Finding My Spiritual Path

Today I became an official member of Unity Church-Unitarian in St. Paul, Minn. The Unitarian-Universalist faith practice is quite different from my childhood experience, where I grew up in a Lutheran household and was a good little Christian girl. I taught Sunday school and vacation bible school, sang in the church choir, performed in motion choir (I’ll save that story for another time), and even went to a college affiliated with the ELCA. However, as I became an adult, I fell away from the church because it didn’t really seem to fit me. I even felt a little pride of my non-church-going rebellion.

In the last couple of years, I’ve been exploring what spirituality and faith mean to me — what I believe in today. This past January, I stopped dabbling and made a concerted effort in seeing if a faith community could fit me again. I found it in Unity. Today, I signed my name in a membership book that goes back to Unity’s founding. During the service, my fellow new members and I recited the Bond of Fellowship with the congregation.

Bond of Fellowship

As those who believe in religion,

As those who believe in freedom, fellowship, and character in religion,

As those who believe that the religious life means the thankful, trustful, loyal and helpful life, and

As those who believe that a church is a community of helpers, wherein it is made easier to lead such a life;

We join ourselves together, name, hand, and heart, as members of Unity Church.

- William Channing Gannett, March 9, 1879, adapted

I’m embarking on a spiritual path that will give me the freedom to determine my individual beliefs and to explore both the reality and wonder of the world. I’m excited about the step I made today and the journey that is to come.