Spirit Journey I: Finding A Course in Miracles

This is the first of a series of articles about A Course in Miracles. In it, I describe the road that led to my reading ACIM. 

I've been a seeker all of my life. Some of my earliest memories are of going to church with my mother. I remember her crying during the Eucharist, because as a divorced and remarried person, she was unable to participate fully, according to church law. I remember the ecstasy with which I prepared for and received my first communion, and the seriousness with which I studied for my confirmation at age eleven.

Sadly, I also remember the day when I understood that while God might be in the church I attended, I could not live up to what I felt was expected of me there. The Roman church began to feel oppressive as I entered my thirties, and I fled with my family to the Anglican Episcopal church. During my time as an Episcopalian, life circumstances forced me to establish a real, dependent and trusting relationship with a God personal to me. The simple fact of my life was that I could depend on that relationship with God, or perish, and the choice was mine. Obviously, I chose God.

My own imperfections and failings brought me to the point of feeling alienated from the Episcopal church several years ago, and I left. At the same time, I experienced a deep depression which made me suicidal and barely functional. As I had so many times before, I reached out to someone who had travelled the road before me and asked for wisdom.

My friend had spoken several times about things she learned from a book called A Course in Miracles (ACIM). I pictured a self-help paperback and asked several times to borrow it. She never outright refused, but she never offered me the book. One day about a year ago, I decided to find out more about this book. I got on the Internet and Googled the title. I found the website for the Foundation for Inner Peace. With a name like that, I knew they had something I wanted.

I discovered that ACIM was nothing like the psycho-babble self-help book I had pictured. I read a lesson or two online, and decided that there was some real wisdom to be had there. Being desperate to restore some kind of sanity to my life, I invested $35 in the book. I began to read one lesson each day. I knew I needed a miracle if I was not going to die by my own hand.

I guess I expected it to be like all the other daily meditation books I'd used over the years, but it was very different. And even though I didn't always understand it, and even though sometimes I didn't read a lesson every day, the miracle still happened for me. I don't remember clearly the first time it happened, but one day I realized that reading the book was having an effect on the way I saw the world and the things that happened in it.

The change was a positive one, and I find that when I am in the situations that cause me the greatest discomfort and fear, I am most likely to remember something from ACIM. 

Next: The message of ACIM, and how it changes my life.