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The Means Serve the End

“This is a course in miracles.” (CE In.1:1)

“This course is a mind-training course.” (CE T-3.I.1:2)

“It [the Course] is concerned only with Atonement, or the correction of perception. The means of the Atonement is forgiveness.” (CE C-In.1:2-3).

Miracles, mind-training, forgiveness… These are just three components of the path of A Course in Miracles that enable us to reach its goal. They can also be referred to as “means” that lead to an “end.”

The various offerings of the Center for Miraculous Living are rooted in these and other “means to an end.” And, it is only while we seem to exist as separate selves in separate bodies, bound and limited by time and space, and with minds split between the ego and our true Self, that such means are necessary. As we read in the Course:

“Means serve the end, and as the end is reached the value of the means decreases, and is eclipsed entirely when they are recognized as functionless.” [CE T-22.VIII.1:7]

The “end” to which the various “means” of the path of the Course are leading is a kind of inner seeing (a healed perception) that is the highest we can attain in this world — a perception of the holiness in everyone and everything. For example, 1) understanding and applying miraculous forgiveness, the central means taught by the Course, 2) allows us to see and experience a very different world from the one we knew before. This very different world is referred to in the Course as the “real world” — the world as seen through forgiving eyes — and is one of the ways of naming and describing the goal of the Course.

The real world is the same world we are living in now, only seen and experienced through “true perception” or “Christ’s Vision.” It is still a world of perception. Therefore, it is still an illusion. Yet, it represents the attainment of a state of mind and way of perceiving in which our minds have been healed and we see a world filled with love, that blesses us and everyone, and in which we feel totally safe. We perceive everyone as our holy equal and possessing inestimable worth. The way the real world is portrayed in the Course is actually very similar to Jesus’ vision of the “Kingdom of God” that was the central focus of his teaching in the gospels.

Although the attainment of the real world is one way of describing the goal of A Course in Miracles, it is very unlikely any one person will reach the kind of perception that allows them to experience the real world in a complete and sustained way. This will more than likely occur gradually and in glimpses at first. Therefore, it is highly unlikely you will be in a Course study group when one of your follow students, having attained a kind of complete awakening, will be lifted from their chair by a giant Godly hand to disappear forever from this world of form.

As a matter of fact, another core teaching of the Course is that all minds are joined and as long as any one of us is hostage to the ego’s false perception, the Sonship is not whole (“Sonship” is used in the Course as the plural of “Son of God.” In the Course’s teachings, you and I and every other being make up the Sonship. Each of us is an individual Son of God at the same time that, together, we are the entire Sonship, one with the “rest” and with God).

Because all minds are joined, awakening is ultimately a shared experience. Individual students can progress toward attainment of the real world or greatly improve their forgiveness skills. However, true and final awakening is collective — no one of us is fully awake and free of the world of form until all of us are.

In other words, students of the Course are not “out for themselves” or on an individual heroic quest to attain enlightenment. If they are, they are misunderstanding its path. Some of the words we could use to describe this central philosophy and methodology of the Course would include: mutual, shared, collective, and together.

I am not aware of any other religious or spiritual path or philosophy that has a system of thought and practice even close to the Course. For the Course, the cause of separation/suffering, the undoing of the cause of separation/suffering, and our ultimate awakening to the truth of who we are — at one with God and the entire Sonship in an eternal and infinite state of all-encompassing love — are mutual or shared experiences. They are:

• A collective (mutual, shared) experience of separation and suffering,
• A collective (mutual, shared) experience of the undoing of the cause of separation and suffering, and
• A collective (mutual, shared) experience of awakening.

Below are passages that refer to some of the other means to an end — other components of its path — that we are instructed to use to achieve its goal for us. Besides the real world, other names for this goal are: “true perception,” “Christ’s Vision,” and the “happy dream,” — all referring to a state of mind/way of seeing that is the highest we can attain in this world, in which we perceive the eternal holiness in everyone and everything.

• From the Text: “This is a course in miracles.” (CE In.1:1)
• From the Text: “This course is a mind-training course.” (CE T-3.I.1:2)
• From the Text: “If the purpose of this course is to learn what you are, and if you have already decided that what you are is fearful, then it must follow that you will not learn this course. But you might remember that the reason for the course is that you do not know what you are” (CE T-9.I.2:2-3).
• From the Text: “This is not a course in the play of ideas, but in their practical application” (CE T-11.IX.4:3).
• From the Text: “For this is a course on love, because it is about you” (CE T-13.IV.1:2).
• From the Text: “This is a course in how to know yourself. You have taught what you are, but have not let what you are teach you” (CE T-16.III.4:1-2).
• From the Text: “Forget not that the motivation for this course is the attainment and the keeping of the state of peace” (CE T-24.I.1:1).
• From the Workbook for Students: “A theoretical foundation such as the text is necessary as a background to make the exercises in this workbook meaningful. Yet it is the exercises that will make the goal of the course possible. An untrained mind can accomplish nothing. It is the purpose of these exercises to train the mind to think along the lines the course sets forth” (CE W-In.1).
• From the Manual for Teachers: “It cannot be too strongly emphasized that this course aims at a complete reversal of thought” (CE M-24.4:1).
• From the Clarification of Terms: “This is not a course in theoretical philosophy, nor is it concerned with precise terminology. It is concerned only with Atonement, or the correction of perception. The means of the Atonement is forgiveness” (CE C-In.1:1-3).
• From the Clarification of Terms: “Theological concepts as such are necessarily controversial, since they depend on belief and can therefore be accepted or rejected. A universal theology is impossible, but a universal experience is not only possible but necessary. It is this experience toward which the course is aimed. Here alone consistency becomes possible because here alone uncertainty ends” (CE C-In.2:4-7).

In addition to these passages, I am sure there are other places in which the means of the Course are clarified. Those familiar with the teachings of the Course will see sameness in this list where others might see differences. We could almost use each word or phrase interchangeably:

“miracles” “mind-training” “the practical application of ideas” “reversal of thought” “learning what you are” “knowing yourself” “attaining and keeping the state of peace” “the correction of perception” “love” “a universal experience” “Atonement” “forgiveness”  

In the same way that a facet or side of a diamond is simply a different angle from which to perceive the diamond’s beauty, we can imagine each of the above as a facet, component, factor, ingredient, or aspect of the means leading us to the highest state we can attain while still “here” — from which we will, together/collectively, experience the ultimate and inevitable end — the undoing of what never was (separation) and the awareness of what eternally is (perfect oneness).

Each means is involved in the other.  Sometimes one might need to come before another.  Sometimes they seem to somehow occur simultaneously. It is faithful and consistent use of these means that guarantee our success on this path.