Kenneth Wapnick, Ph.D. is a clinical psychologist and one of the foremost teachers of A Course in Miracles, which he has been working with since 1973, when he joined Dr. Helen Schucman, scribe of the Course, and Dr. William Thetford at the Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. He has written more than 25 books on the Course, including Love Does Not Condemn, Absence from Felicity: The Story of Helen Schucman and Her Scribing of 'A Course in Miracles,' The Message of 'A Course in Miracles,' and many others. He has also produced over 150 audio and video titles discussing the principles of the Course. He is President and co-founder, with his wife Gloria, of the Foundation for A Course in Miracles in Temecula, California.
From the General Introduction:
Early in the text of A Course in Miracles, referring to the famous biblical quotation, Jesus exhorts his students: I cannot choose for you, but I can help you make your own right choice. "Many are called but few are chosen"...should be, "All are called but few choose to listen." Therefore, they do not choose right. The "chosen ones" are merely those who choose right sooner. Right minds can do this now, and they will find rest unto their soul (T-3.IV.7:11-15; italics mine).
...The focus of the first book is therefore on what the Course actually teaches, while the sequel focuses on the ways in which students have misunderstood A Course in Miracles, not only believing it is teaching something it is not, but also denying what its message truly is. Pages 362-364 in All Are Called (Vol. One):
In an important statement from the text, already cited, Jesus succinctly summarizes A Course in Miracles' metaphysical view and its attitude towards the phenomenal and illusory world: The body was not made by love. Yet love does not condemn it and can use it lovingly, respecting what the Son of God has made and using it to save him from illusions (T-18.VI.4:7-8). It is here that we see the central divergence of A Course in Miracles from practically every other spirituality that has been taught, for it reflects a purely non-dualistic metaphysics that nonetheless does not denigrate, dismiss, or deify the body or the physical world. Since we believe that the body and the world are real, in his teachings in the Course Jesus treats them as if they were real, offering a wonderful example of his own teaching from workbook Lesson 184:
It would indeed be strange if you were asked to go beyond all symbols of the world, forgetting them forever; yet were asked to take a teaching function. You have need to use the symbols of the world a while. But be you not deceived by them as well. They do not stand for anything at all, and in your practicing it is this thought that will release you from them. They become but means by which you can communicate in ways the world can understand, but which you recognize is not the unity where true communication can be found.
Thus what you need are intervals each day in which the learning of the world becomes a transitory phase; a prison house from which you go into the sunlight and forget the darkness. Here you understand the Word, the Name which God has given you; the one Identity which all things share; the one acknowledgment of what is true. And then step back to darkness, not because you think it real, but only to proclaim its unreality in terms which still have meaning in the world that darkness rules.
Use all the little names and symbols which delineate the world of darkness. Yet accept them not as your reality. The Holy Spirit uses all of them, but He does not forget creation has one Name, one meaning, and a single Source which unifies all things within Itself. Use all the names the world bestows on them but for convenience, yet do not forget they share the Name of God along with you (W-pI.184.9-11; italics mine).
When properly understood, A Course in Miracles' central message of forgiveness does not make the error of believing in the reality of the phenomenal world, which hating the body would certainly reinforce, reflecting the ego's unconscious need and investment to perpetuate at least some semblance of belief in the reality of the material world and the body. On the metaphysical level (Level I), there is nobody out there to forgive. However, on the level of our experience (Level II), our projected internal guilt appears to be present in another person. And so it is with that experience of attack on others that we must begin the process of forgiveness.
Jesus' goal for his students is that they become advanced teachers of God which, as we have seen, is roughly analogous to the Platonic notion of the philosopher-king. Both figures are asked to be fully present to the world and its citizens, to be messengers and models. Remembrance of the truth, once attained, becomes the goal for all people. Just as Plato's prisoner must return from the light to awaken his fellow prisoners still chained in darkness, so are we asked by Jesus in A Course in Miracles to be instruments of that light's extension for the world:
In your [holy] relationship you have joined with me [Jesus] in bringing Heaven to the Son of God, who hid in darkness. You have been willing to bring the darkness to light, and this willingness has given strength to everyone who would remain in darkness....You who are now the bringer of salvation have the function of bringing light to darkness....And from this light will the Great Rays [of Christ] extend back into darkness and forward unto God, to shine away the past and so make room for His eternal Presence, in which everything is radiant in the light (T-18.III.6:1-2; 7:1; 8:7). From the Introduction to Vol. Two: Few Choose to Listen: Few Choose to Listen is divided into chapters that reflect the different kinds of errors students are prone to make. We begin with a discussion of the three books of A Course in Miracles themselves, and how each is an import part of the integrated curriculum. This includes a consideration as well of the two supplements that were scribed after the Course -- Psychotherapy: Purpose, Process, and Practice and The Song of Prayer -- and their relationship with A Course in Miracles. This chapter is followed in turn by discussions of the Course's use of language, the roles of Jesus and the Holy Spirit, including the important distinction between form and content, the relevance or irrelevance of groups on A Course in Miracles, with specific reference to students joining together in networks, communities, churches, etc., and finally a discussion of making the error real and the dangers of minimizing the ego.
