Category Busting

The experience of this book launch is teaching me some interesting lessons, and we're only just getting started. One of the biggest challenges involves the labeling of the book, which impacts on where it gets seen, reviewed, filed in bookstores, displayed, etc. Some thoughts.

• It's a Course/ACIM book, maybe, but it's really a Gospel of Thomas book, with introductions that provide the connections to the Course, the Christian tradition, and Gary Renard's work, so as soon as you limit it to the Course, it's stuck in a rut already. I now am starting to see readers who had NO previous background in either the Course or the Thomas Gospel.
• It's a Jesus book, undoubtedly, but the term is apt to be misunderstood, for reasons that should be obvious. They are the same reasons why Pursah in Gary Renard's books uses the term "J" instead of Jesus, namely avoiding the religious stereotypes associated with him, both positive and negative, so he can be appreciated in a new light.
  
• It's a religious book. Of course not, it has nothing to do with religion as the world commonly understands that term, as little as Jesus did. He was only framed for founding a religion by Paul and others who came after him, he had no such interest or intention.
• It's a truth book. Perhaps, but that's not a category anybody knows what to do with never mind how you slice it.
• It's a spiritual book. Well, that's a possibility. Spiritual, not religious as the fashionable phrase goes nowadays. Fine. The way I tend to explain the term is that spiritual for me connotes something that is about my relationship to the Divine, and not about anybody else's rules or concepts, let alonge anything moral or behavioral.
• It is a book that invites a new way of looking at Jesus, resting on the twin traditions of the Thomas Gospel and A Course In Miracles. It has a great picture of Jesus on the cover, which by the way is called "Teach Only Love," and was painted by Sam Augustin -- Personally I like this the best. For the picture, which has a total absence of Christian paraphernalia, and represents Jesus only as a presence of love and light, seems to be inviting people in regardless of any familiarity with either Thomas, or ACIM, or anything else along those lines. It seems to make the book jump in people's arms. Although undoubtedly some are also put off by it, if they have issues with Jesus. Tough luck on them.
• It's a book on non-dualism. A bit of a stretch really, for that is not the topic in any overt way, except that the teachings of the Course, and ultimately of Jesus, clearly are completely non-dualistic.
• It's a contemplative book. For sure. I think that is the whole purpose of the Thomas Gospel, to enter a dialog with Jesus and the thought system he represents, and to invite the reader in to contemplate these ideas for themselves, not to mention to turn around and apply them in their lives.

Preparations for a Booksigning Party

It all started with Sam painting the painting for the cover of my book, a painting which we titled: "Teach Only Love" with a quote from the Course. Sam is a Brooklyn resident, and a native of Haiti. A French ACIM (UCEM) study group we had for a few years, started in his basement/studio. I live in the Bronx myself. Somewhere along the line Isma, another Brooklyn resident offered to help organize a booksigning, not to mention Bernice (also from Brooklyn) who is also helping with the same.

Then I was on the phone with Sam and he told me that he has an artshow coming up with his work and some Haitian artists to raise money for Haiti in the aftermath of the storms--four hurricanes in a row. What organization to donate to? Enter my friend Peter (see www.tr-ac.net.com), who knows his way around in these things, and we selected Fonkoze. The artshow opens on 9/25/08, and from memory I thought that was the official publication date of my book, which however seems to actually be September 26th, but who cares. We're having the book signing party at the opening of the art show, organized as a fundraiser for Fonkoze. The event is at Artisan Gallery, owned by Mery, who is a native of Senegal. Mery and Sam were brought together by one Percy Thomas, who is quietly orchestrating various parts of the program.

So we are having a suitably international event, typical New York, the city where at last count some 120 languages are spoken. And the coming together of this event in a very serendipetous and spontaneous manner is one of those experiences which sometimes makes people say: "Only in New York!", though we should not forget that spontaneous living is really our birthright, regardless of where we live-even in New York-if we only get our egos out of the way. The pictures above are of Mery and Sam discussing the planning for the event on September 16th.