So Much Depends on Seeing with Vision

Reading the newspaper daily, I am always amazed at the suffering and pain and wars going on all the time around the world.  For much too long, I did not understand when a brother would say to me, “You are the cause.”

“What?  I am here, and that is taking place there.”

Well, I finally got it.  It all depends on whether I am looking at worldly events through the body’s eyes, or the eyes of Christ.  This is the causation.  Through my body’s eyes, I see projected images of what is dark within; through the eyes of Christ, I see a bright reflection of my innocent Self.

This all came back to me this morning while I was reading these passages from the Text of the Course.

A simple question yet remains, and needs an answer. Do you like what you have made?—a world of murder and attack, through which you thread your timid way through constant dangers, alone and frightened, hoping at most that death will wait a little longer before it overtakes you and you disappear. You made this up. It is a picture of what you think you are; of how you see yourself. A murderer is frightened, and those who kill fear death. All these are but the fearful thoughts of those who would adjust themselves to a world made fearful by their adjustments. And they look out in sorrow from what is sad within, and see the sadness there.

Have you not wondered what the world is really like; how it would look through happy eyes?

Who in a holy relationship can long remain unholy? The world the holy see is one with them, just as the world the ego looks upon is like itself. The world the holy see is beautiful because they see their innocence in it. They did not tell it what it was; they did not make adjustments to fit their orders. They gently questioned it and whispered, 'What are you?' And He Who watches over all perception answered. Take not the judgement of the world as answer to the question, 'What am I?' The world believes in sin, but the belief that made it as you see it is not outside you. (T-20.lll.4,6)

It all depends on what we choose to see, reminding me of this poem by William Carlos Williams (1883-1963 ).

The Red Wheelbarrow

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens.

This is a demonstration of seeing something exactly as it is, objectively, no judgments,  no projections, just a simple reflection.

*     *     *

Just after writing this, I sat down to read “A Course of Love,” a book that Mari Perron scribed, listening to Jesus, and I read this passage, echoing what I just wrote:

There is not a soul who walks this earth that does not weep at what it sees.  Yet, the Christ in you does not weep, for the Christ in you sees with eyes of love.  The difference is the eyes of love see not the misery of despair.   This is the miracle.  The miracle is true seeing.  Think not that love can look on misery and see love there.  Love looks not on misery at all.  (p. 12, 2.10)