Why People Become Ordained

Here are some stories about why people became ordained through the Universal Life Church and have trained through our online seminary. They readily share their stories and knowledge to help you add to yours.

Monday, February 28, 2011

Why I Became Ordained

Hello Everybody,
I read a book called The Underground Economy (about self employment), and one of the chapters mentioned the Universal Life Church . Because this book was published in 2005, it printed the former web site. Nevertheless, upon checking Google, I read the note under the different web sites and clicked onto the seminary site. Later, I joined. At this point, I'm not trying to perform weddings, baptisms, funerals, etc. However, I do find the web sites for ulc to be interesting reading.

I was raised Roman Catholic, but my parents also allowed me to attend a Lutheran bible school. The Lutherans didn't mind that I was Catholic, but the RC church didn't like my going to one of those "Protestant" churches! By the itme I was a teenager, I disagreed with several of the beliefs of the RC Church and looked into different Christian churches, Jewish synagogues, and Buddist temples. 

At that time, I felt drawn to the Episcopal Church and in my 20s, I was received into the Anglican Communion. By the 1990s, different events happened in my life that I won't go into here, but I stopped going to church. Then, in 1998, I was researching a possible article (I am a part time writer.) to write about the 150th anniversary of the first women's-rights convention (1848) in Seneca Falls , NY . During my research, I noticed that out of a committee of five women, four of them were Quakers (the fifth, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, was Presbyterian). 

At this point, I wondered why so many Quaker women got involved in the women's rights movement?

Then as I researched about the Quakers, it opened my eyes, and in the end, I never did finish that women's rights article as I got sidetracked by my interest in the Religious Society of Friends. I started attending the local Friends meeting house in 2000, and I've been attending since. There are many web sites about the Quakers on Google and other search engines, so, I won't give you a full history or about the beliefs of Friends. Nevertheless, the branch of Friends that I attend, Friends General Conference (FGC), has no formal ministry. They feel that everybody is performing his or her share of ministry during the silent meeting either by keeping silent and opening their thoughts to the Divine, or by feeling inspired to speak briefly during the first-day meeting. Everybody is equal with Friends. Although the Quakers started as a Christian religion, nowadays, FGC accepts many beleifs from different religions, just like ULC. I found some similar parallels between the Religious Society of Friends and the ULC, and that's why I became ordained.

Dorothy Kurtz

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The Universal Life Church is a comprehensive online seminary where we have classes in Christianity, Wicca, Paganism, two courses in Metaphysics and much more. I have been a proud member of the ULC for many years and the Seminary since its inception.

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