Our Approach - Cork Unitarian Church

Our Approach To Doing "Church"

Each of us has our own spiritual journey. At Cork Unitarian Church, we respect that you have your own spiritual journey and even though it is probably similar to that of other others, ultimately it is unique to you and you own it.

In our view, “church” is a community of people who provide a safe, nourishing, and supportive space where people help each other grow spiritually. This is done primarily through shared presence, non-judgemental accompaniment, and learning from each others’ experiences.

Cork Unitarian Church operates as a small faith community:

- A small faith community is a group of people who gather regularly to deepen their spiritual lives, share faith experiences, and support one another.
- These communities are characterised by their relational nature.
- They are peer oriented and provide a safe space for each member to be open and honest about their own spiritual journey.

While this may appear different from our modern common notions around “church”, “church services”, and “religion”, it actually is very traditional.

For example, in the earliest Christian communities:

- Church gatherings would be small and personal (think of “house churches”)
- They were peer oriented – the original word for church was ekklesia, Greek for “called out ones” – the same word was used to describe the democratic assembly of the free citizens of a Greek city-state.
- Early church services were not primarily focused on worship as we might commonly think of it today. Rather they were focused on building-up (i.e. edification)of the individual congregants (e.g. Romans 14:19,1 Thessalonians 5:11, 2 Corinthians 12:19)

In traditional Irish culture, we can think of the word meitheal. It is an old Irish term used to describe a group of people coming together to support each other for the collective good. In the old days it might be related to a planting or a harvest. At Cork Unitarian Church, our application of meitheal is our coming together to support each other on our spiritual journey of meaning, purpose, and connectedness.