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During the years when the Universal Gnostic Church flourished, the Minor Orders were open to anyone who was interested in them, and most church members went through the Gnostic Lessons as an ordinary part of their membership. The priesthood or priestesshood was something else again. It required a serious and sustained commitment to study and practice in the UGC tradition, demonstrated by the completion of a series of tolerably stringent requirements. As explained in the Prospectus, candidates for the priesthood were expected to complete the Gnostic Lessons, to complete the system of training of at least one of the UCG’s affiliated orders, to establish a regular personal spiritual practice, and to engage in systematic reading and study of certain basic textbooks and of at least three holy scriptures, only one of which could be from the candidate’s own faith tradition.
As a bishop in the Universal Gnostic Church I am prepared to ordain candidates who meet these criteria. I am also prepared to consecrate priests and priestesses as bishops in the UGC tradition, provided that they meet the criteria for consecration. All these requirements are covered in the Propectus. What I propose to discuss here are the practical details.
First, it is not necessary to complete the qualifications for ordination in any particular order. If you are still working on the Gnostic Lessons and one of the affiliated orders, you can begin the reading and study now. What matters is that you have fulfilled all the requirements before you contact me to come to Rhode Island for your ordination. You will of course need to document your completion of the Gnostic Lessons and the affiliated order, as well as your personal spiritual practice; keeping a regular journal of your practices and experiences is recommended, so that you will have answers to the questions I will ask.
Second, since I don’t expect candidates for the priesthood and priestesshood to move to Rhode Island for the duration of their studies, we will be conducting seminary training online, using Dreamwidth as a venue. I have created an invitation-only group for seminarians. In order to join, you must have a Dreamwidth account; a free account is fine. Once you have your Dreamwidth account, send me a personal message at my Dreamwidth account giving your legal name, date of birth, mailing address, and at least 500 words explaining why you want to be ordained as a priest or priestess in the Universal Gnostic Church. All these communications will be kept confidential.
Third, the group will be set up to permit discussion of topics relevant to the Universal Gnostic Church. It will be moderated, of course, and there will be specific rules, which will be sent to each person accepted for membership. Violation of those rules will get you suspended or expelled from the group and the seminary program, and no, there is no recourse: my seminary, my rules. This is not a game, nor is it a venue for you to sell things or work out your emotional problems. (The Order of Spiritual Alchemy lessons are meant to help you with the latter.) Imagine that you’re asking to be enrolled in a genuine brick-and-mortar seminary, and the Dean of Students is observing you with the old, cold, bleak expression of someone who has seen every kind of nonsense students get up to and is bored with all of it.
Fourth, one of your assignments will be to post reviews of each chapter of each of the three required books. Yes, you need to review each chapter. The review will be at least 500 words in length and will demonstrate that you have read and thought about the chapter. Please do not simply cut and paste passages from the text—I am interested in your personal understanding of the ideas presented in the chapter, any insights you may have arrived at, any situations in which the material was reflected in your life experience, and the like. I want to know what you think and how you feel about these teachings.
You will also be expected to write a review of each of the sacred scriptures you read. These will cover the entire scripture and will be at least 2500 words in length. Again, cutting and pasting does not qualify; your personal reactions, insights, and reflections are what I want to see, and the goal again is to be sure that you’ve read and thought about the scripture.
Each of your book reviews is to be posted as a friends-only entry to your personal Dreamwidth account, and you and I are the only people who are to have access to it. I will read your review and, provided that it shows that you’ve read and thought about the material, you will get credit for it.
Fifth, when you have completed the Gnostic Lessons, contact me via a Dreamwidth personal message and I’ll ask you some questions to be sure you’ve done the work. In the same way, once you finish your work with the affiliated order you’ve chosen, contact me the same way and be prepared to field questions. So long as you’ve done the work you’ll have no trouble at all answering the questions and getting credit for the work.
Sixth, once you have completed all the requirements, get in touch and we’ll talk about your visit to Rhode Island and your ordination ceremony. You will have to pay all your own expenses for this but there is no other fee for ordination.
Finally, you’ll doubtless have noticed that the training for the UGC does not include instruction in specific kinds of liturgy or religious ceremony, nor does it include instruction in counseling, running a church, or what have you. This is traditional, and quite deliberate. What forms you want to use in your own religious practice, what services you want to perform for other people (or whether you want to perform services for other people at all), and what else is part of your personal religious path is up to you. Few priests and priestesses of the UGC ever had a conventional church and congregation, though there were exceptions. Most walked unique personal paths in their service to the Divine. Much of what you will be doing during the course of your training for the priesthood or priestesshood is determining exactly what kind of path you feel called to walk.
So there you have it. The door is open. Will you pass through it into the light of the Universal Gnosis? Only you can decide.
Back in John Gilbert's time, the Universal Gnostic Church always had a recommended reading list posted on its website, which was edited from time to time. I've done a little editing and updating of my own, but the books below include most of the titles that John recommended to UGC members and other interested people. If you're studying the Gnostic Lessons, if you're interested in the Order of the Universal Monk or the Order of the Universal Nun, and especially if you feel a call to the priesthood or priestesshood of the UGC, books from the list below would be worth adding to your bookshelf (or electronic equivalent). 
And here we are at the last of the Gnostic Lessons, covering the minor order of Acolyte, which in the UGC is the last of the minor orders and the beginning of the transition to the major orders of Priest and Bishop. Next week I'll post a revised version of John Gilbert's recommended reading list for students of the UGC tradition, and after that -- why, then it will be time to post the details for those of you who are interested in potentially proceeding to the Priesthood or Priestesshood. 
On to Gnostic Lesson 5, covering the fourth of the UGC's minor orders, the Order of Healer. 
Here's the fourth Gnostic Lesson, which covers the third of the Universal Gnostic Church's minor orders, the Order of Reader. This should take you another month of work. Yes, the painting's another of Jung's; oddly, he could paint almost anything well except human beings. (That seems to have been a cultural thing in the German-speaking world in his time; Adolf Hitler, who was otherwise quite a gifted watercolorist, couldn't paint a realistic human figure.)
Here's the third Gnostic Lesson, which is the material covering the second of the UGC's minor orders, the Order of Doorkeeper. The work of this lesson, like the last, should take you at least a month. Again, it's seemingly very simple, but the simplicity conceals unexpected lessons. 
Here's the second Gnostic Lesson, which is the material covering the first of the UGC's minor orders, the Order of Cleric. (Yes, you can insert the mandatory Dungeons & Dragons reference here; just remember you're starting out at experience level 0.) The work of this lesson should take you at least a month. It's seemingly very simple -- but the simplicity conceals unexpected lessons. 
The training program the Universal Gnostic Church offered for its lay members and aspirants to monastic and priestly vocations alike was a set of six Gnostic Lessons, which also involve preparation and ritual entry into the Minor Orders of the UGC. (The minor orders of most established churches tend to be highly selective, but in the UGC and most other independent sacramental churches, it's normal for the laity to receive them.) Each one other than the first will take a month of study and practice.
The following essay was written by a leading member of the UGC under the pseudonym “Mother Maria Juliana.” (I exchanged emails with her back in the day but never learned her real name.) It presents the two main monastic orders of the UGC, the Order of the Universal Monk (OUM) and the Order of the Universal Nun (OUN), as they existed in the heyday of the UGC. I know of no members of either Order who still remain active, but—as you’ll see when you read the text below—it’s by no means certain that any such members would make their presence known.
This post is purely for geeks, and geeks of an unusual type at that. Every church that claims apostolic succession -- that is to say, a direct lineage from one of the apostles of Jesus of Nazareth -- traditionally has the responsibility to list that lineage somewhere for public examination. While the Universal Gnostic Church is not strictly Christian -- it affirms the right of its clergy and members to seek gnosis of the Divine in whatever form, and through whatever channels, they find appropriate -- its historic roots are in the independent Christian sacramental movement, and those deserve to be acknowledged and honored. 
Ever since I started posting material on the traditions I inherited from John Gilbert, some readers have expressed interest in the Universal Gnostic Church (UGC), the religious body at the center of those traditions. After much reflection, I've decided to go ahead and set out the course of training that leads to ordination in the UGC. One of the reasons that this took quite a bit of reflection is that I've had bad experiences with this in the past. A lot of people treat ordination to the priesthood or priestesshood as a matter of getting a certificate that allows them to tell other people what to do. I've dealt with people who said all the right things to my face, and then turned around the moment they got ordained, and jumped up on a self-manufactured pulpit to play little tin god to anyone who would listen. 
