When the Course Becomes an Idol

An idol is something you would interpose between yourself and God. It seems odd to suggest that the Course can become and idol when its intent is to lead you back to God. Yet some have become so concerned with the form of the Course that they lose sight of its message.

The Course is an idol when you feel you need to evangelize the Course. This means you feel a need to make others become students, too. The Course is a tool to use in your awakening, nothing more. It is one form of a universal curriculum. This means that the lessons in it are necessary to learn your way back to God, but that those lessons can come in many forms. While the lessons are required, the form of the lessons is different for different people. The Course is the form for you, not for everyone.

The Course is an idol when you obsess about the books themselves – how they were written, exactly what was included and what wasn’t, who had input in the editing, the language, etc. Either the Course resonates with you or it doesn’t. Either putting the lessons into practice works for you or it doesn’t. The Course itself, the books, the theology are nothing. The experience it leads you to is everything.

The Course is an idol when you feel you have to defend it. This includes both defending its theology and defending its origins. The value of the Course lies beyond the words and beyond its form. If others want to argue with you about it you can rest assured that the message of the Course cannot be harmed in any way. It is everywhere because it is within you. There is nothing to argue about because that which cannot be harmed does not need to be defended.

The Course is an idol when you are more concerned with understanding and accepting it than with practicing it. The understanding comes with the practice. Insisting on understanding or accepting it is a distraction from practicing it.

In short, the Course is an idol when you use it for anything other than to return to experiencing your Self in God.

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Comments

Jeremy said…
Thank you for this reminder. Although I have been aware of the ego-ploy of making the Course an idol, I have also been led by the ego into that very error on occasion. You have such a simple and clear way of pointing out these things! This is so helpful!
4:14 PM
carrie genevachild said…
Like Helen Schucman, I am simply grateful for an intellectual spiritual path. The Course speaks to me.
2:13 PM
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