1. It is impossible to use one relationship at the expense of another and not to suffer guilt. 2And it is equally impossible to condemn part of a relationship and find peace within it. 3Under the Holy Spirit’s teaching all relationships are seen as total commitments, yet they do not conflict with one another in any way. 4Perfect faith in each one, for its ability to satisfy you completely, arises only from perfect faith in yourself. 5And this you cannot have while guilt remains. 6And there will be guilt as long as you accept the possibility, and cherish it, that you can make a brother into what he is not, because you would have him so.
2. You have so little faith in yourself because you are unwilling to accept the fact that perfect love is in you. 2And so you seek without for what you cannot find without. 3I offer you my perfect faith in you, in place of all your doubts. 4But forget not that my faith must be as perfect in all your brothers as it is in you, or it would be a limited gift to you. 5In the holy instant we share our faith in God’s Son because we recognize, together, that he is wholly worthy of it, and in our appreciation of his worth we cannot doubt his holiness. 6And so we love him.
3. All separation vanishes as holiness is shared. 2For holiness is power, and by sharing it, it gains in strength. 3If you seek for satisfaction in gratifying your needs as you perceive them, you must believe that strength comes from another, and what you gain he loses. 4Someone must always lose if you perceive yourself as weak. 5Yet there is another interpretation of relationships that transcends the concept of loss of power completely.
4. You do not find it difficult to believe that when another calls on God for love, your call remains as strong. 2Nor do you think that when God answers him, your hope of answer is diminished. 3On the contrary, you are more inclined to regard his success as witness to the possibility of yours. 4That is because you recognize, however dimly, that God is an idea, and so your faith in Him is strengthened by sharing. 5What you find difficult to accept is the fact that, like your Father, you are an idea. 6And like Him, you can give yourself completely, wholly without loss and only with gain. 7Herein lies peace, for here there is no conflict.
5. In the world of scarcity, love has no meaning and peace is impossible. 2For gain and loss are both accepted, and so no one is aware that perfect love is in him. 3In the holy instant you recognize the idea of love in you, and unite this idea with the Mind that thought it, and could not relinquish it. 4By holding it within itself, there is no loss. 5The holy instant thus becomes a lesson in how to hold all of your brothers in your mind, experiencing not loss but completion. 6From this it follows you can only give. 7And this is love, for this alone is natural under the laws of God. 8In the holy instant the laws of God prevail, and only they have meaning. 9The laws of this world cease to hold any meaning at all. 10When the Son of God accepts the laws of God as what he gladly wills, it is impossible that he be bound, or limited in any way. 11In that instant he is as free as God would have him be. 12For the instant he refuses to be bound, he is not bound.
6. In the holy instant nothing happens that has not always been. 2Only the veil that has been drawn across reality is lifted. 3Nothing has changed. 4Yet the awareness of changelessness comes swiftly as the veil of time is pushed aside. 5No one who has not yet experienced the lifting of the veil, and felt himself drawn irresistibly into the light behind it, can have faith in love without fear. 6Yet the Holy Spirit gives you this faith, because He offered it to me and I accepted it. 7Fear not the holy instant will be denied you, for I denied it not. 8And through me the Holy Spirit gives it unto you, as you will give it. 9Let no need you perceive obscure your need of this. 10For in the holy instant you will recognize the only need the Sons of God share equally, and by this recognition you will join with me in offering what is needed.
7. It is through us that peace will come. 2Join me in the idea of peace, for in ideas minds can communicate. 3If you would give yourself as your Father gives His Self, you will learn to understand Selfhood. 4And therein is love’s meaning understood. 5But remember that understanding is of the mind, and only of the mind. 6Knowledge is therefore of the mind, and its conditions are in the mind with it. 7If you were not an idea, and nothing but an idea, you could not be in full communication with all that ever was. 8Yet as long as you prefer to be something else, or would attempt to be nothing else and something else together, you will not remember the language of communication, which you know perfectly.
8. In the holy instant God is remembered, and the language of communication with all your brothers is remembered with Him. 2For communication is remembered together, as is truth. 3There is no exclusion in the holy instant because the past is gone, and with it goes the whole basis for exclusion. 4Without its source exclusion vanishes. 5And this permits your Source, and that of all your brothers, to replace it in your awareness. 6God and the power of God will take Their rightful place in you, and you will experience the full communication of ideas with ideas. 7Through your ability to do this you will learn what you must be, for you will begin to understand what your Creator is, and what His creation is along with Him.