Welcome to the website of the Croydon Unitarian and Free Christian Church. Please do contact us if the information we provide here does not fully answer your questions.

Unitarians have been meeting for worship in Croydon since 1870 (see our history page), though the present church dates only from 1959. As the logo above suggests, we like to think of ourselves as a free church with open doors. Our monthly newsletter goes under the name "Open Door", and contains details of what's on.

The congregation is quite small but growing and thriving. We meet for worship every Sunday at 11am and enjoy coffee and chat in the hall afterwards. Children are always welcome, and we run a special programme for them twice a month. We offer a number of weekday activities, including meditation and personal spiritual development courses.

Our worship does not always follow the same pattern, but it usually includes prayer, readings, music, hymns, silence and an address. Our readings may be drawn from one or more of the many different faith traditions, from literature or poetry, or from any other form of writing in which there is inspiration to be found.

We are a community within which anybody who wishes to worship with an open mind in a spirit of freedom, reason and tolerance should be able to feel at home. Though we hold many ideas in common, we do not all share the same beliefs. Each person is encouraged to develop his or her own faith.

What do Unitarians believe?

If you are a Unitarian already, you probably do not need to read any further. But if you are new to Unitarianism, the following perspectives may help you get a feel for what unites us.

If you believe...

...that we should seek a spiritual and moral framework of love, peace and justice in our lives

...that people should try to understand and respect each other's faith tradition

...that how a person lives is a measure of their faith

...that intellectual and spiritual growth rather than conformity should be encouraged

...that the worth of all people, irrespective of age, nationality, gender or sexual orientation, should be affirmed

...that there is an interdependence with all life on our planet

then you share some beliefs with Unitarians.

We are under no external pressure from creed or dogma, holy book, priest or church. Rather, we are trying to make sense of life and find effective ways of living it.

We enjoy the freedom to explore our own spiritual paths. What we share, whatever our personal religion, is a respect for the truths we find in ourselves and the truths we find in others.

We believe we need to use the life we are given to work together to make the world the best place we can.

Unitarianism arose in central Europe in the sixteenth century, and its roots in this country go back to the seventeenth century. There have been many eminent Unitarians - Dickens, Bartok, Sir Isaac Newton, Priestley, Elizabeth Gaskell and Sir Adrian Boult to name but a few.

Further information is available in the leaflet "A faith worth thinking about".

Are you a Unitarian without knowing it?

Do you feel, with John Ruskin, that "There is religion in everything around us"? Or believe in your heart, with the thirteenth century German mystic Meister Eckhart, that "Every creature is a word of God"?

Are you uncomfortable with the creeds and dogmas of the orthodox religions?

Do you recoil from professional evangelists who preach "hell fire and damnation"?

Do you fight shy of people who have neat comfortable answers to the puzzling questions of life?

Do you believe that everyone has the right to seek truth and meaning for themselves, and that nobody has a monopoly on the truth?

If the answers to these questions are predominantly "Yes", you could be a Unitarian without knowing it.

Try the online "Belief System Selector" to see which religion/denomination best matches your own beliefs.

For more information on Unitarianism, you may find some of our links useful.

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