By Rick Lyon, Indiana, United States
Whenever I talk about the Urantia Book Study Group Directory, I like to point out that the sun never sets on the Urantia community. With 63 countries confirming active study group listings, it is a testimony to the world that like-minded people, often coming from many different religions and cultures, can share the love and friendship of a worldwide community of religious believers. As a matter of fact, 2021 had 49 new listings added, the third-largest number of new groups since the directory was created in 2011.
Within this online directory lies proof that we can come together to study and discuss deep, intimate, and sometimes difficult topics in a civil manner, as brothers and sisters of our Paradise Father. What an inspiration, and what a demonstration of the world-changing power of the love of Jesus when shared sincerely among what may surely be the most diverse group of people on the planet!
The Urantia Book Study Group Directory is a joint project of Urantia Association International, the Urantia Book Fellowship, and Urantia Foundation. This is an example of three organizations working together with a true spirit of organizational and spiritual unity. Bill Beasley serves as chairman of the directory team. Jackie Koury serves as the Fellowship representative, Tamara Strumfeld represents Urantia Foundation, and I am the representative from the Association.
Scott Brooks developed and administers the database and website. There were significant and costly upgrades in 2021 that were paid for by the three organizations. The most visible change is the greater emphasis on virtual study groups. Because this is where the major growth has been, we made it easier to find them on the home page.
You can trust that the directory is current, with the latest listings of location, day and time, and host contact information. Every year, we contact every study group in the directory to confirm that they are still meeting. This is a tremendous labor of love, but it is worth the effort because we are constantly welcoming new readers. Our team wants to ensure that if you find a study group you wish to attend, it is still actively meeting on a regular basis.
Last year we added three new countries (Honduras, Hungary, and Japan) and two new languages (Indonesian and Hungarian). That brings our total number of countries to 63. The states of Delaware and Vermont were new to the US listings.
The statistics are pretty impressive. By the end of 2021, we had the following numbers of listings worldwide. As you can see, we finally broke the 500 mark by a good margin!
• 513 total groups
• 243 online groups
• 358 in-person groups
• 88 that are both online and in person
The top 10 countries by number of registered groups:
• United States
• Brazil
• Colombia
• Canada
• Spain
• France
• Mexico
• Australia
• Venezuela
• South Korea
The top five languages are English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Korean.
Not only are we seeing growth in the number of study groups, we are also seeing increased usage of the directory as people, probably new to The Urantia Book, search for like-minded individuals to study with. If you have not yet listed your study group, we encourage you to sign up today. Help make 2022 our best year ever!
You can find it at https://www.urantiastudygroup.org [2]
If you would like more information, please contact: [email protected] [3]
