"We're using the Christian Science Lessons as our study guide for the month."

"Reality is the last subject for March. We agreed to work on other subjects in that context — like the reality of man, the reality of substance and so on."

"I haven't started getting into the Lessons yet but I've spent time at a couple of reading rooms."

"How was it?"

"The librarians showed me the periodicals."

"It's a great place to study and pray."

"One of them was — but the other, well, two people were arguing ...."

"About what?"

"Some religious point I didn't understand. One of them finally pulled rank on the other one and shut her up. Like ' How long have you been coming to church?'."

"Well, the study of Science is fraught with difficulties."

"One thing someone told me when I got started in Science was not to pay a lot of attention to people at church. Often it's the crazed and the ill who come to church looking for healing. It's like an emergency room and those who can manage some scientific presence are the doctors."

"And let's face it — today's doctor may be among the crazed and the ill tomorrow — wouldn't he like to have a healing embrace?"

"Church is always problematic when seen as a dualistic concept — in other words when it's seen as material. Even if we partake of it at that level it's a good idea to keep the divine idea of it firmly in place."

"Did anyone have something from the Lesson on Man?"

"Why are we still using ' man' as a subject? I mean, it's time to use 'individual' or 'person' or 'being'."

"Yeah, it can be off putting to a newcomer, particularly a woman, but we're kind of trapped by agreed on terminology in Science. In Mrs. Eddy's own lingo 'man' is the divine idea — male and female. The words ' human' and ' person' are reserved for the supposed amalgamation of a mortal and a divine idea."

"We should be putting Science and Health in our own words anyway. If we can't do that, we aren't getting it."

"Here's something about Enoch: 'By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God' (Heb 11: 5). He walked with God ' is how it's put in Genesis, so pleasing God seems to be about putting Science into action in our lives, resulting in ascension."

"In reality that's where we are already. Here's a correlative passage from Science and Health: 'The scientific unity which exists between God and man must be wrought out in life-practice, and God's will must be universally done' (S&H 202: 3-5). We realize our unity, bring it out in our lives and see it reflected everywhere. Our universe is then the real one and not just a dualistic fantasy."

"I'd like a little help on relationships."

"In what way?""First of all, I get panicky just thinking about them — particularly when it's romantic, but even if there's just a situation with a good friend."

"Use what Jesus said: 'Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid' (John 14: 27)."

"Let's try to discern the Science of relationships. Mrs. Eddy showed us a way to get there, even if she didn't demonstrate it well in her own life."

"She had lots of relationships!"

"I'm talking intimate. Two dead husbands and a philanderer — sons, natural and adopted, who were problems. Everyone else basically worshipful, calling her ' Mother'."

"Well, there was Sarah Bagley."

"Ah yes — but with that possible exception, it was a strange, duty driven life. Poor lady."

"Okay but back to the Science — what can we do to live the Science she sacrificed so much for?"

"Let's take the synonyms. Each one of us, as reflection of God, is living out from the synonyms for God. "

"Also from the Lesson here's something: 'Man and woman as coexistent and eternal with God forever reflect, in glorified quality, the infinite Father-Mother God' (S&H 516: 21-23)."

"Good. But we have to somehow transcend the archetypes. Man and woman are archetypes — they're concepts of reality."

"Substitute penis and vagina!"

"They're concepts too! "

"But enough off track to bring out fresh thinking."

"What are you seeing?"

"I'm trying to get beyond men and women to the basic idea. We're all man-woman, so it's not a case of men are this and women are that. We're all infinite this and that."

"How about time-space as infinite vagina and its content as infinite penis?"

"Infinite vagina: no one prizes that!"

"No, but infinite penis! Every guy's dream."

"I don't get what we're doing?"

"We're trying to get at the underlying idea in relationships. This vision of infinite man-woman or penis-vagina could be brought to bear in any activity or thought to bring out that we're already there — already at the end of a process, because in infinity everything already interpenetrates with everything else."

"You said you were going to use the synonyms."

"Okay. There's only one Mind and we're all ideas of that same Mind. We're one. Spirit makes and keeps us perfect. Soul is our infinite individuality. We're governed by Principle, lived by Life, manifested through Truth. Love is a word for our interpenetration, the ultimate truth of God-man and man-man. Thus relationship is the greatest calling upon humans, to bring some semblance of the divine to earth."

"You could use this idea with sex, right?"

"Sure. Anything."

"Prop 8?"

"Yes.. We're already there attending the divine marriage. Matter must conform."

"I just thought of something about specific relationships. We interpenetrate with everyone everywhere, alive or dead. In that sense I have a relationship with everyone. So how do I find a specific relationship anchored in heaven? I'd say it's through Soul. At the absolute level we relate specifically because each one of us is an individual idea of God. We don't just interpenetrate in a generic way — it's unique, specific.""Did you all see the articles in the Economist about 'gendercide'? A hundred million baby girls have been aborted or even killed after birth in Asia. "

"What's going on?"

"It's tradition and economics."

"Like what?"

"A male is going to take care of the parents in old age while a female will marry and disappear into another family. She'll also have to arrive with a dowry. Plus the Chinese one-child policy is aggravating the problem."

"We need to value the feminine in our work."

"Present thinking is that the problem will lessen as Asian countries get social security and safety net policies in place, but that could be a long time. South Korea is already on the road to balance in birth figures as the economy grows and modernizes."

"Did you send the Eve Ensler clip to the webmaster?"

"Yes. I'll ask her to put it up."

"What is it?"

"She wrote the "Vagina Monologues"and her clip is about honoring our girl."

"It's so strange that the East seems locked in this sexist, murderous dynamic while in the West women are making such progress."

"I had no idea it was so linked to economics. Our treatment needs to take that into account."

"Anything else?"

"I like this quote from the Lesson: 'The Lamb's wife presents the unity of male and female as no longer two wedded individuals, but as two individual natures in one; and this compounded spiritual individuality reflects God as Father-Mother, not as a corporeal being. In this divinely united spiritual consciousness, there is no impediment to eternal bliss, — to the perfectibility of God's creation (S&H 577: 4-11).' It's Mrs. Eddy's final word on the notion of males and females. And the separation of God from man. It's all one being."

"Let's think of a topic for next month."

"I've been working on blockages to healing. It's a Course in Miracles idea."

"Something like that for the topic?"

"It works for me. I'm reading Wayne Dyer's new book about excuses."

"We've been using the Lessons as study guides. Shall we continue?"

"We could use the last Lesson topic for April as our topic. Let's see. Oops, Probation After Death. Uh, maybe a little bit of a downer."

"We die daily."

"Fine. By removing the blockages to healing."

"So put it in a word."

"Unblocking."

"That's it then — Unblocking."