A Paradox of Prayer

My embedded theology about prayer was I prayed to a God out there. I prayed to an anthropomorphic God who was everywhere present all knowing and all-powerful.  In addition this God, like Santa Claus, knew when I was good or when I was bad. When I was younger I thought that if I looked up to the sky at night, looked at a star and prayed over and over again for something specific it would be granted but only if I didn’t blink my eyes while I prayed.  Honestly I always got my wish and some very dry eyes.  As I got older I still prayed for something from this God out there but the request changed.  My prayer became asking for the knowledge of His will for me and the power to carry that out (the 11th step in AA). 

After going through life crisis I found this type of prayer inadequate.  I felt as if I were still begging, was still impotent, and at the mercy of a God I couldn’t access. Being introduced to the 5 Basic Unity Principles, the concept of God with in me expressing as me was liberating and empowering. My prayer became quiet meditation where I would experience a God within. Soon however instead of being at the mercy of a God out there I found myself at the mercy of my mind.

Over time I would experience some periods where my mind would be still enough to access a place of peace and joy which I called the divinity within.  That was a gift beyond words. Then I became aware of times when I would experience God in nature and God in people and God in circumstances. With reflection and experience I began to experience God as within me and without.  How could I deny the appreciation and awe I have for the natural world around me for the moon and the stars.  How could I deny how experiencing the presence of God in my connection with  people.  How can I deny the sudden inspiration and gratitude I feel from out of know where but in my own mind.  From this reflection and experience I have formed another perspective of prayer. This perspective was confirmed when I read the passage from The New Being by Paul Tillich:

 Tillich asks is prayer possible? 

According to [Apostle] Paul, it is humanly impossible. This we should never forget when we pray: We do something humanly impossible. We talk to somebody who is not somebody else, but who is nearer to us than we ourselves are. We address somebody who can never become an object of our address because he is always subject, always acting, always creating. We tell something to Him who knows not only what we tell Him but also all the unconscious tendencies out of which our conscious words grow. This is the reason why prayer is humanly impossible.

Out of this insight Paul gives a mysterious solution to the question of the right prayer: It is God Himself who prayers through us, when we pray to Him. God Himself in us: that is what Spirit means. Spirit is another word for "God present," with shaking, inspiring, transforming power. Something in us, which is not we ourselves, intercedes before God for us. We cannot bridge the gap between God and ourselves even though the most intensive and frequent prayers; the gap between God and ourselves can be bridged only by God. [1]

In my world view I say yes!  Prayer is possible because God exists not only outside of me but within as well. Regardless of where God is – prayer for me becomes the conscious connection and communication with this God.  It is a paradox and in that I find it freeing. For me the greatest freedom lies in paradox. 

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[1] Tillich, Paul The New Being Chapter 18 http://www.holybooks.com/wp-content/uploads/The-New-Being-by-Paul-Tillich.pdf.

Short and Sweet

What's it all about really?

Is life governed by immutable law or probabilities and tendencies?

It appears that as human intelligence evolves and and more is known about how the Universe operates, the more Process Theology becomes believable.  What was once thought as immutable law is no longer immutable.  Charles Fillmore was known to have said he is open to changing his mind...so we too must be open to change and that means being open to changing our concept of what is immutable.

And yet we also trust our inner knowing, the faith of our heart.  We know what has worked for us in the past aligning ourself with Unity Principle.  So if trusting what we call immutable law works for us then use it.  We use the Five Step Unity Prayer Method, affirm and give thanks.

When I prayed at Silent Unity, one of the closing prayers stated: "Now we choose to trust knowing that as we allow God to be in charge perfect results are unfolding"  or we pray "We give thanks with complete assurance that the indwelling Christ is working in and through you to bring forth the highest good."

Those results may or may not be what the person wanted. However chances are there is the probability that something will occur and there is a tendency toward that something having a gem (gift)  in there some where.

The Church is Not the Building by Judi Marshall

A huge tornado hit and totally destroyed the Unity Church in Joplin Missouri.  Talking with an overwhelmed and grieving Church Board, Rev Kelly Isola said, “The church is not the building.” This statement had a profound impact on their community and was helpful in keeping them together as they recovered and rebuilt their church. 

Dr. Tom Shepherd writes in his book Glimpses in Truth “From its earliest days, the Christian Church was characterized as a body of committed, caring people” (266). What one hopes for in a Church is a safe loving caring environment where people feel cared about and appreciated. 

Unity has the capacity to provide this sense of “koinonia, the gathered community of loving fellowship” (266). Spiritual Leader and Licensed Unity Teacher Judith Marshall writes: “I have seen what unity can do for those who enter the path of Positive Spirituality.  People come into a Unity Church and within the framework of a loving safe compassionate community, people discover and develop their gifts and become vibrantly alive as they share their gifts strength and hope with others. 

Being able to provide that type of environment takes a minister who is willing to give of themselves to create that space. Dr. Tom expresses it well when he writes:

“There can be no trace of superiority in the true Christian, who is called to serve others in utter humility. When Jesus walked among his disciples, he set the highest example—touching, feeding, healing, washing, and loving everyone who would avail themselves of his ministry” (267).

And yet, Ralph Waldo Emerson in his Harvard Divinity School Graduation speech… Delivered before the Senior Class in Divinity College, Cambridge, Sunday Evening, July 15, 1838 presents another view of a minister equally important in creating koinonia.  He wrote:

I once heard a preacher who sorely tempted me to say, I would go to church no more…A snow storm was falling around us. The snowstorm was real; the preacher merely spectral; and the eye felt the sad contrast in looking at him, and then out of the window behind him, into the beautiful meteor of the snow. He had lived in vain. He had no one word intimating that he had laughed or wept, was married or in love, had been commended, or cheated, or chagrined. If he had ever lived and acted, we were none the wiser for it. The capital secret of his profession, namely, to convert life into truth, he had not learned. Not one fact in all his experience, had he yet imported into his doctrine.

Aside from being professionally trained and ordained and being hired for the job, subsequently paid to share their calling, their gifts, and their talents with their flock wherever that may be – hospital, hospice or church, the role of the minister today is to listen, to accept, to be compassionate, to love, to offer hope. A minister must be available and accessible to others. My mission in ministry is to be all that and to live the Truth I know. I do hope to be a minister who is not afraid to share that, like her congregants, she is human and travels this road called life with them. 

A Cross in Fillmore Chapel? Inquiry by Judi Marshall

A Cross in Fillmore Chapel? Inquiry by Judi Marshall

When we look at the history of the cross we find it is a symbol of pain suffering and death on a cross. 

The history of crucifixion extends as far back as the Assyrians, Phoenicians and Persians of the first millennium B.C., as well as some Greeks throughout the Hellenized world.

Because the main purpose of this practice was to punish, humiliate and frighten disobedient slaves, the practice did not necessarily result in death. Only in later times, probably in the first century B.C., did crucifixion evolve into a method of execution for conviction of certain crimes.¹

¹Bible History Daily Biblical Archaeology society www.biblicalarchaeology.org/.../crucifixion/a-tomb-in-jerusalem-reveals

  

      “The Romans did not invent crucifixion as a method of execution, though it seems that they perfected it.”^{2  2}http://www.orlutheran.com/html/crucify.html It was chosen to represent [and] considered to be the most humiliating painful excruciating form of death done by the Romans.

On what grounds then, would followers of the Unity Movement reinterpret an instrument of torture and put it in our sanctuaries.  On what grounds would followers of the Unity Movement take what became a symbol of atonement for the sins of humanity in traditional Christianity and place it in our sanctuaries.  As one Unity minister shared with me, as we discussed the common practice of taking of other’s rituals and practices incorporating them into our Unity spiritual services, “just because we can doesn’t mean we should.”

Would we put a cross up in the chapel because it is holy or would it be holy because we put it up? In doing so we would have to reclaim the cross and cleanse it of the blood of sacrifice. We would have to reinterpret it and put our very own Unity definition on it.   And for what purpose?

In this light why would a cross be fitting for Unity?  Other methods of execution were done in the Ancient Near East: Stoning, beheadings, burnings, sewing a person in a bag with a snake, dog, chicken and rooster and thrown in water, torn apart by lions, scourging.  If Jesus had been executed by one of these methods would we be wearing necklaces of large stones, swords, fire, a bag with little miniatures inside?  A lion perhaps? Or a whip? Why then the cross?  If Jesus showed up today and was once again found guilty of treason because he accused the powers that be of gross social injustice and moral decay and he was then executed by electric chair would we all be wearing little electric chairs and put one in our sanctuary?  

Why not use the symbols we have or create a new one just as other practices have done for centuries.

A Discussion of The Christ, Jesus, Jesus Christ, Christ Jesus by Judi Marshall

Often in Unity circles when wishing to celebrate a person, a group of people surround the person forming a circle.  Participants rub their palms together until warmth is felt, hands are help up facing out toward the person in the center being celebrated and a chant is said: "[Name of Person] we love you, we bless you, we appreciate you and we behold the Christ as you!”  What does it mean when it is said: “we behold the Christ as you?”

In The Revealing Word Charles Fillmore writes the “Christ abides in each person as his potential perfection.”  He goes on to describe the “Christ in you - The true light, which guides every man coming into the world, is and ever has been, in man.”  So in essence, we are saying to that person, at this moment we behold you abiding in your state of consciousness as the Christ “to the point of realization of unity with the Father and Son…[living] in the perfection of God-Mind, the thought of God, the living Christ.”   What a powerful statement of who that person is at that moment!

And yet - what about beholding the person as Jesus, or as Jesus Christ and what about Christ Jesus?  Why do we behold the Christ?  What is  the meaning of Jesus, Jesus Christ and Christ Jesus and how can we use these concepts in our daily life?

First if one needs a friend, well we have the man – the historical Jesus, Jesus of Nazareth the man who will comfort you when you’re down, the one who will sit and spend time with you as he did with Mary at Martha’s home Luke 10:38-42.   Go ahead, ask for what you need.  He will not only honor your request he will do what he can to fulfill your request by pointing the way. Matthew’s Jesus said in 7: 7-8 7“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”  This is the Jesus that brings you the comfort of knowing that you are not alone and that God is right here right now accessible to you, right by your side, as a friend would be to another beloved friend, and more than this, as a father would be to his child.

Perhaps now you are ready for more. Perhaps you have been inspired and directed to One Source and One Power from your friend Jesus learning it is possible to go direct.  You are ready for someone who reflects back your gift of Divinity, your gifts and strengths. Well then, Jesus Christ is the one to bring to mind. He is the one who realized his full potential that of the perfect idea of God Mind.   “Jesus Christ… was absolutely unique because He gives us a window through which God’s light can shine and by which we can see what we are truly meant to be.”

Finally we come to Christ Jesus the name Paul so reverently and lovingly gave to the ascended Jesus.    Christ Jesus is the one who became the Christ – that state of consciousness we described at the beginning of this article, “…The true light, which guides every man coming into the world, is and ever has been, in man.”  In Christ Jesus we have the Wayshower. John’s Jesus said in 14:12: 12Very truly, I tell you, the one who believes in me will also do the works that I do and, in fact, will do greater works than these…”

In Unity we have a model that provides us with an evolution of consciousness as we grow and evolve. It is also a model as we move in and out of life’s circumstances.  Sometimes we need Jesus of Nazareth a friend and a father/mother.  Other times we need our mentor in Jesus Christ to show us the way.  And then there are those spiritual moments where we know we are so One with the One and Christ Jesus comes to mind. There can be moments, days, months, or years when we totally slide out of this framework altogether. What makes Unity unique is that it is possible for us to move in and out depending on what we need and where we are in our life.   And when our need is great, there is a circle of friends and loved ones waiting to surround us and celebrate us, beholding in us what we may not be able to see in ourselves.

 What does it mean when celebrating a person or a group of people and we hold our hands up and chant, “we love you, we bless you, we appreciate you and we behold the Christ as you!”  We are affirming as Paul said: “Christ in you…the hope of Glory” .


  Charles Fillmore, The Revealing Word. Unity Village: Unity Books 1997. 34.
  NRSV
  NRSV
  Thomas W. Shepherd Glimpses of Truth (Carol City: UFBL Press, 2000). 143.
  Fillmore, Ibid. 34.
  NRSV
  Col 1:15

Where do we look for God? Judi Marshall

Where do we look for God? Judi Marshall

When asked the question: “Shall we center on the God within allowing God to emerge? Or shall we pray to Gods presence and power in the cosmos opening ourselves to the to the infilling of God?” What will our response be? To answer this question we will explore within the framework of the Unity Movement. A New Thought movement begun in 1889.
Emilie Cady, author of Lessons in Truth, a Homeopathic Physician, influenced by Transcendentalist Ralph Waldo Emerson, and New Thought teachers such as Mary Baker Eddy and Emma Curtis Hopkins wrote of centering on a God without and within.    Initially we read: “God is Spirit or the creative energy that is the cause of all visible things. God as Spirit is the invisible life and intelligence underlying all physical things” (P. 17-18). We are led to believe then if God underlies all physical things then God is without.
However she also goes on to write: God is that invisible intangible but very real something we call life.” (P.18). Thus God is within us because we are life and Cady brings the two together when she writes God is “omnipotence (all power), omniscience (all knowledge), omnipresence.  There is no place that God is not.  P. 19.  God “lives within every created thing as the life, the ever-renewing, recreating, upbuilding cause of it. He never is and never can be for a moment separated from His creations” (P. 21).
Charles Fillmore co-founder of the Unity Movement with his wife Myrtle Page Fillmore wrote in his compilation of Unity terms, The Revealing Word: A Dictionary of Metaphysical Terms “God is not person but Principle…expressed in all creation.” Although God is said to be personal to us ” …There is a difference between a personal God and God personal to us. ..it would probably be better to speak of God individualized in man rather than of God personal to man” P. 83) God as mind is “The connecting link between God and man. ..God as principle cannot be comprehended by any of the senses. But the mind of man is limitless and through it he may come into touch with Divine Mind” (PP. 83- 84).
In the book Teach us to Pray Fillmore writes: “To Jesus the God presence was an abiding flame of life…He felt in every cell and fiber of His being…” (P. 14).  On Page 15 he writes “God Spirit, God-Mind is not in any way confined or limited; it is everywhere present.” He goes on to write: “There is only one God, only one ruling power in all the universe; and the highest avenue through which God can express Himself is man”  (P. 20
Author and teacher Rev Paul Hasselbeck writes in his book, Heart Centered Metaphysics, writes “God or Divine Mind is ever-present Spirit. In Truth, we are Spirit; we are Christ (the Idea that is made up of Ideas) P. 39).  God is synonymous with “Oneness, Beingness is Spirit the infinite invisible Essence of all life. Spirit is the activity of Divine Mind and can be experienced in all creation” (P. 100). In this text it is apparent God, aka Spirit, aka Christ, Ideas, Oneness, Beingness, is within and without because it appears in all creation and that would include the cosmos.
Rev Linda Martella Whitsett How to Pray Without Talking to God allows God within to emerge from us because we are not separate from it. She writes: “Divine Omnipresence means God is within us, we are within God, and God is everywhere. Whitsett quotes Myrtle Fillmore in How to let god help you, God is…”the principles of Life Love and Intelligence.” On Whitsitt’s personal journey to pray to God, she writes
She started relating to God as “Divine Life, Love and Wisdom ” (P. 10).  These qualities express through us as I AM; God through me waiting to express.  “I am present. I am feeling the truth before I speak it. I Am” (P.11).
So back to the question: Where do we look for God? What do you think? “What do you need God to be?”  “What brings you comfort and what brings you joy?” “Does a God within you waiting to emerge work for you today?” “Are their days when you want the God of the Cosmos to come forth to celebrate or cry with you?”  What will your response be? What do you need it to be?  As you change and evolve will your concept of God change?
At the beginning of the book The Revealing Word it is noted that Charles Fillmore wrote: “What you think today may not be the measure for your thought tomorrow. A gift of Unity is that there is no prescribed dogma but ideas.  And there is agreement among New thought and Unity writers that God is not in a box but more likely within and although there are exceptions, without.

Ethnocentrism in the Unity Movement?

When one reviews the Biblical history of Jewish people, one begins to notice a written history of conquest, defeat and exile; conquest, defeat and exile by the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Greeks, and Romans. There were the Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, Pogroms in Eastern Europe culminating with the Holocaust 1939 – 1944. It is said “the phoenix rising from the ashes of the Holocaust went on to create the state of Israel. And thus began the Arab Israeli Wars in 1948, 1967, 1973, 1982, and Palestinian uprisings and battles up to the present time.

“Every group assumes their way [to be] the proper, correct, natural way for humans to live. This is called ethnocentrism, i.e., the tendency for each group to assume the superiority of its beliefs and practices” (P. 78 Shepherd, Glimpses of Truth). And it appears that over the history of the Jewish people one ethnocentric group after another asserted their superiority.

I have always wondered how a group of people can remain in a state of constant warfare protecting their survival.  What does it do to their view of the world and when does the oppressed become the oppressor?

A sense of ethnocentrism, a sense of “our way” is best and it is the only way, evolves to protect a group.  It provides a sense of belonging identity as well as protection. It also ensures the group staying intact with their own identity by not allowing questioning of the beliefs or the incorporation of any new ideas perhaps relevant to the time and culture in which they live. To question is to be disrespectful and bring dishonor to the community. Any alternatives or new ways of looking at the world are considered dangerous to the group or community.

I perceive ethnocentrism rising in the Unity community.  Yes, I hear “my way is good and yours is bad.”  “You are not teaching Unity.”  “You are allowing our doors to be open to other influences that are “infiltrating” Unity Churches and Centers.” “Jesus is no longer the head of the Institute.”  “They have thrown out my Jesus.”  “My God no longer exists in Unity.”  “The Institute no longer teaches Fillmore.”  What began as a conversation questioning curriculum, in Unity turned into a discussion of what Unity Churches, now called “Centers,” are offering, and has now become a full blown division between what was and what is.

I think the questioning within the movement is good.  It causes us to look at and examine our beliefs. As Stone and Duke write “Nearly all Christian doctrines or teachings …set forth in the historic creeds were composed in response to controversies over conflicting embedded theologies…To grow in faith is to deepen, extend, and perhaps revise our understanding of its meaning and to arrive at clearer mean by which to state an act on our convictions” ((pp. 20-21). How To Think Theologically).

“Ethnocentrism only becomes a problem for a group when it draws the negative conclusion: If our way is good, your way is un-good” (p. 79 Shepherd, Glimpses of Truth). Yes, by allowing questioning of the old and even the new, we make our selves vulnerable.  “It means finding our own peculiar brand of nonsense and allowing our neighbor to go and do likewise” (p. 86 Glimpses of Truth). Here’s to the dialogue!