Saturday, March 2, 2024

Peace to Every Mind



 “There is a place of peace in the heart that looks out and sees the foolishness of the world but does not judge, criticize or condemn but compassionately accepts the unawakened behavior of others.

This place is called Love.

It is that which cannot be taught, only shown by example.

It is not a lesson to give, it is a relationship with life.

It is not a beating with a stick, but a caress with an open hand.

It is the strongest force in the universe, but needs time to be understood.

The one who encourages you to be afraid is not your friend. The one who shows the unity and interconnectedness of all things will not want something from you.


When you are afraid you are already the victim.

When you are loving, you are exactly where you want be.

This sharing of love without conditions is the way of the heart.”

Michael Kewley


“How holy are you who have the power to bring peace to every mind! How blessed are you who can learn to recognize the means 

for letting this be done through you! 

What purpose could you have that would bring you greater happiness?” 

A Course in Miracles W-63.1:1-3


"Gladness to leave the false landmarks and joy to see them disappear,--this disposition helps to precipitate the ultimate harmony. 

The purification of sense and self is a proof of progress."

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 324:3-5


Friday, March 1, 2024

Walking in the Light

Hillspeak- Eureka Springs, AR
Photo credit: Blake Lasater

“I wish I'd known about this way of thinking earlier in life,” a friend once said to me. He was concerned that he wouldn't have enough time to assimilate these ideas. Many responses came to mind, but I chose to say none of them. Time -- what a concept! We are eternal, so how can there not be enough time to realize something we've always known? Yes, that does sound rather esoteric, or perhaps a bit airy-fairy -- but doesn't it feel true? As Deepak Chopra tells us: "Time is something we've made up so everything doesn't happen all at once." When thinking of time in this way, don't we already know everything that ever has been or ever will be? It feels as though our purpose is to remember the knowledge of our true self. With that remembrance, we open the gates of understanding in all areas of existence. There are no limits as to time and space. We have the ability to grasp concepts, to actualize ideas, and to function as the light of the world. The lovely thing about all of this is: No matter how much I may think I grok, there is always more to experience in this never-ending adventure! 

“It is your forgiveness that will bring the world of darkness to the light. It is your forgiveness that lets you recognize the light in which you see. Forgiveness is the demonstration that you are the light of the world. Through your forgiveness does the truth about yourself return to your memory. Therefore, in your forgiveness lies your salvation.” 

A Course in Miracles W-62.1:1-5


“Truth and Love enlighten the understanding, in whose ‘light shall we see light;’ and this illumination is reflected spiritually by all who walk in the light and turn away from a false material sense.” 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 510:9-12

Thursday, February 29, 2024

Recognizing Humility


Art by Catrin Weltz-Stein

Humility is my focus during this Lenten season. The priest at the Catholic Church where I provide musical accompaniment requested that his congregation choose a virtue to focus on every day, and I feel this is the one in which I need the most practice. While some think it is arrogant to accept our divinity as a child of divine Mind (a/k/a God), students of Mary Baker Eddy and A Course in Miracles feel it is the ultimate humility. It’s a yielding which allows us to realize that Mind, Soul, Spirit, Life, Truth, Love, the Principal of all that Is — these things are all-inclusive, defining God, and all of creation. To rejoice in being One with everyone, to live from Love rather than fear and its imaginings, is to humbly accept the goodness inherent in us all. My focus on humility will hopefully lead me to turn away from the illusion of material problems, as I wholeheartedly accept my function as a reflection of God, and see that image mirrored in everyone I meet.

“To the ego, today’s idea [I am the light of the world] is the epitome of self-glorification. But the ego does not understand humility, mistaking it for self-debasement. Humility consists of accepting your role in salvation and in taking no other. It is not humility to insist you cannot be the light of the world if that is the function God assigned to you. It is only arrogance that would assert this function cannot be for you, and arrogance is always of the ego.”

A Course in Miracles W-61.1:1–2:5


"Praying for humility with whatever fervency of expression does not always mean a desire for it. If we turn away from the poor, we are not ready to receive the reward of Him who blesses the poor. We confess to having a very wicked heart and ask that it may be laid bare before us, but do we not already know more of this heart than we are willing to have our neighbor see?"

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 8:20-27

Wednesday, February 28, 2024

The Faces of Fear



Art by Vladislav Yerko

"Within a system which denies the existence of basic human rights, fear tends to be the order of the day. Fear of imprisonment, fear of torture, fear of death, fear of losing friends, family, property or means of livelihood, fear of poverty, fear of isolation, fear of failure. A most insidious form of fear is that which masquerades as common sense or even wisdom, condemning as foolish, reckless, insignificant or futile the small, daily acts of courage which help to preserve man's self-respect and inherent human dignity. It is not easy for a people conditioned by fear under the iron rule of the principle that might is right to free themselves from the enervating miasma of fear. Yet even under the most crushing state machinery courage rises up again and again, for fear is not the natural state of civilized man.” 

-- Aung San Suu Kyi, Freedom From Fear 


“Had Blondin believed it impossible to walk the rope over Niagara's abyss of waters, he could never have done it. His belief that he could do it gave his thought-forces, called muscles, their flexibility and power which the unscientific might attribute to a lubricating oil. His fear must have disappeared before his power of putting resolve into action could appear.”

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 199:25-31


“How safe the world will look to me when I can see it! It will not look anything like what I imagine I see now. Everyone and everything I see will lean toward me to bless me. I will recognize in everyone my dearest Friend. What could there be to fear in a world that I have forgiven, and that has forgiven me?” 

A Course in Miracles W-60.3:2-6

Tuesday, February 27, 2024

A Wider Sphere of Thought


Photo credit: Arthur Bruno

I've never understood political conflict.  It seems to me that if everyone is for the good of all, what in the world is there to be conflicted about? I simply do not know why we have these clashes, and certainly have no desire to talk about these disagreeable scenarios. Times of major elections in our United States bring out interesting opinions from unexpected places. I try not to listen to any of it, holding to the knowledge of our true selves as the expression of Love, while looking past all the rhetoric and seeming idiocy. If God is the Mind with which I think, and that Mind is (and can only be) light, no fear nor condemnation is necessary. With this realization, we could stop trying to change others' thoughts to what we think they should be. Knowing that every thought which is a reflection of divine Mind grows exponentially, I find cause for continuing the quest to be a clean mirror. 

"This scientific sense of being, forsaking matter for Spirit, by no means suggests man's absorption into Deity and the loss of his identity, but confers upon man enlarged individuality, a wider sphere of thought and action, a more expansive love, a higher and more permanent peace."

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 265:10-15


“Let me not look to my own eyes to see today. Let me be willing to exchange my pitiful illusion of seeing for the vision that is given by God. Christ’s vision is His gift, and He has given it to me. Let me call upon this gift today, so that this day may help me to understand eternity.” 

A Course in Miracles W-59.2:3-6

Monday, February 26, 2024

Perceiving My Holiness


“The perception of my holiness does not bless me alone. Everyone and everything I see in its light shares in the joy it brings to me.” This is part of today’s five-lesson review in A Course in Miracles. We are learning that this holiness is our true state of being as reflections of Love. This Love is realized through forgiveness in its purest sense. When I assert this truth about myself, I affirm it for everyone. Many of us think that such a statement about ourselves is arrogant; something to be avoided. What if the opposite is true, and it’s arrogant to think we can do everything through our individual, human intellect and reasoning?  Perhaps true humility is acknowledging our holiness, allowing divine Mind to guide us, knowing we are all One. 


 “My holiness is my salvation. Since my holiness saves me from all guilt, recognizing my holiness is recognizing my salvation. It is also recognizing the salvation of the world. Once I have accepted my holiness, nothing can make me afraid. And because I am unafraid, everyone must share in my understanding, which is the gift of God to me and to the world.” 

A Course in Miracles W-58.4:1-5


"We know that a desire for holiness is requisite in order to gain holiness; but if we desire holiness above all else, we shall sacrifice everything for it. We must be willing to do this, that we may walk securely in the only practical road to holiness. Prayer cannot change the unalterable Truth, nor can prayer alone give us an understanding of Truth; but prayer, coupled with a fervent habitual desire to know and do the will of God, will bring us into all Truth. Such a desire has little need of audible expression. It is best expressed in thought and in life." 

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 11:22-32

Sunday, February 25, 2024

Living From Truth

Photo by Aaron Springston


I have often been asked if Christian Science is a cult. Having been affiliated with this  life since childhood, it’s easy for me to say it assuredly is not. I've never been controlled by anyone, or asked to worship anyone, or any of the other criteria necessary to qualify for this categorization. I'm sure Course in Miracles students often get the same type of questions, as a quick search of the internet indicates. What we do ask of ourselves is a radical reliance on God, a wholehearted acceptance of Love as the only power, and the desire to let Spirit lead every action. Both of these schools of thought ask us to give up material beliefs and rely on Truth. And this may not be as difficult as it seems. Shouldn't it be easy to allow spiritual principles to guide our actions, rather than accepting material rules which make no sense? Living from the Truth within, rather than made-up rules of material existence, this is the free thought which will lead into harmonious peace for all. 


“When I see the world as a place of freedom, I realize that it reflects the laws of God instead of the rules I made up for it to obey. I will understand that peace, not war, abides in it. And I will perceive that peace also abides in the hearts of all who share this place with me.” 

A Course in Miracles W-57.4:2-4


"The conceptions of mortal, erring thought must give way to the ideal of all that is perfect and eternal. Through many generations human beliefs will be attaining diviner conceptions, and the immortal and perfect model of God's creation will finally be seen as the only true conception of being."

Mary Baker Eddy - Science & Health Page 260:7-12

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