September 5, 2016
Rev. Carmen Cameron, my partner and the love of my life, taught weekly ACIM classes here in Lousiville for more than twelve years. Carmen passed away this past February, but she left her class notes behind.
Carmen started her study of A Course in Miracles on Christmas Day, 1994, when I gave her a copy of the combined volumes published by the Foundation for Inner Peace. At that time both Carmen and I were active in a personal growth organization called ISA. The Institute for Self Awareness. ISA was a spin-off of EST, created by Ole Larson after he had been an EST trainer for many years.
After Carmen had been studying A Course in Miracles for about four years, and she had completed the Workbook lessons, one of our ISA friends remarked that Carmen had changed (for the better), and our friend wanted to know how and why. Carmen attributed her change to her work with ACIM.
A few weeks later, this same friend showed up unannounced at our apartment door with three other companions, and she demanded that Carmen tell them about "this miracle book thing."
Thus, Carmen started her career as a ACIM class teacher.
These are Carmen's class handout notes for October 14, 2010.
-oOo-
Rev. Carmen Cameron
Louisville Class Notes
October 14, 2010
A universal theology is impossible. But a universal experience [of oneness] is not only possible, it is essential.
This course attempts to teach no more than that the power of decision cannot lie in choosing different forms of what is still the SAME illusion and the SAME mistake. All choices in the world depend on this; - You choose BETWEEN your brother and yourself, and you will gain as much as he will lose, and what you lose is what is given him. How utterly OPPOSED to truth is this, when what the lesson’s purpose is to teach that what your brother loses YOU have lost, and what he gains is what is given YOU. T-31.IV.8.3-5
...you cannot distinguish between advance and retreat. Some of your greatest advances you have judged as failures, and some of your deepest retreats you have evaluated as success. T-18.V.1.5-6
LESSON 24. I do not perceive my own best interests.
Because God’s equal Sons have everything, they CANNOT compete. But if they perceive ANY of their brothers as anything OTHER than their perfect equals, the IDEA of competition HAS entered their minds. Do not underestimate your need to be vigilant AGAINST this idea, because ALL your conflicts come FROM it. It IS the belief that conflicting interests are possible... T-7.III.3.3-6
There is a DISTANCE you would keep apart from one another. And this space you see as time, because you still believe you are EXTERNAL to each other. This makes trust impossible. And you can NOT believe that trust would settle every problem NOW. Thus do you think it SAFER to remain a LITTLE careful and a LITTLE watchful of interests perceived as separate. T-26.VIII.2
Ownership is a dangerous concept, if it is left to you. T-13.VII.10.10
Atonement is for all because it is the way to UNDO the belief that anything is for you alone. T-9.IV.1.1
You had DECIDED that your brother is your enemy. SOMETIMES a friend, perhaps, provided that your separate interests made your friendship possible a little while. But NOT without a gap between you, lest he turn again into an enemy. Let him come close to you, and you jumped back; as you approached, he instantly withdrew. A cautious friendship, limited in scope and carefully restricted in amount, became the treaty you had made with him. You shared a qualified entente, in which a clause of separation was a point on which you both agreed to keep intact. And violating this was thought to be a breach of treaty not to be allowed.
The gap between you is NOT one of space between two separate bodies. This but SEEMS to be dividing off your separate minds. T-29.I.3.4 - 4.2
M-1.1. A teacher of God is anyone who chooses to be one. His qualifications consist solely in this; somehow, somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else's. Once he has done that, his road is established and his direction is sure. A light has entered the darkness. It may be a single light, but that is enough. He has entered an agreement with God even if he does not yet believe in Him. He has become a bringer of salvation. He has become a teacher of God.
M-2.5.3-9 God's Teacher speaks to any two who join together for learning purposes. The relationship is holy because of that purpose, and God has promised to send His Spirit into any holy relationship. In the teaching-learning situation, each one learns that giving and receiving are the same. The demarcations they have drawn between their roles, their minds, their bodies, their needs, their interests, and all the differences they thought separated them from one another, fade and grow dim and disappear. Those who would learn the same course share one interest and one goal. And thus he who was the learner becomes a teacher of God himself, for he has made the one decision that gave his teacher to him. He has seen in another person the same interests as his own.
M-8.2. Illusions are always illusions of differences. How could it be otherwise? By definition, an illusion is an attempt to make something real that is regarded as of major importance, but is recognized as being untrue. The mind therefore seeks to make it true out of its intensity of desire to have it for itself. Illusions are travesties of creation; attempts to bring truth to lies. Finding truth unacceptable, the mind revolts against truth and gives itself an illusion of victory. Finding health a burden, it retreats into feverish dreams. And in these dreams the mind is separate, different from other minds, with different interests of its own, and able to gratify its needs at the expense of others.
S-1.in.2. To you who are in time a little while, prayer takes the form that best will suit your need. You have but one. What God created one must recognize its oneness, and rejoice that what illusions seemed to separate is one forever in the Mind of God. Prayer now must be the means by which God's Son leaves separate goals and separate interests by, and turns in holy gladness to the truth of union in his Father and himself.
Louisville Class Notes
October 14, 2010
JOINT INTERESTS: A Practical Application of "We're All One"
A universal theology is impossible. But a universal experience [of oneness] is not only possible, it is essential.
This course attempts to teach no more than that the power of decision cannot lie in choosing different forms of what is still the SAME illusion and the SAME mistake. All choices in the world depend on this; - You choose BETWEEN your brother and yourself, and you will gain as much as he will lose, and what you lose is what is given him. How utterly OPPOSED to truth is this, when what the lesson’s purpose is to teach that what your brother loses YOU have lost, and what he gains is what is given YOU. T-31.IV.8.3-5
...you cannot distinguish between advance and retreat. Some of your greatest advances you have judged as failures, and some of your deepest retreats you have evaluated as success. T-18.V.1.5-6
LESSON 24. I do not perceive my own best interests.
Because God’s equal Sons have everything, they CANNOT compete. But if they perceive ANY of their brothers as anything OTHER than their perfect equals, the IDEA of competition HAS entered their minds. Do not underestimate your need to be vigilant AGAINST this idea, because ALL your conflicts come FROM it. It IS the belief that conflicting interests are possible... T-7.III.3.3-6
There is a DISTANCE you would keep apart from one another. And this space you see as time, because you still believe you are EXTERNAL to each other. This makes trust impossible. And you can NOT believe that trust would settle every problem NOW. Thus do you think it SAFER to remain a LITTLE careful and a LITTLE watchful of interests perceived as separate. T-26.VIII.2
Ownership is a dangerous concept, if it is left to you. T-13.VII.10.10
Atonement is for all because it is the way to UNDO the belief that anything is for you alone. T-9.IV.1.1
You had DECIDED that your brother is your enemy. SOMETIMES a friend, perhaps, provided that your separate interests made your friendship possible a little while. But NOT without a gap between you, lest he turn again into an enemy. Let him come close to you, and you jumped back; as you approached, he instantly withdrew. A cautious friendship, limited in scope and carefully restricted in amount, became the treaty you had made with him. You shared a qualified entente, in which a clause of separation was a point on which you both agreed to keep intact. And violating this was thought to be a breach of treaty not to be allowed.
The gap between you is NOT one of space between two separate bodies. This but SEEMS to be dividing off your separate minds. T-29.I.3.4 - 4.2
M-1.1. A teacher of God is anyone who chooses to be one. His qualifications consist solely in this; somehow, somewhere he has made a deliberate choice in which he did not see his interests as apart from someone else's. Once he has done that, his road is established and his direction is sure. A light has entered the darkness. It may be a single light, but that is enough. He has entered an agreement with God even if he does not yet believe in Him. He has become a bringer of salvation. He has become a teacher of God.
M-2.5.3-9 God's Teacher speaks to any two who join together for learning purposes. The relationship is holy because of that purpose, and God has promised to send His Spirit into any holy relationship. In the teaching-learning situation, each one learns that giving and receiving are the same. The demarcations they have drawn between their roles, their minds, their bodies, their needs, their interests, and all the differences they thought separated them from one another, fade and grow dim and disappear. Those who would learn the same course share one interest and one goal. And thus he who was the learner becomes a teacher of God himself, for he has made the one decision that gave his teacher to him. He has seen in another person the same interests as his own.
M-8.2. Illusions are always illusions of differences. How could it be otherwise? By definition, an illusion is an attempt to make something real that is regarded as of major importance, but is recognized as being untrue. The mind therefore seeks to make it true out of its intensity of desire to have it for itself. Illusions are travesties of creation; attempts to bring truth to lies. Finding truth unacceptable, the mind revolts against truth and gives itself an illusion of victory. Finding health a burden, it retreats into feverish dreams. And in these dreams the mind is separate, different from other minds, with different interests of its own, and able to gratify its needs at the expense of others.
S-1.in.2. To you who are in time a little while, prayer takes the form that best will suit your need. You have but one. What God created one must recognize its oneness, and rejoice that what illusions seemed to separate is one forever in the Mind of God. Prayer now must be the means by which God's Son leaves separate goals and separate interests by, and turns in holy gladness to the truth of union in his Father and himself.
-oOo-
Carmen was also a very fine artist/illustrator who had many visionary experiences involving angels. Her first such angel experience, from long before her introduction the A Course in Miracles, forcefully delivered this message to Carmen:
An angel sleeps in every soul.
Your only job is to awaken yours.
You can imagine Carmen's joy in early 2000 when the earlier, less edited, version of A Course in Miracles was released to the world and the emphasis on "soul" and the additional mention of angels.
"The Atonement actually began long before the crucifixion. Many Souls offered their efforts on behalf of the separated ones, but they could not withstand the strength of the attack and had to be brought back. Angels came, too, but their protection did not suffice, because the separated ones were not interested in peace. They had already split their minds, and were bent on further dividing, rather than reintegrating. The levels they introduced into their minds turned against each other, and they established differences, divisions, cleavages, dispersions, and all the other concepts related to the increasing splits which they produced."
