Sermons

Wineskins and Watersheds
October 2, 2011
Rev. Douglas Taylor

A colleague of mine recently proposed a topic for a book of essays about Unitarian Universalism. He proposed the essays be written by current young leaders who grew up as first generation Unitarian Universalists. His proposal was that those of us who grew up UU and became active UU leaders after the 1961 merger would have a particular perspective on religion and faith. The coming together of four hundred years of Unitarianism and two hundred years of Universalism in 1961 to merge as Unitarian Universalism 50 years ago was a monumental event. It was a watershed event.

Watersheds have been on my mind lately and I’m sure many people have been very aware of the watershed we live in. The Chesapeake Watershed is defined by the rivers that feed into the Chesapeake Bay, the Susquehanna being the most significant this far north. So all the rain that falls (~20-30 miles) north, east, and west of here ends up moving through the confluence of the Chenango and Susquehanna rivers at downtown Binghamton on its way south to the bay. And one of the tragically felt realities of a watershed is flooding as we have recently felt.

For this morning’s purposes, however, I wish to use the metaphor of a watershed – a metaphor that does not follow the reality that closely and so there is no flooding in this metaphor. I would use the idea of a watershed the way that Longfellow uses it in his poem entitled Keramos, from 1878. He writes: “Midnight! The outpost of advancing day! … The watershed of Time, from which the streams of Yesterday and To-morrow take their way.” And so, the stream of history for both Unitarianism and Universalism flow to a confluence point of history in 1961.

We could use another metaphor like milestones along a road or chapters in a book, but the image of watersheds has that sense not only of marking a progression from one place to another it adds the idea that there are a range of sources all flowing together toward this moment. The merger of the Unitarians and Universalists fifty years ago was exactly that. And all that has come over the past fifty years flows from that defining moment in our religious history.

It is not my intention to spend this morning as a history lesson, but please allow me to digress for a moment because often when we talk about our history we tell stories of a hundred and two hundred and four hundred years ago as if nothing interesting or noteworthy has happened during our lifetimes.

In the 1960’s Unitarian Universalist minister, Rev. James Reeb was murdered in Selma, sparking a nation wide outcry and outpouring of support for racial equality. Many white Northerners travelled to march with Dr. King. Of the nearly 500 clergy who arrived, over 200 of them were Unitarian Universalist. Less than five years later a much sadder page of our history with racial justice played out with the Black Empowerment movement and what is commonly known as the “GA Walk-out” in which nearly all the black UUs left the movement.

In the 1970s our Beacon Press published the full Pentagon Papers, one step in the unraveling of Watergate and the undoing of President Nixon. We also launched a separate UUA department office for Gay Affairs and were one of the first religious bodies to officially sanction our clergy to lead Holy Union services for Gay and Lesbian couples. In the 1980’s we rewrote our statement of purpose in the UUA bylaws and created what we call our Principles and Purposes. It was an effort sparked largely by the women’s movement and the recognition of our need to degenderize our religious language.

Over the past fifty years, the number of female ministers has increased to and recently surpassed the 50% mark. Ministers who are homosexual are fairly common and such that we have moved on to the question of how to support and welcome transgender people into our ministry and our congregations. Racism and Classes, those old stumbling blocks we experienced in the late 60’s, are being respectfully approached again to try again to see who we are and who we shall become as a people.

And religiously we have grown more diverse as well. At the time of merger there was a debate that almost halted the merger from moving forward. I assure you there were a multitude of debates at merger. As these two religious organizations came together over the course of several years leading up to it, the actual sit-down-and-hammer-out-the details meeting was a democratically run joint general assembly with the Unitarians meeting in one space and the Universalists in another. They had over 50 specific amendments to debate, amend and vote on … and both groups had to affirm the identical wording for each amendment before it could finally gain approval. The biggest debate, the one that almost caused the whole affair to fall apart, was around a phrase in the principles.

The original phrase presented was “To cherish and spread the universal truths taught by the great prophets and teachers of humanity in every age and tradition, immemorially summarized in their essence as love to God and love to man.” One group was unhappy because this was a weaker rendition of an earlier Unitarian principle that had the last part as “which Jesus taught as love to God and love to man.” Another group was unhappy because they would be just as happy to leave Jesus out as well as any reference to deity at all. A third group suggested a middle ground that referred to the great truths as coming from “our Judeo-Christian tradition.” The Universalists had actually gone ahead and approved the original wording and then had to wait while the three factions among the Unitarians sorted themselves out. Debate lasted past midnight but the meeting adjourned without a solution. Many people thought this issue might be the end of the movement toward consolidation.

Throughout the night while many slept, a few kept working on the wording and networking with people. A door-to-door campaign happened in the wee hours and a new version was proposed and adopted the next morning that read, “To cherish and spread the universal truths taught by the great prophets and teachers of humanity in every age and tradition, immemorially summarized in the Judeo-Christian heritage as love to God and love to man.” Notice the change from our to the Judeo-Christian heritage, it didn’t make everyone happy but it was enough to keep moving forward. (These preceding three paragraphs are very much based on the text of the excellent history, The Premise and the Promise by Warren Ross, p18-21)

Rev. Walter Kring, minister of All Souls Unitarian Church in NYC said,

“To some of you, statements of purpose may be simply matter of semantics. To some of the rest of us, they are a matter of deep conviction.”
(The Premise and the Promise by Warren Ross, p21)

This history has always fascinated me. What it shows is how we came to consensus about questions of organization and institution, and about activism and social issues. This consensus is borne out through the 50 years of history that follow with our emphasis on equality and inclusion as a religious association. But when, at merger, we butt heads on questions of theology and belief we fell back to our historic “freedom of liberty” clauses and had to agree to disagree. And that, too, has echoed down the line of years. Such is the nature of watershed events in history, “from which the streams of tomorrow take their way.”

Now, you who sit here listening to this engrossing page of history may be thinking to yourselves: “Didn’t Douglas say this was not going to be a history lesson; that he was only going to digress for a moment?”

OK, I hear you. All that history was to notice who we are becoming, to see the trajectory of our progress. We are a history-making people, not a history-bound tradition. We wed our tradition to a special form of religious freedom. As the third verse of our opening hymn puts it (Tranquil Steams #145):

A freedom that reveres the past,
but trusts the dawning future more;
and bids the soul, in search of truth,
adventure boldly and explore

That opening hymn was sung over and over in the plenary hall following the vote for merger.

As tranquil streams that meet and merge
And flow as one to seek the sea
Our kindred fellowships unite (they sang then)
To build a church that shall be free

At merger, we were both creating something new and carrying forward a rich heritage. 19th century Unitarian preacher and activist Theodore Parker once said “the church of the new age must have the smell of our own ground.” This is true of every age and generation. This leads me to my second metaphor this morning. In the gospel of Matthew (9:17) Jesus talks about the need for religious forms to be fit to the spirit of the lives we are living today – not contained and constrained by the patterns of previous understandings. He said,

Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved. (Matt 9:17)

As our Unitarian Universalist progenitors met to hammer out the details and give birth to this new and renewed faith, they paid close attention to the organization and structure – indeed that took a significant amount of their attention. They attended to the wineskin as well as the wine.

And they surely knew that in a generation there would be again new wine, new spirit and focus that would emerge. Let me offer up one particular change from then to now that I see. It is a change that flows from the theological work left undone at the time of merger. There has been a change from the divisiveness that threatened to halt the proceedings those years ago.

The sharp divisions have eased. There are still staunch Humanists among us who insist that if you can not prove it empirically, it is not meaningful. And there are still old-school UU-Christians taking regular communion and doing Bible-study. But there are also Buddhists and Pagans, Jews and Transcendentalists, Native and Earth-centered spiritualities, atheists, agnostics and mystics among us as well. But the extremes have eased and the most consequential shift is that we are all in the same congregation, all part of the same worship community.

Even a mere fifteen years ago when I was in seminary I saw the divide. I witnessed and studied the divide between Theists and Humanists, and the ensuing chaos introduced in that dyadic split by the acknowledged presence of the Pagans. A few short years back any given congregation was generally dominated by one of those three prominent positions, and that was considered a fair solution. We could be Humanist and Theist together, but not in the same building.

Today, I find congregation after congregation with a respectful balance of Theists, Humanists and Pagans. That respectful balance allows for a flourishing breadth of other theological perspectives. We are moving from a position of ‘agree to disagree’ on points of theology, to a respectful engagement with each other. More to the point, the labels are growing less important while the recognition of the whole person – the intellect, the emotion, the spirit of a person – the whole person is fed on Sunday mornings.

In short we are becoming more relational. That is our new wine. Not that we could not relate to each other 50 years ago, but our theologies and our communities are becoming more concerned with – more grounded in – relationship. Our justice making is seeing the same. It used to be about issues. Justice making was about the issue of racism or feminism or gay rights. Now it is becoming about how to be in partnership with people, how to be an ally, how to connect across differences.

This is the biggest difference I see in who we are becoming. This is the new wine. And the new wineskin is clearly the concept of covenant. I will not repeat my entire sermon from two weeks ago on this topic. Suffice to say, our container – our wineskin – is not a profession of faith as it was a hundred years back, or a statement of protest for ‘what we are not’ as we would usually offer in generations past. Our container is covenant; our new wineskin is ‘how we are in relationship together.’

In reflecting on the growth of change he had seen in Unitarian Universalism, former president of the UUA John Buehrens writes:

Covenant “captures the best of that heritage and applies it in a new setting – one that is much more multicultural, much more in need of vivid spiritual demonstrations that people of different beliefs, orientations, backgrounds, can not only live together but can actually contribute to one another’s moral and spiritual growth.” The culmination, he concludes is Unitarian Universalism in a new key: that of spirituality joined to justice making. (The Premise and the Promise by Warren Ross, p205)

Our container is covenant; our new wineskin is ‘how we are in relationship together.’ And it makes perfect sense for us to be here based on the watershed event of fifty years ago in which we set out as not only a merged pair of solid traditions but also as a new faith with new days as yet unseen. And as we round this bend in the stream, I trust we are headed into a vibrant and good future, yet I cannot possible imagine where fifty more years will see us. And truly my friends – that is exciting!

In a world without end
May it be so.

Covenant
9-18-11
Rev. Douglas Taylor

The first time I entered this building there was a small framed letter board hanging on the hallway wall next to the entrance of the sanctuary. It was there for a few years before some remodeling, taken down temporarily but never replaced. I spent a few minutes this week looking around in the church closets but I could locate it, but then I’m not sure what I would have done with it if I had located it.

The framed letter board had the words of the Blake covenant inside:

Love is the spirit of this church, and service is its law.
This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace,
To seek the truth in love, and to help one another.
-James Vila Blake

The words of this covenant were not used in the regular weekly liturgy on Sunday mornings. (*I later learned that it was a regular worship element, at least in the 1960s and probably into the 1970s) I had asked and discovered that the words were not our official or formal congregation covenant. No one was able to express to me why we had that covenant hanging there in such a nice framed letter board. As best I could learn some one had thought they were pretty good words and had set them up there – and no one had seen fit to contradict them so they remained. Until the remodeling when they were removed – and no one had seen fit to complain at their removal so they remained.

And this week as I’ve been thinking about the concept of ‘covenant’ and considering what I would say, I remembered that framed covenant and how it had been featured prominently on our hallway wall next to the entrance of the sanctuary several years ago. I wish I had been paying more attention to their presence when they were here for I find I miss them now. I find myself wanting a congregational covenant, one that has some history with us, one that’s been here for a while – especially as we are bumping along with writing up a new mission statement. I wonder if perhaps we avoid being specific about these important foundational pieces of our religious identity as a way to avoid having to follow through with the consequences implied in them.

Love is the spirit of this church, and service is its law.
This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace,
To seek the truth in love, and to help one another.
-James Vila Blake

That really does sum up fairly well what binds us as a community. We gather in peace. We’re looking to know more truth. We’re here to help each other. To do this we have love and service at our center. This is our promise, our bond with one another.

Unitarian Universalism is a covenanting faith. We do not gather around a set doctrine or creed, rather we join in a shared process of discovery. We promise to help each other in the search for what is ultimately meaningful in life. We are a church where you can believe as you must, as your conscience demands. We travel different theological paths, but our covenant leads us to support, challenge, and encourage those around us to each travel our different paths well.

We are seekers first; always open to new learning to new insight, to new understanding. The best avenue we have found is to be seekers in community. The covenant of respect and mutual care is the framework that provides the freedom we long for and the best boundaries possible for being in community.

Covenants are thread throughout much of the life of our church. Yesterday our Sunday school teachers had a training session and one of the things they talked about is making classroom covenants with the children. Most of our children and our Sunday school teachers are very familiar with the idea of covenants. Another prominent area where covenants show up is in our Small Group Ministry program. Each Small Group makes a covenant for how they will be together. A few of the groups do not have formal covenants written down, but even those talk about the meaning of covenant and how it helps the groups to work.

Typically the classroom covenants and the Small Group covenants say things like: we will respect each person in the group. The adults add things like: we will begin and end on time, we will keep conversation confidential. The children add things like: no name-calling, one person talks at a time. Some of it is just details but much of it traces back to the essence: we will treat each person in the group respectfully. “To dwell together in peace, to seek the truth in love, and to help one another.”

Covenants come up in other places as well. The Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism are written as a covenant among the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association. When I was called by the congregation to serve this community we had an installation service in which we covenanted together. Earlier in the service this morning we did a ‘teacher dedication,’ which is a form of a covenant we the congregation make with the teachers. When a person joins the church and signs the membership book, we recite a covenant together. The one we read as a congregation when a new member joins is a composite by Napoleon Lovely:

Though our knowledge is incomplete, our truth partial, and our love uneven, We believe that new light is ever waiting to break through individual hearts and minds to enlighten our ways, that there is mutual strength in willing cooperation, and that the bonds of love keep open the gates of freedom. (N. W. Lovely)

But this begs the question for me: do we as a congregation actually have a specific covenant? Is it the old Blake covenant, or perhaps the Lovely version we use in our New Member liturgy, or something else still?

A few years ago a group did a study in which they asked congregations whether they had a covenant, if they recited it on Sunday mornings and if so – what was it? This was part of the Commission on Appraisal’s report entitled “Engaging Our Theological Diversity” from 2005. As a part of their search to articulate our Unitarian Universalist theological identity, they asked about the use of covenant in our congregations’ worship. They found that about half of the responding congregations recite a covenant in worship each Sunday and the most commonly used statement is the Williams Covenant.

If you look in your hymnals in the back at #471, you’ll find it. It says:

Love is the doctrine of this church, the quest of truth is its sacrament and service is its prayer. To dwell together in peace, to seek knowledge in freedom, to serve humanity in fellowship, to the end that all souls shall grow into harmony with the divine, thus do we covenant with each other and with God. (J. Griswold Williams)
The Williams covenant is from the Universalist side of our family, the Blake, which you will see on the same page of the hymnal (#473) is from the Unitarian side. The Williams covenant, often with some variation in the text, was the most popular covenant and the Blake, the second.

I think I am going to bring the Blake covenant into our regular worship liturgy, just to try it on for a while, see how it feels. I still think it is the congregation’s work to name and own a covenant, not the minister’s work; but as the minister I can suggest and present, and even persuade – so I will. But ultimately, this is ours, not mine. And that’s kind of the point of covenantal theology! If we had a creed I could just tell you all what it is. But a covenant must be an authentic part of the community – there is no covenant independent of a community. A covenant arises from the relationships.

And let me clarify the nature of a covenantal relationship in a congregation. A wise colleague of mine, Rev. Dr. Brent Smith, says that all covenants are always between two entities. One might assume the basis for this is the old marriage analogy. I exchange vows with my spouse – the two of us make a covenant together. But that is not what is happening. At least in Dr. Smith’s interpretation of the concept of covenant, that is not what is happening. It’s more like this: I am making a covenant with the “us” that is created by our marriage. There are three things here: there is me, there is my spouse, and now there is us. The “us” is the part I make my covenant with, the “us” is the part I offer my promise. My wedding vow is a promise to care for the “us” we are creating.

Draw that same interpretation to a congregational covenant and we see the elegance. You are not in covenant with each individual person, you are in covenant with the “us” that is the congregation. The covenant, therefore, calls you to consider and treat each individual member of the congregation as you any other member of the congregation. There are certain basic pieces that you shall automatically offer to every member – not because you like them all or even know them all – simply because all of them are under the same covenantal relationship. It is a theological system that creates a relational justice of equality. You treat people well not because you like them but because you have chosen to be in covenant with this congregation and what it stands for.

Thus we need to get clear and specific about our congregational covenant and our mission because otherwise, how do you know what you have signed up to stand for? As Paul Rasor wrote in our reading, (“Identity, Covenant, and Commitment” by Paul Rasor in A People so Bold) “Covenant helps clarify our religious identity if we take it seriously enough to specify its terms.” Let’s work with the Blake Covenant for now, if we find we need to tinker with it (which I assume we will) or consider a different one, then that is what we will do. But for now:

Love is the spirit of this church, and service is its law.
This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace,
To seek the truth in love, and to help one another.
-James Vila Blake

Each individual shall remain free to responsibly interpret the truths and meanings they find. This covenant should in no way impinge on your beliefs or your theology. It will, however, impinge on your practice here, on how you are with others. Covenant does carry obligations by which we each need to abide. At minimum, any covenant worth its salt will call you to treat others in the covenant with respect. And that is not a small thing. It means listening to someone when they disagree with you and seeking to resolve conflict productively. It means being in relationship with people not because you like them but because you are keeping the covenant with them.

But what do we do when it doesn’t work? What do we do when someone is not keeping the covenant? How do we respond when there is disrespect or disharmony? What do we do when the covenant is broken? Well, at our best we should offer correction and disciple to one among us who has broken the covenant. Correction and disciple are often heard as words of punishment and judgment, as something negative that we Unitarian Universalists avoid and have nothing to do with. If such was your gut reaction when I mentioned our need to correct and disciple each other at times then I gently suggest you should look at that. But the word ‘disciple’ in its original definition is ‘to teach’ or perhaps even more accurately, ‘to guide.’ Yet if there is no way for us to respond when the covenant is broken, then the covenant is not real. And if we are unwilling or unable to help each other through correction and disciple in non-judgmental and non-punitive ways then all our attempts to respond to disrespect and broken covenant in our community will be punitive and painful. That would be terrible.

We are a covenanting faith, a free faith. When you join our congregation you are under no obligation to say you believe this or that creed. You join, not because everyone here agrees with you on significant theological points, but because we agree to support each other in the search for truth and meaning. We have a bond, a covenant, freely entered into by each member who seeks after the truth in love.

If we take the concept of covenant seriously, then it does establish some boundaries in what too many see as an “anything goes” faith. We do have boundaries, not defined by agreement to beliefs but by agreement to behaviors of respect and support. They are passive boundaries – each individual is left free to choose to join or define when they are ready. But we ere to think we can be passive because of our boundaries are passive. Alice Blair Wesley writes in her Minns Lecture Series Our Covenant, “No member of a free church is ‘cast out’ for dissent on some proposition. Rather, a persistent refusal to engage with forbearance is the only proper cause to remove any member from the rolls.” The two elements Wesley calls for in her definition are “engagement” and “forbearance,” and by forbearance she means grace or tolerance.

We agree to “walk together.” That phrase “walking together” dates back a long way, it actually is a reflection from the book of Amos, but more recently in the 1600’s the pilgrims used that phrase in writing up their covenant: We do bind ourselves to walk together in the ways of truth and affection, they wrote. “Walking together” requires us to be engaged with each other and to offer ‘forbearance’ for each other.

We each are seekers first; always open to new learning and new understanding. The best avenue we have found is to be seekers in community. The covenant of respect and mutual care is the framework that provides the freedom we long for and the best boundaries possible for being in community.

Love is the spirit of this church, and service is its law.
This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace,
To seek the truth in love, and to help one another.
-James Vila Blake

That really does sum up fairly well what binds us as a community. We gather in peace. We’re looking to know more truth. We’re here to help each other. To do this we have love and service at our center. This is our promise. This is our bond.

In a world without end,
may it be so.

Seven Ways to Say It
Rev. Douglas Taylor
8-21-11

There are times when I step back and wonder at this community of ours: such an amazing collection of people with an amazing collection of ideals and practices. I am proud and honored to be a part of this community and I occasionally fall into wondering how I ended up so blessed as to be a part of it. I don’t mean to signal a tone of false modesty with these reflections, I know full well that I have played my part in creating this community. My call to ministry is best expressed as a call to help build this sort of life-saving, life-affirming faith community. But I know I am not solely responsible for the result. I know for certain because when I am away for the summer or gone for a sabbatical, this community of amazing people continues to pour out its blessings. I know for certain because when I am here offering my ministry I am also ministered unto: I am affirmed and challenged, uplifted and inspired. I suspect this is the experience for many of you as well.

Early in my ministry while serving another congregation, I led a class focused on helping participants to articulate what Unitarian Universalism is. Many people would speak of their personal experiences of the congregation as I have just done. The best part of the class was that at the beginning of each session, as an opening activity, we would each say our name and answer the question “What is Unitarian Universalism?” After the third session I noticed a few patterns emerging, the answers began to line up in distinct categories. Thus began the list of seven styles of answering the question that I have included as an insert of you.

—–
insert:

Seven Ways to Say It
by Douglas Taylor
It is always good to have several ways to answer the question,
“What is Unitarian Universalism?”

(1) Underlying Unifying Shared Values
We do not gather around shared beliefs, rather we have shared values such as … (eg justice, freedom of conscience, respect, tolerance, reason, spiritual exploration, democracy.)

2) Covenanting Seekers
We do not gather around a set doctrine or creed, rather we join in a shared process of discovery. We promise to help each other in the search for what is ultimately meaningful in life. We are a church where you can believe as you must, as your conscience demands.

3) Theological Commonalities
Beliefs are not at our center, but we do generally share some beliefs such as: Most of us believe that every person has worth and that we have the capacity to choose to do good.

4) Historical Overview
We are a liberal religion born from the Judeo-Christian heritage. Historically, the Unitarians believed in the unity of God and the Universalists believed that all are saved.

5) Interfaith Group
We have a diverse mix of theological perspectives: Pagans, Liberal Christians and Jews, Theists, Agnostics, Atheists, Humanists, Transcendentalists, Native Spiritualities, and Process theologies. We are not one religion, but a respectful group of many religions

6) Personal Experience
When I come to this amazing community of people, I am affirmed and challenged, uplifted and inspired. In this congregation I feel called to be my best self. These are my people.

7) What We Are Not
No Dogma, No Creed, God is not mandatory, Guilt is optional …

—–

Unitarian Universalism is a complex and nuanced faith tradition that does not offer quick sound-byte type answers to the question of definition. It is hard to articulate a simple definition of Unitarian Universalism not because it vague or contrived or non-existent, but because it is complex.  Ours is an evolving faith.  We grow as people and who we are grows with us.  And our capacity to answer the question “What is Unitarian Universalism?” has become rather important to me. Thus, over the years I have developed this list of various ways to answer the question because the first thing I discovered is that my promoting ONE final and ultimate answer is impractical and indeed goes against the heart of what we are all about. I currently have 7 styles of answering the question.

And, an argument could be made that I actually have 8 ways to say it, because I have not included the Principles and Sources as a way of answering the question on my list of seven styles, yet clearly that is a fine way to begin. How many of you have made use of the UU Principles when asked about your Unitarian Universalism? Have any of you carried the Principles and Sources wallet card so you could offer it to someone? And have any of you actually offered the card to someone else curious about our faith? Being able to pull out even just the First Principle about the “Inherent Worth and Dignity of Every Person” is a great way to open a conversation with someone who wants to know more about Unitarian Universalism.

And I slipped in a little thing there that I find very important to all of this that I want to be clear about. These styles and categories of answering the question, these are different ways to ‘start a conversation,’ not to simply answer the question so as to put off the questioner. You see, that is an important piece of all this. Imagine the ways in which this question has come up. Sometimes it is in a conversation with a person who is really only interested in the answer so they will have sufficient fuel to tell you how you are wrong, sufficient information for them to come up with a better way to convert you to their understanding of the truth. This is a conversation you are can avoid if you wish. I don’t much care for this sort of conversation myself.

The other reasons this question may come up can be much more compelling. Sometimes people are genuinely curious about another person’s faith, and dialogue across our religious differences can be of immense benefit! And other times people are genuinely curious because they are searching for a faith community like ours but have not yet found us because (among other reasons) Unitarian Universalists tend to not be very forthcoming about Unitarian Universalism.

Part of why we tend to be quiet about our faith is that in Unitarian Universalism we believe in the freedom of religious conscience, that faith cannot be coerced. So why would we ever foist our beliefs and values on another when we would not wish the same done to us? Do unto others … and all that. Except, with this as our leading understanding we tend to categorize anyone asking “What is Unitarian Universalism?” as a hostile questioner.

If we can allow ourselves to be open to the question and welcome the curious questioner, we may be helping someone find the religious home they have been longing to find. And I am convinced that one simple piece of assistance I can give to anyone willing to engaging in such a conversation is to offer a variety of ways to step in.

So now, to the list! And I will offer them in reverse from 7 to 1.

#7 What We Are Not

This comes up for me when someone in a group looks over at me when they quip, “Somebody should pray for good weather because our event will be outdoors.” My typical response is something like, “I’m a Unitarian Universalist minister, we don’t do weather.” As a non-creedal faith it is easiest to describe what we are not, especially when creed-based religion is the accepted norm. When the question comes, it often is asked as “What do Unitarian Universalists believe?” and the only fair answer to that is to fall back to this category. We are non-creedal; we are not gathered around a shared belief. Individuals believe things, communities do not; the question “what do we believe” is the wrong question.

And then if we get into particulars, I often find myself having to say things like, “We do NOT believe the Bible is the literal word of God.” “We do NOT believe in Hell and, even though we are Universalists, most of us do NOT believe in a literal heaven either.” “We do NOT believe Jesus to be the only begotten son of God, or at least most of us do not.” And it is that last phrase “at least most of us do not,” that really causes confusion when talking to someone trying to correct my heresies. But then, that is exactly the phrase that begins to take us out of the rut of what we are not – which is when the conversation can get exciting for a person truly interested in Unitarian Universalism.

But generally speaking, this is a style of answering the question we do well to avoid. It is not all that helpful to tell people what we are not because it set us up to define ourselves by another religion’s categories. A Buddhist would never begin a conversation about Buddhism by stating they do not believe in the Tao or in Jesus as the son of God. They would begin by stating the four noble truths or outlining the life of the Buddha. So, all considered, this is a poor choice, or one to use sparingly.

I will however, offer you this. I have heard this style put to constructive use in one compelling scenario: as a way to demonstrate to atheists that atheism is a viable and valued path among us. Sometimes, who you are having the conversation with will lead you to choose one strategy over another.

#6 Personal Experience

The next pattern on my list is Personal Experience. This, I already shared an example of earlier. When I come to this amazing community of people, I am affirmed and challenged, uplifted and inspired. In this congregation I feel called to be my best self. I could also speak of our Social Justice work. What is Unitarian Universalism all about? It is about living our faith, it about walking the walk.

The down side to this style is that while it describes the experience of being in this community, it doesn’t really describe what the community is all about. It doesn’t explain the theology or the history or why we do the things we do. On the other hand, this is a great way for talking about Unitarian Universalism with someone who already has some understanding of us but is uncertain if they will fit in or if they just don’t care about the theology and are only really interested in finding a decent community.

#5 Interfaith Group

The next approach, moving up the list, is one that I actually disagree with, but in fairness I have heard a number of colleagues define Unitarian Universalism this way … so it is on my list. And there is a grain of truth to it I will admit. This is an approach that says Unitarian Universalism is not really a religion in its own right. It is more of a mutually respecting conglomerate of many religious perspectives. We have a diverse mix of theological perspectives: Pagans, Liberal Christians and Jews, Theists, Deists, Buddhists, Agnostics, Atheists, Humanists, Mystics, Transcendentalists, Native Spiritualities, and Process theologies. We are a respectfully gathered interfaith group, but not a religion per se.

Now, for each of these styles of answering I am trying to not only offer a fair rendering of it but to also lift up both its limitations and its benefits. But, I am biased about this one. So I will be brief. The limit of this approach is that it is not an accurate portrayal of Unitarian Universalism as I, at least, have experienced. What this approach has going for it is that it will be rather easy for non-UU’s to grasp the concept.

#4 Historical Overview

Our next pattern is one in which we offer a historical overview. I used to use this one a lot, especially when I was among Christian colleagues. Unitarian Universalism is a liberal religion born from the Judeo-Christian heritage, specifically from the liberal progressive wing of the Protestant tradition. Historically, the Unitarians believed in the unity of God. Rather than a Trinitarian formulation of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Unitarians believed in one God with Jesus as a human, a deeply spiritual human but certainly not in some way also God. Historically, the Universalists believed that all people are saved. Rather than seeing a large portion of humanity predestined to go to Hell, Universalists believed that God’s love was stronger than any sin or mistake a human could make and in the end, all souls would be reunited with God in Heaven.

The down side to this approach is that these historic anecdotes do not always offer an accurate rendering of what Unitarian Universalism is all about now. It offers a snap shot of what we were, which for some faith traditions might be great. But ours is an evolving faith that grows and changes. Thus, only a small number of us believe as Unitarians or Universalists did two hundred years ago.

The reasons this would be a good approach to use again depends on who your audience is. When talking to liberal Christians, this can create a shared reference point. It is important, I think, to not let this be the end of the conversation and to instead find a way to bring the conversation around to the present, perhaps augmenting it with the approach of how we have become an Interfaith Group or how we are Covenanted Seekers.

#3 Theological Commonalities

The next style, counting up, is listed as Theological Commonalities. A generation ago, David Rankin produced a list of “Ten Things Common Believed among Us” that is a great starting point for conversation. He lists things like the authority of reason and conscience, tolerance of religious ideas, the worth and dignity of all people, and several more. I have often proclaimed how the vast majority of Unitarian Universalists believe that every person has worth and that our theology of the human condition declares that we have the capacity to choose to do good. Most of us believe we are interconnected with everyone and everything. Most of us believe that our personal experiences of life can lead us to know truth and find meaning.

The trick is that beliefs are not our center. Our center is covenant, a promise grounded in mutual respect to support and encourage each other despite theological differences. We have common beliefs, but beliefs are not what we hold at our center. So, to start talking about our theological commonalities is skating rather close to saying we have a creed. It is a nuance that can be easily lost in conversation with others – especially when so many other people define religion as a set of beliefs.

On the other hand, so long as we can be clear that such a list of theological commonalities is descriptive rather than proscriptive we will be able to say these are the kinds of beliefs we usually find together, with out it being a claim these are the beliefs you must subscribe to before being allowed in to our membership. The benefit would be, again, to create a shared reference point for the conversation, or to be able to offer a bone to gnaw on if the person asking about Unitarian Universalism is just fixated on the idea of beliefs.

How are we doing? I have two more to go and these are my favorites, the ones I recommend highest.

#2 Covenanting Seekers

In all my dozen years of ministry, this answer carries the strongest accuracy by all the lights I have been able to see. Ours is a covenanting faith. We do not gather around a set doctrine or creed, rather we join in a shared process of discovery. We promise to help each other in the search for what is ultimately meaningful in life. We are a church where you can believe as you must, as your conscience demands. We travel different theological paths, but our covenant leads us to support, challenge, and encourage those around us to each travel our different paths well. We are seekers first; always open to new learning to new insight, to new understanding. The best avenue we have found is to be seekers in community. The covenant of respect and mutual care is the framework that provides the freedom we long for and the best boundaries possible for being in community.

The only downside to this approach is that the concept of covenant is a foreign idea to too many people. And so there is some education needed when we use this style of answering. But isn’t that true for all the other styles of answering as well? The benefit of this way of explaining us to others is that it can convey the positive tension of individual-in-community that many of the other approaches miss. Many of the other patterns of answering will work well to unpack how we are individuals, but the concept of covenant is the heart of how we are able to be individuals together.

#1 Underlying Unifying Shared Values

The final style is to talk about the unifying shared values of Unitarian Universalism. Our faith tradition is now and always has been about some basic shared values such as freedom of conscience, respect and tolerance, reason and personal experience, justice and compassion, acceptance, democracy, and encouragement in spiritual and religious exploration. If you read through our seven Unitarian Universalist Principles you will find therein many values such as I have listed just now. The concept of Covenant even is rooted in certain values such as respect, freedom of conscience and Beloved Community. I don’t think there is any down side to this approach except in the need to narrow down the list of guiding values so as not to overwhelm your hearer.

Conclusion

What is Unitarian Universalism? Oh, there are many answers to offer to that question. Sometimes the answer you might offer will depend on who is asking or on the mood you’re in or the book or sermon you’ve just been reading or thinking about.

I have been blessed lately to be able to avoid unproductive or combative conversations with people about my faith. It has been several years since anyone tried to convert me or save me. Thankfully, instead, I have been having conversations with people who are genuinely curious to know more about Unitarian Universalism. I don’t know how this is for you, but I believe we would do well to open ourselves to more such questions and conversations. Answering such questions has helped me be clear about my understanding of our faith. Engaging such conversations has broadened the perspectives of others and has helped a few find their way here.

In a world without end,
May it be so.

Five Habits of a Moderately Successful Minister
Douglas Taylor
6-19-11

Let me tell you a story about my childhood. I have mentioned before that I grew up in an alcoholic home. My father, older brother and sister are all in AA and have been through recovery work for some time now. But back when I was a child growing up, our lives were very different. As the youngest in the family, I was lowest on the pecking order and my best defense was to hide from the chaos and unpredictability. I think that as a child my psyche must have circled the wagons. I was quiet and sullen. I avoided situations in which I would be vulnerable by spending most of my time alone in my room. I don’t think many of you would have recognized me from that time.

Now, I am very comfortable being at the center and being in the middle of what is going on. Then, I did everything I could to go unnoticed. This was the tactic I used at school as well as at home. I sat in the back of the class, squeaked by with C’s, and had no friends at the school until high school. I failed 9th grade history and had to take summer school. I almost failed my senior year of English. And high school is when things were improving for me. Someone reminded me this week about the time I told the story of growing up at the church and one of the elders had admitted to me only recently, “We were not so sure you were going to make it.” I wasn’t so sure I was going to make it. I was unhappy, isolated, sullen and unmotivated to participate in much of anything. I was intensely wrapped up inside myself.

It is sometimes hard for me today to believe that it was really like that. I function as a very different person now. The change did not happen overnight, but gradually as I eased into adulthood things changed. The reasons are legion. My father and my older siblings went into recovery. I went to college and experiencing life at my own pace. I started a family of my own. I discovered theater and music as outlets for my otherwise overwhelming shyness and unease around people. But let me lift up one thing in particular that changed in me; one thing that resulted in a significant shift in my perspective: advice my father offered to me one day. This is fitting, perhaps, as it is Father’s Day today.

My father’s advice came during my years in later elementary school. He and my mother had separated when I was four-years-old, but he lived one town away so we spoke nearly every day. It was around fifth or sixth grade that I had developed the habit of being sick on Wednesdays. I hated school at that point. I was regularly the target of ridicule and pranks. I particularly loathed gym class. There was not anything particularly awful about my schedule on Wednesdays I just felt I needed a break after a few days. So I would fake an illness. Stomachaches and headaches were the easiest to get away with.

One day my dad said to me, “There are days when I have gone to bed very late and when the alarm clock rings I may have only gotten a few hours of sleep. But I tell myself that I am waking up after a full night’s sleep. It’s enough to get me out of bed and moving.”

This statement, at the time, did not really sink in. Before too long I did shift that Wednesday off habit, but it was years later with my father’s voice echoing in my mind that I really began to appreciate what he was offering. Basically, what I came to hear in his words was this: you have more control over your body in particular (and your life in general) than you are taking credit for. You are more powerful than you are letting on.

This is the crux of what I want to offer this morning. There are people who go through life with a fair assessment of their strengths and gifts, a realistic sense of themselves in the world. They do what they do with their lives and don’t need to worry about being out of balance or overly self-critical or out of touch with some aspect of themselves. There really are people like this in the world. I am sure, if you are one of them, you could still use some improvement; you could still use some advice on how to be a better person or to improve your life. I am not sure I know what that advice might be, but don’t give up on it. Stay curious and something will open up, I am sure.

There are others, however, for whom life is not so clear. Others, such as myself, who have doubts or who struggle to be in balance. There are those who even may have an accurate sense of their gifts and strengths yet manage to stymie themselves and sabotage their own good sense. If you are like me, perhaps my father’s perspective may be of help. You are more powerful than you are letting on; you have more control of your life than you are taking credit for.

Now, there is a whole section in the bookstores devoted to helping people improve their lives. Of the “self-help” books, there are a few classics that have stood a test of time to still be useful. The Stephen Covey book Seven Habits of Highly Successful People is one such book. Looking through his list of habits, I see a lot of very sound advice. Know the difference between important work and urgent work. ‘Win-win’ scenarios are possible and more desirable in the long run than the competitive model of winners and losers. But at its core, Stephen Covey’s book is about developing habits, behaviors rather than abstract ideas.

So I thought perhaps there are spiritual parallels. Covey’s “Seven Habits” are based out of psychology and leadership theories. Would there be similar habits based on spirituality? What are the habits I have stumbled into in my ministry that have served me well? And might those habits translate into other aspects of living such as parenting or work-relations?

OK, confession time: the title of my sermon suggests I have five habits to offer rather than having a perfect parallel with Covey’s seven. Over this past week I discovered two things. First, the wayside pulpit sign put the number of habits I would be preaching on back up to seven, and the facebook announcement echoed that promise of “Seven habits of a moderately successful minister.” The second thing I discovered along these lines around midweek was that I really could only think of three. So really, this sermon is about Three Habits of a Moderately Successful Minister. Perhaps if I have seven or even five I would be more than moderately successful, but there you are. I’ve got three to offer.

The first habit is borne initially from the advice I heard and eventually took from my father. “Offer the best you have in every situation.” I realize there is some irony in stating my first habit as one in which I seek to offer excellence right after I admitted to doing only half of what I promised to do. But let me tell you my second habit which may serve to ameliorate this apparent contradiction. “Laugh and learn” is my second habit. Life is messy and mistakes happen. Don’t dwell on it, don’t waste energy and time lamenting or beating yourself up. Mistakes happen; laugh at the absurdity of life and see what there is you can learn from the mistakes. This second habit is a habit of acceptance. And it leads to my third habit which is to trust. “Trust yourself, trust the process, and trust the good people you are with.”

Offer the best you have in every situation
Laugh and learn
Trust

When my father reflected to me his habit to push himself to get moving in the morning, to trick himself really, to get moving in the morning, he was sharing a technique as well as a basic outlook: The technique is a form of self-talk or self-motivation which really does work. I’ve learned to use it myself. I have learned to tell myself that what I am feeling is really excitement not nervousness, for example. But that is just a technique, talking yourself into doing what you know you need to do. The deeper habit is to always offer the best of what you have in every situation.

Seek to offer the best within you for whatever you have before you. I remember a professor I had in seminary, he taught New Testament. Because I had done very well in his class I asked him for a letter of recommendation. In the letter he said he knew UUs to be free to critique and even ignore passages in the bible, particularly some passages that perhaps deserved to be ignored. But he found that I had not done that in his class. Instead I had tackled the biblical passages I had been assigned and uncovered worthwhile insights from them. My professor claimed to see in me not a particular passion for bible but instead a habit to always approach the work before me with my whole heart.

Of the three habits I am offering up this morning, I suspect this is the one that will translate easiest for you in any situation. I commend to you this habit to always offer the best within you for whatever is before you. This habit serves not only for tasks and projects but for people as well. As it says in Fred Small’s song Everything Possible, “If you give your friends the best part of yourself, they’ll give the same back to you.”

Of course, life is messy and complicated. What we think of as our best may not be quite what is needed, may not fit the situation. What we expect to be able to offer may at times fall apart by circumstance (or intention). Mistakes happen. I make many mistakes. This leads me to my second habit. If I did not have a decent habit for responding to my mistakes I would be in a lot of trouble because I make a lot of mistakes. So I laugh and I learn.

Perfection is over-rated I say. Mistakes and imperfection are some of the juiciest things in life. Mistakes and imperfections are, in many ways, what makes life beautiful and full of grace. By all means aim for excellence, aim to give the best within you for whatever you have before you. But when it gets messy or it all starts to fall apart then see if you can find a way to laugh. I don’t mean to say you should not take it seriously. I mean to say you should not make it worse with worry.

Once during my internship I botched up a small moment in worship. It was the custom of this particular church to share some context before offering the reading. I stood to do the reading and realized I had not taken the time to gather a sentence worth of context for the reading. I said, “Our reading this morning is from A. Powell Davies who …” and I stopped because I should have known who Davies was and I thought I had known but here I was standing up front and I didn’t have a clue what to say next. So I laughed and said, “Well, I am not sure who he was, but I really like what he wrote here and I think you will all like it too.” Later a member of the congregation said “Hey, if that kid can make a little mistake like that and keep going then I think any of us can do the same.” I suspect this wise elder already knew well enough the art of making mistakes but he clearly also knew the art of giving a student minister a shot in the arm.

But in fairness I did not only laugh and move on. I also learned. I learned I can role with a mistake like that but I also made sure to learn pretty quickly just who A. Powell Davies was. (And you don’t know, you should go find out. Davies was a rather remarkable minister!) So go ahead and make mistakes, accept imperfections – so long as you can learn from it. Aim for excellence but be ok with “good enough.” Then pick yourself up and aim for excellence again.

This leads us to Trust. At least it leads me to trust. Offer the best you have in every situation. Laugh at and learn from mistakes and imperfections. And trust.

Trust and faith share a lot of meanings together and in many ways are interchangeable worlds. While today is father’s day I must admit I learned a great deal about a behavior of trust by watching my mother at work. My mom served as the Director of Religious Education at the First Unitarian Church of Rochester when I was young, and she was ordained into the ministry there when I was a young teenager. Watching her in that setting was very illuminating. She taught me about trust through her example.

Things would be moving along there in the life of the church and something would come up – as something always does. And while others would get very anxious or would get worked up or upset or even panicked, my mother would calmly continue to do the next thing that needed to be done and move through all that anxiety with grace and calm. She would say, ‘we will get through this and it will work out.’ And then we would get through it and it would work out. Not always perfectly, but see habit number two for my answer to that.

Trust is not just a condition of believing that everything will work out. It is that, but it is more. It is also a behavior and can be a habit of dealing with situations. The habit of trust is to proceed on the assumption that things will work out. The habit of trust is to treat other people around us as though they also want the best outcome. The habit of trust is to accept that a sound process will bring us to a good solution – perhaps not the solution I want, but a good solution all the same.

When I think back on what I was like as a child I think the advice my father offered about my own power was invaluable. But at the root, my trouble was that I had no trust or faith. I did not trust the alcoholics in my family. I did not trust potential friends at school. I did not trust myself. In learning more about my own power I have also learned to trust myself and others. And that – I believe – is the basis of every good thing I have to offer as a minister and perhaps as a father and husband and friend and colleague as well. Not just trust, but the behavior and habit of trust – that is the heart of any success to which I might boast.

It is less about what you believe or about the principles you may espouse, and all about what habits and behaviors you have that guide your living. I commend to you to look at your life, to examine the habits that serve you well and bring ‘success’ in the many ways that word can be understood.

In a world without end,
May it be so.

Study War No More
5-8-11
Rev. Douglas Taylor

Happy Mother’s Day. Religion has an old and deep tradition of honoring motherhood that is somewhat lost in our modern practice. Ancient religious rituals to honor the Creative power of divinity would invoke maternal symbolism, through either a mother-deity or in less-than ancient times the mother-church. Over time however, this has slipped out of practice in many traditions. What we now call “Mother’s Day” is broadly secular. We’re not giving mom flowers or breakfast in bed to honor the ancient creative divinity undergirding all that is. We’re giving mom chocolates and spa-treatments because we love our mothers and wish to show our gratitude for all they have done for us, first and for most: giving birth to us and nurture us through our early years.

It does feel as if the holiday has become a sentimental prop for corporate interests. Mother’s Day shopping is second only to Christmas. It is the top sales event for florists. Mother’s Day has become a billion-dollar industry.

Yet, the rampant consumerism of the holiday really has nothing to do with religion. And unlike the Christmas season debate between consumerism and religion, Mother’s Day never was a formal religious holiday and as such is not something to be ‘rescued’ by religion. Unless the piece to be rescued involves honoring the ancient earth-mother deities, which is really not something I hear about much. So I feel fairly safe in saying, Mother’s Day does not need to be rescued by religion.

Mother’s Day, or Mothering Day as it was earlier known in England, is clearly focused on the personal human mothers in our lives. There is a very secular base to the day. In the 1600’s in England Mothering Day was focused as a holiday for laborers to travel back to their home towns where they would gather with their families for feasting with mother as the guest of honor. Mothers were given cakes and flowers and visits from beloved though distant children. This was a compassionate holiday for the working class.

And it is not a holiday that traveled to this country, America had to invent Mother’s Day all over a few centuries later. This is probably due to the fact that it was the puritans who traveled from Europe to America and the puritans did not bring Mothering Day with them because it wasn’t religious enough.

And it was not until 1870 that Mother’s Day made its début in American culture. Julia Ward Howe, the woman who, ironically, had written the Battle Hymn of the Republic 12 years earlier, issued a Mother’s Day proclamation for peace. She called for an international gathering of women on June 2nd to bring those values and qualities of motherhood such as compassion, patience, and caring for one’s family to the boarder world family.

This original Mother’s Day was not a religious holiday to honor creation and the divine mother, but neither was this a day to let mom sleep in and be pampered. This was a day for mothers to take up the mantle of active citizenship and public activism for the goal of peace in the world. The vision of this woman who penned The Battle Hymn of the Republic was to spark women to gather for the abolition of war.

Thus, in the spirit of the original Mother’s Day, in the spirit of Julia Ward Howe’s vision, Mother’s Day might better be a day of taking to the streets, a day of prayer and action and involvement, a day of promoting peace among people and peace among nations.

One fond memory I have of my mother was the Sunday she led the congregation parading around the outside of the Church singing peace songs and carrying banners calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The newspapers and TV stations came out and I was standing with her as she spoke to the press about why we were all outside singing that Sunday morning. I was so young then and so proud of myself for being part of that and singing so loud. Now, when I think back, I’m proud of her for organizing it and leading us to speak out for peace. Julia Ward Howe would have been proud too.

Rev. Dr. Forrest Church tells this story about his mother:

She even saved me from the bomb. It was 1958. Fire drills in elementary school had been temporarily replaced by nuclear attack drills. The alarm would go off and all of us would dutifully tuck ourselves under our desks. From the moment of the first alert to the arrival of the missiles, we had ten minutes. Three times a year we practiced this. I can assure you (and some of you will remember), ten minutes pass very slowly when you are crouching under your desk waiting for an imaginary bomb to fall.

So I planned my escape, and practiced by running home after school every day. Despite an innate lack of athletic ability, I finally got it down under ten minutes. One day I arrived panting at the door, and my mother, fearing that once again I had attracted the attention of neighborhood bullies, asked me why I was so winded. I told her my plan. She understood completely. “If there ever were a nuclear attack, I’d want you here with me, not at school under your stupid desk.”

So my mother went to the principal and requested that, in the event of nuclear attack, I might have permission to run home and die with her. The result was a new school policy. Should a nuclear attack take place, upon securing parental permission, those children who could get home within ten minutes would be excused from school.

I grew up in the 70’s and 80’s and did not have these bomb drills, but I had heard about them. And the news was filled with worry over the cold war and fear for the ever pending threat of World War III. I honor my mother today for showing me that we need not wring our hands or hide under desks or live in fear. I honor my mother this Mother’s Day for showing me that we can stand up and speak out for peace.

This is a message we still need today. War and violence have been very much in the news lately. The killing this past Monday, May 1st of terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden by US troops has sparked a wave of response from relief to jubilation. It has also marked a resurgence in national conversation about war and about how best to respond to the evil we call terrorism. Among my colleagues and several members of the congregations the death of Osama bin Laden stirred up questions about the nature of a Unitarian Universalist response to the killing of bin Laden, to war and terrorism, and to the events of 9/11. Certainly we do not want to wage war, but when Osama bin Laden and others like him attack us it certainly tries our principles and convictions as a nation. And it tests our theology as Unitarian Universalists.

The Republican response as typified by President Bush was to take the fight to nations that harbor terrorists such as those who attacked our country nearly ten years ago now. The Democrat response as typified by President Obama was to take out the mastermind who orchestrated the September 11th attack resulting in the death of thousands of innocent American citizens. Personally, if I were in charge, my strategy would be to bring to bear the wisdom of Julia Ward Howe on our foreign policies. I would call for compassion and patience and the sense that we are all one human family, thus dismantling the injustices that sow the angry seeds of terrorism. I don’t know what Julia Ward Howe would suggest be done with Osama bin Laden or with terrorists. She did, after all, write the Battle Hymn of the republic out of her strong support of abolition and the Union cause of the Civil War. Yet when the Civil War had ended and the Franco-Prussian war began, Julia Ward Howe felt compelled to speak out against the endlessness of humanity’s warring ways.

I don’t know what Julia Ward Howe would have said about Osama bin Laden or about terrorists in general. I am certainly glad Osama bin Laden is dead and will not be spreading malice and suffering across the face of the earth any longer. But that gladness and relief is tempered by a sadness borne of my theology that must acknowledge that it took his death to accomplish this.

My colleague Chip Roush in Traverse City, Michigan wrote this prayer for today which I find compelling.

We call upon the ghost of Julia Ward Howe,
dead now one hundred years,
yet still alive in our imaginations and our hearts
we call you forth in our consciousness
to echo your cry
for a Mothers Peace Day
to end the unnecessary bloodshed
which we humans all-too-often employ.

We call you, dear Ms. Howe,
to help us make sense of the death of Osama bin Laden.
You, the author of the Battle Hymn of the Republic,
know that self-defense and war are sometimes necessary.
Yet you, as a mother,
who lost her own mother as a child
and who lost a child herself,
know the tragic sting of death.

Mindful of the chaos and destruction
and the many, many deaths
on September 11, 2001,
and through the war-torn years since,
we honor the losses and the sacrifices
and we rejoice at this possible turning point
in the war on terrorism.

We rejoice at the possibility of peace,
but let us not rejoice at the loss of life.
Mother Julia, remind us
that every life has inherent worth,
that each person had a mother somewhere.
Help us to use this moment for self-reflection,
that we might grow and evolve.
Urge us to take this opportunity
to rededicate ourselves
to justice and compassion for all:
help us to end terrorism
by ending the injustices which fuel it.

Let us honor this Mother’s Day
as if it were your own Mothers’ Peace Day.
Let us honor mothers of all kinds,
and those who serve as mothers,
and those who would be mothers,
by creating a more just and peaceful world
for all children.

So may we be.

Yesterday I drove down to my cousin’s funeral service and I witnessed there a mother’s grief. My cousin was a veteran of the gulf war, he came home with (among other things) PTSD. My cousin had depression before going to war, so I won’t lay the blame all at the feet of war. And he believed in the war he had fought, believed he was making the world safer for freedom and for peace. The hell of war did not kill him, but the hell that lived in his head following the war did. My cousin received military honors at the graveside yesterday; they presented the flag to his father and mother in gratitude for his service to our country.

Motherhood is about creating a peaceful and healthful world in which your children can grow. Julia Ward Howe wanted to expand that compassionate sensitivity to all the world. “Women of one country will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.” “Arise, Arise, then, women of this day,” and “Let us take counsel with each other as the means whereby the great human family can live in peace.”

There is a movement afoot to bring the Original Mothers’ Day vision of Julia Ward Howe back into practice: to make the day one of activism and witness. While I was at my cousin’s funeral yesterday, there was a group back here in Binghamton gathered to commemorate that original vision and its call to peace.

I have a modest proposal. Rather than trying to reclaim the holiday, let us add to or adjust the current practice with a growing amount of activism and work to make the world a better and more peaceful place. Sort of like how at Christmas many people give with a social conscience. Some support the Heifer Project as a gift to friends and family, other shop at environmentally friendly stores. It is sort of like the way we have added a hands-on justice-making component to our UU Pal Sunday. We don’t need to stop doing the kind and enjoyable, fun and family-focused holiday activities we have grown to love and expect on Mother’s Day. But we certainly can augment the holiday with a thoughtfulness toward justice and compassion for the whole world.

As with every holiday, there are those for whom Mothers’ Day is not a joyful day for one of several real possibilities. Might this be a way for everyone to take part? Can we expand the day, allowing the honoring not only of each individual’s mothers but also of Motherhood and creation and peace? Can all of us honor Motherhood as a force of creation and as a drive to create a peaceful and healthful world in which the children can grow? Make a donation in honor of your mother, do something kind for children on the other side of the world or in your own neighborhood. Use your imagination. Dream.

Give some thought to it today and perhaps put it into action next year. What could be added to this day that would not detract from the wonderful displays of gratitude and love children offer? Mothers’ Day has been domesticated from its early wild ways. What can we do to unleash it again a little and allow the wildness in its eye to lead us closer to a world of love?

In a world without end,
May it be so.