Shedding our conditioning to experience the non dualistic Oneness.

In Heaven there is no guilt, because the Kingdom is attained through the Atonement, which releases you to create. The word “create” is appropriate here because, once what you have made is undone by the Holy Spirit, the blessed residue is restored and therefore continues in creation. T-5.V.2:1-2

A Course in Miracles . Foundation for Inner Peace. Kindle Edition. 

We have separated ourselves from the non dualistic Oneness when our soul was incarnated in our bodies and then we were socialized and conditioned into the world of the ego by our families and society.

To experience the Atonement, the conditioning of the world of the ego must be shed and purified. When we rejoin the non dualistic Oneness we experience directly our Transcendent Source with all its creative power.

In Unitarian Universalism we covenant together to affirm and promote the love of the interdependent web of all existence and experience the awe of the Oneness of All Creation.

Today, it is suggested that we acknowledge our conditioning and turn inward to access the experience of our non dualistic Oneness through meditation.

Offering our own state of being.

 

 

The work of building a better society ultimately involves improving the “civic virtue” of individual persons, and this cannot be accomplished by cultural evolution alone. To effectively cultivate character development and thereby foster the authentic betterment of our people, the project of evolving culture ultimately requires spiritual growth.

 

McIntosh, Steve. Developmental Politics: How America Can Grow Into a Better Version of Itself (p. 128). Paragon House. Kindle Edition. 

 

The level of spiritual intelligence in the people of the U.S. is very low. They are not aware of their stages of points of view and that these points of view can be described from an evolutionary map: traditional, modern, postmodern.

 

Understanding that the primary values of people at the different stages transform as a person grows up is missing from our national consciousness. McIntosh makes the point that this map of evolutionary development begins with the individual and then becomes the norms and attitudes of groups and then becomes the culture of a society.

 

The facilitation of positive development begins with the raising of consciousness initiated by people whose level of consciousness is already at a more developed stage. This is done primarily by demonstration and example not by words. People at higher levels of spiritual intelligence have a salubrious effect on those they interact with. Actions speak louder than words.

 

Steve Gaskin said one time that in the end all that we have to offer another human being is our own state of being.

Unitarian Universalists covenant together to affirm and promote justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.

Choose between scarcity or abundance.

Perhaps some of our concepts will become clearer and more personally meaningful if the ego’s use of guilt is clarified. The ego has a purpose, just as the Holy Spirit has. The ego’s purpose is fear, because only the fearful can be egotistic. The ego’s logic is as impeccable as that of the Holy Spirit, because your mind has the means at its disposal to side with Heaven or earth, as it elects. But again, remember that both are in you. T-5.V.1:1-5

A Course in Miracles . Foundation for Inner Peace. Kindle Edition. 

Guilt operates based on fear and the principle of scarcity. There is never enough for everyone and what will make us happy is the next big thing. Spirit operates based on unconditional love and the principle of abundance. There is plenty for everyone and what will make us happy is available to us in the present if we choose to look within and avail ourselves of it.

In Unitarian Universalism we join together to affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person. This worth and dignity comes from the Ground Of Being and is already available to us in the form of Life and Consciousness.

Today, it is suggested that we acknowledge that we have a choice between the principle of scarcity or the principle of abundance flowing from the unconditional love of the Transcendent Source.

Co-creating a beautiful future.

We all are leaders to the degree we help to create a better today and a better tomorrow. The true hero does not undertake the journey for personal glory, but for the benefit of all. While there is a great deal of good news globally - higher literacy rates, cures for many diseases, increased longevity, and decreasing levels of abject  poverty over the last one hundred years - there is much, much more that needs to be done to relieve suffering and create a sustainable health future for humanity and this planet. We can each do our part by developing ourselves, finding our higher purpose, and taking the wisest most compassionate actions we can. Collectively we will decide how the future turns out. I hope we co-create a beautiful future. SQ can help us do that.

John Mackey in forward to Cindy Wigglesworth’s book, The Twenty-One Skills Of Spiritual Intelligence. P. ix

When one becomes enmeshed in the onslaught of sensationalized hourly news from cable news shows and social media platforms, it is understandable how people become cynical, depressed, angry, and feel helpless.

While we cannot do much to influence external circumstances, we can always work on our own level of spiritual intelligence. When we become more spiritually intelligent our presence in the world has a salubratory, beneficial influence.

There are steps we can take to increase our spiritual intelligence. There are maps people can acquire to plan their journey and mark their progress. One of these maps are the seven principles of Unitarian Universalism. Another map is provided by Cindy Wigglesworth in her book, The Twenty-One Skills Of Spiritual Intelligence.

Is virtue a necessary qualification for public office?

The idea of virtue rarely is discussed in public any more. When we consider which candidates to vote for virtue is rarely a consideration. Certainly Donald Trump was no paragon of virtue nor some would argue was Hillary Clinton.  

It would seem that politics is a dog eat dog kind of enterprise and virtue, good character, is not considered a necessary or even a desirable qualification.

 

How important is virtue and character when you choose a political candidate to vote for?

Unitarian Universalists covenant together to affirm nd promote the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process...

Would we choose conditional love or unconditional love?

 How can you who are so holy suffer? All your past except its beauty is gone, and nothing is left but a blessing. I have saved all your kindnesses and every loving thought you ever had. I have purified them of the errors that hid their light, and kept them for you in their own perfect radiance. They are beyond destruction and beyond guilt. They came from the Holy Spirit within you, and we know what God creates is eternal. You can indeed depart in peace because I have loved you as I loved myself. You go with my blessing and for my blessing. Hold it and share it, that it may always be ours. I place the peace of God in your heart and in your hands, to hold and share. The heart is pure to hold it, and the hands are strong to give it. We cannot lose. My judgment is as strong as the wisdom of God, in Whose Heart and Hands we have our being. His quiet children are His blessed Sons. The Thoughts of God are with you.  T-5.IV.8: 1-15

A Course in Miracles . Foundation for Inner Peace. Kindle Edition. 

St. Paul writes in a letter to Corinthians something like “If God is with you, who can be against you?” In the above passage from A Course In Miracles we are told by Jesus that goodness, truth, and beauty is forever. It is in knowing this that peace and joy arise.

In Unitarian Universalism we covenant together to affirm and promote the free and responsible search for truth and meaning. One aspect of this search is the purification of the things of the ego and focusing on the things of God. Another way of saying this is that we purify our conditional love to find the unconditional love within. It is this unconditional love, as the Universalists have taught, which are the thoughts of God which abides within us.

Today, it is suggested that we reflect on the differences between conditional love and unconditional love and choose in which we would abide and offer to others.

The whole is holy.

The full power of creation cannot be expressed as long as any of God’s ideas is withheld from the Kingdom. The joint will of the Sonship is the only creator that can create like the Father, because only the complete can think completely, and the thinking of God lacks nothing. Everything you think that is not through the Holy Spirit is lacking. T-5.IV.7:3-5

A Course in Miracles . Foundation for Inner Peace. Kindle Edition. 

Non duality is a challenging concept for the Western mind. Separation and division is the work of the ego which has given homo sapiens the illusion of being able to control and manipulate phenomena in the ego world. Indeed, separation and division has provided the ego mind with this power but there is always something missing, something lacking, something subtracted from the whole. It is the whole that is holy and the Holy Spirit reminds us of this experience and helps us to understand and enjoy it.

Unitarian Universalists join together to affirm and promote a love for the interdependent web of all existence of which they and everything else is a part.

Today, it is suggested that we remember that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts and that this wholeness is of God and very holy.