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Dear Marianne,

I am just now listening to your address from Feb 19th. You surely have accomplished speaking skills, but I deeply wonder how you think your views in any way reflect the teachings of ACIM. I have been a student and teacher of the Course for 18 years, and I don't see any platform for political action within the teachings of ACIM.

Can you explain this to me? Can you show me anywhere in the material where God would have any interest or investment in our work to change the world? I have a growing ministry, and have begun to be publish within the ACIM circles. I want to find a way to not see our roles as adversarial. Can you help me?

Faithfully yours,

L
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Dear L,

Thank you for your letter.

As you well know, ACIM says this world is not real, but rather illusion. But it also says that "illusions are as powerful in their effects as is the truth." While we are in the illusion, it feels real indeed! People suffer. Horrible things occur. They are illusions, yes, but they are our experience.

When you walk into a room and someone is having a nightmare, you don't say, "Oh, it's not real. They'll be fine in the morning" and then leave them alone. No! You shake them by the shoulders and wake them up! Their experience was not real, but their suffering still matters. You don't say about a serial killer stalking the town, "Oh it's not real, so there's no reason to try to catch him." The line in ACIM, "I need do nothing," means, to me, that I of myself need do nothing. We are to rest in Him, yes -- and while that is a matter of where our minds are placed, it does not necessarily mean He will never lead us to take some action. The point is that He will guide us what actions to take!

The Holy Spirit is a bridge between the two worlds. He is sent by God into the illusion to help lead us out of it. He uses the experiences OF the world to lead us BEYOND the world. Forgiveness itself, according to ACIM, is "the last illusion." ACIM talks about "the highest level of thinking of which the ego is capable." There are levels of thought that are still within the illusion, but which lead us out of it -- such as the desire to heal the sick, feed the poor, etc. Remember: according to ACIM, the world is not bad; it is nothing. Whatever we use here for purposes of healing, is holy. Whatever we use for purposes of separation, is unholy. And I am moved by Gandhi's statement that "politics should be sacred."

Everything, according to ACIM, is relationship. And every relationship is here to be healed. To me, politics is just another relationship. And an important one.

Politics as we know it is of course unreal. Of course it is illusion. But it exists within a darkened corner of the world, which we are not here to IGNORE but to TRANSFORM. The Course says, "Look at the crucifixion, but do not dwell on it." If you dwell on the illusion, it is true that you increase it. But if you do not look at all, you cannot be an instrument of resurrection. As He says in ACIM, "I cannot take from you what you will not release to me."

We are taught that we are to be ministers of God. He sends us where He can use us best. And given how politics affects the world today, why would He not send His teachers there? We are here to transform the world, not just study ACIM, or simply pray or meditate. Remember, the Course says He wants to use our hands and feet. Wouldn't that mean we are going to do something?

And now the most important thing: I think a lot of people, with legitimate concerns such as your own, think any kind of disagreement is negative. But I do not. Only in a totalitarian state are people all supposed to think and speak the same way. The fact that we disagree with each other doesn't necessarily mean we don't love each other. Is a marriage where the couple cannot disagree a better marriage? Were preachers who didn't speak out against slavery in the US, or against Jews being taken to concentration camps in Germany and elsewhere, being spiritual? I do not find the statement of an opposing political position of itself an adversarial stance. This is not personal, unless we make it so -- which I try very much not to do.

So that's it. Thank you for raising such an important question, and for giving me the chance to reply.

All my best,

Marianne Williamson