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Page 1: COVER - Heartland Healing Jesus got his copyright... · of Malta, as he continues on ... letters@HeartlandHealingMagazine.comor ... its better-known students wrote books and became
Page 2: COVER - Heartland Healing Jesus got his copyright... · of Malta, as he continues on ... letters@HeartlandHealingMagazine.comor ... its better-known students wrote books and became

History tells us that the decade of the1960s was one of the most turbulentand trying of times. Locked in a war

that seemingly could not be won, caught inthe crucible of change that marked expand-ing social freedoms and still collectivelymourning the grave loss that this countryendured with President Kennedy’s assassi-nation, fear dominated the headlines.Uncivilized civil conflict raged in our ownland as friendships and relationships weretested by opposing views of how to right theship. It culminated in the shocking deaths offour college students at the hands of theirfellow countrymen in Ohio in 1970.

During that tempestuous decade of the1960s, two doctors of psychology workingtogether at Columbia University recognizedtheir own issues of conflict within theadministration of their daily duties. Finally,one of the doctors threw up her hands andbegged for a way of seeing things morepeacefully. She declared, “There has to be abetter way.”

Soon, as if in answer to that very prayer,Dr. Helen Schucman began to scribe the textof A Course in Miracles. The three bookscomprising that work were finally printed

in 1975. Schucman was not interested in anycredit for the content and no person’s namewas listed as author. The copyright was heldby the Foundation for Inner Peace. That wasa fitting name for the foundation since thestated goal of the self-study text is to gentlyguide the student toward the shift in per-ception that leads to peace.

A tale widely told by followers of theCourse is the story of a group of studentswho were reading the Text one day. A ques-tion arose as to the meaning of a particularpassage. The dialogue among the studentsbecame quite energetic, if not heated. Intothe room walked one of the senior membersof the group, one known for having a veryclear and practical handle on what theCourse teaches. As a senior teacher, heasked what the problem was. The studentsclamored, each for their position of interpre-tation. It was obvious conflict. The leaderasked to be shown the section of text thatcould be so inciting. Handed the book, opento that page, he looked casually at it,grasped the corner and gently removed theoffending page from the book.

Softly, he spoke to the students andreminded them of the goal of the Course,

peace. “It seems,” he said, “ that all of youhave misinterpreted that part. Carry on.”

In that story, it was ironic that the instru-ment for peace was being trifled over as asource of conflict. In our cover story, we findthat conflict, just like peace, can be foundwherever we look for it. It is the seeker whomust decide what he or she is looking for. Isit peace I seek or is it conflict? For what Iseek, I shall truly find.

The decade of the 1960s was a time notunlike our own. We once again find our-selves in armed conflict far from our shores.We once again have a focal tragedy that weshare; only the date is not November 22 butrather September 11. We once again aredeeply divided on how to deal with fear. Itappears we are a country in conflict on howto move forward. It appears there is greatsocial and political turmoil. It appears thatwe are separate from one another. The ques-tion is whether we have learned from thatvital and dynamic decade 40 years ago.Have we forgotten so quickly? We mustdeclare, “There has to be a better way.”

— Michael BraunsteinProducer / Editor

So you thought turkeys were a bird, right? Well, the typical ones served inAmerican homes can’t even fly! Doni Yoast is a natural foods cookinginstructor, specializing in health restricted diets for over 20 years. She tellsus about the growing trend toward real turkeys, heritage turkeys, the wayNature made ‘em. Most weekdays Doni can be found at Wild Oats whereshe works.

Author and world traveler Brad Olsen signs on from the Mediterranean isleof Malta, as he continues on his European tour gathering background forhis third book, 108 Sacred Destinations: Europe. This issue, Bradtakes us to the mystical temples of that ancient island.

Shawn Phifer, is Executive Chef and with his wife, Eva, owner of OMCafe/ Dogspot Catering in Omaha’s Old Market. After Dogspot catered a brilliantsoirée for Heartland Healing Magazine, Shawn promised to let us in onsome professional tips about how to prepare your holiday party just likethe pros do.

Enjoy! And see you next year!

COVERILLUSTRATION

BY JASON HAYS

Body • Mind • Spirit of OmahaMAGAZINEMAGAZINE

NOVEMBER / DECEMBER 2004

HEARTLAND HEALING MAGAZINE 4 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2004

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HEARTLAND HEALING MAGAZINE 5

FEATURE ARTICLESHOW JESUS GOT HIS COPYRIGHT BACKWhen a new copyright holder took over A Course in Miracles in 1999, enforcing copyright issues turnedinto a legal battle. Can you say, “Let well-enough alone?”Page 6

BREW THE RIGHT THINGA glut of labels has swarmed the marketplace. Some are meaningless but this one means a fair shake tothousands of third world families. Page 10

REAL TURKEYS CAN FLYThose meaty monsters on the carving board bear little resemblence to the turkeys our forefathers servedup. Stay abreast of the heritage turkey movement and try a taste test.Page 18

PARTY LIKE A PROWhat’s the next best thing to having your holiday party professionally catered? Why, doing it yourself andhaving it look like you spent the big bucks! Read about the trade secrets.Page 20

COLUMNSSACRED DESTINATIONS: ON THE ROAD WITH BRAD OLSEN Our traveling contributor reports on the mystical island of Malta Page 12

ASK DR. NATURAL: The doctor reminds us that flu vaccine isn’t the only option. Page 14

NOTES ON NUTRITION - got garlic?Gina Moss gives her take on that bulbous über-food. Page 26

HEARTLAND HAPPENINGSA band of Arabs singing peace. It deserves more than a listen. Page 28

THE LAST PICTURE SHOW

Contents HEARTLAND HEALINGMAGAZINE10730 Pacific StreetOmaha NE 68114General Inquiries: 402-551-5810www.HeartlandHealingMagazine.com

How to suggest a story idea or inquireabout submitting an article: Email [email protected]

Articles may be submitted only by emailunless otherwise arranged. Inquire aboutwriting and content guidelines.

Send a Letter to the Editor: [email protected] ormail to the address above.

To advertise in Heartland HealingMagazine: call 402-551-5810 or visitwww.HeartlandHealingMagazine.com formore information.

Producer/Editor: Michael BraunsteinArt Direction: Jared CvetasCover Layout: Ethan BondelidEditorial Contributors: Randall Bradley,Michael Braunstein, Gina Moss, BradOlsen, Doni Yoast, Shawn PfiferDistribution: Ben HeastonDelivery: Best Delivery Staff in Omaha

Heartland Healing Magazine is published bi-monthly by HeartlandHealing in partnership with the Readernewspaper.

Editorial content in this magazine may bereproduced upon receiving permissionfrom the publishers. Content in this mag-azine may not necessarily reflect theviews, opinions or beliefs of any or everyperson involved with this publication orreflect said viewpoints of any advertiserherein. All contents are © 2004 HeartlandHealing Magazine, all rights reserved.

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HEARTLAND HEALING MAGAZINE 6 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2004

The intriguing story of how an oldaudiocassette, some Xerox copiesand a few miracles led to a hugelypopular book losing its copyrightand entering public domain

by Michael Braunstein

In October of 1965, Helen Schucmanthought she was going crazy. It didn’tmake sense to her that she was sitting

up nights with a steno pad taking notesfrom an internal voice. In fact, she foundit pretty upsetting. Here she was, a Ph.D.in clinical psychology, a tenuredAssociate Professor at ColumbiaUniversity Medical Center and she washearing inner dictation? That wasn’t theworst of it. She was Jewish by descentand atheist by decision and the voice,when queried, told her that she could callhim “Jesus.” All this did not sit well withthe 56-year-old researcher. Plus, it wascosting her sleep.

Her boss, Dr. William Thetford,noticed Helen’s apparent preoccupationsafter a few weeks. When prodded, shetold her colleague about the nightly scrib-ing. He asked to see the manuscripts.Thetford was mightily impressed withwhat he read. There was a clarity and con-sistency of content that convinced himthat something important was happening.

Over the next seven years, Helen andBill compiled the product of her scribing.She would dictate from her handwritten

notes and he would duti-fully transcribe intotypewritten text. Thatmanuscript became whatthe world would know asA Course in Miracles.

The result of HelenSchucman’s experiencewas a three-volume setof hardcover books titledA Course in Miracles(ACIM), a spiritually-based, psychologically-oriented self-studycourse intended to gently guide the stu-dent toward a shift in perception and theexperience of inner peace. Neither Helennor Bill claimed authorship and it wasgenerally acknowledged that the contentwas directly channeled to Helen from thesource who called himself Jesus.

A U.S. copyright was granted to theFoundation for Inner Peace, which pub-lished the set in 1975. But that wasn’t thefirst copy of ACIM to see print. Copies ofACIM had been previously disseminatedand in April of 2004, that caused a feder-al court to void the 1975 copyright, put-ting ACIM into public domain. How thecourt came to see that evidence is part ofour story.

How it came to beAfter nearly seven years of laborious tran-scription, Helen and Bill had a finishedmanuscript that up till then had been seenby only a few acquaintances.

In 1973, copies of that manuscript

were given to more people, includingHugh Lynn Casey, the son of the late psy-chic, Edgar Cayce. Others who receivedcopies included a co-worker, a fellowpsychologist named Kenneth Wapnick, aCatholic priest and another friend. All ofthem were similarly impressed with thework. In 1975 A Course in Miracles waspublished in three hardcover volumes: a622 page Text, a 478-page Workbook forStudents and an 88-page Manual forTeachers.

The original publishers were twofriends of Helen and Bill named Judithand Robert Skutch. They published theCourse through the Foundation for InnerPeace and there was no author credited.Helen and Bill were reluctant to be iden-tified with the Course because of concernover what some of their colleagues in thescientific community might think.

The Course became known as a self-study curriculum that could help the stu-dent shift or change perception of the

How Jesus Got His Copyright Back

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world. Teaching that cause was withinrather than without and that a connec-tion with the energy of the universe,love, would manifest miracle-minded-ness, ACIM flourished and propagatedaround the world. By 1999 there wereabout 1.5 million copies in print andthousands of study groups.

ACIM cannot accurately bedescribed as a movement or a cult orreligion: there was and is no titularhead or organization, though many ofits better-known students wrote booksand became closely associated with it.Oprah mentioned it often and authorMarianne Williamson and others wroteabout it freely in best-selling books.Ministers and clerics quoted it in ser-mons while others, notably fundamen-talists, criticized it as “new age.”

Its proliferation and recognition ledto its increased stature. Willis Harman,a scholar and Regent of the Universityof California, professor at Stanford andmajor player at the highly respectedStanford Research Institute said of it,“A Course in Miracles comprises per-haps the most important writing in theEnglish language since the translationof the Bible.” That feeling was sharedby many scholars and students of theCourse.

In the early years, the Foundationfor Inner Peace, the original copyrightholders, had a very laissez-faire atti-tude toward reprinting or citing pas-sages from the Course. That suited stu-dents and groups using it in their mate-rials. In 1999, nearly 25 years after ini-tial publication, the copyright changedhands and became owned by KennethWapnick and his Foundation for ACourse in Miracles (FACIM). Thingschanged.

In 1999, Wapnick sent letters refus-ing permission for a number of ACIMstudy groups to publish excerpts fromthe work. This had been unheard of in

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the past and what followed was asAmerican as apple pie: lawsuits.

The Omaha AnglesThe stated motivation for studying theCourse is peace. To find peace, forgive-ness or changing our perception of thevalues we place on things of the materialworld is necessary. It was ironic then, thatin 1999 the new owners of the ACIMcopyright, FACIM, Wapnick and his wifeGloria, became embroiled in a con-tentious lawsuit with a community inWisconsin known as the EndeavorAcademy, comprised of longtime studentsof ACIM. Here were two proponents of acourse of study that teaches peace and isbelieved to be channeled from the Princeof Peace Himself and they were actinganything but peaceful.

What transpired was that in April of2004, a Federal judge set aside the copy-right that had been granted to Foundationfor Inner Peace back in 1975. A Course inMiracles entered the public domain.Omaha attorney Tom Whitmore was amajor energy leading to that historic rul-ing. He and the group he formed to furtherthe free use of ACIM have also beeninvolved in litigation with the Wapnicksand FACIM.

Shift happensWhitmore began studying the Course in1992.

“It was the bookstore angels that didit. I was in Pegasus Bookstore one day,browsing,” said Whitmore. “I was in thespirituality section and the thing basicallyfell off the shelf and landed on my foot. Idon’t recall if that’s literally true but I’vetold the story so many times now that itseems like it is. I didn’t know anythingabout the Course nor had I ever evenheard of it.

“The book was wrapped in plastic likea Penthouse or something and I bought it.I brought it home and I opened it to theintroduction and I read that first para-graph and it just seized me.”

A Creighton graduate and a practicingattorney in Omaha since the mid-70s,Whitmore recognized the importance ofaccess to the material contained in ACIM.Groups had used parts of it in teaching foryears.

“When the Course first came out, [theoriginal publishers] were allowing peopleto publish excerpts from it and artists touse phrases and so on,” Whitmore added.

Things changed when the copyrightshifted from the Skutch’s Foundation forInner Peace. It’s a murky story why thathappened in the first place.

“The story put out to the world wasthat Judy and Robert Skutch were gettingon in years and it was time to pass thetorch to the next generation. At least, thatwas the way they spun it,” Whitmorerecounted. “But I believe there was someinfighting going on. Gloria and KenWapnick were agitating for tighter controlof the Course and tighter enforcement ofcopyright. I’ve heard from insiders thatSkutch basically just threw her hands upand said, ‘You guys do it. I’m not going tohave any part of this.’ That is what Iunderstand.

“And that resulted in commercializa-tion of the Course. As soon as Wapnicksgot control of the copyright, they enteredthis multimillion-dollar contract withPenguin Books for publishing and

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Penguin began a campaign to proselytizethe Course in the world.

“Gradually [FACIM and Wapnicks]began to tighten the process until evenwhat we consider fundamental fair usewas restricted,” Whitmore said.

Contention escalated into theinevitable lawsuit. A fateful demonstra-tion of pride started the ball rolling.

Oops!“It’s a series of lawsuits, really,”explained Whitmore. “One was brought[against] the New Christian Church ofFull Endeavor in Wisconsin Dells, Wis.,also known as the Endeavor Academy.

“Endeavor is a Course-based commu-nity. They have residential facilities andwhat I would call graduates of that resi-dential program who are out in the com-munity and have jobs but are still centeredaround the Academy.

“Endeavor printed materials fromACIM to help with teaching programs.For example, they took lessons from theWorkbook and printed them in bookletswith places for notes. They have doneteaching videos, audiotapes and printedmaterial.

“They had done a printing that con-tained extensive ACIM quotations andteachings around that material. Theyweren’t selling it or anything. They weregiving it away to their students.

“One day, they proudly sent a copy offto Wapnick at FACIM. It was ironic in away, because they really just wanted toshow him the kind of work they weredoing. That was apparently the wrongthing to do because when Wapnickreceived it, he turned around and suedthem for copyright infringement. That isthe beginning of the litigations.”

Part 2:The ghost of Rosemary Woods or theCase of the Lost TapesPart of the contention of the EndeavorAcademy legal team was that A Course inMiracles is the word and teaching ofJesus and therefore, as channeled infor-mation, is public domain. Although somecase law supports that contention, itturned out not to be the strongest argu-ment.

The word of Jesus wasn’t enough butdivine intervention may have played apart.

To challenge the copyright, EndeavorAcademy eventually chose to assert thatthe copyright should be voided since somany copies of the Course had been dis-seminated in various forms prior to copy-right filing. At least four versions existedand were distributed without restrictionbefore the first 1975 copyrighted edition.One of the reasons Endeavor chose thatdefense was because of the discovery ofsome compelling evidence.

“That [it was channeled] was thethrust of Endeavor’s defense in the begin-ning,” Whitmore said. “They thought thatwas a pretty good argument. I don’t wantto claim credit for putting the winningargument in their hands because I thinkthey had it before. I do suppose I wouldclaim that I had influence on them focus-ing more energy on that prior publicationissue than they had previously. When theyhad the summary judgment hearing in2002, the judge threw out all claims otherthan the premature publication claim andleft that one issue for trial.”

That turned out to be the key legalpoint and it wouldn’t have worked but fortwo crucial pieces of evidence. One wasthe prior copy given to Hugh Lynn Cayce,now called the HLC text, two years beforethe 1975 copyright.

“Without naming names,” Whitmoredemurred, “one of the publications of the

Course that was a cornerstone of JudgeSweet’s opinion that the material hadalready gotten into the public domain wasa complete copy of the Course, all threevolumes, that Bill Thetford had sent toHugh Lynn Cayce at the Cayce Institutein Virginia Beach, Va. in 1973. That three-volume set ended up in the library at theCayce Institute where the public couldview it.

“In 1999, a person, or persons,unknown went to that library and with-drew the only remaining volume, the Textportion; took it to a Kinko’s, copied it andbrought it back,” Whitmore revealed.“Some say it was done without theapproval or knowledge of the librarian onduty; some say otherwise. Nevertheless, acopy of the Hugh Lynn Cayce text gotinto the hands of some people who tran-scribed it and put it on the internet.”

To recap the madcap path of miracletexts“The first version, of course, was thehandwritten steno books that Helen wrotedown herself [publication 1],” Whitmorerelated. “From her dictation of those,Thetford typed a triplicate carbon set.That transcription of 2000 pages is calledthe Urtext [publication 2]. That was sub-jected to some editing by Bill and Helencorrecting grammar and such. That Urtextis now lodged in the Copyright Office andDr. Wapnick claims, I believe, personalcopyright on that material as ‘Schucman’sunpublished notes.’

“From that Urtext, Thetford addedheadings and chapter breaks and editedout a lot of the personal material. Hebound that in what are often called ‘thesisbindings’ and he sent a copy like that toHugh Lynn Cayce. That is known as theHugh Lynn Cayce (HLC) version [publi-cation 3]. I think there were about six peo-

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ple, including two at Columbia, who gotit.

“The copy retrieved from the Caycelibrary and submitted for evidence wasone of those typewritten versions. I have aphotocopy of that original version. That isthe version posted on the internet inDecember of 1999.

“When Wapnick got his copy of theHLC version back in 1973, he said toSchucman that it seemed rough and sheagreed. So they did some editing on thatone. That edited version became the so-called “Nun’s Version” [publication 4]because it was retyped by Maryknollnuns. That was the version that wasphoto-reduced and published as theCriswell edition [publication 5]. It wasnamed such after the woman who helpedget it printed. That version was the firstone that had a notation of copyright on it.”

The copyright Wapnick eventuallyacquired in 1999 was based on the 1975copyright application submitted by theSkutch’s and the Foundation for InnerPeace for that Criswell printing. In thelawsuit, Wapnick, with supporting testi-mony from Judith Skutch, maintained thatthe earlier versions prior to the 1975printing were working manuscripts thatexisted only in a small number.

Judged Judy and the smoking tapesEstablishing that there were previouslydistributed copies of ACIM floatingaround long before the 1975 version wasa crucial part of the Endeavor Academy’sdefense. The copy of that HLC text wasimportant for that. But an even more com-pelling piece of evidence seemed to sealthe deal. An audiotape was discoveredthat held the voice of Judith Skutch froma lecture she delivered sometime in the1970s.

“We had already begun to assist the

Endeavor Academy on their legal case,”recounted Whitmore. “An interestingstory that involves an important piece ofevidence involves Joy Steadman fromOmaha. She was a member of our group,A Course in Miracles Society, and shewas traveling to visit her sister in Arizona.She stopped at a friend’s house, a fellowCourse student, in Santa Fe.

“She learned that one of the peoplethere, a fellow named Lee, had recorded aJudy Skutch presentation about theCourse in Miracles back in the middle1970s, when the ink was still wet. Leerecalled that in that presentation Skutchhad talked about all the enthusiastic copy-ing and distribution of the Course prior tothe time the Criswell text had been print-ed. Now, realize, that is an importantpoint about prior distribution.

“Lee thought he had a copy of thattape. Well, after a few days, he went look-ing and found it.

“On that tape, you hear Judy Skutcharound 1977 saying, ‘Oh, yeah! We print-

ed hundreds of copies of that thing. That’swhy we had to print the Criswell becausethe demand was so strong for it we could-n’t keep up with it at the Xerox machine.Can you imagine a nickel a page?’ Thecourt hearing her own voice saying thatwas a pretty persuasive piece of evidencefor Judge Sweet that there had been priorunrestricted distribution.

“Lee, the man from Arizona, traveledto New York to authenticate it and thatwas important. In court depositions,Skutch claimed that it was just ‘salestalk,’ hyperbole.

“You know, the story of this legalaction is full of miracles. Finding thattape was one of them,” Whitmore smiled.

The Omaha beefWhitmore received a copy of the earlyHLC text.

“I didn’t know what it was when I gotit. I eventually opened it and saw how dif-

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“The Course is a spiritual textand it’s the primary spiritual text

for a growing component of oursociety. I foresee the day when itwill be of the same stature in the

world as the Koran or the Bible orany religious text of that sort.

You ought to be able to quote it,translate it into as many

languages as wanted and peopleought to be able to use it and

benefit from it.”

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ferent it was from the popular 2nd editionthat is in bookstores that I had been study-ing for 10 years or so,” Whitmore said.

“In the first four chapters [the HLCtext] contained 25% more material thanthe [bookstore] editions. Some of it waspretty significant to me. Some was subtleand some changes in emphasis andnuance and some of it was absolutechange in meaning.

“I thought, ‘We need to get this out.’So we created a non-profit corporation.There were a lot of collaborators in thisprocess. We had people on four continentsin the group, called Course in MiraclesSociety.

“By spring of 2000, we took the inter-net version of the HLC text and had itreproduced in print form, easier to dealwith than an electronic file and we pub-lished it as the Jesus’ Course in Miracles(JCIM). It was bound and contained theentire HLC 31 chapters plus an appendixthat compared the HLC version to thepublished [bookstore] 2nd edition.”

Of course, publishing that versionopened Whitmore and his group to legalinteraction with Wapnick and FACIM.

“We printed 1500 and within a coupleweeks had mailed about 500 to peoplewho wanted it and then were hit by aninjunction and had to stop.

“Two things happened. When we pub-lished, we filed a lawsuit in Federal courtin Omaha seeking a declaratory judgmentthat the copyright was invalid and unen-forceable, which would permit us to con-tinue our publication. Four days later,FACIM, Dr. Wapnick’s organization, fileda lawsuit against us in Louisville, Ky.,where one of the directors resided, claim-ing an infringement on their copyright. Sowe had these Federal court cases pending.They prevailed on the judge in Louisvilleto issue an injunction prohibiting us from

distributing pending this litigation.Eventually they got the Nebraska casetransferred to Louisville.

“Our case is still pending but we’re onthe cusp of settlement. We have a settle-ment agreement in our hands that hasbeen verbally agreed upon between thetwo sides. It hasn’t been executed yet. Theterms will have to remain confidentialunder the agreement itself but it willallow us to resume publication.

“The outcome of our case has beendictated by the setting aside of the copy-right. And because [the Endeavor] casewas further along than ours, we kind ofput the brakes on our case and focusedour energy on assisting with their case,providing them with the witnesses we hadand the information that we had.”

Judged WapnickAfter FACIM gained control of theCourse copyright, it seemed to becomelike any other book. Course studentsdon’t think of ACIM like that.

“It’s the commercialization of it.[FACIM] treat it like a bag of Fritos™and then they try to put a copyright on thematerial and then put a trademark on thename, of all things,” continued Whitmore.“They are trying to trademark the title ofthe book. That’s the last part of theEndeavor Academy suit that still has to bedecided, the validity of that trademark. Ithink that will be thrown out, too.

“It’s the proper name of a book andcase says you cannot copyright a propername like that unless it has gained sec-ondary meaning for the works of theauthor. Nobody associates A Course inMiracles with FACIM, the seekers of thetrademark. Ask the man on street whoKen Wapnick is and they won’t know.And if you ask them to name a personthey associate with A Course in Miraclesthey’ll probably say Oprah or MarianneWilliamson rather than the foundations or

individuals involved in them. So I thinkthey have a pretty impossible task of try-ing to show secondary meaning.”

Students of the Course believe its con-tent should be free to reprint. Whitmoreexplained the importance of this landmarkcopyright decision.

“People like to quote the Bible andthey like to quote extensively from it,”Whitmore pointed out. “The Course is aspiritual text and it’s the primary spiritualtext for a growing component of our soci-ety. I foresee the day when it will be of thesame stature in the world as the Koran orthe Bible or any religious text of that sort.You ought to be able to quote it, translateit into as many languages as wanted andpeople ought to be able to use it and ben-efit from it.”

And the Omaha version of theCourse?

“They’re here in Omaha, under lockand key. When the court dismisses thecase we’ll release them,” Whitmoreasserted. “We’ve got people wantingthem.”

“All things work together for good.”– Text, Chapter 4If Wapnick’s lawsuits and restrictions onthe use of the words in A Course inMiracles had not happened now, the sta-tus quo (i.e., somewhat limited andallowed use of ACIM content, done witha wink and a nod but no officially grantedfreedom) may have continued for years.Who knows? Years down the road, ifrestrictions and lawsuits materializedthen, perhaps no copies of previouslypublished versions of the text or dustyaudiocassettes may have existed.Defendants in any lawsuit then may haveclaimed prior publication, but withoutevidence, it would have been hard toprove. Now it’s done. Jesus got his copy-right back.

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