If you want to know more about Unitarians in UK here’s a
good place to start:
As for us Unitarians in Ringwood, here’s what we did
yesterday.
We lit our chalice to some words by Dr Norman Pittenger:
"Give me a
humanist or agnostic who cares. In him
or her I can see the charity of God working anonymously. Whenever and wherever I see self-giving love,
I shall know it is of God."
Our opening prayer had been sourced from the World Community
of Christian Meditation, the community associated with John Main and Laurence
Freeman.
We welcomed a visitor from the Quaker community, who
professed to have no expectations beforehand, and who said afterwards that the
ritual aspects of our gathering for reverence were interesting, and that she
intends to come again sometime.
Our readings were from Dan Millman and Rowan Williams, and
they both reminded us that the path every person takes is necessarily
different, but the paths taken by everyone all ultimately lead to the same end.
The learning along the way is different and arises in relation to the personal
need.
Our president for the day built on this theme. She spoke frankly about the pitfalls she gets
into sometimes; those times when she falls back into the pattern of acting and
speaking to others as though her own solutions and models would be better for
them, than their own. Her conclusion was
that we’re not there to fix it for each other; we are there to accompany each
other as we each struggle with our own battles and burdens. And that as the kingdom of God, the realm of
reconciliation and peace, lies within, thus personal solutions are provided
personally not generically. All we can – and must do – is attend to each other
by really listening.
We sang a couple of hymns from the Hymns for Living Unitarian
hymnbook and heard a haunting, profound song, sung by Hayley Westernra, from
New Zealand.
After our candles for joys and concerns we concluded with
these words by Rev. Johanna
(Jopie) Boeke, Unitarian Minister emeritus:
SOMETIMES by
Johanna Boeke
Sometimes we are
so filled with ourselves, that we only see ourselves, and not the person next
to us or opposite us. May we enlarge our
souls, and make room for others.
Sometimes we no
longer have hope for each other or for ourselves, or for the future. Sometimes we ignore each other, speak only
words of pain and separation.
May we be given
new words, words of peace, words which create community, words which bring
healing and blessing and belief in the future.
May we open our
doors and invite others in, feeling safe in spite of our vulnerability.
May we learn to
live with each other and for each other.
