Unity Hall was buzzing after the service on Sunday. It was a potluck Sunday and both people and food were in abundance. There is something special about having the time to sit and have a meaningful conversation over a lunch that you didn’t have to prepare. I am acutely aware of the fact that now as a single person I rarely cook and eat most meals alone. I am declaring that the second Sunday of the month is potluck Sunday. So, the next potluck on a Sunday will be February 12. Just in time to celebrate Valentine’s Day.

A special thank you to Nancy Burnette and Nancy Sawyer for their help in setting up and cleaning up. I know others helped; however, they are the mainstays.

Sunday was the White Stone Ritual. If you didn’t get to do it, the service is on our Facebook page and on our YouTube channel Unity for Spiritual Growth; click on Live.

The White Stone Ritual gives us the opportunity to receive a new spiritual name for ourselves, a name that comes from Spirit. It is a way to mark a new beginning in life or the optimistic start to a new year.

The message I delivered on Sunday had two very important kernels.

The first kernel is that a miracle is simply a shift in perspective. That we can call upon the Holy Spirit to help us see things differently and, in that shift, a miracle occurs.

The second kernel is everyone is either coming from love or calling for love.

Marianne Williamson writes that “Everything that someone does is either love or a call for love.”

She also says that: “Forgiveness is like the martial art of consciousness.

“It is ‘selective remembering’ – a conscious decision to focus on love and let the rest go.”

To learn more about Marianne Williamson and these two kernels, check out the talk.

I also want to leave you with an email that I received from Marianne Williamson on December 31, 2022, titled Ringing in the New. This is a portion of the email:

I have a feeling about 2023; I think it’s going to be big. I think it’s both a challenge and an invitation to rise to our best selves, to find our courage, to spread our wings and help heal the world. Nobody else is going to do that for us; we have to do it ourselves. Perhaps tonight we can forgive ourselves and others, put down the baggage that keeps us bound, and reach for what only love can do. For miracles occur naturally in the presence of love. For those of us not suffering tonight, let’s commit in our hearts to helping those who are. Love will heal everything if only we will allow it to.

Here’s to the New Year, to the passing away of one year in our lives and our opening to miracles in 2023. Einstein said we wouldn’t solve the problems of the world from the same level of thinking we were at when we created them. So, here’s to another kind of thinking next year, and another kind of world.

If you haven’t already registered for either of the yoga classes do so now and while you are at it check out the other events that are happening.

Next week the message will be focused on Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr as we celebrate his birthday.

You are a blessing in my life,
Rev. Patricia Bessey

P.S.: Just a reminder to take care and pay attention to what your body is telling you. If you feel great, join us in person, if you don’t feel so great join us online.