I am of two minds about the best-known and probably best-loved of the principles adopted by the Unitarian Universalist Association. On the one hand, it is an affirmation of Universalism. We can hear within it an echo of the line from the 1935 Washington Declaration, avowing "the supreme worth of every human personality." On the other hand, it also flattens Universalist theology to the point of misrepresenting it. The first principle accepts the value of human nature as self-evident. The violence and cruelty this century has seen shows that human worth and dignity is not self-evident, but must be defended and affirmed with power. Such a statement about human worth and dignity goes far to cover up human sin, longing, and confusion. Such a proclamation obscures personal development, repentence, and reconciliation, which is as Unitarian a value as a Universalist one. In everyday life we know people who take a suggestion as an assualt on their freedom, even when the suggestion (say, to seek a doctor) would mean much to his or her well-being. I would hate to believe that life offers no room for growth, change, or gracious new beginnings.
      The film As Good as It Gets muddled this message, but had one clear and memorable moment of hope. It was featured on movie trailers, and so even if you never saw the film, you may recall the scene. Jack Nicholson's abrasive and mentally ill character (Melvin) had just insulted Helen Hunt's character (Carol): she demanded an immediate complement. He replied: "You make me want to be a better man." A tad manipulative, but the point is well taken: life without growth is death. But what is the source of growth?
      Universalist Christianity has affirmed that the love and providing of God is the source of human good and growth. I have often heard evangelical Christians say that if someone does not know Jesus, he or she cannot love, as if Jews, or Buddhists, or atheists are filled with some secondary, fractured emotion. This is patently false, and a rather ham-handed from of self-delution. The Universalist part of us affirms the completeness of God's gift to the whole human family. The Christian part of us affirms the character of the gift: that what is of value is not outward riches, but the unseen things of the Spirit. We gain our dignity and worth from God, who loves us, and this treasure is the most vauable one we have. Theologically speaking, the creation of God in us is the source of our human rights. Governments may rise and fall, becoming more free or tyrannical, but as children of the living God, we have a basic nature which cannot be stripped away by proclamation.
      We see this character of our dignity and worth in certain passages of the Bible. Psalm 8 is often mentioned. Human beings are placed at a place of honor in the natural world, and in the mind of God:

Out of the mouths of babes and infants you have founded a bulwark because of your foes, to silence the enemy and the avenger.When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars that you have established; what are human beings that you are mindful of them, mortals that you care for them? Yet you have made them a little lower than God [or, the God-like beings], and crowned them with glory and honor. (Ps 8:2-5, NRSV)

And should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also many animals? (4: 11, NRSV)