65 Beyond the poor attraction of the special love relationship and
always obscured by it is the powerful attraction of the Father for His Son. There is no other love that can satisfy you, because there
is no other love. This is the
only love that is fully given and fully returned. Being complete, it asks nothing. Being wholly pure, everyone joined in it
has everything. This is not the basis for
any relationship in which the ego enters. For every relationship on which the ego embarks
is special. The ego establishes relationships only to
get something. And it would keep the giver bound to itself through guilt.
66 It is impossible for the ego to enter into any relationship without anger, for the ego believes that anger makes
friends. This is not its statement, but it
is its purpose. For the ego really
believes that it can get and keep
by making guilty. This is its
one attraction; an attraction so weak that it would have no hold at all, except that no one
recognizes it. For the ego always
seems to attract through love and has no attraction at all to anyone who perceives that it attracts through
guilt.
67 The sick attraction of guilt must be recognized for what it
is. For having been made real to you, it is essential to look at it clearly, and by withdrawing your
investment in it, to learn to let it go. No one would choose to let go what he believes has value. Yet the attraction of guilt has value to you only because you have
not looked at what it is and have judged it completely in the dark. As we bring it to light, your only question will be why it was you
ever wanted it. You have nothing to lose by looking open-eyed at this, for ugliness such as this belongs not in your holy mind. The host of God
can have no real investment here.
68 We said before that the ego attempts to maintain and increase guilt, but in such a way that you do not recognize what it would do to
you. For it is the ego's fundamental doctrine that what you do to others,
you have escaped. The ego wishes
no one well. Yet its survival depends on your belief that
you are exempt from its evil intentions. It counsels, therefore, that if you are host to
it, it will enable you to direct the anger that it holds outward, thus
protecting you. And thus it embarks on an endless, unrewarding chain of special relationships, forged out of anger and dedicated to but one insane belief—that the more anger you invest
outside yourself, the safer
you become.
69 It is this chain that binds the Son of God to guilt, and it is this chain the Holy Spirit would remove from his holy mind. For the chain of savagery belongs not around the chosen host of God, who
cannot make himself host to the ego. In the name of his release, and in the name of Him Who would release him, let us look more closely at the relationships which the ego contrives, and let the Holy Spirit judge them truly. For it is certain that, if you will
look at them, you will offer them gladly to Him. What
He can make of them, you do not know, but you will become willing to find out if you are willing, first, to perceive what
you have made of them.
70 In one way or another, every relationship which the ego makes is based on the idea that by
sacrificing itself, it becomes
bigger. The "sacrifice," which it regards as purification, is actually the root of its bitter resentment. For it would much prefer to attack directly and avoid delaying what it
really wants. Yet the ego acknowledges "reality" as it sees it and recognizes that no one could interpret
direct attack as love. Yet to make guilty
is direct attack but does not
seem to be. For the guilty
expect attack, and having
asked for it, they are
attracted to it.
71 In these insane relationships, the attraction of what you do not want seems to be much stronger than the attraction of what you
do. For each one thinks that he has sacrificed something to the other and
hates him for it. Yet this is what he thinks he
wants. He is not in love with the other at all. He merely believes he is in love with
sacrifice. And for this sacrifice, which he demanded of
himself, he demands the
other accept the guilt and sacrifice himself as well. Forgiveness becomes impossible, for the ego believes that to forgive another is to
lose him. For it is only by attack
without forgiveness that the ego can ensure the guilt which holds all its relationships together.
72 Yet they only
seem to be together. For relationships, to the ego, mean only that
bodies are together. It is always physical closeness that the ego demands, and it does not object where the
mind goes or what
it thinks, for this seems unimportant. As long as the body is there to receive its sacrifice, it is content. To the ego, the mind is private, and only the
body can be shared. Ideas are basically of no concern, except as they draw the body of another closer or farther. And it is in these terms that it evaluates ideas as good or bad. What makes another guilty and
holds him through guilt is "good." What
releases him from guilt is "bad," because he would no longer believe that bodies communicate, and so he would be "gone."
73 Suffering and sacrifice are the gifts with which the ego would "bless" all unions. And those who are united at its altar
accept suffering and sacrifice as the price of union. In their angry alliances, born of the fear of loneliness and yet dedicated to the
continuance of loneliness, they seek relief from guilt by increasing it in the
other. For they believe that this decreases it in
them. The other seems always to be attacking and wounding
them, perhaps in little ways, perhaps "unconsciously," yet never without demand of sacrifice. The fury of those joined at the ego's altar far exceeds your awareness of it. For what the ego
really wants, you do not realize.
74 Whenever you are angry, you can be sure that you have formed a special relationship which the ego has "blessed," for anger
is its blessing. Anger takes many forms, but it cannot long deceive those who will learn that love brings no guilt at all, and what brings guilt cannot be love and
must be anger.
All anger is nothing more than an attempt to make someone feel guilty, and this attempt is the
only basis which the ego accepts for special relationships. Guilt is the only need the ego has, and as long as you identify with it, guilt will
remain attractive to you.
75 Yet remember this—to be with a body is
not communication. And if you think it is, you will feel guilty about communication and will be
afraid to hear the Holy Spirit, recognizing in His voice your
own need to communicate. The Holy Spirit
cannot teach through fear. And how can He communicate with you while you believe that to communicate is to make yourself
alone? It is clearly insane to believe that by communicating you will be abandoned. And yet you
do believe it. For you think that your minds must be kept private or you will
lose them, and if your
bodies are together your minds remain your own. The union of bodies thus becomes the way in which you would keep
minds apart. For bodies cannot forgive. They can only do as the mind directs.
76 The illusion of the autonomy of the body and
its ability to overcome loneliness is but the working of the ego's plan to establish its
own autonomy. As long as you believe that to be with a body is companionship, you will be compelled to attempt to keep your brother in his body, held there by guilt. And you will see
safety in guilt and
danger in communication. For the ego will
always teach that loneliness is solved by guilt and that communication is the
cause of loneliness. And despite the evident insanity of this lesson, you have
learned it.
77 Forgiveness lies in communication as surely as damnation lies in guilt. It is the Holy Spirit's teaching function to instruct those who believe that communication is damnation that communication is
salvation. And He will do so, for the power of God in Him
and you is joined in
real relationship, so holy and so strong that it can overcome even
this without fear. It is through the holy instant that what seems impossible is
accomplished, making it evident that it is
not impossible. In the holy instant, guilt holds
no attraction, since communication has been restored. And guilt, whose
only purpose is to disrupt communication, has no function here.
78 Here there is no concealment and no private thoughts. The willingness to communicate attracts communication
to it and overcomes loneliness completely. There is complete forgiveness here, for there is no desire to exclude anyone from your completion in sudden recognition of the value of his part in it. In the protection of
your wholeness, all are invited and made welcome. And you understand that your completion is God's, Whose only need is to have
you be complete. For your completion makes you His in your awareness. And here it is that you experience yourself as you were created and as you
are.
