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January-March, 2021

Grace in Everyday Moments

by Rev. Peggy Rivera, Ordained Ministerial Counselor

In choosing a topic today I was moved to address how important it is to see grace every day so that we can find comfort from our Creator in knowing that no matter what happens, we are fine. We are loved no matter what happens in the world of dreams because this is not our true reality. Grace is that connection to the remembrance of that.

A Course in Miracles, Lesson 169, begins with “By grace I live. By grace I am released.” I think that is very important to remember because it tells us that we don’t have to do anything. It’s not something we earn nor something we learn. It is something given to us freely. It also says in Lesson 168, “Your grace is given me. I claim it now.” It teaches us how God’s Love is limitless, and even when we sleep, He Loves us still.

We often try to tell ourselves stories that disprove His unconditional Love for us. But through A Course in Miracles we learn that the ego makes up these stories out of fear. The truth is none of those lies are real. How do we find evidence of this truth? We find the evidence through forgiveness. When we accept that all of us are One, we realize that the only constant in life is Love.

It does not matter if we get mad at someone who cuts us off in traffic or gets pushy at the grocery store. When we try to see them through the eyes of Love and accept that they are also doing the best they can. In that moment we find grace.

Jesus tells us, “Grace is the acceptance of the Love of God within a world of seeming hate and fear. By grace alone the hate and fear are gone, for grace presents a state so opposite to everything the world contains, that those lighted by the of gift of grace cannot believe the world of fear is real.” (W-pI.169.2:1) “As an expression of what you truly are, the miracle places the mind in a state of grace. The mind then naturally welcomes the Host within and the stranger without. When you bring in the stranger the stranger becomes your brother.” (T-1.III.7:4)

There seems to be a need for a shift in awareness from egocentric thoughts to a more spiritual experience. Once we shift our beliefs to realize that no matter what happens, the state of our Being is pure Love and acceptance, we experience grace. It is the acceptance of God’s Love, even when we feel betrayed. How comforting it is to know that we are loved and accepted, no matter what. I remember a time in my life when the God I believed in was judgmental and was waiting to throw me into a fire pit for eternity if I didn’t believe a certain way.

I have since learned that is not the truth. And to me that is also what grace is. Knowing who we are and accepting who we are in relationship with God. As I contemplate about finding grace in everyday life, I make it a point to forgive myself for all my misinformation and for allowing myself to believe untruths. Now I pay attention to the grace moments in my world.

I was scrolling through my Facebook feed the other day, and I heard a story of a woman who was standing in line to vote in the rain. She was soaking wet and the line was very long. A man pulled up and handed her an umbrella. She asked how she could get it back to him and he said to pass it on. That is a lovely expression of compassion.

Those are the moments in which we find grace. But grace is really about finding Love, even when it is hard to. There are many different ways grace is described. Like it is a thing of beauty, a woman’s name, as in Grace Kelly, or a smooth flawless movement, as in dancing with grace.

But the kind of grace that stabilizes us in life is the grace that is the connection with unconditional Love. There is a clear pathway to experience it through forgiveness. When we forgive ourselves and our perceptions of others, we are left with a profound feeling of joy that grace bestows upon us. It is seeing our brother through Love instead of judgment.

The world that we are living in today takes a lot of focus to be able to forgive even when it seems like the other is unforgivable. When I saw on television the death of a man in police custody, my heart broke and I felt angry. I wanted to lash out at everyone involved. Regardless of the politics of it, it was the disregard of another human where a life was snuffed out that shook me to my core.

I had only seen another life taken at the hands of another person on purpose once before in my life. When I was a teenager working at a local supermarket as a cashier, the store was being robbed by several men. When a customer reacted by grabbing hold of the robber and shaking him, he pulled out a gun and started shooting. A man in my line was shot. He showed me a bullet hole in his chest. But the worst was a woman waiting in line who was fatally shot. She had stopped at the store to pick up one item on the way to pick up her child from school.

Watching those type of crimes does not compare to watching someone pass from illness. There is a feeling of such loss and sadness that it takes time to process it. Fear leads people to do those things. These things make me stop to look for the opportunity to find it in my heart to forgive. I remember hearing a family tell of forgiving a man who killed their daughter. That is really grace — knowing that God loves us all no matter what.

We do not know what led to these things, but God does. Our job is to see who they are underneath the appearance. We are not asked to perform miracles but miracle mindedness ensures our state of grace. “…the action aspect of the miracle should be controlled by me because of my complete awareness of the whole plan.” (T-1.III.8:4)

We have a job to do and our judgment is not part of that. We need to find a way to forgive and accept that sometimes we witness what seems to be a lack of Love. This is our job, to see it for what it is — unreal. Anything that is not Love is not real. I think this is the really hard part for me and I guess I’m not alone in that. What is real is God’s Love for us.

Our bodies are not our reality; only our Spirit is real. But in our current ego-state we are trained to see differences, good and bad. Don’t think that I am saying it’s okay for someone to harm another and chalk it up to it doesn’t exist. Our behavior while we are expressing through a body is like a barometer showing us where we need to heal. But be assured in this world of ego, people are held accountable from the world’s view of their behavior.

I would love to see a time when we live totally in a state of grace, where we don’t need any evidence that Love is unconditional. I want to wake up in the morning and feel Love envelop me, seeing with eyes that see only grace. We have to practice that.

We can surround ourselves with things of beauty — gardens, flowers, birds, music, art, people who we love and who love us. Sometimes it can be a pet. We don’t always have access to family or friends so we can find it in our dogs and cats etc.

I recently saw a movie called “My Octopus Teacher.” It was about a man who had lost his job so he began going skin diving every day. He found an octopus den and he began watching it. Amazingly after a while the octopus reached out and began to touch him. Each day the octopus reached out a little more until she formed a very sweet relationship with the diver. At one point it showed the octopus nestled up on the diver’s chest like a kitten curled up affectionately.

Sharks in the area of the den would comb the bottom looking for food. One of them found her and a chase began. The diver did not want to interfere with nature so he painfully watched as the shark wrestled with the octopus and tore one of her legs off. Thankfully she survived that time.

How beautiful this story was to me and the surroundings were in kelp forests in South Africa. The story showed how this man found unconditional love during a down time in his life. To experience grace, we only have to be aware of the Love of God in all of us.

Remember that our physical eyes were not created to see Spirit. They only see the body. Through our bodies we can find and reconnect with our true nature. When we watch a beautiful sunset or sit beside a stream of crystal-clear water and listen to the sounds in nature. “Spirit is in a state of grace forever. Your reality is only spirit. Therefore you are in a state of grace forever.” (T-1.III.5:4-6)

Rev. Peggy Rivera, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Palm Bay,FL 305-322-6610 Email:7seas@bellsouth.net Web: www.revprivera.lifeministries.com

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

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January-March, 2021

COVID-19 from the Perspective of A Course in Miracles

by Rev. Jennifer McSween, Ordained Ministerial Counselor

In March of this year, life as we’ve come to know it came to a screeching halt for most of us in the greater part of the world. The sudden worldwide outbreak and rapidly increasing spread of COVID-19 led to a complete lockdown of schools, businesses, and services. All forms of physical and social interaction with each other were asked to be stopped in an attempt to curb the spread of the virus.

Both the onset of COVID-19 and the ensuing lockdown led to massive changes and losses of our livelihood, loved ones, and our basic social freedoms. This brought up feelings of fear, pain, and/or uncertainty for many, if not most of us. I say “us” because I, too, have experienced the effects of COVID and the challenges of the ensuing lockdown, personally and professionally. Let me tell you how.

Officiating weddings is not only a big part of my ministry but also the part that I enjoy the most. For me, marriage is one of the ways we can join most lovingly, intimately and authentically with another on the level of form. And “I,” in the role of the officiant, “get” to be instrumental in helping this joining to take place. How cool is that?

I usually have a steady flow of ceremonies booked especially between the months of May and October, and this year was no different. This year, however, I officiated my last wedding ceremony on Saturday March 14th. On Monday the 16th we went into lockdown. By the end of the month, all the ceremonies I had booked all the way to October were either canceled, postponed, or simply “put on hold.”

On April 28th, five days after coming down with symptoms of COVID-19, my mother passed away. She was living in a senior’s residence at the time so, due to the lockdown, I had not visited her for six weeks. Two days before she came down with the symptoms of COVID we saw each other from a distance for the first time in six weeks. I called her to come to the window so she could see me where I stood at the quiet street on her side of the building, about 500 yards away. That would also be the last time we saw each other.

I wrote about my experience in an article titled, “Peace in the Midst of Pain,” in the summer issue of Miracles News. I shared about my feelings of pain over the loss of my mother’s physical presence in my life, and facing them from the perspective of the Course.

Now I’d like to share how A Course in Miracles would have us look at COVID without feeling fearful or victimized, neither by the virus nor the limitations and challenges of being in lockdown. I’ve been asked the question of how A Course in Miracles would have us look at COVID quite a few times over the past seven months and at the time of this writing, November, 2020, we have entered into a second lockdown. Both COVID cases and related deaths are once again rising.

How do we look at COVID from the perspective of the Course, and why look at it from the Course’s perspective? Well, the first thing we need to be aware of is that, whether it’s COVID, some major catastrophe, or the common cold, A Course in Miracles does not look at any of these in terms of something specific.

Instead, the Course looks at the world and everything that seems to take place in it as the projection or reflection of the idea of separation that’s in the mind. The underlying premises that give rise to the Course’s perspective of the world and what takes place in it are as follows:

1) Mind is all there is. 2) Everything happens in the mind. 3) All that is ever taking place — with everything you see and experience — is nothing but your experiencing the contents of the mind in different forms.

These premises lead to perspective that will keep you from feeling fearful of or threatened by those things you see, encounter, or experience in your life or in the world. This is a radically different perspective than the one we generally hold of the world and it leads us to think that our feelings are caused by the things we see, encounter, and experience in our lives and in the world.

Looking at the world and everything that takes place in it from the perspective of A Course in Miracles is about understanding the true cause of your feelings. It means that you realize that it’s never what happens, what comes into your experience, or the form in which something appears that determines the way you feel. It is always and only “the way you’re looking at it, your perception” that is the cause of your feelings.

“Forgiveness” is remembering this and being willing to look past the form as being the cause of your feelings. You pay attention to the way you’re looking at it — the story you’re telling yourself about what it is, what it means, and most importantly, that you are being victimized by it.

So, the way the Course would have us look at COVID is as a way of telling us what’s taking place in our minds and seeing it as an opportunity to “practice forgiveness.” Feelings of fear, worry, and uncertainty related to COVID and/or its accompanying challenges, are to be looked at as nothing but information.

We’re being informed that we are looking at COVID as something specific and telling ourselves a story about what it is and what it means, based on its form. With this awareness we can then choose to look past the form and recognize the truth that lies behind and see it for what it really is. It is nothing but a reflection of the misperception that the world and everything that takes place in it is real and we are victims of it.

When we practice forgiveness, we correct that misperception and we look at everything, not according to the form in which it appears, but as the reflection of the idea of separation. We realize that nothing we see, encounter, or experience in any form can cause us to feel anything, nor cause us any pain.

This enables us to entertain the perspective that’s shared in the title of Workbook Lesson 31: “I am not the victim of the world I see.” When we look at COVID and the lockdown from this perspective, we feel peaceful, even if we experience the loss of a loved one, loss of our livelihood, or limitations in our way of life.

Rev. Jennifer McSween, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Montreal, Canada. She is the author of the book True Forgiveness… the key to happiness and hosts a weekly podcast titled, Understanding the Language of A Course in Miracles. You can listen at www.Rev.JenniferMcSweenPodcast.com

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
You may freely share copies of this with your friends, provided this copyright notice and website address are included.

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January-March, 2021

Pain Is Not Real — Could This Be True?

by Rev. Myron, Jones, Ordained Ministerial Counselor

I am ready to let go of the physical symptoms I have experienced in the body, and like everything else I have done with the Course, I am taking it one step at a time. I have an ongoing conversation with Jesus about this and have had some helpful thoughts given to me.

For instance, once he told me I was paying way too much attention to the body. I knew immediately he was right. I would have pain and have this inner conversation about what it meant and what I would maybe tell the doctor and what he would say. It was ridiculous. I would have inner conversations about what I should eat or not eat, worried conversations about weight gain.

So, when I catch myself doing that now, I put an immediate stop to it. I look at the thoughts with the Holy Spirit and release them. I ask Him to correct my thinking and heal my mind. I surrender the body and all its problems and needs to the Holy Spirit. I do this as often as I need to and the inner conversations about the body are becoming rarer. I have learned to trust His promises. “Father, I thank You that Your promises will never fail in my experience, if I but test them out.” (W-pII.327.2)

Included in body issues is pain and recently I had an interesting and promising experience with this.

Recently, having gotten through two back-to-back hurricanes, I am dealing with the aftermath. I don’t have a ceiling in my kitchen which means I am exposed to the fiberglass, dust and mildew etc. I had a headache every day for weeks and it was getting worse. Finally, I decided that I should use this as a healing opportunity. I told Jesus that I didn’t want to keep taking medicine. I wanted my mind to be healed of the belief that something outside me could affect me.

I decided I was through with the headaches. He kept giving me more thoughts, more insight. I remembered he said in the Course that I am not this body. I am not in this body. He also said that this body could not contain me. And, at no instance has the body ever existed. So, who has a headache? It can’t be me. I don’t even have a head.

He also said that the body itself is a neutral event. It is itself an effect and cannot have effects. This means that the body cannot be the source of pain. If the body is not the source of the pain, what is? It is my thoughts. I am now often asking myself, “Who am I? I am not this woman who thinks she has a headache. I am that which is aware of the woman in pain, the observer of this situation, the dreamer not the dream. 

And speaking of pain, I remembered what he told me in “If God is real, there is no pain. If pain is real, there is no God.” (W-pI.190.3:3-4) With all this information, and with the absolute certainty that Jesus knows what he is talking about, I gave the headache over to him along with all the thoughts and beliefs that are the cause of the headache. And the headache dissolved instantly! I had that headache for a good month, and it was just gone. I noticed a few times when I would start to feel the headache trying to return and I just refused to accept it. After all, “I rule my mind, which I alone must rule.” (W-pII.236)

One interesting moment came when I had a hectic day of trying to juggle monkeys (get the contractor, insurance adjuster and SBA all on the same page). I began to feel the headache trying to return. I had a clear thought that I should just give into it. Take some medicine, watch TV for the rest of the day. It felt almost comfortable to think about it. I was astounded! Wow! That’s how the ego works. It tries to convince me that pain is valuable and my old friend. I laughed and then shooed it away. I’m onto you, ego. Pain is not real and has no value.

Jesus says in Lesson 190 that pain is not a fact at all and I have tested this and seen it is true. If my headache was a fact then there would be no way for me to let it go. I could take aspirin and get temporary relief because I believe in aspirin. But to simply decide against the headache and watch it vanish proves that Jesus is right, pain is not a fact.

He also says this about pain: “There is no form it takes that will not disappear if seen aright.” (W-pI.190.1:4) So, I wondered what my headache miracle meant as far as other pains go, and if it would apply to sickness. Of course, it does! If pain is not real this time, it is never real, neither is sickness. I remember listening to a talk by Dr. David Hawkins. He believed lesson 190 completely. He said that he had two surgeries in which he did not have anesthesia to block the pain.

What about me? Am I done with pain? I am not ready for Dr Hawkins’ level of faith, but I keep using these truths and reminding myself of them often. I don’t want to let this experience fade in my mind. I want to emphasize it. I had some other aches and pains and I noticed that the ego doesn’t want to give up one of its favorite separation tools. It argued that there was a reason of this pain or this ache and why not just take an aspirin? But so far, I have remained steadfast. On the other hand, when I went to the dentist, I accepted the shot to dull the pain. So, I am still working on this.

And what about sickness? I looked at my medicine last night, a couple of pills I’ve been taking for a long time, and I wondered if I really needed them. I heard the ego object, reminding me I’ve tried this before and it didn’t work. But I also know that I am not the same person I used to be. I’m asking Jesus to guide me in this as he has everything else I have done.

I just had some new cabinets delivered and I noticed I felt uncomfortable that the delivery men were not wearing masks and I forgot to put mine on. I also found myself talking to a friend about how much COVID-19 has risen in our country.

I told Jesus that I see that I am still arguing for the idea that something outside my mind could affect me and I asked the Holy Spirit to heal my mind.

My process for healing my mind is gentle. I don’t force anything. Changing behavior is not the same as being healed.

What I do is notice all the thoughts
and behaviors that point to the error
in my mind and ask the
Holy Spirit to look at them with me.

This dissolves the error itself and then the behavior changes automatically. I may have to look with the Holy Spirit many times if the belief has a firm hold on me, but always eventually it works because I want it to. This is a kinder and gentler way to do this work. It is also genuine healing.

“I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt.
Loss is not loss when properly perceived. Pain is impossible. There is no grief with any cause at all. And suffering of any kind is nothing but a dream. This is the truth, at first to be but said and then repeated many times; and next to be accepted as but partly true, with many reservations. Then to be considered seriously more and more, and finally accepted as the truth. I can elect to change all thoughts that hurt. And I would go beyond these words today, and past all reservations, and arrive at full acceptance of the truth in them.

Father, what You have given cannot hurt, so grief and pain must be impossible. Let me not fail to trust in You today, accepting but the joyous as Your gifts; accepting but the joyous as the truth.”(W-pII.284)

Rev. Myron Jones, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister living in Westlake, Louisiana. Read her inspiring Healing Journal articles on the Pathways website. Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address). Myron’s website: www.forgivenessisthewayhome.org

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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January-March, 2021

One in Forgiveness

by Rev. Michael Atkins, Ordained Ministrial Counselor

“You’re out of your mind, Michael. Lay down on the floor, you hippie, take your Ritalin — and call 911.”

My Father frequently enjoyed telling me I was going to hell, mostly because I didn’t see eye-to-eye with him and Jonathan Edwards on the subject of “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” The quote above was his canned response to me whenever I would attempt to share the thought of God’s perfection making it impossible for Him to create something He would want to destroy.

When I was younger, his mockery of my beliefs simply served as more evidence that my strategy of seeking for the truth on my own was correct. I felt that I had to defend myself from those who would twist God’s words to serve their own purposes, establishing themselves as my superiors; the chosen ones, keepers of a higher knowledge who had every right to tell an ignorant, low-life spiritual peasant like myself how I should interpret His messages and what I should believe.

As you may have guessed from the words I chose to illustrate that last point, this was a difficult lesson for me. My persistent belief in victimhood blinded me to my own unforgiveness and the fact that I was perpetuating separation by justifying it in my own mind this way.

Many years were spent in a spiritual stalemate through my choice to isolate myself from the perceived harmful influence of others. It took me quite a long time to realize that I could never find love on my own.

In fact, “finding love on my own” is actually a very good description of the ego’s plan for salvation! Looking for love through the mind of fear. Separating out a self from all of Creation and utilizing judgment and defense to protect this self from what is harmful and “bad” in an attempt to achieve some measure of temporary happiness in a hostile and, ultimately, lethal world.

Love is the opposite of alone. It is sharing. True joining through sharing is found in this world through forgiveness. Forgiveness is the letting go of all those thoughts of fear and conflict in our minds that we would use to justify our desire to remain separate from one another. It is these thoughts that block our awareness of the desire to Love that is the sole motivation of everyone in everything they do or strive for.

Love is our only will, and this will we share with our Creator, who truly just wants us to be happy. His Will is perfect, and so He created All for All, that His Son may be happy with everything that is, forever.

We can restore the memory of our oneness with all by joining through forgiveness here. Forgiveness is practice in the special lesson of giving and receiving are one. As we forgive all the thoughts that we hold against our brother, we set them free. In that very instant, we realize we are forgiven as well as we let our thoughts of conflict go.

We see the face of Christ in our brothers as the thoughts that had blocked our awareness of Love are removed by our own willingness to let our True Self take them from us and replace them with the gift of His enlightened perception which alone reflects the truth. We learn to see in every encounter the desire to Love.

As I see my brother, I will see myself. And so will I see God. All are One, even here. We can shut our eyes against the truth, but we can’t really hide from it.

As I became willing to let go of my long-held fears of persecution and feelings of unworthiness and opened up to others, allowing myself to be vulnerable and sharing my own cherished insights, which, for so long, I had wanted to protect from the potential attacks of those who might disagree with me.

I learned that there is no one I need to fear. Everyone is here for my own best good, no matter what the appearance may be. The will to Love is always visible. Even anger, rejection and attack are the witnesses for the desire for Love.

Every time that I can avoid the temptation to respond in kind to a negative experience and instead forgive that thought and that interpretation of conflict and attack in my own mind, it brings a deeper and more durable peace that I find I can share with others. Love inspires Love. Forgiveness heals all.

Interestingly enough, as I was in the process of writing this, I received a gift of confirmation from Spirit in the form of an amazingly relevant Pathways of Light Daily Inspiration, which shares the same idea:

“To restore Love to our awareness, we need to let go of the past through forgiveness. This is why the Course’s central focus is on forgiveness. Itis the means for restoring our mind to the awareness of Love’s oneness. Weare so entrenched in the beliefs of the ego thought system that we need toask for help from the Teacher Who knows that only Love is real.”

Separation is insanity. The cure is unity, and the means is the forgiveness of all the thoughts we hold in our minds that block our awareness of the ever-present Love that motivates us all.

I’m still working on my own lessons. But I can laugh about it now. I tell myself that “you’re out of your mind” is the one thought the ego has given me that is true. I am out of my right mind whenever I’m attempting to justify unforgiveness. And it is insane to be afraid of Love when I know nothing could bring me more joy. Yet, by the grace of God and through the divine guidance of the Voice within us all, we are constantly reminded of what we already know to be true. I am so grateful to be here now and to know I am so much closer than I’ve ever been to the day when I will fearlessly cry out for all the world to hear: “I Love You!”

And Dad, I know that everything you did and said was motivated by your desire to love me. Your anger was a mistaken projection of the upsetting belief that you were not finding in me the love you instinctively knew you deserved. The hurt and anger I felt in response was due to my mistaken belief that you did not love me, which is all I ever wanted because I loved, and do love you, so much. Now I remember all those times you said that you just wanted me to be happy. I believe you. Thank you for being here for me in this life and all you did to help me be what I was meant to be. 

Peace.

“Be not afraid of love. For it alone can heal all sorrow, wipe away all tears, and gently waken from his dream of pain the Son whom God acknowledges as His.” (W-pII.10.4:2-3)

Rev. Michael Atkins, O.M.C., is a Pathways of Light minister in Austin, Texas. Email:mea35tx@hotmail.com

© 2020, Pathways of Light. https://www.pathwaysoflight.org
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