This is the first in a series on the "Cults" or false Christian religions.  A cult is defined as any religious organization claiming to be Christian or holding to Christian beliefs yet deny the cardinal doctines of the Christian faith.  The Unity Church and the Unity School of Chrisitianity are clearly a cult and not a true Christian Church.

Jesus and the New Testament apostles warned about false prophets and false teachers appearing in the last days and today they are plethora. There seems to be an available cult to fit the mind-set of those seeking extra-biblical and extra Christian experiences. Unity is certainly one of those and is part of the end-time apostasy and Mystery Babylon:

Matthew 24: 4-5, 11, 23-25

4 And Jesus answered and said to them: "Take heed that no one deceives you.
5 "For many will come in My name, saying, I am the Christ and will deceive many.
 
11 "Then many false prophets will rise up and deceive many.

23 "Then if anyone says to you, 'Look here is the Christ?' or There !' do not believe it.
24 "For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders to deceive, if possible even the elect.
25 "See I have told you beforehand.

I  Timothy 4: 1-5

1 I charge you therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ, who will judge the living and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom:
2 Preach the Word! Be ready in season adn out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and teaching.
3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers;
4 and they will turn their ears away from the truth and be turned aside to fables.
5 But you be watchful in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

I Peter 2:1-2

1 But there were also false prophets among the people, even as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Lord who bought them and bring on themselves swift destruction.

2 And many will follow their destructive ways, because of whom hte way of truth will be blasphemed.

Comparing these few Scriptures (many more could be referenced) with the doctrine of the Unity Church proves it is a false cult apostate organization because it denies the deity of Jesus and His blood sacrifice for sin, and as the following articles point out, Unity also rejects the sin nature of fallen man, a literal heaven and hell. Moreover, when it teaches that man is really "the christ so-called consciousness" or to put it in plainer language, that god or the divine nature is in every man as man is basically good, it fulfulls what  Jesus said in Matthew 24:5 - "For many will come in My name saying, 'I am the Christ and will deceive many." (See the second article below point "5" where Charles Fillmore says, "I am the Christ of God;"  there is only one Christ of God and that is the Lord Jesus Christ).  

The Unity Church is without  doubt a false apostate organization and no true Christian should every step one foot inside the hellish organization for its members unless they repent and leave it, will go to the very hell they do not believe exists.

The Lord's last letter to the saints in Revelation 18:4 is to come out of Mystery Babylon The Great - the Great Whore and mother of Harlots. What is a harlot in the Bible?  A harlot is a spiritual union with false doctrine; Therefore, the Unity Church is part of the Great Harlot  of Revelation 18 whom God will destroy and judge those who of their own desires followed its heretical teachings.

Do not be deceived by this New Age cult for it is has nothing to do with true Christianity.

Dr. Allen M. Barber

Unity School of Christianity - A Practice of Various Religions

Founded by Charles Fillmore in 1889, Unity School of Christianity mainly propagated itself through literature distribution. The followers are encouraged to remain in and practice their respective religions. They consider their mission a way of subtly disseminating their ideas. The main purpose of Unity School of Christianity is to enable people to become the heir to their true divine nature. "We see the good in all religions and we want everyone to feel free to find the Truth for himself wherever may be led to find it" (Modern Thought, 1889, p. 42).

Unity School of Christianity - The Basic Theology

The salvation beliefs of Unity School of Christianity are described in the Unity publication, Salvation. It says, "As a matter of fact, salvation is one of the finest words in our language, for it means simply that by the virtue of God's presence within our own being we have the power to overcome wrong thinking and thereby to deliver ourselves from the unhappy results of such thinking." It goes on to say, "To be saved to be born anew, is to come into Truth with the whole person and build a new way of life. This is the way of salvation that Jesus taught." According to Unity School of Christianity, there is no sin to be forgiven. All a person needs to do is believe in their true divine nature and their belief alone will make it true. Unity denies the existence of a heaven or hell.

Unity teaches that as man discovers his divine nature, he raises his inner being until he is fully God-realized. Once he has reached this state, he is in perfect oneness with God and does not need further redemption. He is now divine.

Who is Jesus? According to Unity School of Christianity, Jesus was only a man who attained a higher mental state. J. Sig Paulson, an author in Unity magazine, writes, "Each individual has within himself the Christ potential, the Christ presence, the Christ reality." Unity teaches that it is the potential of every man and woman to become a "Christ."

Who is God? Fillmore writes, "We must relieve our minds of a personal God ruling over us….God is not person but Principle" (Dynamics for Living, p. 30).

Unity School of Christianity - Reincarnation

Unity School of Christianity also believes and teaches reincarnation. Charles Fillmore said that reincarnation was a simple way for God to offer man a second chance at perfection. Article 22 of the Unity Statement of Faith states, "we believe that the dissolution of spirit, soul and body, caused by death, is annulled by rebirth of the same spirit and soul in another body here on earth. We believe the repeated incarnations of man to be a merciful provision of our loving Father to the end that all may have the opportunity to attain immortality through regeneration, as did Jesus." Unity believes that when a body dies, the soul passes into the bodies of lower animals or other human beings, in a rotating cycle. This continues until purification is accomplished. Then the soul passes to Nirvana (Buddhism) or Brahma (Hinduism).

Unity School of Christianity - The Basic Christian Response

The teachings of Unity School of Christianity are in direct contradiction with the Bible. The Bible distinctly says, "For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God" (Romans 3:23). All people are in need of a Savior.

The Bible also contradicts Unity's standard for salvation. Jesus said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life: no one comes to the Father, except through me." It is through Jesus Christ alone that people receive salvation, not through their own effort (Ephesians 2:8-9).

The Bible presents Jesus as the sinless, Son of God-fully God and fully man (John 5:18, Philippians 2:6-7). In the Bible, God is presented as more than Principle-he is a personable Creator.

Regarding reincarnation, the Bible tells us that we die once and then face judgment (Hebrews 9:27). The Bible never mentions people having a second chance at life, or coming back as different people or animals. Reincarnation has been a popular belief for thousands of years, but it has never been accepted by those who believe in the Bible.

A list of contradictions could go on and on. It is clear that Unity School of Christianity is not based on the Bible.

Source - http://www.allaboutcults.org/unity-school-of-christianity.htm

Unity School of Christianity

Russ Wise

The Unity School of Christianity is a classic new age cult. It has the appearance of being Christian; however, it holds pantheistic or new age beliefs at its core. Unity was founded by Charles and Myrtle Fillmore in 1889, and was later incorporated as a church in 1903 by the Unity Society of Practical Christianity in Kansas City. Unity is best known by its publication The Daily Word, used by many who are unaware of its doctrinal positions.

History

The Unity School of Christianity began as a quest for physical healing by its co-founder, Mary Caroline Page, known as Myrtle, the wife of Charles Fillmore. Even before their marriage in March of 1881 Myrtle had already developed an eclectic theology. Charles had a background in Hinduism, Buddhism, Rosicrucianism, and Theosophy.

They became students of metaphysics and after taking some forty or more courses Myrtle developed what was to become known as Practical Christianity. Myrtle became a practitioner of "mental healing."

A spiritual breakthrough came for Myrtle in 1886 when she attended a meeting lead by Dr. E.B. Weeks, a noted metaphysician. Dr. Weeks made a statement that would change Myrtle's understanding of herself and set her on a new course of spiritual development. Myrtle was in a state of mental and physical illness and had come to a point where she was not helped by either medicine or physicians. Dr. Weeks's statement that day brought her the healing she sought. She cherished each word of the phrase "I am a child of God and therefore I do not inherit sickness."

Myrtle believed that she had discovered a great "spiritual truth" regarding healing, i.e., by repeating this phrase as a positive affirmation she would be healed. She began to offer her services to others and soon developed a following of those seeking divine healing.

The Fillmores were students of Phineas Parkhurst Quimby, a mental healer and metaphysician. Myrtle was also a follower of Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, who was likewise influenced by Quimby. Unity, therefore, was birthed by the Fillmores, but its roots go back to directly to Mary Baker Eddy and both directly and indirectly to Phineas Quimby.

According to Charles Fillmore the name Unity was adopted in 1895, denoting that Unity was devoted to the spiritualization of all humanity and took the best from all religions. He said the following regarding the eclectic belief system of Unity:

We have studied many isms, many cults. People of every religion under the sun claim that we either belong to them or have borrowed the best part of our teaching from them. We have borrowed the best from all religions, that is the reason we are called Unity. . . . Unity is not a sect, not a separation of people into an exclusive group of know-it-alls. Unity is the Truth that is taught in all religions, simplified. . .so that anyone can understand and apply it. Students of Unity do not find it necessary to sever their church affiliations.

Thus many Christians adopt Unity's teachings and bring those back into their churches, not identifying their "new" teachings as Unity's and thereby compromising the doctrinal integrity of the church.

Unity Doctrine and Theology

God

God is not a personality but a spiritual energy "force" or principle of love. Charles Fillmore in his book, Jesus Christ Heals, says that "God is not loving. God is love . . . from which is drawn forth all feeling, sympathy, emotion, and all that goes to make up the joys of existence."

Fillmore goes on to say, "God does not love anybody or anything. God is the love in everybody and everything. God exercises none of His attributes except through the inner consciousness of the universe and man." In other words, God is not a personal being but an energy or force that expresses itself as a pantheistic love that permeates all things.

H. Emilie Cady attempts to reconcile the seemingly incongruous possibility that God can be both personal and impersonal by her statement:

To the individual consciousness God takes on personality, but as the creative underlying cause of all things, He is principle, impersonal; as expressed in each individual, He becomes personal to that one personal, loving, all-forgiving Father-Mother.

It's obvious that Unity's understanding of who God is has fallen victim to its own syncretism. Unity, while attempting to identify itself as being biblical, has offered too much on the "altar of tolerance" and, thereby, has prostituted itself on the bed of other gods.

Donald Curtis, former minister at Unity Church of Dallas and author of several Unity books, has this to say about God: "Every one of us has planted within him a God-seed, and the business of life is to see that this seed grows, unfolds, and expresses in our world."

Curtis goes on to say, "As this seed unfolds through the development of the Christ consciousness, we fulfill our highest objective in this world."

The ultimate goal of those who follow Unity teaching is to recognize their "oneness" with the "Force," thereby realizing their true self, the God-Self. The god of Unity is an adaptation of Hindu belief regarding the divine. God is a part of His creation. God is in all things.

Jesus the Christ

Unity also holds an unbiblical view of Jesus. Donald Curtis agrees with Unity theology in that he believes that Jesus the man is fundamentally different from Jesus the Christ. Curtis says, "Christ is the universal principle of love and wisdom. Christ is the only Son of God, but this only Son of God lives in each one of us."

Curtis makes a primary deviation from biblical understanding in that he holds the position that Jesus is man and that Christ is divine consciousness. He states, "Let us prepare ourself so that the Christ may be born in our own consciousness!" In other words, our spirituality is based on the discovery that the Christ is inherently within each one of us regardless of our personal beliefs or affiliations.

Curtis continues: "When we say 'Jesus the Christ,' we must realize that Jesus represents man and Christ represents God in man." Unity distorts Christ as the Messiah and renders Him as a "universal principle of love" that resides in all of humanity simply waiting to be discovered through self-consciousness.

Unity, along with other New Age belief systems, espouses a mental and spiritual 'transformation' that will raise our consciousness. According to Curtis "there are levels of development through which we grow toward full Christ-consciousness when we are truly transformed, fully reborn."

The pantheistic nature of Unity is expressed in Curtis' declaration that "we let our self be ruled by the Christ within. We let the Christ teaching unfold in and through us in this great new age. We know that this Christ principle indwells every individual, no matter what his religious beliefs may be. . . . We give thanks for the realization of the mystical Christ, for the Christ consciousness alive in our life."

Unified Man

According to Donald Curtis, man's primary purpose is to recognize that he is divine. He states: "There is another teaching, however a higher teaching. It is that man has always existed as part of God, and that this God-self, which is the living Essence of everything, individualizes itself in man."

Curtis goes on to say that "within each of us there is a great, wise, and beautiful Being. This is what we really are--the living Essence of everything. We are evolving constantly. We have self- consciousness; now we must develop God-consciousness, a sense of universal unity. And we must endeavor to manifest this God- consciousness in our world to solve our apparent differences through love and understanding."

Unity teaches evolution, both physical and mental or spiritual. It teaches that mankind evolves toward Godhood and that this collective God-consciousness will be man's solution to all his problems. This teaching elevates mankind to divinity, a position that is far from biblical teaching.

In his book The Way of the Christ, Curtis says that "man is human, but he is first of all divine." He adds that "as we recognize and identify with the Christ within, we become one with the universal Self-God."

This is nothing more than Hindu philosophy dressed in Western garb: everything is a part of God and God encompasses all that is, whether it be animate or inanimate. This idea, pantheism, is widely held in the East and is being imported to the United States via every means available to man.

Salvation

H. Emilie Cady in her book, Lessons in Truth, says that "man originally lived consciously in the spiritual part of himself. He fell by descending in his consciousness to the external or more material part of himself." In other words, the fall of man was from the spiritual realm to the physical and this fall has caused him to suffer spiritual amnesia. Therefore man's dilemma is to reclaim his place in the spiritual realm through right thinking.

Unity teaches that as man discovers his innate divinity he continues to raise his consciousness until he becomes fully God- realized. Once man has achieved this state of understanding he recognizes that he is in perfect oneness with God and is not in need of redemption but that he is indeed the divine.

The unbiblical position regarding salvation held by Unity is clearly seen in the Unity publication, The Way to Salvation. This pamphlet states that "Jesus Christ was not meant to be slain as a substitute for man; that is, to atone vicariously for him. Each person must achieve at-one-ment with God, by letting the Christ Spirit within him resurrect his soul into Christ perfection."

Curtis says that "more than ever, we need to become quiet and focus upon the inner. We need to be still and to know that the presence within is God." When one becomes fully aware of this divine presence salvation is realized because the individual no longer has a sense of lostness.

Reincarnation

Unity teaches that the individual lives a number of lifetimes within one existence. Dr. Donald Curtis of the Unity Church of Dallas writes that "it isn't so important that we make it in this particular lifetime, as it is to realize that we do make it, because there is only one lifetime and it goes on forever."

Article 22 of the Unity Statement of Faith states, "we believe that the dissolution of spirit, soul and body, caused by death, is annulled by rebirth of the same spirit and soul in another body here on earth. We believe the repeated incarnations of man to be a merciful provision of our loving Father to the end that all may have opportunity to attain immortality through regeneration, as did Jesus."

Charles Fillmore rejected the standard understanding of reincarnation as described by the Hindu or the Buddhist. He could not accept their respective teachings regarding the Law of Karma or the Transmigration of the soul. For him reincarnation was a much more simple way for God to offer man a second chance at perfection.

This teaching of reincarnation is perhaps the most destructive of all the false teachings of Unity. The belief in reincarnation undercuts the primary tenets of the gospel. One would have to deny the deity of our Lord, His physical resurrection, and His Second Coming to accept the error of Charles and Myrtle Fillmore.

Reincarnation undercuts Christian doctrine in three ways. First, it assumes that God is impersonal and is therefore unknowable. Second, reincarnation denigrates the Atonement of Christ, and third, it denies the fact that Jesus physically resurrected from the dead. We need to look at each of these more closely.

The Bible does not offer any evidence to support these assumptions. On the contrary, the Bible clearly teaches that God is a personal Being and that He is knowable. Isaiah 43:25 and Jeremiah 31:20 tell us that God remembers; Exodus 3:12 and Matthew 3:17 say that God speaks; Genesis 1:1 and 6:5 along with Exodus 2:24 say that God sees, hears and creates. Elsewhere the Bible tells us that God is a personal Spirit (John 4:24 and Hebrews 1:3). Since God is a personal Being, He has a will (Matthew 6:10, Hebrews 10:7-9 and 1 John 2:17). Because God has an expressed will, He will also judge His creation (Ezekiel 18:30 and 34:20, and also 2 Corinthians 5:10).

Unity attempts to denigrate the Atonement of Christ in order to build a better case for reincarnation; however, the Atonement delivers man from the cyclical concept of rebirth. Reincarnation does not offer us either peace or hope. The Atonement offers us peace because we do not have to rely on our own righteousness, and it offers us hope because of what Jesus did on the cross. Jesus has dealt with our sin on the cross and our response is to simply accept His work on our behalf.

Likewise, Unity cannot accept a physical resurrection for our Lord. Unity holds that the disciples expected Jesus to be reincarnated, not resurrected. The biblical claims that Jesus rose physically, appeared to and was recognized by many, was physically touched by some, and ate fish with others are troublesome and must be explained away or spiritualized into meaninglessness if Unity is to seem plausible. (See Luke 24:16 and 31.)

Conclusion

The Unity School of Christianity is recognized as a cult because it exhibits several cultic characteristics. One such characteristic is syncretism. Syncretism is the attempt to combine or reconcile differing beliefs, usually by taking the most attractive features from several sources and combining them into a something new. Unity has taken what some would call "the best qualities" of various religious view points and combined them into a new and more acceptable faith.

Another characteristic of cults that is true of Unity is the denial of the biblical doctrine of salvation by faith in Christ's person and His finished work on the cross. In Unity, salvation comes by recognizing our inherent divinity and our oneness with God.

Unity is, in my opinion, the most deceptive of the cultic groups that use the word Christian in their name. Unity's distinction is that the follower of its teaching is encouraged to remain in his respective church home whether it be Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, or whatever. The followers of Unity considers their denominational affiliation as a mission field where they can subtly disseminate their ideas.

I recall that when I first became a believer and was attending a Methodist church, there was a particular woman in the church who often greeted me with the phrase, "Greetings to your higher self." It was a peculiar way to greet someone, yet I never asked her what she meant by it. It was several years later when I became a student of the cults that I understood the significance of her greeting. She was a follower of Unity's teachings, that each of us has the divine residing within us and that the higher self is God.

According to Charles Fillmore, Unity is the blending of various religions and belief systems into one unified system of thought. The Fillmores introduced beliefs into their system that had been commonplace in Eastern religions and occult practices.

The Fillmores introduced a pantheistic view of God to their followers and saw God as being both male and female. God is seen as an energy or force that resides in all things both animate and inanimate. Likewise God is seen as being impersonal and a part of His creation.

Jesus is a principle of "love" that brings oneness to all things. This Christ principle is present within each one of us and ultimately unifies us in a salvation experience.

Unity teaches that man's primary problem is that he has spiritual amnesia and needs to reconnect with his destiny. He needs to regain the realization that he is evolving toward divinity.

Salvation, according to Unity, comes by recognizing one's divine nature. Unity does not recognize the Atonement of Christ but rather seeks what Eastern mystics refer to as at-one-ment or realizing oneness with the divine on a spiritual level.

Since Unity does not recognize the work of Christ on the cross (the Atonement), but rather accepts evolution as a positive ingredient in man's spirituality, it is only logical that they embrace reincarnation as a valid system for spiritual enlightenment. As you can see, then Unity is not based on biblical teaching. To the contrary, it is heavily influenced by Eastern thought and belief. Unity is a classic New Age cult and is not Christian in any aspect of its doctrine or teaching.

© 1995 Probe Ministries

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