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 FIP registered a copyright (Reg. No. A 805255) for the Course on August 2, 1976, listing the author as "Anonymous" with unknown words following whited out ("Manual for Teachers" only). On July 17, 1992, FIP obtained copyright registration (No. TX 32 377 899) for the second edition of the Course, listing as author "Anonymous (Helen Schucman)."

FIP was not always diligent in its enforcement of its copyright, as the following excerpt from the December 1992 Article states:

The promulgation of "A Course in Miracles" was left to the Holy Spirit and obviously did not need our help, nor anyone else's.

Our trusting attitude carried over to our enforcement of the Course's copyright, and so for approximately six years we maintained a very liberal stance regarding permission to quote from the Course. Our lenience also reflected in part our feeling that very few people would be interested in "A Course in Miracles" because of the profound nature of its teachings. There seemed little reason to carefully scrutinize all published Course references when for so many years the material remained relatively unknown, without widespread acceptance.

One result of our lax policy was the appearance of a number of abridgements and poetic compilations of passages excerpted from the Course. In fact, these directly contravened Jesus' very specific instructions to Helen that the three books should never be separated from each other, nor should any of the material appear out of context in abridged form. The Course's curriculum is by its very nature an integrated and self-contained one. Therefore, any attempts to abridge or "short cut" the process of teaching and learning forgiveness could only