Site Index

After having spent over fifteen years exploring the mind-expanding concepts in science, philosophy, and religion presented in The Urantia Book, I became aware that I was separating myself from some very spiritual friends who were studying The Course in Miracles. Simply observing the fruits of the spirit in friends who were students of the Course alleviated my fear of Caligastia, and helped me to trust the Spirit of Truth to enlighten me as I studied this very spiritual psychology course. The Urantia Book and A Course in Miracles have thus proved complimentary aspects to ongoing spiritual growth in my case, and I would therefore like to share some thoughts concerning the Course by addressing some questions that often come up in our study groups. These questions are: 

• 1. Who wrote the Course?
• 2. What is real?
• 3. Do we have free will?
• 4. Do we personally survive death?
• 5. Are we reincarnated?
• 6. Are we all one?
• 7. What is the value of the Course for Urantia students?

 This is an informal essay, so I take the liberty of simply using Urantia to mean The Urantia Book and the Course to mean A Course in Miracles. I will paraphrase concepts from the Course as I understand them and give direct quotes from Urantia of what I consider to be the same or similar concepts. Unless otherwise indicated, all direct quotations are taken from The Urantia Book.

WHO WROTE THE COURSE?

On page five of the Course text, Jesus or Christ Michael is speaking as our elder brother, saying he is equal to us on one dimension and standing between us and our Father on another. He is speaking through two psychologists who have made a joint decision to seek a better way. Considering that we still know very little about how celestial beings gave us our fifth epochal revelation, it seems only fair to remain open to the idea of a course in mind training revealed through two mind specialists, especially in light of these words of a Melchizedek: "Revelation as an epochal phenomena is periodic; as a personal experience it is continuous."(1107:2)

Our revelators tell us that Michael may personally visit our planet many times, that they do not know where his soul is (2015), and that they had access to his personalized adjuster in giving us our revelation. (341) After pondering these possibilities as a means for receiving the course, the most plausible speaker to me seemed to be the Spirit of Truth. Concerning his own spirit, Jesus said: "...In a very short time I am going to send you my spirit, just like me except for this material body." (1949:1) A Midwayer, speaking of the Spirit of Truth, says:

The spirit never creates a consciousness of himself, only a consciousness of Michael, the Son...The proof, therefore, of your fellowship with The Spirit of Truth is not to be found in your consciousness of the spirit but rather in your experience of enhanced fellowship with Michael.(2061:2)

Here again, we know very little about the technique used, but the Course says the Holy Spirit is our teacher, and pages five and six of the course text describe the Holy Spirit as the mediator who keeps the direct channel from God to us open for revelation. In Urantia, an Archangel, concerning the Holy Spirit, says:

The Universe Mother spirit acts as the universe focus and center of the Spirit of Truth as well as her own personal influence, the Holy Spirit.(387:1)

And concerning our acceptance of this plural spiritual guidance:

And when such a life of spiritual guidance is freely and intelligently accepted, there gradually develops within the human mind a positive consciousness of divine contact and assurance of spirit communion; sooner or later the Spirit bears witness with your spirit (Adjuster) that you are a child of God. Already has your own Thought Adjuster told you of your kinship to God so that the record testifies that the Spirit bears witness 'with your spirit', not to your spirit. (381:6)

 

WHAT IS REAL? 

This question is summed up in the "Introduction" to the Course as:

Nothing real can be threatened.

Nothing unreal exists.

Herein lies the peace of God.

This is a challenge to our common perception of reality, yet many of our concepts in science such as light-dark or hot-cold support this concept. Dark is not real, it is only the absence of light, or cold (absolute zero) is only the absence of heat (movement). The Course teaches that God is real and has no opposite, thus anything not of God is unreal. We ourselves are truly creative only when we are doing God's will; when we are not doing God's will we are only making illusions. The love-fear contrast is applied to emotions. If our thoughts come from love we are creating with God, but if they come from fear we are making illusions, since fear does not exist in God. A similar concept is expressed by a Solitary Messenger in Urantia: "The Infinite God is, as always, replete and complete, infinitely inclusive of all things except evil and creature experience." (1185:2)

The Master, when asked about who created evil, explained:

It was still believed in those days that God creates both good and evil, but Jesus never taught such error...Jesus said: 'My brother, God is love; therefore he must be good, and his goodness is so great and real that it cannot contain the small and unreal things of evil. God is so positively good that there is no place in him for negative evil.. Evil is that which is dark and untrue... (1429:1)

Another dichotomy the Course presents is the physical-spiritual: the physical is unreal whereas the spiritual is real. Urantia deals with this finite paradox in two ways. It teaches that our souls are not identical to our spirit within (Adjuster) but is the evolving joint child of this spirit and our human personality. We may, therefore, view our souls as the bridge from our mortal self to our real spiritual Self. Concerning our souls, A Solitary Messenger says:

There is something real, something of human evolution, something additional to the mystery monitor, which survives death. This newly appearing entity is the soul, and it survives the death of both your physical body and your material mind. (1234:1)

Urantia delineates three levels of reality: spiritual, mental, and physical (matter). The spiritual level is value, the mental level is meaning, and the physical level covers all things that are devoid of meaning and value. When we examine these levels of reality within us, from the lowest physical level through the mid-level of mind and soul to the highest level of all--God the Father's spirit--we discover that physical matter may have little or nothing to do with our reality. In terms of value, our soul is more real and our physical matter is but the scaffolding for our soul. We are never told, however, that physical matter is unreal. A Perfector of Wisdom verifies its reality in cosmic evolution:

In cosmic evolution matter becomes a philosophic shadow cast by mind in the presence of spirit luminosity of divine enlightment, but this does not invalidate the reality of matter-energy. Mind, matter, and spirit are equally real, but they are not of equal value to personality in the attainment of divinity. (140:8)

A Mighty Messenger also verifies matter as real in time:

In time, man's body is just as real as mind or spirit, but in death, both mind (identity) and spirit survive while the body does not. A cosmic reality can be non-existent in personality experience...Physical matter is the time-space shadow of the Paradise energy-shining of the absolute Deities. (141:1)

From the perspective of Mighty Messengers and Perfectors of Wisdom, "in time" and "in cosmic evolution" are the qualifiers for the reality of physical matter, characterized by fear, shadows, evil, and darkness. From the Course perspective, time itself is an illusion. Likewise, from a scientific perspective we keep asking questions such as: Does time accelerate, warp, crunch or even exist? Is our reality in infinity in "no time"? Are we living in parallel universes in the eternal now? However much we toy with these thoughts from science, we are still faced with the fact that both Urantia and the Course are given to us "in time", and we "must perforce serve two masters." (1199) The Course says truth is timeless, and the aim of the Course is to train our minds toward a higher perception of truth, truth being beyond what it can teach. The Master himself gave us a higher perception of truth in a beautiful discourse on time:

Time is the stream of flowing temporal events perceived by creature consciousness. Time is the name given to the succession-arrangement whereby events are recognized and segregated...On the inhabited world, human personality (indwelt and oriented by the Paradise Father's spirit) is the only physically related reality which can transcend the material sequence of temporal events...as man ascends, as he progresses inward, the enlarging view of this event procession is such that it is discerned more and more in its wholeness. That which formerly appeared as a succession of events then will be viewed as a whole and perfectly related cycle; in this way will circular simultaneity increasingly displace the onetime consciousness of the linear sequence of events. (1439:3)

The Course teaches us to experience our timelessness in the Holy Instant. Urantia tells us that our personality transcends time, that our adjuster is eternal, and that we can personally choose to become conscious of our timelessness. It is fascinating to hear a Melchizedek describe this consciousness:

Religion assures man that, in following the gleam of righteousness discernible in his soul, he is thereby identifying himself with the plan of the Infinite and the purpose of the Eternal. Such a liberated soul immediately begins to feel at home in this new universe, his universe...Now, rather are the sons of God enlisted together in fighting the battle of reality's triumph over the partial shadows of existence. At last all creatures become conscious of the fact that God and all the divine hosts of a well-nigh limitless universe are on their side...Such faith-liberated sons have certainly enlisted in the struggles of time on the side of the supreme forces and divine personalities of eternity...at last they gaze upon the universe from within, from God's viewpoint, and all is transformed from the uncertainties of material isolation to the sureties of eternal spiritual progression. Even time itself becomes but the shadow of eternity cast by Paradise realities upon the moving panoply of space. (1117:3)

DO WE HAVE FREE WILL?

 The "Introduction" in the Course text tells us:

This is a required course, only the time you take it is voluntary. Free will does not mean you can establish the curriculum. It means only that you can elect what you want to take at a given time.

Does Urantia teach that our human self establishes the curriculum? Probably not, according to the message transmitted by a self-acting Adjuster to the human associate:

...the Adjuster pleaded 'that he more faithfully give me his sincere cooperation, more cheerfully endure the task of my emplacement, more faithfully carry out the program of my arrangement, more patiently go through the trials of my selection, more persistently and cheerfully tread the path of my choosing, more humbly receive the credit that may accrue as a result of my ceaseless endeavor. (1213:5)

The Course addresses us as Sons of God and speaks to us as if we have already chosen God's curriculum but tells us over and over that the choice is ours and reminds us that the choice is ongoing. It emphasizes that we can be happy only when we choose this real Self. As a Midwayer in Urantia puts it: "Jesus wanted his children on earth to live as though they were already citizens of the completed heavenly kingdom." (1582:6)

As stated earlier, our one choice in each moment of time is always between God or nothing--between what is God or what is our own making. A Mighty Messenger explains the relativity and limitations of free will:

Volition on any level short of the absolute encounters limitations which are constitutive in the very personality exercising the power of choice. Man cannot choose beyond the range of that which is choosable. He cannot, for instance, choose to be other than a human being except that he can elect to become more than a man; he can choose to embark upon the voyage of universe ascension, but this is because the human choice and the divine will happen to be coincident upon this point. And what a son desires and the Father wills will certainly come to pass...Temporal volition is linked to time.....spiritual volition is self-identifying with the will of God. (1300:2)

The Course, speaking to us as Sons of God, says that time is in our hands and herein lies our free will. From Urantia and The Course perspective, there seems to be only one choice in reality, God or nothing.

 

DO WE PERSONALLY SURVIVE DEATH? 

The Course provides a very personal relationship with Jesus, but neither Urantia nor the Course attempts a definition of Personality. Unlike Urantia, The Course does not attempt to delineate between different ways of surviving, only that we are Sons of God and will return to the Father. A Mighty Messenger in Urantia discourses about survival:

Man’s personality is eternal but with regard to identity a conditioned eternal reality. Having appeared in response to the Father’s will, personality will attain Deity destiny but man must choose whether or not to be present at the attainment of such destiny. In default of such choice, personality attains experiential Deity directly, becoming a part of the Supreme Being. The cycle is foreordained, but man’s participation therein is optional, personal, and experiential.(1232:3)

Thus, if we personally choose to identify with God's curriculum and embark upon the voyage of universe ascension, then the divine will and our human choice are coincident upon this point. If we do not choose this, all real aspects including our personalities, mind and soul values, and Adjusters, will continue in some other way. Concerning personality, a Might Messenger says:

The human personality can truly destroy individuality of creaturehood, and though all that was worthwhile in the life of such a cosmic suicide will persist, these qualities will not persist as an individual creature...the unique personality of a nonascender returns to the Supreme as a drop of water returns to the Sea. (1283:6)

The mind of man is an individualized circuit, an impersonal portion of the Cosmic mind (1036), therefore, any mind value will survive as a part of the Supreme mind since "Anything that has cosmic value will always persist." (1235:4)

Our Adjusters are a gift of the Father and will survive to form another relationship--another soul, with another personality. A Universal Censor says, "If mortal man fails to survive natural death, the real spiritual value of his human experience survives as a part of the continuing experience of the Adjuster." (195:5)

 

ARE WE REINCARNATED?

 In Urantia, a Midwayer says, "The master found it difficult to make men believe that their souls had not had previous existence."(1811:5) For students of the Course, this teaching on reincarnation may be an obstacle to studying Urantia, as reincarnation seems to provide a plausible explanation for some of their experiences. For me, Urantia offers several reasonable explanations for these experiences, but the most relevant to this paper seems to be from the perspective of our God within.

Most students of Urantia who study the Course do not think it teaches reincarnation of the soul. The Course does not use the word "soul" because of the term's controversial nature and it does reach out to many hungry souls who are not students of Urantia.

In the Manual for Teachers we are told that in the ultimate sense reincarnation cannot be true. It states that if a teacher of God believes in reincarnation then his internal teacher might advise him he is misusing the belief and might recommend reinterpretation. It then goes on to say that all that must be recognized is that birth was not the beginning and death will not be the end. A former mortal, now a Mighty Messenger, tells us," you think of a body as having a spirit, but we regard the spirit as having a body.." (483:5)

Regarding this spirit, and concerning worlds such as Urantia, a Solitary Messenger reveals more:

It is our belief that on such worlds practically all Adjusters indwelling intelligent men and women of survival capacity belong to the advanced or the supreme type. (1198:1)

Supreme Adjusters [are] those Monitors (adjusters) that have served in the adventures of time on the evolutionary worlds, but whose human partners for some reason declined survival, and those who have been subsequently assigned to other adventures in other mortals on other evolving worlds. (1178:5)

To view ourselves from within as our higher Self certainly allows us to understand that birth was not the beginning and death will not be the end. We can also accept that in the ultimate sense reincarnation is a distorted view, but should this difference of perception separate us from our brothers and sisters who may not have the same concepts of our evolving souls?

 ARE WE ALL ONE?

 A very important concept in the Course is our "oneness." "The universe is a whole no thing or being exists or lives in isolation," says a Mighty Messenger.(647:5)

Urantia gives a concept of the Supreme Being as our evolving finite Deity and our oneness may be viewed as referring to the Supreme. A Mighty Messenger implies this by saying that, "From the finite standpoint, we actually live, move, and have our being within the imminence of the Supreme." (1283:2)

A Divine Counselor, however, says that finality of oneness is only on the absolute level. (25:5) We are personal beings within the Supreme, have a personal destiny within the Ultimate, but finality of oneness is in the Absolute Father . A Mighty Messenger, viewing from a higher perception, says:

Those of us who are able to observe wider stretches of universal phenomena, and who are more experienced in this art of detecting the basic unity which underlies creative diversity and of discovering the divine oneness which overspreads all this functioning of plurality, better perceive the divine and single purpose exhibited in all these manifold manifestations of universal creative energy. (637:2)

When we recognize our oneness and unity of spirit, actually seeing ourselves as our brothers, the golden rule takes on new dimensions, and "Love they neighbor as thyself" becomes possible. When we see ourselves as separated, unrelated to and split apart from all other personalities, we become what our ego is, unreal.

 WHAT IS THE VALUE OF THE COURSE FOR Urantia STUDENTS?

 As students of Urantia we are sometimes faced with the difficult, uphill struggle of trying to fit our revelation within our communities, churches, and families. The Chief of Seraphim reminds us:

"To accept the guidance of a seraphim rarely means attaining a life of ease. In following this leading you are sure to encounter, and if you have the courage, to traverse, the rugged hills of moral choosing and spiritual progress."(1245:3)

As I studied the Course I kept remembering Jesus’ promise: "I will send you a spirit helper ...who will even comfort you," (1947:2) keeping in mind that the Course states, "this is not a course in the play of ideas but in their practical application." (TX. 196)

Urantia, on the other hand gives us long discourses on the supreme and ultimate expansion of the "third road" which I find exhilarating. However, when I try to emulate the Master’s life as he lived it on Urantia I always seem to fail. Did Jesus give us this very spiritual course and even a "how to" workbook to provide a structure and a discipline for practicing the real religion of Jesus? For me, the Course compliments and enhances my ongoing study of Urantia. Its value and its uniqueness lies in its very effective mind training. It does fulfill its stated aim, "the attaining and the keeping of greater peace." (TX 464)