by Beverly McNeff
“Vision already holds a replacement for everything you think you see now. Loveliness can light your images, and so transform them that you will love them, even though they were made of hate. For you will not be making them alone.” (W-23.4)
The power of A Course in Miracles is its focus on hope and healing in a world of such division. It reminds us that no matter how much pain and suffering we may be personally experiencing or how dangerous we feel our world is right now, “vision already holds a replacement for everything” we think we are going through. It tells us that the power of God’s love is far greater than the hate of this world or of those in power, because God’s love pulls us all together in truth. A world of hate, attack, fear, and grievances cannot stand in the face of love.
When I was reading the above thought from workbook lesson 23, a movie that came out in 2016, Collateral Beauty, popped into my mind. The movie starred Will Smith, and even though critics panned it, I found some collateral beauty in it. The film follows a man (Smith) who copes with his daughter’s passing by writing letters to time, death, and love. Without giving the movie’s plot away, I will say that time, death, and love come to him in the form of people, leading to some interesting conversations.
Most of us have heard the term “collateral damage,” which is associated with deaths, injuries, or other damage inflicted on unintentional targets. This movie, however, asks us to look for the collateral beauty in tragedy rather than the damage, much the same way as A Course in Miracles describes vision in the quote above.
“Vision already holds a replacement for everything you think you see now.”
This type of vision can light our darkened images and replace them with loveliness and hope. Many of us may have experienced devastating events in our lives, but the Course reminds us that the potential for a transformed vision is here and now. We can see the loveliness we are promised because that is God’s will for us. His loving presence in our lives makes this transformation not only possible but inevitable. We must want this awareness, though, more than we want the devastation.
I have often said that I am a fatalist; according to the Course, our fate is already preordained: we will lovingly awaken to our oneness with God and each other in the awareness of heaven. I think that’s a pretty good fate. The Course would say this has already been accomplished, for it could never be otherwise. Our awakening, however, is necessary. Therefore, a new vision that can see past the darkness and despair must be wanted and valued more. We must be willing to look at the despair we now see, join with the power of love, and look through it to its loveliness, to its collateral beauty, to the miracle.
“This world is full of miracles. They stand in shining silence next to every dream of pain and suffering, of sin and guilt.” (T-28.II.12)
The Course is telling us that fear and suffering will be undone because miracles, the antidote to the suffering of the world, are available to us now. Nature can mirror the truth. Often, you will find the cure for a poison growing next to it. For example, the California Mugwort plant often grows near poison oak and has historically been used to treat allergic reactions to the poison. If it is natural in nature for the problem and the solution to grow side by side, it can be natural in our minds too. The miracle we need right now from the pain, suffering, guilt, or fear we are facing is “standing in shining silence” next to them. The choice is whether we will want the answer, the collateral beauty and healing that is all around us.
This idea was also reflected in a scene in the movie in which Death (played by Helen Mirren) sits next to a young woman named Madeleine in a hospital waiting room. Madeleine is there because her child is dying from a rare form of cancer. Madeleine doesn’t realize she is sitting next to Death and sees her only as an older woman. Death asks why she’s there, and after Madeleine explains, Death suggests she become aware of the collateral beauty all around her. As Madeleine recalls the older woman’s comments, she says they were not just niceties but seemed to carry a deep inner knowing that inspired and comforted her. Madeleine still went through the pain of her daughter’s passing, but with a reassured sense and an awareness of the collateral beauty that surrounded her.
The sense I have always felt from the Course is that everything is going to be okay, much like a wise parent comforts a child upset about a childish problem that the parent knows will pass. I guess this is why I have always liked the passages in the Course that remind us of the unfailing support and comfort God is extending out to us:
“If you knew Who walks beside you on the way that you have chosen, fear would be impossible.” (T-18.III.3)
“His care for me is infinite, and is with me forever.” (W-58)
“My Father supports me, protects me, and directs me in all things. I am eternally blessed.” (W-58)
“God goes with me wherever I go.” (W-41)
The Course tells us that we will continue to make our journeys without distance to a goal that never changes, but we do not take these journeys alone. The Answer, the Helper of God’s Love, is always with us. No matter if our path is a painful, rocky one, one that is slightly irritating, or outright enraging, Love walks with us. God goes with us wherever we go, God supports, protects, and directs us in all things, and because of this, there is nothing to fear. Our focus now needs to be on the collateral beauty, the miracle next to every cause of suffering.
For the past ten years in this country, fear, attack, revenge, and hate have been normalized. This country’s current leaders have promoted wars, threats, and isolationism. Shouts of separation and fear have drowned out calls for unity and healing. Focusing on the “other” as being responsible for our problems aligns with the ego’s doctrine of “seek but do not find.” The more we look outside of ourselves for the solution to our problems, the more the solution will elude us. Therefore, it behooves us not to make the same error we see being made.
If we project our own anger onto those who we see as attacking us or others, we will miss the answers, the collateral beauty, the miracles that are all around us. To truly lift our minds to the healing solution of God, which is being held out for us, we must remember the Course’s early workbook lesson: “My attack thoughts are attacking my invulnerability.” (W-26) If we want to feel the strength God is holding out to us, then we must act from our invulnerability. Attacking back proves we are vulnerable, but a focus on love, unity, and joy proves our strength. Once we believe it, we will see it.
The “No Kings” rallies and peaceful protests for unity in the face of outrageous acts by ICE and this current administration have created some incredible collateral beauty. The third and most recent nationwide “No Kings” rally took place on March 28, 2026, and it was estimated that a combined 9 million people participated in over 3,300 events across all 50 U.S. states and dozens of countries. This followed roughly 5 million peaceful demonstrators in June 2025 and 7 million in October 2025.
In the 60s and 70s, marches to protect civil rights and equal rights were often marred by violence, but this movement seems different. As one MDC subscriber, Sandy who lives in Bellingham, Washington, wrote:
“I’ve been resting on my activist laurels for a long time. I’m so grateful to get to know the women, men, and children who are taking action to make sure all people are safe. It’s so different than it was forty years ago when I marched. The dominant motivation today is LOVE and I say WOW.”
Another subscriber, Bonnie, who lives in Michigan, attended her first rally in March. She had been afraid to attend one before, but the safe and joyful atmosphere was nourishing to her soul. She wrote:
“I attended the ‘No Kings’ rally in Farmington Hills, and a friend joined me. I am part of the ‘Red, Wine, and Blue Network,’ which is a sisterhood of diverse communities working to change the world together while having lots of fun! It was so inspiring, and I am so glad I attended. I’m not afraid anymore.”
Our MDC staff attended a local rally in Southern California, and the joy and the sense of joining were palpable. We may not know what to do in this world, but there is One within us that does. Joining together for a common purpose of healing, peace, and joy can move us to new insight and awareness.
These are the moments of unity we need to focus on, the collateral beauty in the midst of chaos. The Course reminds us, “the ego is chaos.” (T-14.X.5) It further explains that finding moments of healing and beauty within the chaos of the world means we are not lost in the ego and that more than an ego is within us. We can arise in the strength that will sustain us. In many ways, the emerging isolationist ideas are a call to our awakening. It is time for us to be as vigilant for God and His Kingdom as we have been in the past for the ego’s dictates.
In the Course, darkness is synonymous with the illusion, while truth is associated with light – not necessarily physical light, but the awareness of truth in every situation. Light has the power to pierce the ego’s illusion of lies and show us the collateral beauty, the miracle, that is always present. Transforming darkness and fear is possible, but we must finally be willing to look at the darkness of the ego’s illusory world of pain and suffering and, through it, to the light. We are not denying the world we believe in, but we are asking for the help of the gift God has given us in the Holy Spirit to lead the way, using our actions to bless the world. As workbook lesson 353 beautifully says,
“My eyes, my tongue, my hands, my feet today
have but one purpose; to be given Christ
to use to bless the world with miracles.”
The world and all its chaotic happenings can be changed from destruction to release. According to the Course this it the way the Holy Spirit uses the defenses we have made on behalf of truth and our release.
“Light cannot enter darkness when a mind believes in darkness, and will not let it go. Truth does not struggle against ignorance, and love does not attack fear. What needs no protection does not defend itself. Defense is of your making. God knows it not. The Holy Spirit uses defenses on behalf of truth only because you made them against it. …Defenses, like everything you made, must be gently turned to your own good, translated by the Holy Spirit from means of self-destruction to means of preservation and release.” (T.14.VII.5)
The Holy Spirit will work at the level of our understanding to lift us to a healed awareness. Whatever challenge we face, whether it be a health issue or a global conflict, the Holy Spirit can “translate” the defenses that keep us separate and alone into a means of “preservation and release.” This is possible because we are not alone. A mighty companion travels with us, and, if we are willing, helps us to access a vision that will replace our pain with peace.
“He [the Holy Spirit] will reinterpret all you see, and all occurrences, each circumstance, and every happening that seems to touch on you in any way from His one frame of reference, wholly unified and sure. And you will see the love beyond the hate, the constancy in change, the pure in sin, and only Heaven’s blessing on the world.” (W-151.11)
Let us be open to the collateral beauty that is all around and allow the Holy Spirit to give us a vision that will replace everything we think we see with loveliness.
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