For the last seven years, our August World Wisdom series has brought great spiritual teachers form many faiths to Unity of Berkeley. We invite you to experience the deep river of Spirit and Oneness that flows through all the speakers that will join us in August.

August 1 ~ Hinduism
Dr. Sunil Sanon heads Divine Light Trust in order to realize his dream of serving the poor, ailing, and the underserved. An innovative thinker, he has spoken on topics related to Mind Body Medicine, paradigm shifts, and ethics. He is a devout disciple of Pandit Sriram Sharma Acharya, founder of Gayatri Pariwar.

Music: Sound Voice Healers and Members of Gayatri Pariwar.

August 8 ~ Judaism

Avram Davis, Ph.D. is the founder and Rabbi Emeritus of Chochmat HaLev in Berkeley. An international known writer and speaker sought after for his humor and joy, he is currently living in simplicity as the Farmer Rabbi. We welcome his wit and wisdom at Unity.

Music: Tad Toomay and the Unity House Band

August 15 ~ Taoism

Master Alex Feng directs the Taoist Center in Oakland and has a deep lineage in the Taoist tradition and ancient Chinese medicine. We welcome Master Feng for the third year. His presence has delighted many with great humor and insight.

August 22 ~ Indigenous Wisdom
Our Mother Earth is experiencing great shifts and it is time to invite the wisdom of our indigenous peoples to communicate and connect with Her wisdom. We look forward to bringing a representative of this earth-based wisdom to our summer series. Stay tuned to our website for the name of this guest.

August 29 ~ Sufism
John “Wadude” Laird, M.D. is Dean of the University of Spiritual Healing and Sufism in Pope Valley, California. He received his medical degree from Dartmouth and in addition to his deep loving presence, he is a master healer and teacher. Wadude will lead a Sufi Zikr as his contribution to our World Wisdom series.
Music: Charles Moselle

This Graph represents monthly income from January-March, 2010 and weekly income in April 2010

This graphs represents our outstanding financial obligations as of April 30,2010

Letter from the President, Unity leadership Team
May, 19,2010

Dear Unity Family,

You are all aware of the tenuous financial situation that we are experiencing. To address this situation we, the Leadership Team, invite you to spend some time with us on Sunday, May 30 during service as we open to our vision and create a strategy for rising to achieve that vision.

As I spend time with the Leadership Team focusing on our challenges, I am often energized by reflecting on the magic that brought each of us as individual members to our community. I am motivated by the relevance, need and good prospects for our future.

I’m immensely grateful for the learning experiences I’ve had at Unity and am amazed at the incredible line-up of notable speakers that have graced the doors of our small congregation. I’ve grown significantly from interactions with teachers from many paths and have had the privilege to make a home with this incredible family called Unity of Berkeley. I want to celebrate the many opportunities and divine appointments Spirit has brought my way.

At the same time, as your President, and with our cash reserves depleted, I need to underscore the need for us to start living within our means. This means a future of increasing revenue and/or reducing costs. The attached graphs portray our current financial circumstances. Aware that our membership is weary of hearing about money challenges, I must again call on you for help. Please know that the Leadership Team is well organized around our community needs and focused in our work to move away from the drain of existing in a day-to-day survival mode.

I must announce to the community that Rev. Patricia will be taking an unpaid furlough for the month of June. We are unable to bring her pay up-to-date (not counting past obligations). We also owe two month’s rent. The unpaid leave is a decision that Patricia supports and she looks forward to using the time to write, pursue passions and re-energize. We all need to be aware that this means Patricia will not be available for any of her organizational or pastoral roles during this voluntary furlough. She has planned a Healing Focus for June with outstanding speakers: Rev. Kerry Chinn, Rev. Glenn Dunning, Rev. Felicia Searcy and Rev. David Hiller. Patricia will return in July to share her renewed and deepened energy and passion with us.

We continue to work on developing the means to draw on resources outside our community. But as you may imagine, turning our financial circumstances around may not be a quick or easy process. We are looking at other measures with dramatic impact on our expenses, including the possibility of downsizing our space rentals. I believe that our family characteristic can sustain us through most any challenge. The Leadership Team’s intention is to see that our community connections evolve well beyond survival, and to see our full potential blossom.

As we investigate other revenue possibilities and explore potential cost savings, we need your immediate help to generate a sufficient level of income. Our first priority is to maintain our obligations and then to start paying down our longer term debts.

We need your expanded support, including bringing more people in to the community. We need you to join in our growth through increased participation. Please do what you can to help sustain our viability during this transitional period.

I look forward to visioning and planning with you during the May 30 Sunday Service Session.

Much Grace to each of you,

David Gifford
President
Unity Leadership Team

Rev. Dr. Patricia Keel, Founding Minister and Steve Carter, Acting Chair of the Leadership Team, enthusiastically invite and encourage you to attend the Unity of Berkeley Annual Meeting on Sunday, March 7 from 12:30 to 2 PM.

There will be a Potluck Luncheon after the Sunday Service, with our meeting following the refreshments. This is your opportunity to show off that new recipe and/or delight the palates of your community with your favorite dish!

It is Birthday Sunday for March babies, the Unity House Band will be playing some of Tad Toomay’s songs during the service, and the theme of the message is “Love It and Guide It – Your Soul Powers of Love and Wisdom.”

It will be a beautiful day. Please plan to join us.

A G E N D A
Election of new Leadership Team members
Report by the Minister Rev. Patricia
Financial Report by Alice Gallagher McGraw, Treasurer
Overview from Ministry Team Leaders
Question and answer session.
Moving Forward and Expanding Unity of Berkeley

Please bring something to share at the potluck and join us for this important meeting. Your active participation is most critical to the health and vitality of our spiritual community.

Sunday, February 7, 10:30AM
Return from India
Message by Rev. Patricia
Music by Tad Toomay and the Unity House Band

Sunday, February 14, 10:30AM
“Believe It and See It – Faith and Imagination
Message by Rev. Patricia
Music by Deborah Winters and Charles Moselle

Sunday, February 21, 10:30AM
“Accept It and Choose It – Understanding and Will”
Message by Rev. Patricia
Music by Serendipity Choir

Sunday, February 28, 10:30AM
Be It and Speak It – Zeal and Power”
Message by Rev. Patricia
Music: Bev Barnett and Greg Newlon

As you pray, know that God is present in the midst of every situation. Envision each and every person in Haiti embraced by this Divine Presence of love, comforted, strengthened and guided in next steps. Hold an image of Divine Love in action as people offer assistance and relief by providing food, water, shelter, clothing and medical aid to those in need.

There is energy in prayer that touches the minds and hearts of all involved. United we make a difference.

Here is the link to one international aid organization that is offering immediate assistance. If you are able to do so, making a donation to Oxfam is one way to offer practical as well as spiritual help to the people of Haiti.
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/oxfam_in_action/emergencies/haiti-earthquake.html#

I have been reflecting on my Sunday message and really going deeper inside to discover what my passion is. I missed the mark on my “bread crumbs” analogy – calling them passion crumbs instead of what I see now as passion ashes. They are the ashes left behind from the “fire in the belly” that point us and show us the path of our passion. These ashes give us evidence of the “little fires,” the sparks that Vivekananda reminded us are our “karma.” (I will re-type that passage that I shared on Sunday at the end of this writing.)

I was reflecting this morning in my mediation on my own passion ashes, in particular the evidence of a long-held desire/idea/intention of mine to write a book on the Unity teachings of the 12 powers. When I started to look back at the numerous little piles of ashes in my life I could see a steady trail that started in 1992 in Sacramento at Unity Christ Church Continuing Education Program. I was a new Unity Student and taking my first week of classes that would eventually lead to my Licensed Unity Teacher credential. (When I think back I believe that the seeds of desire to become a Unity minster were planted in that week’s experience. But that is another story.) I found a set of colorful cards describing something called Unity’s 12 Powers. I was intrigued ,fascinated and a little bit overwhelmed I didn’t know how I would ever remember 12 somethings, three to five seemed like my limit! I had never heard of this teaching and it seemed to resonate within me very deeply.

Over the next few years I began to gather all the books on the 12 powers that I could find. It was not a program or theme that seemed to interest my minster, but as I was planning to become a Licensed Teacher I was free to do my own study and focus. In December 1995, I decided to select one power to focus on each year. I would close my eyes and select one card from my stack of 12 and really be intentional in my awareness of that particular power for the following year. I remember that first year because I so wanted to pick the power of LOVE, but I got STRENGTH, which seemed rather pedestrian and not very WOW. How wrong I was! That year was one of great challenge for me and my family, and my inner Strength was just what I needed to cultivate and rely on. .

In the mid 1990s I began to create spiritual growth programs based on books. In 1998 created a six week book study for a small group study program in Santa Rosa that was based on the 12 powers. Next I created a 13 week sabbatical for my Unity in Marin minister called Claim Your Power. From the early days of New Thought Unity, later to become Unity of Berkeley, I created the tradition of having people pick a 12 Power Card at the Christmas Eve Service. One year we studied a power each month to bring more focus to the ideas. One year I tried to offer a once a month Saturday class on the 12 powers, but the energy was not strong and so that class did not continue as I had hoped. The timing was not right, not in Divine Order I guess.

Between Christmas and New Year’s Day in 2007, I took a week to pray and study and once again caught the fire of writing my own book on the 12 powers. I set up a web site, www.claimyoursoulpower.com. I had wanted to call it Claim Your Power but that name was already taken. I started writing and working on the site, and then my fire went out and another pile of ashes were left on the trail.

This Sunday, when May Rose was sharing about her idea to raise funds for the church by doing a matching $1,000 challenge, I realized how much the 12 powers really mean to ME. She has been telling me that the program is not HER program. She had another idea of how to raise the funds, but due to travel and illness was not able to execute her idea. In being with all of this conversation I realized how I have put my own passion for this project on the back burner. It has been on simmer for a very long time.

Today I have been fanning the fire in my belly and looking at what transformation is happening in this fire, and what is my karma, my authentic action to take? My desire has always been to get this 12 power message out in a contemporary, compelling, current book that will offer insight and tools for personal spiritual growth. And so I am taking this action, I am writing to share with all of you.

Sometimes we share our thoughts and then find the after-thoughts are more powerful. Such has been the case with me today and yesterday and all last week. I have been living these topics, as we are Walking in the Light together for these seven weeks. I dearly hope that you are finding your passion, your deeper purpose and your spiritual power as you journey with me this fall at Unity.

I owe you a write up on our Path Two of Creativity and Abundance. I think I will let Spirit flow these transmissions in the right and perfect order for my soul growth and hopefully for each of you. I welcome your ideas, your comments and your prayers. This journey is more fun when we take it together.

The children did a belly button meditation yesterday to focus on the third chakra and the solar plexus. I hope you will have a belly laugh and find your spiritual power center as you look at the divine fires you have created and those that are waiting for your good karma, your authentic. God bless.
In Love and Oneness
Rev. Patricia

Here is the reading from Sunday morning
By Vivekananda from Karma Yoga and Bhakti Yoga, published 1955 page 5-8

“Like fire in a piece of flint, knowledge exists in the mind. Suggestion is the friction which brings it out. So with all our feelings and actions. Our tears and our smiles, our joys and our griefs, our weeping and our laughter, our curses and our blessings, our praises, and our blaming – every one of these we shall find, if we calmly study our own selves, to have been brought out from within ourselves by so many blows. The result is what we are. All these blows taken together are called karma- work, action. Every mental and physical blow that is given to the soul, by which, as it were, fire is struck from it, and by which its own power and knowledge are discovered is karma, using the word in its widest sense. Thus we are all doing karma all the time. I am talking to you: that is karma. You are listening: that is karma. We breathe: that is karma. We walk: that is karma. Everything we do, physical or mental, is karma, and it leaves its marks on us……You must remember that the aim of all work, is simply to bring out the power of the mind which is already there, to wake up the soul. The power is inside every person; and so is knowledge. Different works are like blows to bring them out, to cause these giants to wake up.”

Our community is a very eclectic and spiritually diverse group of individuals. We are Unity of Berkeley, a community that is centered in the positive, practical spiritual teachings of Unity. Yet part of the unique character of Unity of Berkeley is its spiritual diversity. We are not in Kansas any more! We have some people who bring a rich background in a particular religious tradition, while others have abandoned their early childhood religions and taken up various forms of meditation, spiritual practice, reading and study. From these varied spiritual roots we come together to experience the mystery and power of the Divine Presence each Sunday morning and throughout the week in our many classes and workshops. We are connected, not by a particular religion, but by our spiritual curiosity, our sense of wonder and delight, our creativity, and by our willingness to walk our talk, to pray and to love.

Each fall we focus seven Sundays on a particular theme, based on a book that offers new insight and opportunities for spiritual growth. This year, our Fall Program, Walking In the Light: 7 Paths to God invites us to move beyond our August series on the World Wisdom Traditions to an interior examination of our own personal experience of the mystery of spirit in our lives. The framework of our exploration is Joan Borysenko’s book, 7 Paths to God, The Ways of the Mystic. In looking at the 7 paths we will bring in other traditions and open a window into Unity’s 5 teachings as we progress each week. My hope is that you will find and explore your own pathways, open your heart and mind to the many ways that others meet in the mystery of Spirit, and grow and deepen your connection to the God of your Being. By sending out weekly emails, I want to invite all of us to go deeper. Listen to the meditation and message on our website at http://unityberkeley.org/sundays-at-unity/sunday-audio/ Whether you can be with us on Sunday morning or not, you are part of the beautiful and rich reflection of God that is Unity of Berkeley.

The Path One Mystic is what Joan calls the Everyday Mystic. This is the person is deeply and reverently connected to the Earth. This person demonstrates a profound care and concern for the global environment and particularly for all the plants and animals that share our earth with us. In this path, we can identify the grounding of the Native People’s and their alignment and attunement to the Mother. In calling forth from the seven directions, it is the below, the ground of being under our feet which anchors us to this mystical path. This native medicine chant calls forth this deep connection:

Mother I feel you under my feet
Mother I hear your heart beat….

Earth my body
Water my blood
Air my breath and
Fire my spirit.

The Path One Mystic is dedicated to hearth and home, to kinship with to all beings. In that reverence is a fierce sense of pride and commitment to do whatever it takes in small acts and in great ways to preserve and protect our land, our water, our air and all living creatures for generations to come.

The Path of Gratitude is the Red Road. It is a reminder to be fully present to all that is before us, moment to moment. We have created small Gratitude booklets for you to write your Gratitude Lists daily during out seven weeks. Pick one up on Sunday morning. Also pick up a colorful poster to place in your home where you can focus on our weekly path with affirmation cards.

Question to explore on The Path of Gratitude
Chapter 2 – Earth and Home: The Everyday Mystic

1. How does my connection to Earth show up in my life? How do I honor my “home”?
2. How do I use solitude in nature to enhance my intuition and creativity? Take a silent walk. Notice any changes in your insights and feelings.
3. How do I use harmony and beauty to acknowledge Divine Order in my home, workplace, church community, etc.?
4. What am I grateful for today? Adopt the practice of Brother David Steindal-Rast; write down each night one thing that you are grateful for that you have never thought about being grateful for before.

The Path of Gratitude

I respect the Earth and all creation as I delight in
God’s beauty all around me. Gratefully I celebrate
life and I am fully human, fully present.
“Oh, Lord, I see your face in every leaf, and my heart sings.”

As I journey on the Path of Gratitude,
I, ____________________, Am Walking in the Light

Trip Leader Darrell Hunger

As a Co-Director of Music at Unity and leader of the Unity House Band, Tad loves to share his insightful songs at various Sunday services, concerts, and other events. Mindy, a professional writer and editor,  has volunteered at Unity in various capacities.

Reverend Patricia is a warm and wonderful teacher and spiritual friend. Soaking up her words of wisdom and loving presence on Sunday mornings is a high point of our week!