Now, about finding a live discussion
group in your area, below we give information to help with that.
But first we want to say that we're not very enthusiastic about ACIM groups
even though we have helped to facilitate one such group on the Internet.
It's not so hard to find a group as it is to find one that will really
be helpful to one's understanding and practice of the Course. In our opinion,
ACIM is first and foremost, an individual self-study Course which requires
dedicated personal effort and willingness to enter into an intimate relationship
with the voice that speaks from the pages of the Course itself. This is
not to say that a teacher or a group cannot be helpful, but study groups
and teachers can also be misleading and confusing.
The best and most helpful teacher we
know of is Kenneth Wapnick, who was a very close friend of Helen Schucman,
and who helped prepare the Course for publication. Ken has been on the
board of the Foundation for Inner Peace (FIP) from the beginning.
Perhaps you know that FIP has been responsible for publishing and distributing
the Course. Later, Ken and his wife Gloria established the Foundation
for A Course in Miracles (FACIM) which is sister to FIP and responsible
for teaching about the Course. If you haven't already done so, you might
like to visit the FACIM Web site at: www.facim.org
where you'll find a wealth of teaching materials, and, at some point, you
might like to attend a class at the Foundation which is located in Temecula,
California. The schedule of classes and workshops is at: http://www.facim.org/mc/schedule.htm
You can obtain a free subscription to
the Lighthouse, which is the quarterly newsletter of the Foundation,
by going to the Web page at: http://facim.org/lithouse.htm--
and that newsletter is also available in PDF format for download from the
FACIM site.
If you like, you can learn more about
Ken at the following link:
KenWapnick.html
Finally, to find information about face-to-face
study groups in US locations, as well as around the world, go to the miracle
studies page on the Web site of the Foundation for Inner Peace at: http://acim.org/miracle_studies.html
On that page, click on the link for Miracle Distribution
Center. That will take you to information about how to find
a group.
And, while you are at the FIP site,
you might like to look around since it contains some interesting and helpful
information about the Course.
For information about an on-line discussion
group, visit the "Course Talk" home page: http://www.yahoogroups.com/group/Course_Talk
". . . the Course can and should
stand on its own. It is not
intended to become the basis for
another cult. Its only purpose
is to provide a way in which some
people will be able to find
their own Internal Teacher"
(Preface to the ACIM text, p.viii).
