we would be His hostage because He would deny us the things we treasure in the world. “The idea is simply this: you believe it is possible to be host to the ego or hostage to God. This is the choice you think you have, and the decision you believe that you must make. You see no other alternatives, for you cannot accept the fact that sacrifice gets nothing.” (5:4-6)

This belief in sacrifice is reflected in the common statement, “Everything has a price.” In paragraph six Jesus shows us how the trick of the ego really works. When we are host to the ego we think we can see guilt in another and thereby deflect it from ourselves, bringing us relief from the guilt we feel. When we project the guilt onto another it seems that we do not pay a price, but the truth is, when we see guilt in another, we are simply reinforcing our belief in our own guilt. Guilt has not left our mind.

How do we truly let go of guilt?

To truly let go of guilt we need help from outside of the ego thought system. That help is available from the Holy Spirit in our minds. As we consistently practice taking each perception of guilt and fear to the Holy Spirit, ask to receive His perspective and open our minds to receive it, we release ourselves from the bondage of the ego. But we are unwilling to take our perceptions to the Holy Spirit if we believe we will be asked to give up something in the world we value. It seems that we would be asked to sacrifice what we think we want in order to have the peace of God. “How fearful, then, has God become to you, and how great a sacrifice do you belief His love demands!” (7:1)

We believe that total love would demand the complete sacrifice of everything we value in the world. We don’t realize that what we value in the world is really nothing and that by valuing it we are really sacrificing awareness of everything real that God has given us. Thus God becomes something to be feared because it seems that He asks us to give up everything we value.

We are always choosing between total bondage when we value anything in this world and total freedom when we choose the Holy Spirit’s perception. “You have tried many compromises in the attempt to avoid recognizing the one decision you must make. And yet it is the recognition of the decision, just as it is, that makes the decision so easy.” (9:4-5)

Yet as we practice taking all our perceptions to the Holy spirit to receive His purification, we will learn to recognize the valuelessness of everything that we have treasured in this world. When we recognize something has no value, we freely let it go with no sense of sacrifice. We are then free to accept the gift of all that is real that has always been ours.

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Chapter 15: The Holy Instant

Section IX: The Holy Instant and the Attraction of God

Read ACIM Chapter 15, Section IX (pages 322-324)

How do we become more willing to let the ego thought system go?

The ego thought system reflects the desire to see separation rather than oneness. The ego thought system teaches that separate bodies are real and therefore separate minds are real. But we are now seeing that it is just a false thought system, a facade that is trying to hide the truth of continuous Love. We see the facade of separate things is not reality. A false thought system is just that — a false idea that could never be true. As we learn to see every separate form (the facade) for what it is, just a false idea that could never be true, we become more willing to let it go.

We are now seeing that we have been giving strength to the idea that separation is real and we just as easily can remove our support from this false idea. We can become willing to join with the truth instead of the ego’s lies. We join with the truth through the help of the Holy Spirit. It is the Holy Spirit that brings us the holy instant and the attraction of God.

How do we move into a state of mind where we let the Holy Spirit help us?

The following is one way of moving into a state of mind in which you let the Holy Spirit help you. As you read each thought below, be with it wholly. Let it carry you to the Holy Spirit’s bridge of return to the truth.

Think of the Holy Spirit as a bus driver… And on the front of His bus the destination says, “Heaven.” You remember that the Holy Spirit can take you to the awareness of your true Identity. He knows the way to Heaven. He knows the way to everlasting happiness. He knows that in Heaven you can never experience death. In Heaven there is eternal bliss, eternal peace, eternal joy. Only God’s Love is there. It is everywhere you are and everywhere everyone is. God’s Love is the Source of our happiness. It is the Source of our joy. God’s Love is the source of our peace…

Because you would let yourself experience this, you get on the Holy Spirit’s bus… and you notice immediately how comfortable it is… It is the perfect temperature for you… The seat is the most comfortable you ever sat in… The whole interior of the bus is set up so that you can relax now… You know you are safe here… the Holy Spirit knows what will help you be prepared for taking this journey with Him and He brings that to you now…

He knows you better than you do and He knows what will be helpful to you… He prepares you personally to take the journey with Him… He helps you relax… He helps you soften… You let Him help you… He is helping you now… You are open and receptive to His help……

He is leading and you are following…

The Holy Spirit tells you He is taking you on an inner journey—a journey to the Center of your Self… But to take this journey you must be willing to relax… and let go… You are going to be carried… All your needs will be met… You are in the ultimate Expert’s hands… the ultimate Professional is taking you Home… to where you truly belong…

You trust in the Holy Spirit’s service to you… You just know you are in safe hands…

You are brought to a state of mind where there is peace… You let it in… You rest in this state of mind… You let the feeling of peace wash through you… You join with peace… You take it in… You would be one with it…

As you feel the peace you realize you really are being guided by Holy Spirit’s healing Light… Your trust that you can really join with God’s peace grows… You are proving to yourself that you can do it, that you can let your awareness of God’s peace in… and feel it… You let yourself be led deeper… into Holy Spirit’s peace… You let it soak in…

Your awareness of God’s soothing peace is strong now… You realize the Holy Spirit is guiding you to the experience of your true Home… It is a state of being the peace and Love that is your true nature… You love this experience and feel a deep desire to let your awareness of it come in even stronger…

You are aware that you are this beingness of Love… and so is everyone… You become aware of the peace and joy that are inherent in this Love that is everywhere…

You realize that you have moved past the facade of separation… past the facade of differences and are experiencing the fact that Love is all that is real… …

The facade of bodies and separate things can no longer hide the truth from you… You know better… Behind every facade, only Love is there…

You know that you want to take this awareness to your daily “life” experience. You let yourself practice being on Holy Spirit’s bus. You practice letting Holy Spirit bring you to a state of mind where you can see past the facade of separation to the truth that we are one Light. There are no differences.

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Chapter 15: The Holy Instant

Section VIII: The Only Real Relationship

Read ACIM Chapter 15, Section VIII (pages 320-322)

How does the Holy Spirit help release us from fear, pain and unhappiness?

In paragraph 1 Jesus emphasizes that the Holy Spirit will use everything in our dream of separation to help release us from the dream. He understands that we have a fear of forgiveness (or letting go of thoughts of being different from our Source) because, hidden below our conscious awareness, we believe that this would mean letting go of something that we still want.

The Holy Spirit knows that we do not let go of our belief in separation because we believe we would be losing something. The Holy Spirit also knows that instead of loss, forgiveness, or letting go of our belief in the dream of being separate, would bring us release from fear, pain and unhappiness. Jesus tells us, “He will teach you to remember that forgiveness is not loss, but your salvation. And that in complete forgiveness, in which you recognize that there is nothing to forgive, you are absolved completely.” (1:6-7)

How long will we hallucinate that we are not united?

We will hallucinate the opposite of the truth (that we are not united) as long as that is what we desire to see. But the good news is we can change our mind about what we want to see. We can change our mind by allowing our mind to be changed by the part of our mind that has never left the truth — the Holy Spirit. We can choose to open up to being under the Holy Spirit’s influence.

What does choosing to be under the Holy Spirit’s influence mean?

How do we go about doing this? We do this by stepping back from our normal way of thinking, stepping back from thinking we know anything. What we think we know is just an hallucination, but we think it is real in our minds and so we experience it that way. Once we learn to question what we think we know instead of going along with it, there is a chance for the Holy Spirit to enter.

The Holy Spirit quietly waits until we are ready to listen. We listen by being quiet. We listen by focusing on being open and receptive to receiving the Holy Spirit’s peace. We join with the Holy Spirit’s peace. We allow ourselves to rest in Holy Spirit’s peace awhile. We give our weary minds a respite from the constantly changing and shifting sands of the ego’s ongoing story of separation. We let our mind stay open and continue to receive the peace and sense of well-being that continues to flow through our mind. We give thanks because we know that peace of mind is not a small gift. It is our pathway to freedom from the tyranny of the ego.

What happens as we practice being under the influence of the Holy Spirit?

As we practice being under the influence of the Holy Spirit, Who still resides in our minds, we will be brought to the holy instant. We will be brought to the truth of our unity with God and every brother. Jesus tells us, “Relate only with what will never leave you, and what you can never leave.” (3:1) We can never leave God and God can never leave us. God’s perfect Love is all that can ever be real and we can never make our delusions of separation real, no matter what our body’s eyes show us.

What is our only real relationship?

As we learn to choose peace, the Holy Spirit does the rest. The Holy Spirit brings us to the only real relationship — our relationship with God. In paragraph 4 Jesus tells us, “Your relationships are with the universe. And this universe, being of God, is far beyond the petty sum of all the separate bodies you perceive. For all its parts are joined in God through Christ, where they become like to their Father. Christ knows of no separation from His Father, Who is His one relationship, in which He gives as His Father gives to Him.” (4:4-7)

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Chapter 15: The Holy Instant

Section VII: The Needless Sacrifice

Read ACIM Chapter 15, Section VII (pages 317-320)

In truth, are there many different kinds of love?

In the first paragraph Jesus describes the Love between the Father and His Son. He reminds us that this Love is the only thing that will satisfy us. Mic Jagger sings the lament of the world when he says, “I can’t get no satisfaction.” We try and try again to get satisfaction from the special love relationships found in this illusionary world of separation. Jesus wants to help us understand that the false images of the ego are not reality and will never bring us satisfaction.

He says, “There is no other love that can satisfy you, because there is no other love. This is the only Love that is fully given and fully returned. Being complete, It asks nothing. Being wholly pure, everyone joined in It has everything.” (1:2-5) Let us think about what Jesus is telling us here. He is helping us understand that there is no other love than our Love for God and His Love for us. And because this Love is fully given and fully received, this Love is total and holds no reservations.

How do we become aware of God’s total Love for us?

Exercise: Relax and let the Holy Spirit bring you the awareness of God’s total Love for you and your total Love for Him. Open your mind to that awareness. Let in the feeling of your closeness to God. Let yourself become aware that, in your true Reality, you are receiving and giving all of God’s Love, now and for eternity. In truth, God’s Love for you and your Love for Him does not change. It does not come and go. Because this Love is all inclusive, It is not special. It is your Reality forever.

What does Jesus call the needless sacrifice?

What we call love in this world is just the specialness that the ego mind craves for. With special love there are differences. It comes and goes because it is not eternal. The needless sacrifice (separation from Love) that the ego asks of us is to give up, or sacrifice, our real Identity, which is eternally at one with all Love, at one with God and all our brothers. Within the oneness of God, Love is always fully given and fully received in a nonstop flow of communication to all of Itself. The ego sacrifices God’s Love in an attempt to establish a unique and separate identity. This can only seem to be accomplished by denying Love’s presence.

There is a very helpful description of the meaning of sacrifice found in Section XI of Chapter 15 that is useful to help us clearly understand what Jesus is telling us here in Section VII. He tells us, “You who believe that sacrifice is love must learn that sacrifice is separation from love. For sacrifice brings guilt as surely as love brings peace. Guilt is the condition of sacrifice, as peace is the condition for the awareness of your relationship with God. Through guilt you exclude your Father and your brothers from yourself.” (T-15.XI.4:1-4)

The ego is the belief that by separating from God (sacrificing the Self) it can become master of its own domain. It believes it can usurp the power of God. In this insane thought system, the ego perceives itself as the maker of all it looks upon. This gives the illusion of power. But what it does not recognize is that by separating from Love, it has cut itself off from the Source of all power. All that it has left is the capacity to make and believe in illusions. It is only belief that seems to give the illusions power. But the moment belief is withdrawn, the illusions disappear. The ego seems to have made a grand and complex universe, but this is accomplished only by sacrificing Reality through separating from It. Having attacked Reality (Love), guilt is inevitable and attack is expected in return.

Why is judgment and guilt so attractive to the ego?

Remember that the ego is the idea of separation. Consequently, it attempts to solve all perceived problems by using guilt as a means to make separation seem real. With separation as the foundation of its thought system, it teaches us that everything we see is separate from us and therefore what we do to others has no effect on us. “For it is the ego’s fundamental doctrine that what you do to others you have escaped.” (4:2) The ego would have us believe that if we judge another we are not judging ourselves; if we see guilt in another we have freed ourselves of guilt.

He tells us, “The sick attraction to guilt must be recognized for what it is. For having been made real to you, it is essential to look at it clearly, and by withdrawing your investment in [guilt], to learn to let it go [forgive]. (3:1-2) Most of the time we do not realize that when we become angry with someone, what is happening at an unconscious level is that we are joining with the ego’s idea of safety. Jesus tells us, “[The ego] counsels, therefore, that if you are host to it, it will enable you to direct its anger outward, thus protecting you. And thus it embarks on an endless, unrewarding chain of special relationships, forged out of anger and dedicated to but one insane belief; that the more anger you invest outside yourself, the safer you become.” (4:5-6)

In paragraphs 2 through 12 Jesus goes into detail describing the ego’s replacement for God’s Love for you and your Love for Him. He describes the ego’s relationships in such detail, not to make us feel guilty for what we are believing in, but to help us see it clearly for the insanity that it is. He wants us to see how hopeless it is to try to find satisfaction within the ego’s thought system. He wants us to see how depressing and stressful our projections of guilt really are and that they will never bring us the experience of the truly rewarding eternal relationship we have with God.

To break the chain of an endless series of unrewarding special relationships, we need to look closely at these relationships with the Holy Spirit Who will show us the truth behind the false stories the ego has made. Because the ego is dedicated to maintaining guilt, it carefully disguises the guilt in its special relationships, telling us that they are loving relationships. When we look closely at ego based relationships, we will see that this is not what we really want. We will recognize the guilt that these relationships hold in place. To the ego, relationships mean that bodies are together. It denies the communication the Holy Spirit would bring.

How does the Holy Spirit teach true communication?

To the Holy Spirit communication means union or joining as one Mind. The ego avoids this at all costs because the ego believes that minds must be kept private to maintain its separate identity. Jesus shows us how the ego thinks: “...if their bodies are together their minds remain their own. The union of bodies thus becomes the way in which they would keep minds apart.” (11:5-6) Because the Holy Spirit does not believe in bodies, He will always show you true communication, or union. He will always help you move past guilt, which is the cause of all feelings of loneliness and abandonment. The Holy Spirit teaches by bringing us the experience of the holy instant. The holy instant is the experience of true communication, of total union and completion. “And here it is that you experience yourself as you were created, and as you are.” (14:10)

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section III: Shadows of the Past

To hear the Holy Spirit, what do we need to do?

Why do irritating people show up in our lives?

As we forgive, what happens to these ‘shadow figures’?

Why does Jesus tell us that this world is a world of vengeance?

What happens in our relationships when we join with the Holy Spirit?

What do we want to see? Am I joining with ego or Holy Spirit?

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section II: The Forgiven World

What is the effect of believing in a world of separate bodies?

What happens when we are willing to look past bodies to see the face of Christ?

Where does our true happiness lie?

How does Jesus describe the forgiven world?

As we open to the Holy Spirit’s instruction, what happens in our mind?

What determines whether we hear the Holy Spirit or not?

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Chapter 17: Forgiveness and the Holy Relationship

Section I: Bringing Fantasy to Truth

How do we make every relationship holy?

Why is trying to change our reality from wholeness into separate pieces so painful?

Why is forgiveness, or letting illusions go, so important to our happiness?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section VII: The End of Illusions

Why is the special relationship an attempt to re-enact the past and change it?

What are we hiding from ourselves when we seek the special relationship?

Why is it inevitable that we will experience the holy instant in its fullness?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section VI: The Bridge to the Real World

When we equate ourselves with the ego, does it seem ‘natural’ to search for a special relationship?

What are we shown when we learn to receive the holy instant from the Holy Spirit?

What is it like as we continue to let the Holy Spirit undo our false beliefs?

What help does the Holy Spirit need from us in order to do His job?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section V: The Choice for Completion

What are the unconscious motives behind our special relationships?

Why does Jesus say that the ego’s hatred truimphs in the special relationship?

What is the difference between how the Holy Spirit and ego sees completion?

What does it take to wake up to the reality of Heaven?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section IV: The Illusion and the Reality of Love

What is the difference between the illusion and the reality of Love?

What is the purpose of the special love relationship?

What does special love deprive us of?

How do we transform our special relationships into holy relationships?

Why is it so important to change our minds rather than change the outer form?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section III: The Reward of Teaching

How are we learning to accept the comfort of Love from our inner Teacher?

How do we listen to the truth that is beyond the ego thought system?

How do we separate ourselves from illusion and not from truth?

Why are we to accept our true Self as the only part that is real?

What does Jesus mean when he refers to “our creations”?

What do our extensions of Love teach us?

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Chapter 16: The Forgiveness of Illusions

Section II: The Power of Holiness

How are we to see everyone?

Why do we see differences?

How do we see that all differences are equally unreal?

Why do we want to see past this world to Reality?

How is every perceived problem solved?

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