Notes on the Text of A Course in - Stephen Wingate

Main Themes: Overcoming the four obstacles to
peace. And sin versus error.
Introduction: This chapter addresses the ego's
strategy and purpose for making the body. The first
three obstacles to peace address how the ego uses the
body as a distraction to keep us out of our mind,
away from the Holy Spirit, and focused in the world.
The fourth obstacle to peace is the fear of God's
punishment for our sin, and also the fear of God's
unconditional love.
First Obstacle to Peace: The desire to get rid of it.
The attraction of guilt.
Second Obstacle to Peace: The belief that the body is
valuable for what it offers. The attraction of pain.
Third Obstacle to Peace: The attraction of death. The
incorruptible body.
Fourth Obstacle to Peace: The fear of God. The
lifting of the veil.
Also, we will look at the holy relationship and see
how the Holy Spirit uses the body as an instrument
of healing rather than attack.
•
We begin with a statement of the Atonement
principle. There is one Will in the universe and that
is God's Will of love and perfect oneness. All else is
a projection of the ego mind, which is no power at
all.
•
The ego's strategy is to convince us that the
separation from God really happened, sin is real
which leads to guilt and the fear of punishment. To
avoid punishment the ego makes a body and world
onto which it projects its sin and guilt. In truth the
separation from God never happened, sin is not real,
our guilt was based on a false premise, and God has
no interest in punishment. If we get back to our
mind, and look at our sin, guilt and fear with the
Holy Spirit, we will realize our mistake in believing
the ego's story, and we will choose for the Holy
Spirit instead. Therefore, to maintain its special
separate existence the ego uses the body and world to
keep us out of our mind and distracted by the world
of bodies.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
THE ATTAINMENT OF PEACE
66
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Sin is the insane belief that we are separate from God
and greater than Him. We cannot separate ourselves
from God, nor can we be greater than Him.
Therefore there is no sin, only an error in our
identity, which can be corrected through Self
Knowledge.
•
Sin is the belief in separation and is the foundation of
the ego's religion. Without sin the ego's Bible has no
meaning, value or purpose. Without sin the ego
dissolves into the nothingness that it is.
•
Sin is a required belief to maintain our special
separate existence. This is why we love conflict, war,
pain and suffering — without sin, guilt, fear,
conflict, war, pain and suffering we do not exist!
•
By fearing punishment by God for our "sin," we have
made God as insane as we are. Would God punish
His Son for a sin he cannot commit? Only the ego's
insane god would do so. The ego's god is a god of
wrath and vengeance — and the ego loves him so!
For without a god of wrath, the ego melts into
nothingness.
•
Guilt demands punishment which means that
separation and the ego are real. This is the ego's
attraction to guilt. An error can be corrected, which
is the ego's fear. If the Son realizes his error in
believing in sin (separation) the ego is dead on the
spot. The ego lives only because of the Son's power
to believe in sin.
•
Guilt and sin go together. Sometimes the Course
emphasizes sin, other times guilt, but they are
virtually the same as they coexist. Sin and guilt are
felt as a sense of selfishness in your daily life. With
selfishness comes the fear of loss and punishment.
To avoid punishment the ego projects its selfishness
onto others in the world so it can maintain its face of
innocence and have others be punished.
•
The purpose of the ego's strategy is to keep us
distracted by the body and world so we will not get
back to our mind, realize our error, and choose for
the Holy Spirit rather than the ego. Once we have
projected our sin and guilt (selfishness) out of our
mind and onto the world of bodies, we cannot correct