A Course in Life

Gattuso (A Course in Love) recounts a lifelong journey in search of the ""Universal Principles"" that were ""the underpinnings of all great spiritual thought."" Questioning her original Roman Catholicism, studying many religions and finally becoming a Unity minister, she found 12 ""Spiritual Laws"": faith, divine purpose, consciousness, vision, joy, power, love, wisdom, non-attachment, abundance, forgiveness and life. Gattuso seems to have found her philosophical home in the book A Course in Miracles. Punctuated by many quotes from a wide variety of religious sources, this effort offers yet another retelling of the tenets of the Course in everyday terms. But the simpler language does not always clarify the Course's message. A major theme running throughout the book is summed up by Gattuso's claim that ""Whatever it is that you truly desire, from a healing of your soul to your perfect home, from a new face to a new car, inwardly develop the consciousness for it and it shall be yours."" She so oversimplifies spiritual work that readers may wind up blaming themselves for being unable to make their lives perfect and problem-free by following spiritual principles. Curiously, it's only near book's end that Gattuso lets on that she suffered uterine cancer and a six-year battle with the IRS after she had discovered and begun living the principles she espouses. It is only here that she describes the useful art of forgiveness and the power we have to say ""no"" to the negativity we do not want. Alas, this smidgen of good-natured realism comes too late to make this work anything more than an unremarkable addition to the ever-growing Course collection. One Spirit Book Club selection. (Mar.)