UNISON READING (#613) - from the Chandogya Upanishad
You could have golden treasure buried beneath your feet,
and walk over it again and again, yet never find it because
you don’t realize it is there.
Just so, all beings live every moment in the city of the Divine,
but never find the Divine because it is hidden by the
well of illusion.
MINISTER’S PRAYER:
God of the Ages, Spirit of Life, Thou whose energy connects us
with that
which we hold most dear,
We gather today on the cusp of autumn, surrounded by sunlight,
inspired
by birches, and strengthened by memories of devotion and love.
On this day we will gather again to remember and to honor one
who has
been a part of our congregational life for more than fifty years:
Richard
Crawford. We cannot walk across the threshold of this sacred space
without missing
him already, without wondering how we will carry on without his
warmth and
challenging spirit.
Yet we gather also with other joys and sorrows to absorb, to make
new
meanings with. We think of those among us struggling with issues
of separation
and of loss, those whose marriages have ended, whose parents are
ill, or whose
college age children have gone away. We remember those who have
spoken of
deaths in their families, or among their friends. We think of
those who are
looking for work, who wonder about their futures, who find themselves
asking if
they are truly alone.
Gracious Spirit, and harmonic energy of all life, we your love
includes
us all. Help us now to lay forth all that we wonder or worry about,
to
recognize all for whom we give thanks or try to lend support.
Help us now in the
collective intensity of our shared meditations to be honest and
real: to let our
thoughts and fears, worries and wonders tumble out, unchecked,
that we might
remember to draw breath, ask for courage and patience, and give
heartfelt
thanks.
As we move now into these shared moments of meditation and prayer,
help
us to ask for the healing of pain. Open us for the possibility
of the soft,
gentle coming of love...
(silent prayer)
May we be blessed. Amen.
READING: (a poem by Billy Collins, entitled “Introduction
to Poetry”)
I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide
or press an ear against its hive.
I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,
or walk inside the poem’s room
and feel the walls for a light switch.
I want them to water-ski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author’s name on the shore.
But all they do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.
Sermon:
REVERENCE REVISITED
Before I begin I’d like you to know that this is the beginning
of a
sermon series that will have at least two, and possibly three,
parts. Today’s
sermon brings you the background for my interest in this theme.
In case you haven’t heard, the topic of the year for Unitarian
Universalists has been the buzz over our UUA President’s
call to us, in several
speeches, sermons, and editorials, to develop what he calls “a
language of reverence.”
The Reverend Bill Sinkford, in a daring and personal sermon
last January
to the First Jefferson Unitarian Universalist Church of Dallas,
first spoke of
the strength and vibrancy of our Unitarian Universalist Association
in terms
of the growth in the numbers of people worshipping at our 1,050
congregations
across the continent. But he immediately moved on to say that
far more
important than numerical growth is the new growth he senses among
us, the new
maturity within our ranks, to engage in meaningful religious dialogue
among
ourselves and with the wider religious community about our liberal
religious
perspective, about the faith that we call OUR “good news.”
Said Sinkford, “I believe that Unitarian Universalism is
growing up.
Growing out of a cranky and contentious adolescence into a more
confident
maturity. A maturity in which we can not only [honor] the value
we have found in
this free faith, but also begin to offer that [perspective] to
the world outside
these beautiful sanctuary walls.”
Well, perhaps he pushed it a bit too far with that line about
“maturity!” After all, we all know that if you want
to provoke anyone’s worst behavior,
all you have to do is tell them how nicely they have matured.
“Oh yeah?”
we snarl, immediately suspicious of what we’ve been tricked
into overlooking.
And to be honest, there has been a bit of a flap over President
Sinkford’s comment that we are growing up. And there has
been suspicion, as well as
some honest concern from the many humanists, atheists and agnostics
among us that
development of this new language may result in leaving them behind.
Nevertheless, be advised that the discussion about developing
a new language of
reverence has begun!
President Sinkford’s opening speech, and call for a language
of reverence
at General Assembly in Boston this past June, had people buzzing
all week.
So much so that towards the end of the last Plenary Session, the
late afternoon
time when everyone usually shuts up so we can all go home, a speaker
appeared
at a floor mike to ask the Moderator if it might be possible for
those who
had been discussing President Sinkford’s challenge to have
fifteen minutes to
share their thoughts with the wider assembly? She explained it
had been her
experience that this was the topic everyone had been discussing
all week, over
lunch, on the T, or on the way to workshops. She thought there
might be a few peop
le who would be willing to share what they had been hearing, or
thinking
about, with this larger audience.
The Moderator said, “Yes. Fifteen minutes.” And people
lined up at
both floor mikes, speaking from alternate sides of the hall, about
what excited
them, what worried them, or why this mattered so much after all.
Their comments were honest, respectful of difference, poignant,
and
searching. Speaker after speaker began by acknowledging that the
viewpoint of the
person who had just spoken was not their own viewpoint, but they
wanted us to
remember that it had been said; they wanted to be sure that no
opinion or
honest concern got lost in the wide ranging exchange of views
underway.
After 15 minutes, the Moderator noted that there were still
nearly 45
people lined up waiting to speak. Should they be allowed additional
time? A
motion was made to extend the comments for another half hour,
and the usually
worn out, frazzled UU delegates voted a resounding “YES!”
then cheered and
applauded when it passed.
It was an extraordinary occasion. Momentous. I’ve never
seen anything
like it in my twenty-five years of experience at General Assemblies.
You know,
we UUs have become so adept at saying “No!” in years
past. We’ve been quick
to stake out extreme positions; to stridently but virtuously polarize
discussions. And while there have been wonderful debates on the
floor of GA, over the
years, occasionally I have come away wondering if anyone who spoke
had
actually LISTENED to what any of the other speakers had to say.
Sometimes I would
just leave shaking my head in discouragement because of the tone
of withering
scorn which was occasionally directed toward opinions which were
not
politically correct.
Yet that was not what I heard and saw at this day’s sharing
of
perspectives from the floor. There was deep listening. There was
scattered applause for
a wide range of perspectives. There was patient willingness to
wait while
people who had never spoken in front of a crowd of this size struggled
to find
their composure, or to pick the right words.
There was a kind of respectful listening, honest sharing, intelligent
questioning and raising of anguished concerns that day which made
me think of
this congregation: of Follen Church; of all the occasions we have
had over the
past five or six years to get at the heart of what we believe,
feel, and fear,
and then, as we feel ready, to make a democratic decision.
We’ve faced some tough questions together in this congregation,
and it
hasn’t been easy sorting out facts and feelings, responsibilities
and fears. But
I have seen us gather our courage, marshall our generosity, and
resolve
together to gain the deeper perspective we needed about choices
we faced. Yes,
we’ve lost a few folks who simply could not bring themselves
to tolerate either
the process or the outcome, but what I’ve seen, over and
over again, is how
these difficult dialogues at Follen have eventually taught us
to trust each
other, trust the process, speak from our minds and our hearts,
and to embrace an
outcome that represented the best collaborative effort we could
give. This
characteristic of our congregational life together has been, for
me, the most
remarkable aspect of my ten years of ministry at Follen.
I speak of this because President Sinkford’s challenge
to the larger
Association of congregations is a challenge that I have been longing
to issue,
myself, at Follen. Many of you know of my years of training and
involvement with
interfaith dialogue. Currently I am coordinating -- with Maggie
Herzig and
Imam Salih Yucel - the UU-Muslim Dialogue group that has so enriched
my
religious perspective, and, I hope that of others among us as
well.
But my interfaith work began when I was at Harvard Divinity
School and
needed a thesis to get out of that place in one piece. It occurred
to me that
during my 15 prior years’ work as a UU religious educator,
I had always been
fascinated by the lack of vocabulary newcomers had to use when
trying to answer
my friendly questions: “So, what brings you here today?”
Almost invariably
they’d say something like this. “Well, you see, Reverend
Duncan, my husband’s
Jewish and I’m Methodist, so we’re looking for a compromise
religion.” Or
they’d say, “Well, I was raised Catholic but my husband
is an agnostic, so
we’re looking for a neutral church.” Ahah, I thought
to myself at Harvard: I
know what my thesis needs to be about! I need to work on helping
all these
people with interfaith issues WITHIN UU congregations! I need
to find a way to
help those of us -- well, all of us -- who have come into our
ranks from other
religious or secular backgrounds to learn how to describe, in
language
consistent with our free faith, what really matters; what we are
seeking and,
apparently, cannot find the words to say.
The thesis I produced, “Mixing Oil and Water, Religiously:
Talking About
Faith Differences with Folks You Love,” tackled the problem
of language as the
key to understanding. I’ve worked with it for over a decade
now, and it never
fails to amaze me how we miss the boat with one another when trying
to
describe what we most deeply believe, question, or need. It has
been thrilling to
find new ways to help folks widen the shutters of their perception,
and to see
good people learning to explain their religious perspectives --
and to listen
to those held by others -- with more understanding and empathy.
Yet what is obvious to me now, after more than a decade of working
with
UUs on their issues of interfaith dialogue, is not obvious to
other newcomers
who still pour in our doors seeking answers to the questions they
now have.
What most of our newcomers, and many of our members, still don’t
get is that
there is no one right answer here! We are a religiously pluralistic
faith! Walk
into any other church up the street here and you’ll find
congregations of
people who essentially agree to a central set of beliefs. That’s
because they are
creedal religions. Because we are non-creedal; because we ask
each individual
to take the responsibility to deepen and articulate their own
faith journey
in community, there are many different understandings of apparently
common
words.
Indeed, within any one UU congregation, given our extremely
diverse
religious and faith backgrounds, there are many languages and
faith perspectives
at play. So talking with each other deeply becomes nearly impossible.
This is
then made harder because so many of us have chosen to reject the
religious
language of our personal pasts. Without any new language, we find
it terribly
hard to express what we now believe. We may feel reverence when
we are carried
away by the choir’s gorgeous music - like this morning’s
anthem and offertory!
- or we may feel inspired by the beautiful vista beyond these
elegant
nineteenth century windows, but when it comes to expressing what
we feel in words
-- well, it’s just too hard to do without dragging in old
words that make us
wince, or triggering old memories of religions we want to leave
in the past.
So we opt to remain inarticulate. We come to worship, and we think
about
it; we may even love it, week to week. But, knowing we are surrounded
by
folks whose religious perspectives differ from our own, and of
course not wanting
to offend them, we soon learn that the way to reap the benefits
of being a UU
is to slide into a kind of consensual silence about all matters
religious.
Why would we need to deepen our religious pathway or learn to
translate, or
rework, a language of reverence if we have essentially agreed
that we’re not going
to talk about it, after all?
I may be coming across a bit more negatively than I intend.
But I would
like us to spend time this year thinking about how to release
ourselves from
this consensual silence about all matters religious. I would like
us to
discuss what we hear, think, and feel when we hear certain words
or concepts
expressed. I would like us to hear how we almost unanimously say,
when others ask
us about Follen, that we love the beautiful music, the RE program,
and the warm
caring community.
Did you catch that? Can you hear how we usually do not say one
word
about what worship means to us, about our spiritual journeys,
or about the ways in
which we are being encouraged to go deeper, spiritually, or that
we would
like to grow?
The fact is that we do not talk about Follen as a place of worship,
as a
place to bring our spiritual or religious questions. What this
says to me is
that we may be underestimating what we can do together at Follen.
Which brings me back to Bill Sinkford’s call that we begin,
now, to go
deeper. He’s raised the issue of reverence in terms of vocabulary,
which is
certainly important. But I am also raising the issue of reverence
in terms
attitude; in terms of how we allow others to use vocabularies
which we do not
understand. While we can intellectually affirm that the inclusion
of certain words
may apparently enrich and nourish others, we also know -- if we
are really
honest with ourselves -- that there are certain words we simply
cannot abide.
Regardless of how long it has been since we left those words behind
us, we
still feel as if we’d like to tie those words to the back
of a chair and begin
beating them with a hose, “ to torture a confession out of
them,” to find out
what they really mean!
It is worth noting that Bill Sinkford believe that if we can
move in this
direction, it will strengthen us. He asks, in one of his speeches,
“Can we make
Unitarian Universalism even stronger by embracing language that
will both speak to o
ur individual searches for truth and meaning and enable us to
converse with the
wider religious community as well? “ He continues, “The
Reverend David
Bumbaugh, a UU minister and religious humanist, has called this
language “a
vocabulary of reverence.” Bumbaugh writes: ‘We have
manned the ramparts of reason
and are prepared to defend the citadel of the mind. But in the
process...we’ve
lost...the ability to speak of that which is sacred, holy, and
of ultimate
importance to us; we’ve lost the language which would allow
us to enter into
critical dialogue with the religious community.’”
Perhaps we have much to do before we even begin to create a
language.
Perhaps what we need is just to wonder about reverence in general
for a while.
About why we so rarely talk about it at all, either as a concept,
or as an
attitude embedded in so many of our everyday customs, behaviors,
and ceremonies.
About how, because it is considered an old-fashioned word, it
seems all
right to dismiss it as irrelevant, or to limit it to a particular
religious
tradition which we may have chosen to leave behind. About how
we feel it, on
occasion, but most of the time forget even to notice if it is
there.
So a language of reverence which we can all understand and agree
to share
may not be the first step. The first step may be considering again
what
reverence means to us, and whether it is actually present in some
of our everyday
customs, understandings and ceremonies without our awareness.
It may mean
simply appreciating -- and sharing -- what it feels like to allow
some questions
to remain questions; to refrain from the temptation to turn them
into problems
to be wrestled to the ground.
It may mean simply wondering why we consider the term old-fashioned,
or why
we feel it must be linked with a religious practice we prefer
to leave behind?
There are many questions yet to consider about reverence, and
about Bill
Sinkford’s call for UUs to develop a language of reverence,
a vocabulary of
reverence, which will enable us to enter into wider dialogue.
In my next sermon
I’ll consider additional ways to think about reverence, and
of specific
concerns for such language. Perhaps down the line we’ll get
to a discussion of
what such a vocabulary might be, and how it might help us to allude
to
understandings for which we have no words right now. Hang in there,
folks. Keep your
courage up. This will be an interesting year!
