Join us in the comfort of your own home; take a few moments in your day wherever you are; to connect in silent prayer. Join us on Zoom and share the energy of united prayer in a very real way.
We will hold a vigil of prayer from 9am-9pm, holding the silence and sharing meditations throughout the day. Send us names to hold in prayer with you. It is our honour and privilege to connect with you in this powerful way.
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I trust in the evolutionary impulse of loving goodness In Unity, we describe faith as more than believing: It is an inner knowing. Charles Fillmore, our co-founder, taught that faith is our foundation, from which we experience our lives. Today, if we listen to all the news we may have faith in a declining economy, struggle, debt and lack. Not very inspiring or helpful, is it. How do we turn this around? Our practice in Unity is to spend time each day in prayer, meditation and silence. It is here we come to know God in a real and personal way, yet also active as a constant, unchanging and limitless energy. We ‘persevere in faith’ and practice. Why? Because as we make space for God-awareness and experience, we are changed and our lives change. It is a powerful process and one that blesses all of life. Truthfully – we have to start somewhere! Let us use our faculty of faith to tune in to the loving goodness of God. Trust that God is evident as an evolutionary impulse working through all of life, inviting us to awaken into our divinity, lived through our humanity. My lovely friend and Unity teacher, Isabel Compton, used to say, ‘we are being done’. I must admit I struggled with this idea at first. Now, when I let God as the impulse of loving goodness express through and as me, I begin to experience Life as an evolutionary impulse that is drawing all of life into a deeper awareness of oneness and wholeness. Life is changing everywhere. Let us see this change positively as evolution. Let us use our faith to tune into life as an evolutionary impulse of loving goodness working through us. Then we will show up in a way that others may know this too. How is the evolutionary impulse of loving goodness expressing through you? For as you seek it, you will find it. Enjoy the journey. I’d like to share something that happened the day after a Unity meditation on ‘Beauty’. I went out into the garden and lay down on the grass. I like to do this…I feel connected. I looked up at the sky. It was blue with big white clouds drifting slowly by. I noticed what looked like a ribbon of wispy cloud further up from the big clouds. It wasn’t moving….it was coloured, as if a piece had broken off from a rainbow. I watched it for about 5mins, entranced. Was I the only one to notice it? How many others were looking up at the sky at this moment. The colours started to fade. I felt wonder, gratitude but also sadness that this world which has so many beautiful gifts, is so often taken for granted and so often unseen. I closed my eyes for a second or two and it was gone. Rosie, online
Myrtle Fillmore, Unity co-founder who experienced self-healing through affirmative prayer and an awakened mind used to say, ‘what about the children?’ She herself was a teacher and recognised the importance of educating our young ones with positive thoughts about themselves, their lives and the potential within them.
To help our children, we begin with ourselves. Both Charles and Myrtle Fillmore realised that when we change our thinking we are changed. In my words, when we allow ourselves to be changed by the infinite power of Divine Grace, Love and Wisdom, we awaken to who we are and live from our awakened potential. This is why Unity was originally called, ‘Unity School of Practical Christianity’. Using the practice of affirmations, prayer, silence and meditation, as Jesus did, we are all encouraged to practice going within to discover our experience of God and how this energy works through us to serve us and our world. Charles and Myrtle knew the importance of education in the original way it was intended: to drawout of the student the innate wisdom and understanding that lies within. With all of this in mind, we are offering a new way of engaging with Unity in the UK through our Friends membership scheme. We have put together a package that offers a yearly subscription to the digital Daily Word for those who want it, classic talks, free downloads, monthly Zoom live meetings and meditations, all for just £5 a month. Of course, we continue to share our FREE daily prayer and meditation meetings, book club, Thursday evening meditation and monthly Sunday service, all on Zoom, details here, honoured and blessed to do so. For as we build our spiritual community, we are all blessed. September is also the month when we hold Unity’s annual World Day of Prayer. This profound and potentially life-changing day offers you the opportunity to connect with us in silent prayer and shared meditations, from 9am-9pm, Thursday 14th September 2023. Through our personal experience of prayer, the ‘drawing out’ of our innate wisdom and sharing Unity’s practices and teachings, we learn, grow and bless our world. Join us – be part of something greater than your human self. Allow yourself to be changed. Claim the energy of God as a power and presence working through you. As you do, know that together, we support and encourage our inner child, the children around us and our world.
The truth is, relationships cannot always meet our lofty expectations and sometimes this causes us to feel hurt. When we encounter this, we may start to doubt love and our relationship to it.
Perhaps the belief that love is a feeling, an emotional state to be achieved, that we either “have it” or are “in it” needs a radical rethink. Let’s try this instead. Love is action. Not a feeling. A choice that we make when we care not just about the outcome for ourselves but for the whole. It is complex connection, not just to any one person, but to the all attributes that make us both human and divine. It is empathy. It is the ability to commit to radical emotional responsibility and to keep trying, even when things get tough. It is embracing the idea that there are always two sides and to strive for the happiness of all parties. When we start to see love as a set of actions we can release ourselves from it needing to feel perfect every second of every day. Embracing what is truly real. Forget the master plan on how to get love. Go out there people and “do” love. Stefanie Bridges Unity administrator and student Angus, one of our regular Zoom attendees and contributors to Unity, sent me this message recently:
I wanted to share a thought I had. My first wife's dad was the principal of a United Reform Church Missionary College in Birmingham. He said that traditional missionaries had gone out and told people that they were doing everything wrong, adding that we (The United Reform Church) went out and asked people how they could help. That's how Unity seems to work and as more people learn of this the congregation will expand. Keep up the excellent work. If we all went through life saying, “How can I help?” how amazing life would be. Some of us might even learn to ask for help as well! Further, one of the very first things we say to people who join us on retreat and in class is that we are do not tell anyone how to think or what they must do. Instead, we offer ideas and practices that support us as leaders, in the desire that they help others, too. We believe in the real idea of education – that of drawing out from within us, that which at one level we know to be true. So this week let us ask each other – how can I help today. We love to read of good news stories and sharing them on our blog. Rev. Kimerie Mapletoft Director of Silent Unity and Daily Word UK I am the light of the world, Love is my only function, That is why I am here Unity and A Course in Miracles (ACIM) have been linked for many years, with many Unity people finding much joy and support in both practices. This expression is another example of the two coming together. One of our Unity students in fact, recently shared this during a study class, as something everyone in their Unity Church says each week. It is a beautiful reminder of who we are and why we are here. In Scripture, we read of Jesus saying to the people around him, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” (John 8:12) For students in Unity, Jesus is our guide – the example for all of us to follow. In our language, we say that Jesus was portraying, living, the Christ energy as his Truth – the full embodiment of God working through him. Thus, as Jesus is our example, when we follow the teachings and ministry of Jesus, we too, can embody God. We, too, become the ‘hands, voice and feet of God on earth.’ It is a calling for every one of us to hear and respond to, wherever we are and whatever our life experiences.
Right where you are, can you say these words and mean them as your truth? Speak them aloud to yourself now. Say them with faith, authority and joy. For I would say to you, that is why you are here. Rev. Kimerie Mapletoft Director of Silent Unity and Daily Word UK Whatever you have planned, and whatever the weather, do take time out for some rest and renewal this month. Perhaps enjoy some summer reading. Our Unity booklets are easy to read; the articles share uplifting and supporting ideas and practices to help you stretch and grow into the beautiful being you are. Prices start at just £1.95 (including P&P). Click here to explore our website.
Here at Daily Word and Silent Unity UK headquarters, we are slowing down a little too. Our normal opening hours continue for the office and prayer line, alongside our morning and lunchtime meditations. However all weekend and evening meetings have been postponed until September – a month to relax a little, read, enjoy our countryside and each other’s company. We will also spend time giving our offices a deep clean, polish and shine – as we prepare to welcome you to our offices in Taplow at our Open Day Meet Up, Saturday 2nd September. We have been here for over 10 years and it has become a real home to our Daily Word and Prayer family. Do come along, meet each other and share in a meditation and celebration service in our prayer and meeting room. You may have seen us on Zoom – now come and see us in person! Whatever your plans this month, we are here for you. You can always reach out to us, night and day, to speak to us in person or listen to a supportive prayer message. With prayer in mind, our annual World Day of Prayer, Thursday 14th September is fast approaching. Make a note in your diary to join us. Click here to register and send us names of those you wish held in prayer. It is our honour and privilege to pray with you. Have a beautiful, blessed and restful month. I am becoming!
As I became conscious of this in Unity, I felt it as a hand in my back, pushing me forwards. Of course, it enabled me to get out of my comfort zone and step up to be a qualified leader in Unity. Here I am now and I am grateful that I took these steps, as this work calls me to respond from my best Self. Further, as adults, we do strive for a career: a way to be valued and appreciated in this world. However, looking at the root cause of the thinking, this striving to do more, become more, was out of a feeling of lack – I am not good enough and need to prove that I am. From this viewpoint, or level of thinking, we are never enough. To help us know we have this belief, life around us will mirror it back to us. We experience people telling us we are not enough, even when they are not saying it! Now, in my maturity, instead of striving to do more, I seek to experience myself becoming more – more of my true spiritual self. Not out of a feeling of lack, but because of an inner yearning and desire to be free. This calls me to look at myself – my resistances to life: recognising when I want to avoid something, control a situation, or blame someone for something I am experiencing. The degree of discomfort measures how much I have to release and move through. That which we resist, persists. Still, I know from experience it is hardly ever easy! Yet I believe this desire to become more than we think we are, is in all of us. It is what set me on the spiritual path in the first place. It is why you are reading this. We all have a yearning to awaken, to remember who we are and be free: To release ‘the inner splendour’ that resides not only within us, but is the truth of us. Some people will not use these words. Not everyone says as we do in Unity – I am a spiritual being having human and spiritual experiences. Yet this call is within us all. I believe it is why we are here. The urging to do more and become more is Spirit working through us all the time. Every step taken, every decision made, has brought us here. Spirit works through us constantly with the gentle call to awaken. Let us hear the call to be free – to show up in the world as an awakened spiritual being, the Christ alive in us and as us, uniquely beautiful, radiant and shining the light so that all who hear the call can awaken too. Let us let The Christ within, set us free. Rev. Kimerie Mapletoft Director of Silent Unity and Daily Word UK |
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