New Unity

Who we are

A place of love and justice in north London

New Unity is a thriving non-religious church with locations at Upper St. in Islington and Newington Green in Hackney. New Unity’s roots go all the way back to 1667, when the first congregation met to champion tolerance, inclusiveness and individual freedom. In later centuries, members of the church supported the campaign to abolish slavery; they provided an education for unschooled young women; and they championed the idea of a welfare state. These activities were all way ahead of their time, and established the church as a notable source of progressive thinking.

A lasting legacy

That proud tradition flourishes to this day. New Unity is a radically inclusive community that works towards a fairer and more compassionate society. It runs a weekly support centre for migrants, providing legal advice and other practical help. It helps to fund a host of small, local charities that might otherwise be overlooked. Through community organising work, New Unity works to help settle Syrian refugees, to get government to crack down on abusive private landlords, to increase the number of employers paying the London Living Wage. Nationally, it supports campaigns such as LGBTQI+ rights and Black Lives Matter.

New Unity continues to offer many of the activities you’d expect of a church: there’s a Sunday Gathering, singing, children’s programmes, various kinds of small groups, seminars and pastoral care. But we call ourselves non-religious because we don’t promote supernatural beliefs, we reject the unacceptable social attitudes of many traditional religions, and we’re totally democratic and self-governing.