Readings:
From Franklin D. Roosevelt's Inaugural Speech, 1933, addressing the depression panic that was gripping the nation: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself-nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance."
From Pema Chödrön, When Things Fall Apart:
"When things fall apart and we're on the verge of we know not what, the test for each of us is to stay on that brink … The very first noble truth of the Buddha points out that suffering is inevitable for human beings as long as we believe that things last-that they don't disintegrate, that they can be counted on to satisfy our hunger for security. From this point of view, the only time we ever know what's really going on is when the rug's been pulled out and we can't find anywhere to land. … Right now-in the very instant of groundlessness-is the seed of taking care of those who need our care and of discovering our goodness." (p. 9)
"The off-center, in-between state is a … situation in which … we can open our hearts and minds beyond limit. …
"To stay with that shakiness-to stay with a broken heart, a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge-that is the path of true awakening. Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic-this is the spiritual path. Getting the knack of catching ourselves, of gently and compassionately catching ourselves, is the path of the warrior. We catch ourselves one zillion times as once again, whether we like it or not, we harden into resentment, bitterness, righteous indignation-harden in any way, even into a sense of relief, a sense of inspiration.
"Every day we could think about the aggression in the world, in New York, Los Angeles, Halifax, Taiwan, Berut, Kuwait, Somalia, Iraq, everywhere. All over the world, everybody always strikes out at the enemy, and the pain escalates forever. Every day we could reflect on this and ask ourselves, 'Am I going to practice peace, or am I going to war?'" (p. 10)
And this from the First Epistle of John: "There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear."
THE SERMON:
On Tuesday evening I received an email message from Suzie, a high school classmate whom I have not seen for 40 years. Her 22-year-old son was there. He watched as the second plane slammed into the Number Two Tower of the World Trade Center and exploded; he saw people fall or jump from the towers, and he later witnessed the collapse of the pillars of trade and finance that had dominated the skyline of Manhattan. While he was running away from his office, he called from his cell phone and woke his parents in California. Some of his friends were dead-he knew that, for he had worked with them in the building that crumbled before his eyes. Suzie wanted to know if I had any resources to suggest for him. I told her he needed human resources, not books, and gave her some suggestions. And I said, "Suzie, you are an important resource, too." Later, she wrote again, saying, "I don't think he'll feel like returning to his job no matter how much counseling he receives. He can't close his eyes now without seeing people jumping from the tower. He said he'll never fly again and wants us to come get him. My 220 lb. super intelligent son wants his mama and daddy to come pick him up."
It was only a day later that she wrote again to say, "He is unbelievably resilient. Yesterday he was filled with despair and anguish after witnessing the second plane attack and the many who jumped to their death. Today he has anger. I think this is healthy. He is no longer so quick to let terrorists chase him from his job."
"What is his name?" I asked. "August," she said. "But everyone calls him Champ."
I went to church Tuesday evening and I lit a candle for Champ and for so many others who have witnessed the ugly visage of terrorism up-close. It is said that a thousand deaths are a statistic; one death is a tragedy. There will be thousands of stories of this tragedy, and we will hear them one death at a time, one grieving spouse at a time, one parent or sibling at a time, one orphaned child at a time, one friend or colleague at a time.
Shock. The urge to run away. Rage. Grief. Feel them. Feel them.
And fear. Feel that, too. Fear itself. Feel it, express it, and move toward it. Know it. Name it.
To know and name your fear is to begin to disarm its deadly power.
I am afraid.
I am afraid that we have only seen the beginning of what kind of horror can be wrought in our own land in the name of holy hatred.
I am afraid that patriotism will become nationalism and that our leaders will be too quick to make a show of force where it will do more harm than good.
I am afraid that our democracy will become a police state.
I am afraid that distrust will prevail among Americans of diverse ethnic or cultural descent and that fear will become an excuse for violence and discrimination against the people of Islam.
Yes, I am afraid.
And I have fears for my own safety, too. For one thing, I am not too excited about getting on an airplane. I am not alone. Paranoia is palpable in the friendly skies. A political cartoon depicts an airplane on the runway, with the caption, "This is your captain speaking. Please place your fears and anxieties in the upright position and prepare for take-off."
Apart from the threat of terrorism, I am generally nervous about flying, because it means putting my life in the hands of pilots and mechanics and equipment and weather-all of which I have no ability to control. The threat of terrorism-whether from a bin Laden disciple or an angry employee or a Libyan fanatic or an American militant-the threat of terrorism adds one more thing to fantasize as I am imagining someone trying to go through the big mess on my desk or as I think about what I should have changed in my will. If I am sitting in the back of the plane, I recall the DC10 that had the rear engine blow out; if I am near the front, I remember the big hole in the front of a Hawaiian plane. Or I hear my husband Chuck saying, "You should always sit in the rear, because a plane never backs into a mountain."
Seriously (actually I am being serious even as I make fun of myself)-seriously, I do not board a plane without fear. It is subtle--a sort of review of my life. I may think, "Is this trip worth risking my life for?" Generally the answer is no, but there I am. Because if I didn't get on the plane, I would be giving in to the fear; I would be its hostage. I would give up the freedom to travel long distances in a matter of hours. And with that freedom, other freedoms would be eroded as well.
There are measures that can and should be taken to reduce the risks of terror in the sky and elsewhere. I advocate taking some of them. By all means, pass legislation against handguns and other weapons that are designed to kill people. Tighten up security at the borders. Smoke out the known perpetrators of hate. And spend more money for sophisticated detection devices in major airports. But don't expect any legislation or any detection devices to address the real problem. Not unless you can legislate against hatred and detect the wounds deep in the hearts of righteous fanatics. As for the effectiveness of airport security, one writer sums it up when he says that increasing security measures against terrorists puts the country in the position of "a giant trying to swat a gnat." Learn to detect metal, and they make bombs of plastic; learn to detect plastic and they will use wax. Confiscate pocketknives and they will use a box of matches.
If we put our faith in legislation or technology, we are putting our faith in fear itself.
If we expect government to get control of the problem, then we invite government to get control of us. John Adams once said that "fear is the foundation of most governments." It is most assuredly the foundation of all oppressive governments.
And if we allow ourselves to become hostages to fear, we infect our children with nameless terror.
David Grossman is an Israeli who has lived in the shadow of terrorism. He describes a way of life in which you are surrounded by your protectors-guards at every corner, alarm buttons in schools, searches and roadblocks, phone taps, secret arrests. A typical excuse for shooting someone is to say, "Oops, I thought he was a terrorist." In the shadow of terrorism you become more racist. We know how that works: Just ask any Muslim how he or she felt after the Oklahoma City explosion. Ask them how they feel now.
Terrorism, he tells us, "always succeeds because the very act of fighting it and adjusting (your) life to it slowly distorts all that is dear and humane." As a hostage of fear, you develop the "wisdom of the survivor who does not even know how much a prisoner he (or she) is to (the) struggle for survival."
Grossman concludes, "The price we pay" for a high level of security in Israel is "our humanity." The soul-the soul of every single person "gets cloaked in harshness and callousness."
Amen. Amen. Amen. This is a very high price, indeed. As Lance Morrow says, "Disaster sends us looking for the devil." Our anxiety creates "a kind of low-grade moral infection" because we do not know exactly what evil we are up against. And the more we project that evil out there on our enemy, the more that moral infection weakens our spirits and the spirit of our country.
Fear itself: nameless, unreasoning terror. Witch-hunts in Salem. Depression panic. McCarthy inquisitions. Hysteria and cruelty to people living with AIDS. Internment of Japanese-American citizens. Hate crimes against Jewish-Americans, against homosexuals, against African Americans. Hate-crimes against Muslim-Americans, Sikhs, and anyone who looks vaguely Middle Eastern.
This fear is a moral infection, a social dis-ease, and our democracy is not immune.
It infects each of us an individuals and it infects us as a country.
It kills the human spirit.
I'm not exaggerating. That's exactly what it does. And it destroys human community.
The antidote to fear is not increased security. The antidote to fear is an extraordinary kind of love. Agape. Divine love. Spiritual power. Martin Luther King said this kind of love seeks to preserve and create community. It is not passive and it does not deny the rage that demands justice. It is the power that fueled the American Civil Rights Movement and the power that ended Apartheid in South Africa. This power is soul-force, the same nonviolent method of response that Mahatma Gandhi called ahimsa and used to dismantle institutionalized racism in India. At the core of their teachings was one pure and vital principle, common to their Christian and Hindu faiths: Do not return violence with violence. As Martin Luther King, Jr., put it, "Let no man pull you so low as to hate him." Standing in the rubble where his own home had been bombed, he said, "We want to love our enemies." Surely he must have been angry and afraid, but he said that the fear of death was overcome by loving something more. There is room in love for anger; there is not room in love for violence.
Fear is a normal, healthy human response-a survival mechanism. It can teach you reasonable caution or create walls of prejudice and distrust between you and others. It can alert you to danger or provoke you to engage in violent behavior. It can spur you to inform your children wisely about dangers in the world or it can cause you to frighten them unnecessarily. Fear can open your heart to your human vulnerability or imprison you inside of yourself. If you allow yourself to become a hostage to fear-to be pulled so low as to hate or to become violent-you give power to the fear-mongers; you concede your integrity to that minority of people whose betrayal or violent behavior will terrorize your heart and cut you off from the resources of human community.
The only thing I know to do with fear is name it. Name what you feel it doing to you. Name what freedoms it has taken away from you. Look fear in the face. Stare it down.
Let fear teach you reasonable caution, but do not allow it to create walls of prejudice and distrust.
Let fear make you alert to danger, but do not allow it to make you violent.
Let fear spur you to inform and protect your children, but do not allow it to make you frighten them.
Let fear inspire you to lobby for decisive international action, but do not allow it to make you divisive.
Let fear open your heart to your human vulnerability, but do not allow it to imprison you inside of yourself.
The great secret of democracy, says David Grossman, is that in order to have a democratic, safe, serene way of life, we need a lot of good will. Invite goodwill wherever you can. Start in your own neighborhood, where anyone who is Arab or Egyptian or Iranian or Muslim may be afraid to go outside their own home.
And forget about trying to control things. You can't. You can't control what a disturbed person or a religious fanatic will do. So do what you can.
Nurture gratitude and reverence for life. If you live it, others will too. It really does work that way. Take time every day to see something beautiful, to marvel at the extravagant beauty of Autumn, to give thanks for family or food or running water. Give thanks for your child's ready tears and easy laughter, your lover's familiar wrinkles, for your own aching or aging body-Give thanks for this incredible gift of life that is unfair and unpredictable and cannot ever, ever be safe.
And remember that fear kills the Spirit. Love heals it. Love casts out fear.
In fear, we isolate ourselves from others.
In love, we connect with others.
In fear, we become immobilized.
In love, we are empowered to act.
In fear, we judge others.
In love, we seek justice.
In fear, we distrust.
In love, we trust.
In fear, we seek punishment.
In love, we seek mercy and forgiveness.
In fear, we see death.
In love, we see life.
In fear, we retreat.
In love, we reach out.
Let us respond to this crisis of our times with love.
Let us reach out.
Footnote
* Sarah York, a Unitarian Universalist minister for 19 years, delivered this sermon as the guest minister at the Unitarian Universalist congregation in Boone. She is the author of Remembering Well: Rituals for Celebrating Life and Mourning Death, Pilgrim Heart: The Inner Journey Home, and Into the Wilderness. Information about Ms. York and her books is available on her web site, www.sarahyork.com.
