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Chapter 1Introduction To MiraclesThis is a course in miracles. It is a requiredcourse. Only the time you take it isvoluntary. Free will does not mean that youcan establish the curriculum. It means onlythat you may elect what you want to take at agiven time.The course does not aim at teaching themeaning of love, for that is beyond what canbe taught. It does aim, however, at removingthe blocks to the awareness of love’sPresence, Which is your natural inheritance.The opposite of love is fear, but what is all-encompassing can have no opposite.This course can therefore be summed up verysimply in this way:Nothing real can be threatened.Nothing unreal exists.Herein lies the Peace of God.______________________Principles of Miracles1. There is no order of difficulty amongmiracles. One is not “harder” or “bigger”than another. They are all the same. Allexpressions of love are maximal.2. Miracles as such do not matter. The onlything that matters is their Source, Which isfar beyond human evaluation.3. Miracles occur naturally as expressions oflove. The real miracle is the love thatinspires them. In this sense, everything thatcomes from love is a miracle.4. All miracles mean life, and God is theGiver of life. His Voice will direct you veryspecifically. You will be told all you need toknow.5. Miracles are habits and should beinvoluntary. They should not be underconscious control. Consciously selectedmiracles can be misguided.6. Miracles are natural. When they do NOToccur something has gone wrong.7. Miracles are everyone’s right, butpurification is necessary first.8. Miracles are healing because they supply alack in that they are performed by those whotemporarily have more for those whotemporarily have less.9. Miracles are a kind of exchange. Like allexpressions of love, which are ALWAYSmiraculous in the true sense, the exchangereverses the physical laws. They bring MORElove both to the giver AND the receiver.10. The use of miracles as spectacles toINDUCE belief is wrong; or, better, is amisunderstanding of their purpose. They arereally used FOR and BY believers.11. Prayer is the medium of miracles. Prayeris the natural communication of the createdwith the Creator. Through prayer love isreceived, and through miracles love isexpressed.12. Miracles are thoughts. Thoughts canrepresent lower-order or higher-order reality.This is the basic distinction betweenintellectualizing and thinking. One makes thephysical and the other creates the spiritual,and we believe in what we make or create.13. Miracles are both beginnings and endings.They thus alter the temporal order. They arealways affirmations of rebirth, which seem togo back, but really go forward. They undo thepast in the present, and thus release thefuture.14. Miracles bear witness to truth. They areconvincing because they arise from conviction.Without conviction they deteriorate intomagic, which is mindless, and thereforedestructive; or rather, the uncreative use ofmind.15. Each day should be devoted to miracles.The purpose of time is to enable man to learnto use it constructively. Time is thus ateaching device, and a means to an end. Itwill cease when it is no longer useful infacilitating learning.16. Miracles are teaching devices fordemonstrating that it is more blessed to givethan to receive. They simultaneously increasethe strength of the giver and supply strengthto the receiver.17. Miracles are the transcendence of thebody. They are sudden shifts intoinvisibility, away from a sense of lower-orderreality. That is why they heal.18. A miracle is a service. It is the maximalservice one individual can render another. Itis a way of loving your neighbor as yourself.The doer recognizes his own and hisneighbor’s inestimable worth simultaneously.19. Miracles make minds one in God. Theydepend on cooperation, because the Sonship isthe sum of all the Souls God created. Miraclestherefore rest on the laws of eternity, not oftime.
 
20. Miracles reawaken the awareness that theSpirit, not the body, is the altar of truth.This is the recognition that leads to thehealing power of the miracle.21. Miracles are natural expressions of totalforgiveness. Through miracles, man acceptsGod’s forgiveness by extending it to others.22. Miracles are associated with fear onlybecause of the fallacious belief that darknesscan HIDE. Man believes that what he cannot seedoes not exist, and his physical eyes cannotsee in the dark. This is a very primitivesolution, and has led to a denial of theSpiritual eye. * The escape from darknessinvolves two stages:A. The recognition that darknessCANNOT hide. This step usually entails fear.B. The recognition that there isnothing you WANT to hide, even if you COULD.This step brings ESCAPE from fear.(*The term “Spiritual eye” is later replacedby the Holy Spirit and the physical eyebecomes the ego. The emphasis on the two waysof seeing, however, remains throughout.)23. Miracles rearrange perception, and placethe levels of perception in true perspective.This heals at ALL levels, because sicknesscomes from confusing the levels.When you have become willing to hide nothing,you will not only be willing to enter intocommunion, but will also understand peace andjoy. Your commitment is not yet total, andthat is why you still have more to learn thanto teach. When your equilibrium stabilizes,you will be able to teach as much as youlearn, which will give you the proper balance.Meanwhile, remember that no effort is wasted,for unless you remember this, you cannot availyourselves of MY efforts, which ARE limitless.Only eternity is real. Why not use theillusion of time constructively?24. Miracles enable man to heal the sick andraise the dead because he made sickness anddeath himself, and can abolish both. YOU are amiracle, capable of creating in the likenessof your Creator. Everything else is only yourown nightmare, and does not exist. Only theCreations of Light are real.25. Miracles are part of an interlocking chainof forgiveness which, when completed, is theAtonement. This process works all the time,and in all the dimensions of time.I am in charge of the process of Atonement,which I undertook to begin. When you offer amiracle unto any of my brothers, you do itunto YOURSELF and me. The reason YOU comebefore ME is that I do not need miracles formy own Atonement, but I stand at the end incase you fail temporarily. The purpose of mypart in the Atonement is the cancelling out ofall lacks of love which men could nototherwise correct. The word “sin” should bechanged to “lack of love,” because “sin”is a man-made word with threat connotationswhich he made up himself. No REAL threat isinvolved anywhere. Nothing is gained byfrightening yourselves, and it is verydestructive to do so.26. Miracles represent FREEDOM from fear.“Atoning” really means “undoing.” Theundoing of fear is an essential part of theAtonement value of miracles.The purpose of the Atonement is to restoreEVERYTHING to you; or rather, to restore it toyour AWARENESS. You were GIVEN everything whenyou were created, just as everyone was. Whenyou have been restored to the recognition ofyour original state, you naturally become partof the Atonement yourself. As you share MYinability to tolerate lack of love in yourselfand others, you MUST join the Great Crusade tocorrect it. The slogan for the Crusade is“Listen, learn, and DO;” – Listen to myvoice, learn to undo error, and DO somethingto correct it.The power to work miracles BELONGS to you. Iwill provide the opportunities to do them, butYOU must be ready and willing, since you arealready able. Doing them will bring convictionin the ability, since conviction really comesthrough accomplishment. The ability is thepotential; the achievement is its expression;and the Atonement is the Purpose.27. A miracle is a universal blessing from Godthrough me to ALL my brothers. It is theprivilege of the forgiven to forgive.The disciples were specifically told to bephysicians of the Lord and to heal others.They were also told to HEAL THEMSELVES, andwere promised that I would never leave them orforsake them. Atonement is the naturalprofession of the Children of God, becausethey have professed me. “Heaven and earthshall pass away” simply means that they willnot continue to exist as separate states. Myword, which is the Resurrection and the Light,shall not pass away because Light is eternal.YOU are the work of God, and His work iswholly lovable and wholly loving. This is how
 
a man MUST think of himself in his heart,because this is what he IS.28. Miracles are a means of organizingdifferent levels of consciousness.Miracles come from the below or subconsciouslevel. Revelations come from the above orsuperconscious level. The conscious level isin between, and reacts to either sub- orsuperconscious impulses in varying ratios.Consciousness is the level which engages inthe world, and is capable of responding toboth. Having no impulses from itself, andbeing primarily a mechanism for inducingresponse, it can be very wrong.Revelation induces complete but temporarysuspension of doubt and fear. It representsthe original form of communication between Godand His Souls, involving an extremely personalsense of closeness to Creation, which mantries to find in physical relationships.Physical closeness CANNOT achieve this. Thesubconscious impulses properly inducemiracles, which are genuinely interpersonal,and result in real closeness to others. Thiscan be misunderstood by a PERSONALLY willfulconsciousness as impulses toward physicalgratification.Revelation unites Souls directly with God.Miracles unite minds directly with each other.Neither emanates from consciousness, but bothare EXPERIENCED there. This is essential,since consciousness is the state which inducesaction, though it does NOT inspire it. Man isfree to believe what he chooses, and what heDOES attests to what he believes. The deeperlevels of the subconscious ALWAYS contain theimpulse to miracles, but man is free to fillits more superficial levels, which are closerto consciousness, with the impulses of thisworld, and to identify himself with them. Thisresults in DENYING himself access to themiracle level underneath. In his actions,then, his relationships also becomesuperficial, and miracle-inspired relatingbecomes impossible.29. Miracles are a way of EARNING release fromfear.Revelation induces a state in which fear hasALREADY been abolished. Miracles are thus ameans, and revelation is an end. Miracles donot depend on revelation; they INDUCE it.Revelation is intensely personal, and cannotactually be translated into conscious contentat all. That is why any attempt to describe itin words is usually incomprehensible.Revelation induces ONLY experience. Miracles,on the other hand, induce ACTION. Miracles aremore useful now, because of theirinterpersonal nature. In this phase oflearning, working miracles is more importantbecause freedom from fear cannot be thrustupon you.30. Miracles praise God through men. Theypraise God by honoring His Creations,affirming their perfection. They heal becausethey deny body-identification and affirm Soul-identification. By perceiving the Spirit, theyadjust the levels and see them in properalignment. This places the Spirit at thecenter, where Souls can communicate directly.31. Miracles should inspire gratitude, notawe. Man should thank God for what he reallyis. The Children of God are very holy, and themiracle honors their holiness.God’s Creations never lose their holiness,although it can be hidden. The miracleuncovers it, and brings it into the lightwhere it belongs. Holiness can never be reallyhidden in darkness, but man can deceivehimself about it. This illusion makes himfearful, because he knows in his heart it ISan illusion, and he exerts enormous efforts toestablish its reality. The miracle setsreality where it belongs. Eternal realitybelongs only to the Soul, and the miracleacknowledges only the truth. It thus dispelsman’s illusions about himself, and puts himin communion with himself AND God.32. Christ inspires all miracles, which arereally intercessions. They intercede forman’s holiness, and make his perceptionsholy. By placing him beyond the physical laws,they raise him into the sphere of celestialorder. In THIS order, man IS perfect.The Soul never loses its communion with God.Only the mind NEEDS Atonement. The miraclejoins in the Atonement of Christ by placingthe mind in the service of the Spirit. Thisestablishes the proper function of the mind,and corrects its errors.33. Miracles honor man BECAUSE he is lovable.They dispel illusions about him, and perceivethe Light in him. They thus atone for hiserrors by freeing him from his own nightmares.They release him from a prison in which he hasimprisoned HIMSELF, and by freeing his mindfrom illusions, they restore his sanity.Man’s mind CAN be possessed by illusions, buthis Spirit is eternally free. If a mindperceives without love it perceives an empty
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