UNIVERSAL LIFE CHURCH
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the power of understanding

Understanding

Why should we be thinking about understanding?

Understanding is probably the biggest key to achieving love, peace and harmony. Only when we really understand each other can we truly forgive, accept and come to love.

Look at the problems that society faces today, war, bitterness, hatred, crime, greed, envy, racism, starvation, poverty, sexism? the all are as a result of a lack of understanding.

One of the greatest attributes of or church is it's understanding of multiple beliefs, it's acceptance comes through the fundamental understanding that love of god, in whatever form is good. Man created churches and faiths, I believe that there is one god and that man has created many different faiths and churches for this one god, we may use different language, we may have differences in what we believe is right and wrong, but we all have a fundamental belief in god and a set of basic moralities that have come from him.

We have a duty to god, to be the best we can, and to be the best we can, we need to have understanding of each other. The problem is that sometimes we think that we know the facts because we have read them in newspapers, magazines and have heard them on TV. But have we really questioned what we have heard? Have we really been given all the facts, or have we being manipulated by advertisers, governments or spin doctors to only hear one side of the facts. If we do not question, but mearly accept the facts we are given, then perhaps the deliberately engineered misconceptions created by those with access to media will prevail and our understanding will not improve.

Perhaps this is easiest to illustrate with an example. I was born, grew up and still live in England. During my childhood, the news was constantly filled with the stories of terrorist atrocities in the Northern Ireland conflict. As a child I could never understand why these "evil" people were doing such terrible things. As time progressed the violence escalated, car bombing in England started to happen, we used to look under our cars before we got in to check for bombs. Fortunately the Northern Ireland conflict has subsided, indeed, it is now possible to see that this conflict will be resolved without violence and the peace could be permanent.

Northern Ireland though illustrates understanding. As a child I could not understand, not because I was unable but simply because the information I had was incomplete. The English had occupied another country, and not surprisingly some of the people who had been occupied didn't like it. Indeed we also put a lot of our civilians into the occupied territory in order to secure the territory. The people whom we had seen as terrorists were only terrorists from our point of view, for the Irish they were freedom fighters, but due to the control of the media I never understood this. Indeed in other parts of the world the Irish were seen as the victims, America had a great deal of influence with NORAID which funded the freedom fighters.

Over a period of time, the truth has come out, we now understand much more about the conflict, what the issues are, we have even forgiven the freedom fighters (terrorists) and released them from our prisons. This has improved understanding and has lead to peace in Northern Ireland, which is a great achievement. But why were we not given the facts at the time, why were we deceived with propaganda, to further or save the career of some now unknown politician who couldn't allow us to back down. We had decades of fear, hatred, violence and death, just because we didn't understand enough, because we didn't ask questions, we didn't believe the unpatriotic IRA sympathisers when they told us the truth we were brainwashed by the media. The people who suppressed the truth, were probably just as ignorant as we were, they were probably following party lines and supporting a war on terrorism without questioning the issue facing them.

We know some information on some things but do we understand them, have we weighed up the pro's and con's or are we just going along with the flow? Is there a relationship between our ignorance and our failure to be creating a better world for everyone, is it important, does it matter?

We must question what we are told if we are to understand better what is happening in our world. Only through that better understanding can we really start to achieve some of Gods goals; such as for us to live in a harmonious world without poverty, war and suffering.

Perspective affects our interpretations; information is never as complete as we think it is. Time tends to let information leak out, but there are a lot of people holding it back and hiding it. All the time the information is suppressed, evil is free to do it's biding.

If we are to serve God and our fellow man then it is our responsibility to find out the truth, to question everything and to spread our truth, as we see it, as far and wide as we can.


Bruce

Absolution of Sins
From our services section, you can also access our Online Confession and Absolution of Sins page, if this is within your belief system. You can give thought to your actions and release yourself from the burden of guilt. Many people spend their lives reliving and regretting past actions. By confessing them in writing and genuinely seeking to improve your behavior, you can release your guilt and move on. Please take a moment to look at it and see if there's anything you'd like to let go of.

In that section, you are given the opportunity to receive forgiveness for your sins, if this concept is in your belief system.

You can be certain that we are sincere in this offer and that you are worthy to receive it.

RELATED LINKS

Online Confession

If you do believe this concept, you can receive forgiveness for your sins immediately. Doing this here online is a way of relieving yourself of your burden in a private, yet significant way. You can tell everything that is troubling your mind, get it out of your system and ask God for help.

Through this action, you are inviting God into your heart to lift your burden from you and give you peace. You are putting your request out into the universe where you can receive the love and guidance you are seeking.

This act of confession is not required by the Universal Life Church, or its Seminary, but we are offering it here for those to whom it can bring some peace of mind. You can confess your sins in writing below or you can do it in your own mind and just press the button.

Please know that we don't read those emails. They are destroyed as soon as they arrive because we feel that your confession is between yourself and your God. By destroying them, we set them free to travel the universe and find their destination.

Miracles

Today I'd like to talk about miracles. I'm a strong believer in miracles. I believe that miracles happen every day, all the time, everywhere. The trick is being able to recognize them when they occur.

There have been many words spoken over the last several months about all the helpful beautiful, miraculous people who got a chance to shine in the aftermath of 9/11. For that reason alone, the tragedy could be seen in a different light. For a time, people felt good about their ability to help others and to perform miracles of their own.

I've seen this sort of amazing demonstration myself. About 9 years ago or so, I was very sick with cancer. I was looking for my miracle cure and, in the process, finding many other miracles along the way. I was also getting sicker every day. In my case, being a stubborn ol' so and so, I needed to become too sick to defend myself against a miracle happening. I say defend myself because that what I had always done and what many others do all the time. I was going to take care of this myself and force a miracle to happen.

When I became very ill, I found that I needed help. I still wasn't quite ready to ask, but I got it anyway. One of the first was at the grocery store. I shuffled in, took forever to get my groceries and stood in line at the check-out. The checker looked at me and said, "You look like you're not doing very well. I'd like to come over and help." The first miracle was that she asked and the second was that I let her. She did come over; she emptied my trash, cleaned up my kitchen and generally tidied up. I tried to make conversation and perhaps start a friendship, but she told me point blank that she was just doing a good deed and that was all she wanted. I was shocked. I still think about her, nine years later. I don't know her name either.

I'm pretty sure she was an angel.

Other Resources

I've had many people ask me what religion I believe in and dedicate myself to. My answer is "all religions" and here is the explanation of that belief:

No religious person questions the fact that God placed plants and their seeds all around the world, each in the environment where they can grow and flourish. I believe that in this way God placed the seeds of his religion throughout the world, each in a way that the people of that portion of the world could understand and could worship.


I have studied religions ranging from ancient Hopi and Hinduism all the way to the more modern religions of Christianity and the Muslim Faith. They all carry within them many similarities and the same basic truths.

We live in an age where science has become almost a religion unto itself, yet the more science learns about the history of ancient times the more the old religious texts are holding up. Why then are men still killing men over the basic human right to worship as they please? Why does one faith keep trying to win over another and hold that only their belief is the correct one when both people believe basically the same thing?

Unfortunately, the answer to these questions can only be "Money and Power". For centuries religion has been used as a political weapon and force by those benefiting most by the continuation of seperatist visions of religion.

I call for the assertion of logic in these times. The belief in God, in any form and by any name is a basic right, a freedom and is always good.

Encourage the belief in God. Foster the belief in Faith, and welcome all mankind into a future of unanimous religious expression!