Prophetic voices and events - Accommodation for people with disabilities and small children

Accessibility Matt On The Beach For Wheelchairs And Strollers

Quiz #2 on the stages of spiritual development

When we become aware that there is a better way to live our lives and wonder what that way might be, we experience:

1. An epiphany
2. The turning
3. Relief
4. Conversion

The answer is in the comments.

Teach what you want to learn

The third of seven principles of Unitarian Univeralism asks us to covenant together to affirm and promote the acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth. This "encouragement" is a form of teaching. We teach all the time by demonstrating through our thoughts, feelings, and behavior what we believe.

Are you a teacher of God or a teacher of the ego?

It is written in A Course In Miracles, "Any situation must be to you a chance to teach others what you are, and what they are to you. No more than that, but also never less."

Stephen Gaskin said that the only thing we have to share with others is our own state of being.

It also is important to understand that we are teaching all the time and that we learn what we teach. It is written in ACIM "It (the course) also emphasizes that teaching is a constant process; it goes on every moment of the day, and continues into sleeping thoughts as well." A little further it is written, "Teaching is but a call to witnesses to attest to what you believe."

We must choose what we wish to learn and what we wish to teach. Do we want to teach about the idols on the path of the ego or about the attributes of the Divine on the path of the spirit?

It is simple really. Do we want money, power, fame, sex, social status, approval, drama, or do we want peace, love, and bliss?

UUs believe in the God of second chances

We all make mistakes. In many theological models, mistakes are called sins, but the word "sin" is laden with judgment, condemnation, guilt, punishment, shame, and fear.

Existentially, human beings, unconsciously, feel guilty for having separated themselves from God. We are told in religious texts that human beings have sinned and triggered the wrath of God who will punish them sometimes eternally in a hell. These myths are projections of the human mind which is making God in the ego's own mistaken image.

The Universalists tell us that their God loves us unconditionally and would never consign God's creations to hell. The Universalists prefer the word "mistake" to "sin." We are told that in the story of the adulterous woman, Jesus, tells the woman and go and don't make the same mistake again. Unfortunately, the Aramaic word gets translated in English as "sin" when the meaning of the Aramaic is actually "mistake." There is a big difference in the meaning of the word "sin" and "mistake" in English.

It is written in A Course Of Miracles "In every difficulty, all distress, and perplexity Christ calls to you and gently says, "My brother, choose again."

It is written in ACIM a little further on, "The images you make cannot prevail against what God Himself would have you be. Be never fearful of temptation, then, but see it as it is; another chance to choose again, and let Christ's strength prevail in every circumstance and every place you raise an image of yourself before. For what appears to hide the face of Christ is powerless before His majesty, and disappears before His holy sight."

The true God is a God of second chances, and third chances, and fourth chances, whatever number it takes until God's human creation gets it right.

The only question is "how quick will we learn?"

Prophetic voices and events - International Women's Day, March 8, 2018

Quiz on stages of spiritual development

The stage of spiritual development which follows anguish, discouragement, depression, frustration, and anxiety is called;

1. Midlife crisis
2. Nervous breakdown
3. The dawning
4. The dark night of the soul.

The answer is in the comments.

Knockin on heaven's door

Unitarian Universalists covenant together to affirm and promote seven principles the fourth of which is the free and responsible search for truth and meaning. Where will "the search" take us? Where should we look? Where is true truth and meaning to be found?

Life's main existential question is very simple: do we want to live in hell or heaven?

Identifying with body and the path of the ego will be hell. Identifying with the spirit and the path of the spirit will be heaven.

The "miracle", the shift from ego to spirit, is based on forgiveness. Forgiveness not in the usual sense, but forgiveness for ourselves and others that we ever separated ourselves from God, the path of the spirit to begin with.

Our separation from the divine began with our worship of idols whom we thought and were taught by our society would make us happy. It can take years, if not decades, to become aware that this is not true.

This growing awareness born out of depression, anxiety, frustration, discouragement and anguish is called "the dawning." We become aware that there is a better way to live our lives here on earth and we begin to turn from the world to the divine within. Jesus told us that the kingdom of God is within us.

With this turn within, called "the turning," we begin to realize that we are not our bodies but part of the transcendent oneness. Our spirit is part of an oceanic pool of spirit-hood which we share with everyone. We become aware that we are not separate, but joined.

If "the turning" is brought about by forgiveness what does forgiveness take? Merely a decision to turn our separate wills over to the Will Of The Universe. As they say in Alcoholics Anonymous, "Let go, and let God", or simply, "Let go."

Ask the Holy Spirit, Jesus, God, your Higher Power, the muse to help you. Jesus says, "Ask and you shall receive. Knock and the door will be opened for you."