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You are here: Home / Archives for Bill Thetford

Helen Schucman & Bill Thetford Speak… hear the recorded voices of the two scribes of “A Course in Miracles!”

May 6, 2019



 

 

Helen Schucman

 


Only known public recording of…

Helen Schucman speaking

(in a 15 min. radio interview)

 

 


Helen Schucman’s Autobiography on ACIM.org:

(click here)

Although the scribing itself was relatively effortless, it did engender tremendous anxiety in Helen, though less in Bill. As Helen wrote:

“It made me very uncomfortable, but it never seriously occurred to me to stop. It seemed to be a special assignment I had somehow, somewhere agreed to complete. It represented a truly collaborative venture between Bill and myself, and much of its significance, I am sure, lies in that. I could neither account for nor reconcile my obviously inconsistent attitudes. On the one hand I still regarded myself as officially an agnostic, resented the material I was taking down, and was strongly impelled to attack it and prove it wrong. On the other hand I spent considerable time in taking it down and later in dictating it to Bill, so it was apparent that I took it quite seriously. I actually came to refer to it as my life’s work. As Bill pointed out, I must believe in it if only because I argued with it so much. While this was true, it did not help me. I was in the impossible position of not believing my own life’s work. The situation was clearly ridiculous as well as painful.”

 



 

Bill Thetford

 

 

 

 

 Bill Thetford Talks About…

His Life & A Course in Miracles:

Part One:

Part Three


Bill Thetford’s Autobiography on ACIM.org:

(click here)

As to the impact of A Course in Miracles on Bill, he said:

“It changed my life totally. I recall typing the first fifty principles on miracles that came through Helen in the Fall of 1965, and realized that if this material was true then absolutely everything I believed would have to be challenged—that I would have to reconstruct my whole belief system. At the time, however, I thought that would be impossible; I didn’t know how I could do it. Yet I felt that was a requirement, since the material that came through Helen in the beginning phase seemed so authentic and genuine. I went into shock for a brief period, wondering how it would be possible to make such an abrupt change in my perception of life and the world. Later I realized that God is merciful, and does not ask us to make changes so abruptly, that there would be adequate time to gradually begin to shift my perception. I think what was important was my willingness to change, not mastery of the material.”

 

 



 



 

Ken Wapnick talks about Helen’s own Course process on Youtube

(click here)

(10 min.)

 



PBS “Visionaries” Documentary:

  (with Sam Waterston) 

Helen and the Course:

(click here)



 

Ken & Gloria Early Days

@ Roscoe, N.Y.

(click here)

 



One Hour Video Introduction to…

“A Course in Miracles”

by the School for A Course in Miracles

with a little history and a brief explanation of the Course’s metaphysics and its unique version of forgiveness …

(click here)

 



Six Month Online Course Immersion Program,

January- June 2022

(click here)


(Please, never let lack of funds be a deterrent in taking any of the SFACIM classes or events listed… give Tim a call @ 720-391-9294, leave a voicemail, and he will get back to you ASAP. We always try to work something out. We want you to be there!)






Filed Under: Home Posts Tagged With: A Course in Miracles, ACIM, Bill Thetford, forgiveness, Helen Schucman, Ken Wapnick, Peace, SFACIM

Musings… How Could the Separation Ever Have Happened??

September 25, 2018

 


(by Tim Wise)

In the 1980’s the Talking Heads rock group had a song that kept repeating the line… “Well, how did I get here?”

Probably the most often question ever asked by both new and ongoing Course students is this: How did we/why would we ever leave the oneness and the peace of Heaven, and then separate into something else… if oneness is our true reality. 

What is the Course’s short and quick answer to “How did the impossible happen?”… It didn’t!

 

 

There are actually three ways the Course approaches and doesn’t answer this ego-based inquiry:

(1) It’s An Assertion, Not a Question

1) It’s not really an innocent question, the Course explains, but rather a statement masquerading as a question. We have already wrongly defined ourselves as separated beings. Now we are similar to two year olds throwing a fit and stamping our feet, insisting on something not real or helpful. We are demanding an explanation from God as to how that exodus from Heaven took place. As with any loving and caring father dealing with a tantrum, there’s not a lot He can say… but simply quietly wait for the tantrum to stop.   (Text: p. 376, par.4  &  The Quiet Answer p. 574-6)

“Who asks you to define the ego and explain how it arose can be but he who thinks it real, and seeks by definition to ensure that its illusive nature is concealed behind the words that seem to make it so” (Man. p. 81 par. 2).

 

 (2) It’s Not Only in the Past- It’s Happening Now Too!

2) At one point Jesus said to Bill Thetford, when Bill asked him about how the separation happened… “why are you asking about something that seemingly happened in the past (The Big Separation from God), when you believe you are doing it right now?” In any given moment there is only one of two thoughts being projected into our awareness in time and space… either separation (and it’s not our fault), or forgiveness (the Course’s Atonement principle which says separation never did happen, and isn’t happening even now). That all solely depends on which internal teacher we are choosing in this very second, the ego or the Holy Spirit. (Text p.85, par. 6 & p.179, par. 11-12)

“It is reasonable to ask how the mind could ever have made the ego. In fact, it is the best question you could ask. (Because, the ‘best’ answer is…. it din’t.) There is, however, no point in giving an answer in terms of the past because the past does not matter, and history would not exist if the same errors were not being repeated in the present” (Ch. 4, p. 56, Sec. II, par. 1).

 

 

(3) Ask for An Experience, Not An Explanation

3) And finally the most comforting description of this process of addressing this belief… Jesus says that when we practice forgiveness in our minds with others and ourselves, this question/belief will simply fade away, into the unreality from which it came. In other words, an experience of our true connection and identity as one Son of God is the direct result of forgiveness. We will know the disconnect never happened, despite the separated images we still seem to see. Then the question “well, how did I get here” becomes irrelevant, and we totally lose our investment in needing an impossible answer to a silly question. The simple answer to the question “how did the the separation ever happen?” is… it didn’t.     (Manual p. 77, par. 3-4)

“The ego will demand many answers that this course does not give. It does not recognize as questions the mere form of a question to which an answer is impossible. The ego may ask, ‘How did the impossible occur?’, ‘To what did the impossible happen?’, and may ask this in many forms. Yet there is no answer; only an experience. Seek only this, and do not let theology delay you.” (Man. p. 77 par.4)

 


https://youtu.be/_lQYJCYIIsA


For further discussion of our ‘leaving Heaven’

see Ken Wapnick’s CD set or MP3 download on

“The Four Splits” (click here),

——————————–

For an SFACIM post on the ‘way back’ to Heaven thru

“The 3 Steps of Forgiveness”:  click here

 



 

Filed Under: Home Posts, Musings Tagged With: A Course in Miracles, ACIM, ACIM Beginner Classes, Bill Thetford, forgiveness, Ken Wapnick, Peace, School for A Course in Miracles, SFACIM, WHY

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