- Dharma Ocean Denver Sangha: Every Wednesday evening 7:00-8:30 p.m. in the Event Hall. $5 donation is appreciated. For information, visit Meetup.com/Dharma-Ocean-Denver-Sangha.
- Lauren Skye Metaphysical Service: Sunday, April 3; 1-4 p.m. In the Event Donation suggested. Contact Lauren at: InnerConnection.org for more information.
- Zen Center of Denver: Sunday mornings- Formal sitting with chanting and teisho; 8 to 10:30 a.m. Wednesday mornings: 6 to 7 a.m. Formal Sittings. Thursday evenings: 7 to 8:30 p.m.: Formal sittings. All programs in the Event Hall. For information call: 303-455-1500.
- Crystal Bowls with Teresa Helgeson: Friday, April 8: 7-9 p.m. in the Library. For information contact Teresa at: Teresa@reikimiraclesabound.com.
- Nirvana Day! With Roy Willey, Teresa Helgesen and others: Saturday, April 9, 10 a.m. -5 p.m. in the Event Hall; Noon-5 p.m. in the library. Emergence Care Immersion, Crystal Bowl Sound Healing and More. To register go to RoyWilley.net/nirvana.
- Sufi Practice of Remembrance: Saturday, April 16; 6:30-9:30 p.m. in the Event Hall. For information, contact Sara Rain at: rain@trigoddess.org.
- Peter Hughes Workshop: Monday, April 25, “What is the Soul of Money?” 7-9 p.m. in the library. For workshop fees and program details, visit: PeterJHughes.com. To register for the workshop contact Peter at 303-831-9471 or by email at : peter@peterjhughes.com.
- Denver Vegans Pot Luck: Saturday, April 30: 6-8 p.m. in the Library. For information contact Vilma Reynoso at: vilms@live.com.
Archives for March 2016
From Special to Holy Relationships: Workshop Saturday April 9, 2016
A one-day workshop entitled “Changing Special Relationships into The Holy Relationship” facilitated by Lyn Corona and Tim Wise will take place Saturday, April 9, 2016, from 9:30AM to 4:00PM at the Glendale Office Building, 600 S. Cherry St., North Bldg. Glendale, CO 80246. More details including registration are on the School For A Course In Miracles website.
Movie Matinee: Sunday, April 10, 2016, 12:30PM
Our featured movie at RMMC: Sunday, April 10, 2016, 12:30 PM: The Gods Must be Crazy
Starring: Marius Weyers, Sandra Prinsloo, and Nixau
Sunday at RMMC – April 3, 2016
Join us this Sunday, Apr. 3, 2016
9:00 AM to 10:30 AM
The Spontaneous Discussion Group
Group Leadership of The Way of Mastery
Topic: T.B.A.
11:00 AM to Noon
Sunday Gathering
Topic: T.B.A.
Facilitated by Robert Bennett
Vigilance
Ch. 7. VI. 7 – 10. Jesus: “Vigilance would never have been called upon by the Holy Spirit if you had not chosen to believe the untrue. When you believe something, you have made it ‘true’ for you. When you believe that which God does knows not, your thought seems to contradict His, and this makes it appear to you as if you are attacking Him. Thus, as I have repeatedly emphasized, the ego in your mind does believe it can attack God, and tries to persuade you that you have done so, hence your guilt.
The mind, being truly whole, cannot attack, so the ego proceeds quite logically to the belief that you must not be mind, but something separate, a body. By perceiving you as you are not, it sees itself as you, and as it wants to be – separate! Aware of its own weakness in this, the ego wants your allegiance, but not as what you really are! The ego therefore wants to engage your mind in the ego’s own delusional system, making you seem to be a body, because otherwise the light of your understanding would dispel the ego entirely!
Because the ego itself is not true, it wants no part of truth! If truth is total, nothing within it can be ‘untrue,’ and the untrue simply does not exist. Commitment to either truth or untruth is unavoidably total; the two positions cannot coexist in your mind without splitting it. If they cannot coexist in peace, and if you want peace, you must give up the idea of conflict entirely, and for all time. This requires vigilance, yet only as long as you do not fully recognize what is true.
While you believe that two totally contradictory thought systems ‘share the truth,’ your need for vigilance is apparent! Your mind is dividing its allegiance between two kingdoms, and you are totally committed to neither. Your identification with God’s Kingdom is totally beyond question, except by you, and then only when you are thinking insanely. What you are is not established by your perception, and is not influenced by it at all. Perceived problems in self-identification at any level are not problems of fact. They are problems of understanding, since their presence implies a belief that what you are is up to you to decide. The ego believes this totally, of course, being fully committed to it. But it is not true! The ego, therefore, is totally committed to un-truth, perceiving in total contradiction to the Holy Spirit and to the knowledge of God.
You can be perceived with meaning only by the Holy Spirit, because your very being is the knowledge of God. Any belief you accept apart from this will obscure God’s Voice in you, and will therefore obscure God to you. Unless you perceive His Creation truly, you cannot know your Creator, since God and His Creation are not separate.
The oneness of the Creator and the Creation is your wholeness, your sanity and your limitless power. This limitless power is God’s gift to you, because it is what you are. If you dissociate your mind from it, you are perceiving the most powerful force in the universe as if it were weak, because you do not believe you are part of it.”
Sunday at RMMC – March 27, 2016
Join us this Sunday, Mar. 27, 2016
9:00 AM to 10:30 AM
The Spontaneous Discussion Group
Group Leadership of The Way of Mastery (WOM)
Topic: The importance of humility
References: Lesson 6, Par 3; Par 4 Page 70; Par 1 Page 71; — page 64; and a presentation on self-image: “As I See It”
Facilitated by Bud Ham
11:00 AM to Noon
Sunday Gathering
Topic: Easter celebration: ACIM Text Chapter 20 Part 1 1:3
ACIM Workbook: Lesson 62, Par 5; Lesson 65, Par 8; Lesson 68, Par 6: Lesson 69, Par 9
Facilitated by Bud Ham
Sunday at RMMC – March 20, 2016
Join us this Sunday, Mar. 20, 2016
9:00 AM to 10:30 AM
The Spontaneous Discussion Group
Group Leadership of The Way of Mastery (WOM)
Topic: “How much of God can you receive and then return to the world?”
References: Way of Mastery – Chapter 23 (The Voice of Love), pg. 326 (paragraphs 4, 5, 6)
Facilitated by Susie Earhart
11:00 AM to Noon
Sunday Gathering
Topic: The Ego’s Dream
Facilitated by Ray Wells
True Communion
Ch. 7. V. 9 – 11. Jesus: “Just as you can hear two voices, so you can see in two ways. One way shows you the image of a body, an idol you may worship out of fear, but will never truly love. The other way shows you only truth, which you will love because you will understand it!
Understanding is full appreciation, because what you understand is what you can identify with. Then, having made it a part of you, you have accepted it with love. That is how God Himself created you; in understanding, in appreciation and in love!
The ego is totally unable to understand this because it does not understand the image it makes, does not appreciate it, and does not actually love it. It incorporates with another like it only to take what it would seem to lack. It literally believes that it has increased every time it has gotten something away from another!
I have spoken often of the increase of the Kingdom by your creations, which can only be created as you were. The whole glory and perfect joy that is the Kingdom lies in you to give. Do you not want to give it?
Because I am with you always and I cannot forget the Father, you cannot forget Him! To forget my presence within you is to forget yourself and the One Who has created you. Our brothers are forgetful. That is why they need your remembrance of me, and of Him Who created me! Through this remembrance, you can change their minds about themselves, as I can change yours about you. Your mind is so powerful a light, that you can look into theirs and enlighten them, as I can enlighten yours if you will let me.
Because sharing a body is really to share nothing, it is not my body I would share with you in communion, not even symbolically! Would I really try to share an illusion with the most holy children of a most holy Father? Yet I do want to share my mind with you because, in truth, we are of one Mind, and that Mind is ours. Recognize only this Mind everywhere, because only this is everywhere and in everything. It is everything because it encompasses all things within itself.
Blessed are you who perceive only this, because you have come to perceive only what is true! Come therefore unto me, and learn of the truth in you. The mind we share is shared by all our brothers, and as we see them truly, they will be healed. Let your mind shine with mine upon their minds, and by our gratitude to them, make them aware of the light in them.
This light will shine back upon you and on the whole Sonship, because this is your proper gift to God. He will accept it and give it to the Sonship, because it is acceptable to Him and therefore to His Sons.
This is true communion with the Holy Spirit, Who sees the altar of God in everyone, and by bringing it to your appreciation, He calls upon you to love God and all of His Creation. You can appreciate the Sonship only as one. This is part of the law of creation, and therefore governs all thought.”
Movie Matinee: Sunday, March 20, 2016, 12:30 PM
Starring: Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Sean Bridgers; details here.
Human kindness is overflowing and I think it’s going to rain today – by Susan Dugan
I sat in my little car in a parking space outside my bank’s ATM machine, not even bothering to rationalize the environmental folly of continuing to run the engine while I unsuccessfully tried to pry myself away from an NPR story. One of those much touted “driveway moments” alluded to at pledge time, designed to prompt listeners to dig into their wallets for support. After all, who could blame me? Given the characteristic Denver summer heat and the wildly uncharacteristic humidity that, along with daily rain and severe, property-damaging storms, had left everyone I encountered in my normally dry, sunny city more than a little cranky about all too up-close-and-personal evidence of climate change these last two months.
On the radio, filmmaker Liz Garbus continued to wax eloquent about her new documentary, What Happened, Miss Simone?, on “civil rights diva” and vocalist extraordinaire Nina Simone, a personal idol of mine since junior high, recounting Simone’s childhood in the segregated South. How people in the North Carolina town she grew up in, recognizing her musical talent, had banded together to raise money to provide her with classical music training. How at a classical recital at 12 years old, Simone refused to perform after her parents were banished to sit in the back of the room.
Black-and-white TV images of civil rights marches resurrected from my own childhood swam in my head. I recalled my outrage back then that people in this country, reputedly founded on a belief in equality; could be treated like this, that our government–President Kennedy and later Johnson–would allow it. How incredulous I was observing so many adults around me (even in the state of New York, where I’d been told one of my actual ancestors had fought for an end to slavery) looked the other way during these newscasts and later, too, when racial violence detonated on the streets of nearby Harlem and Newark.
It was not OK, it had never been OK, and it was still not OK, today! Even though the unresolved racial conflict and hatred simmering just below the surface in this country had erupted all year in police violence against African Americans, for example, and again, just last week, when a young white man had opened fire in a Charleston, South Carolina Church, killing nine people including the pastor and a state senator.
I shook my head in solidarity hearing about Nina Simone, the strains of her soulful rendition of Randy Newman’s song I Think It’s Going to Rain Today—a kind of personal anthem–rising from the vaults of my teenage memory banks, plaintively echoing in my head. (“Human kindness is overflowing/and I think it’s going to rain today.”) Nonetheless glancing at my watch, all too aware of a long list of tasks to accomplish before the afternoon slipped away; I reluctantly turned the engine off and noticed, with a start, a middle-aged African American man standing several feet from the passenger door of my vehicle, his mouth soundlessly moving outside the glass of my car window.
Although I couldn’t quite hear him, I could tell from his pleading expression that he was asking for money, and found myself already reflexively shaking my head no and warily scanning the parking lot to make sure I was not alone before getting out of the car. He needed to get home; I thought I heard him say, as I opened the passenger door and climbed out. Even as I continued to mutter I’m sorry, my mouth and nodding-no head apparently stuck on autopilot, simultaneously sorry for my own lack of generosity, my knee-jerk fearful reaction that, once set in motion, seemed to have taken on a life of its own.
He turned around, then, began to walk away.
“Human kindness is overflowing,” I thought, black-and-white TV images still swimming in my head. Right.
And something in the slump of his shoulders, the plastic grocery bag I guessed did not contain groceries but a tangle of scant belongings, suddenly made me reach into my wallet—still flustered, guilty, unsure, ashamed of my reaction—pluck out what turned out to be two dollars, and call out to him, hurry after him, catch him before he rounded the corner of the building, and press them into the palm of his hand. Unable this time, to avoid his eyes.
“Bless you,” he said, looking smack into mine. “I love you.”
And the thing is; I think he meant it. I could feel he meant it. Hell, there was absolutely no doubt in his eyes that he meant it! The unmistakable expression of kindness, completely unconditional love I saw there, would continue to haunt me all day, haunts me even now as I write these words. Along with the distressing awareness that I could have given him the $10 more deeply nestled in the fold of my wallet instead of the paltry $2. Hell, as the ego, rising in triumph to hijack the occasion gleefully pointed out, I could have asked him to wait while I used the ATM and given him $100! Could have said, “I love you,” returned the blessing. You know, like any other sincere A Course in Miracles student should have, would have, for Christ’s freaking sake! Would that have been so difficult? But instead found myself able only to mumble the vague assurance, “It’s going to be OK,” as if trying to reassure myself we would all make it home.
The irony of my predicament did not escape me. The timing of this encounter following my driveway moment listening to the plight of Nina Simone (which had followed continuously breaking news about the recent shooting victims and victimizer in Charleston) and, literally a heartbeat later, encountering a black hand earnestly extended right in my face that seemed to have catapulted me back into a bottomless pit of fear. “Safe” behind the invisible lines that divide us everywhere we seem to look “out there” in a world hopelessly dissected by the sinful sword of our secret belief in separation that begat an addiction to robotically upholding and defending our differences!
Revealing, as it did, the uncomfortable truth that like others of my race, I’m very good at digging into my pockets to support NPR, listening to stories that bolster the face of my theoretical generosity and innocence, even as the imaginary lines that divide us remain firmly entrenched within. Until their consequences lunge from concealment as they had just now to expose the hateful “you-or-me, one-or-the-other” thought system I blindly obey when I have chosen the ego as my inner teacher. Prompting me to realize I can also choose to remember this is not what I am, not what we are. I really am not afraid of this person for the reason I think, and can join with the part of my mind that knows beyond all shadows of doubt that the unassailable safety we share, resting in undifferentiated union while dreaming of differentiated exile, can never be, has never been, threatened.
All of us–victim and victimizer, black and white–wandering outside the one loving mind we believe we destroyed, feeling lost and alone and no longer welcome home, shares the same interest in learning we are wrong. Discovering the same inner teacher of kindness within capable of gently leading us there, one human encounter, one hand joined to a seeming other, at a time. Regardless of superficial differences that seem so important, so hell-bent on rocking our world, our inherent equality prevails and can always be accessed as we dare to look straight into the eyes of our brother through the eyes of the one Love in our mind and rediscover only our one innocent face gently staring back at us.
True, I might have had the same reaction to a white man “invading” the “personal-space comfort zone” outside my vehicle. But that, too, would have sprung from a gender-judgment based on past ego programming. And while that’s a normal response within the dream, it’s still based on the lie that our imaginary flight from abstract, eternal Love had devastatingly real effects.
A Course in Miracles is not asking us to deny our physical experience as vulnerable bodies within the dream. We can’t not react or judge as long as we think we’re individuals vying for survival, adrift in a hostile world we forgot we dreamt up. Denying our physical experience as bodies, the Course tells us, is a “particularly unworthy form of denial.” Besides, denial is unkind. After all, it’s what got us into this seemingly unkind mess in the first place.
Instead the Course asks us to change our mind about the world by honestly looking at our reactions to our experience, questioning their real cause, and recognizing we can choose to make every reaction and judgment we notice arising within an opportunity to heal our split mind of the belief in separation. To change the purpose of our difficult experiences in this difficult world from rooting ourselves more deeply in the dream, as Ken Wapnick so often reminded us and reminds us still, to taking another step toward awakening.
Although my ego continued to berate me for not giving enough, to reinforce a hierarchy of illusions we have crafted to captivate ourselves , I was done, at least for now, listening to the madness that what had just occurred had anything at all to do with the quantity of money exchanged. There was no need to keep believing in a voice that told me you could quantify real, boundless Love. Besides, I had found my teacher today in a stranger’s eyes, reflecting a kindness not of this world. And that message continued to haunt me, in the best possible way—in a way that heals instead of hurting our shared, frightened mind—and continues to haunt me, still.
Apparently, kindness not of this world of troubled humans really is overflowing. And, all things considered, what’s a little rain, anyway?
“The Christ in you is very still. He knows where you are going and He leads you there in gentleness and blessing all the way. His Love for God replaces all the fear you thought you saw within yourself. His Holiness shows you Himself in him whose hand you hold, and whom you lead to him. And what you see is like yourself. For what but Christ is there to see and hear and love and follow home?”
– (Text 24, V. paragraph 6, lines 1-6)
Susan Dugan’s books Extraordinary Ordinary Forgiveness, Forgiveness Offers
Everything I Want, and Forgiveness: The Key to Happiness are available at
RMMC and on Amazon. She writes about ACIM based on Ken Wapnick’s teachings at ForaysInForgiveness.com and teaches Tuesday nights at RMMC.