A Brief History of Unity

Founded in 1889, by Charles and Myrtle Fillmore, Unity offers a practical philosophy for living. We have no strict creed or dogma, but offer a comprehensive teaching to all who are seeking a deeper understanding of their spiritual nature.

Unity is more than a church, more than a school. It is a spiritual movement for all individuals growing, seeking, unfolding, and becoming what they are meant to be. Unity is more interested in teaching one how to think than what to think. It always leaves you free to choose what has value for you.

Unity is a way of life, a way of thinking that emphasizes humanity's divine nature and the goal of expressing that nature in every area of life. One of Unity's fundamental working propositions is that the way we think and feel about ourselves, our fellow human beings, our world, and God is a determining factor in the expression of that divine nature.

Unity stresses prayer as the fundamental method for developing constructive thought patterns. Prayer unifies us with God. It is out of our relationship with God that our divine nature comes alive, our thinking becomes constructive, and our life is blessed with good.

The actual impetus for the founding of the Unity movement came from Myrtle Fillmore's remarkable healing of tuberculosis. Myrtle Fillmore was healed because her thinking was changed. She had a deep-seated belief that her illness was inherited. From a lecture on metaphysics, however, she suddenly grasped the idea that she was a child of God and did not inherit sickness. She prayerfully applied her new insight with great success, and her health instantly began to improve.

In describing her experience, Myrtle writes:

“I have made what seems to me a discovery. I was fearfully sick; I had all the ills of mind and body that I could bear. Medicine and doctors ceased to give me relief, and I was in despair, when I found practical Christianity. I took it up and I was healed. This is how I made what I call my discovery:
 
I was thinking about life. Life is everywhere… Ah! intelligence, as well as life, is needed to make a body. Here is the key to my discovery. Life has to be guided by intelligence in making all forms. The same law works in my own body. Life is simply a form of energy, and has to be guided and directed in man's body by his intelligence. How do we communicate intelligence? By thinking and talking, of course. Then it flashed upon me that I might talk to the life in every part of my body and have it do just what I wanted. I began to teach my body and got marvelous results.”

It was the central event of Myrtle Fillmore's healing that provided the beginning inspiration for the Unity movement.