uujeff's muse kennel and pizzatorium

Fear and Everyday Courage

2012-02-01T10:22:00.000-05:00

This morning, as I drove to my Fellowship, an SUV flew by me in an active school zone going at least 45 MPH. I watched him pass two more vehicles and pull into a gym parking lot. I am still replaying the next 60 seconds in my mind.

I debated whether to act upon this opportunity and decided after a couple of seconds of deliberation that it was my duty to do so. There were no children present and even the crossing guard had left. But, that is not the point. What if a child, late for school, had darted across the road?

So, I pulled into the parking lot and behind his vehicle. As he got out, a large muscular fellow dressed in work out clothes, I rolled down my window and told him calmly that school zone speed limits exist for a reason. He responded with a string of obscenities and moved threateningly toward me. He obviously wanted to instigate a physical confrontation and intimidate me. I drove away.

As I came around to exit the parking lot, he stood in front of the car, again calling me names and picking a fight. I felt I had made the point, drove around him and left.

I hate confrontation. I guess to be more honest, I fear confrontation. I suppose most reasonable people do. That is why bullies are so often successful in getting their way regardless of the consequences or whatever rationale they have for their actions, if any. Sitting here in the safety and security of my study, I'm not sure how I could have handled those 60 seconds any differently and still lived my principles.

I was afraid this morning. I am still shaking a little as I type this message. But, if we all stand up to the bullies in our lives, who knows what good can come out of our actions down the road. I talk and preach about Unitarian Universalism being a religion that emphasizes courage from my pulpit all of the time. I also preach about nonviolence and peaceful conflict resolution every chance I get.

So, to that nameless driver this morning, I bear you no ill will and hope that whatever caused you to ignore our laws this morning in your haste will resolve itself. Yes, you succeeded in making me feel afraid. I left not only out of fear of the physical pain you seemed intent on dealing to me, but because it was apparent that any additional dialogue at that moment would be fruitless. I can only hope that the next time you drive that road, you hesitate before putting a few seconds of your valuable time ahead of the safety of innocent children. Staying to confront you further would have only provided you a destructive outlet for your anger. I hope your gym work out provided a more constructive outlet.

Can We Build a Utopia?

2012-01-09T13:40:00.000-05:00

Pundits want to know what Occupy Wall Streets protesters want. I believe that Occupiers want what the 99% - deep down - all want. We want utopia. Here is my vision of utopia.

Guarantee that everyone receives free and reasonable access to a basic core program of health care.
Guarantee that no one goes hungry or homeless; no child or elderly person gets left behind for lack of our caring.
Guarantee that everyone receives free and reasonable access to education from birth to at least high school plus two years of technical education or upper-level college prep.
Guarantee that everyone who wants to work gets a job that pays at least a living wage.
Restructure our system of employment so that everyone who works receives compensation commensurate with the value of the work performed - this includes everything from service workers to politicians to corporate CEO's.
Guarantee that every citizen receives the free and unencumbered right to vote; no person or entity can donate more than $100 to any political campaign and all details on all campaign finances must be available to the public.
Redirect the criminal justice system at every level toward the goal of rehabilitation and the dispensing of just and equal punishment, not the production of profit or mistreatment.
Require every citizen to provide at least two years of public service, broadly defined as including service in local or national peace forces, community development, aid to developing countries, or other forms of human assistance.
Rethink and re-engineer every element of society to function in closer concert with our environment, from food production to sustainable energy to manufacturing outputs.
Afford every reasonable effort to promote the creative and imaginative efforts of our people, from arts grants to business start-up funds to financial assistance to organizations or industries seeking to upgrade their technology and operations. The ultimate goal is to retain and maximize the fullest measure of human potential and productivity of our people.
Eliminate every law that discriminates on the basis of any identity, including but not limited to sex, gender, age, race, ethnicity, nationality, sexuality, ability, religion, political views, or socio-economic status.

Now, the big question - how do we get there? The biggest challenge is funding, so here are my suggestions.

Eliminate the current Department of Defense and all associated military forces and replace them with a scaled-down Department of Peace and forces whose sole purpose is to protect this nation and support the development and maintenance of human rights of all people in the world. The majority of efforts directed toward the production of military equipment should be retooled to the production of supplies needed for rebuilding communities after natural disasters, improving the nation's infrastructure, and deterring the development of war technologies throughout the world.
The current structure of 50 separate state governments is an historical anachronism that has long lost any purpose or meaning. We eliminate the current structure and replace it with 5-10 regional governments to serve a similar purpose.
At the local level, similarly eliminate thousands of separate civic entities and school districts, seeking to reach a basic critical mass level of size for towns/cities and for educational entities.
Conduct a comprehensive review of all government, eliminating all bureaucracies and entities that can be replaced by better resource allocation and more equitable distribution mechanisms. Government should always retain strict oversight responsibility (with severe penalties for corruption), but private industry should be encouraged to replace inefficient public programs and historical leftovers, such as toll roads and bridges, the proliferation of public fees, and many separate taxes.
Conduct a comprehensive review of all law enforcement codes with a goal of decriminalizing a significant proportion of current actions and significantly reducing the current level of frivolous legal actions, thus relieving an enormous burden on our justice system and getting government out of the business of enforcing morality.
Show the world the nature of true leadership by cooperating at the highest level with world organizations and creating true partnerships with other nations. Our goal as a nation should always be to seek the most mutually advantageous relationship with other nations, which will in the end provide the greatest return and encourage the same from other nations.
Conduct a comprehensive review of all areas of business enterprise and reinstitute a new area of monopoly-busting, starting with the unhealthy current situation involving our nation's media enterprises.
Stop trying to motivate action through fear-mongering and instead inspire our people with messages and actions of hope and love.

Can it work? Every great accomplishment of human civilization derived from a vision that, at the time, seemed impossible. Let us dream of the impossible.

Occupy Church - Christmas Day Sermon

2011-12-25T14:08:00.000-05:00

Occupy Church
Christmas Day Sermon, December 25, 2011
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland
Rev. Jeff Liebmann

Chalice Lighting

We light this chalice as the flame within us,
But also as the beacon light for seekers,
The hearth flame for the homeless and hopeless,
And as the torch to engulf injustice

Opening Words
From “The Mood of Christmas” by Howard Thurman

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and the princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flocks,
The work of Christmas begins:
To find the lost,
To heal the broken,
To feed the hungry,
To release the prisoner,
To rebuild the nations,
To bring peace among brothers,
To make music in the heart.

Time for All Ages - Jericho Road

Throughout his ministry, learned people questioned Jesus, testing his knowledge of Hebrew law and his understanding of the Kingdom promised to the Jewish people. On one of these occasions, a lawyer asked Jesus, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” Jesus replied (one might imagine in a slightly condescending tone), “What is written in the law? What do you read there?...You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.”

Now, perhaps the lawyer saw this as an opportunity to trip up the young rabbi, for Jesus gave what might be considered a stock answer, quoting Leviticus 19:18 “You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against any of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.” So, the lawyer asks a seemingly innocent question, “And who is my neighbor?” In his usual fashion, Jesus replied with this story, but with a somewhat shocking twist.

A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. Now, any listener of the day knew that this road was notoriously dangerous and difficult. The Jericho Road was known as the "Way of Blood” for all the victims that had fallen to attacking thieves on its winding curves that were perfect for ambushes. Jesus continued, explaining that the man indeed fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead.

Jesus continues, saying that a priest (possible a Jewish Pharisee) was going down that road; and when he saw the prone victim, he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite (who in this context is likely meant to portray a Jewish politician), when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. Now, we must be careful here. Our quick temptation would be to assume that Jesus is skewering Jewish religious and political leaders – which may well have been his intent. However, on the Jericho Road, one’s likely first assumption might well be that this situation may well be a trap and that a stopping traveler would himself be ambushed. Also, strict purity rules applied to priests and Levites that could well have prevented them from touching an apparently dead body.

Now, here comes the big twist. A Samaritan while travelling came near him; and when he saw him, he was moved with pity. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, having poured oil and wine on them. Then he put him on his own animal, brought him to an inn, and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii, gave them to the innkeeper, and said, “Take care of him; and when I come back, I will repay you whatever more you spend.”

Now, the people of Samaria were not Jews. In fact, Samaritans were hated by Jesus' audience. The Samaritans in turn hated the Jews. Tensions were particularly high in the early decades of the first century because Samaritans had desecrated the Jewish Temple at Passover with human bones.

So, when Jesus asks the lawyer, “Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” the lawyer likely grudgingly says not “The Samaritan,” but rather, “The one who showed him mercy.” And Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”

This important parable is only one of many times when Jesus clearly articulates that his message was not meant for only one people, but for all.

Reading
From “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence,” by Rev. Martin Luther King
(Speech delivered on April 4, 1967, at a meeting of Clergy and Laity Concerned at Riverside Church in New York City)

A true revolution of values will soon cause us to question the fairness and justice of many of our past and present policies. On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside; but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth…

The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just. A true revolution of values will lay hands on the world order and say of war: "This way of settling differences is not just." …A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death…

America, the richest and most powerful nation in the world, can well lead the way in this revolution of values. There is nothing, except a tragic death wish, to prevent us from reordering our priorities, so that the pursuit of peace will take precedence over the pursuit of war. There is nothing to keep us from molding a recalcitrant status quo with bruised hands until we have fashioned it into a brotherhood….

A genuine revolution of values means in the final analysis that our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies.

Sermon – Occupy Church

When I tell people that I am a Unitarian Universalist minister, their faces usually assume a quizzical gesture that often does not go away even after I explain what that means. Sometimes, people have actually heard of us, even attended one of our congregations.

The reactions differ significantly when I attend a gathering of clergy. Non-Christians – rabbis, imams, Buddhist priests – almost universally welcome me into the group. Among the Christians, the reactions can vary across the widest spectrum. Some smile broadly, and share discussions of their participation in social action projects with Unitarian Universalist ministers. Others simply turn away.

Then there are the rare few who do little to hide their disdain, but stay to engage in theological debate. These ministers often dismiss my assertion that there are many Unitarian Universalists who consider themselves Christian. And when they learn that I consider myself a religious atheist, the intensity of the debate kicks up several notches. It is not uncommon to be grilled regarding my definition of words like “prayer,” “religion,” and other reverential terms.

When I have the opportunity, I ask them to describe to me the God they worship. Interestingly, they often articulate an essential, universal mystery that they are surprised to learn that I believe in, too. Often, the only real stumbling block arises over the nature of the man Jesus.

I explain that I believe that Jesus (or an amalgamation of concurrent prophets preaching the same message) existed. I agree with the essential teachings. I simply do not believe in his purported resurrection from the dead, the actual details of which the four canonical gospels wildly disagree.

But, that is enough. For these clergy, that one dogmatic assertion is all that matters to turn me into one of “them.” And this is such a shame. Because right now, at this critical juncture of our history, the great teachings of all the world’s religions have come together in common purpose.

For every major world philosophy and religion teaches against the pursuit of unbridled wealth, against greed, and against failing to care for your brothers and sisters as you would care for yourself. Charity is one of the Five Pillars of Islam. In the Mahabharata, Bhishma, one of Hinduism’s great yogis, names greed as the source out of which all other evil arises: “Covetousness alone is a great destroyer of merit and goodness. From covetousness proceeds sin. It is from this source that sin and irreligiousness flow, together with great misery. This covetousness is the spring also of all the cunning and hypocrisy in the world."

The Tao Teh Ching tells us that, “There is no crime greater than greed. No disaster greater than discontentment. No fault greater than avarice.” The Adi Granth, the holy book of the Sikhs, asks: “Where there is greed, what love can there be?” The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism teach us that enlightenment cannot be achieved so long as we suffer, and that suffering is caused by desire. Greed, hate, and ignorance are the Three Poisons that bind us to desire.

From the commandments against stealing and covetousness, to countless citations against greed, the Hebrew Bible abounds with warnings against the love of money. And, as one of the seven deadly sins (arguably the most important), Christian texts have spoken against greed for centuries.

But, let us return to the focus of this day. The four canonical Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John generally portray Jesus as a relatively even-tempered, if passionate, person. When is the one time in all four accounts that he completely loses his temper? When he enters the Temple in Jerusalem, the holiest place of his faith, and sees people buying and selling animals and changing money. He overturns the tables, and chases them away, even using a whip of cords in John’s account. One must find it interesting that even Jesus, the Prince of Peace and avowed opponent of taking up the sword, was moved to violence when the house of prayer was corrupted and perverted by those pursuing money.

My clerical colleagues and I often have very different concepts of “God,” of that unifying principle of life. Whatever form that force takes, however, we can all strive to tap into its power. Our Universalist ancestors preached this message by simply saying that “God is Love.” Even a nonbeliever, whether you are non-religious, agnostic, even atheist, can develop a willingness to accept that simple definition. We engage with the wonder and mystery of our universe, of all existence simply by loving each other. And if it helps some people to call that “God” so be it.

I know that many people struggle with that concept – not just the “God” label, but implications of accepting that God is Love. How do I love a stranger? How do I love my nameless neighbor, the co-worker I barely know, that clerk that makes my coffee in the morning? We start by caring. We start by stopping on the road and helping the beaten and robbed – by being as concerned for the well-being of everyone as for our own well-being.

Dr. King described this beginning in his speech: "This call for a world-wide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all...This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept – so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force – has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of [humankind]. When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Moslem-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the first epistle of Saint John:
Let us love one another; for love is God and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love. If we love one another God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us."

But, this is just the beginning. The next step is to tear up the Jericho Road we have paved with unchecked greed, corrupted oversight, and indifference. We must rip up that pavement and lay a new surface. We must root out the hiding places of the bandits, lining the highway with inviting paths and resting points. We must remove the tollbooths restricting access to free travel. We must straighten out the dangerous curves and widen the road so that all can walk together, side by side.

This work may be back-breaking. We will not always agree on the direction of the road, or how to traverse obstacles that arise. At times we may find ourselves laboring over a lonely stretch with no end in sight. And, let’s be realistic. We will not want for nay-sayers, people with money and power wishing to stop us in our quest, and for masses too consumed with their own lives to help us wield the picks and shovels.

But, this is the real work of Christmas – not pageants and concerts; not mangers and myth; and certainly not layaways and credit cards. The real work of Christmas is the message of Jesus, not the details of his birth – but rather to find the lost, to feed the hungry, to release the prisoner, and to rebuild the nations.

On several occasions during his ministry, Jesus articulated the roadmap for creating this new highway, the Kingdom he foresaw. The Beatitudes were blessings Jesus bestowed on all the people as a blueprint, a design for this new world that included Jews and Samaritans, priests and paupers, politicians and prostitutes.

Today, in the 21st century, we who are working in the here and now, striving to create a human world of equality and justice, can learn from these teachings. We can adapt them to our own actions in this life.

Blessed are the dispirited: for they most understand and welcome necessary changes to our broken and corrupted economic, political, and social systems.
Blessed are they that mourn: for they help others comprehend the depths of sorrow created by war, hate, greed, and ignorance.
Blessed are the nonviolent: for they shall model a better way to those who equate force with power and killing with justice.
Blessed are the searchers, the questioners: for they shall be open to new experiences and to finding new answers to our problems.
Blessed are the merciful: for every act of love and caring is returned to us one hundred-fold. A universal law of every human philosophy teaches us to love our neighbor as we would ourselves be loved.
Blessed are the sincere and innocent: for they understand that the business of humankind is not profit, but is humankind itself.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall lay the way to common purpose and understanding in society and in concert with our planet.
Blessed are those persecuted in the name of justice: for their sacrifice motivates us all to act and to have faith in the power of commitment and love.

When the song of the angels is stilled,
When the star in the sky is gone,
When the kings and the princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flocks,
The work of Christmas begins.

Prayerful Reflection

Spirit of life and love that we know by many names, be with us as we enter an attitude of reflection, meditation, and prayer.

Dr. King continued: Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter -- but beautiful -- struggle for a new world. This is the calling of the sons of God, and our brothers wait eagerly for our response. Shall we say the odds are too great? Shall we tell them the struggle is too hard? Will our message be that the forces of American life militate against their arrival as full men, and we send our deepest regrets? Or will there be another message, of longing, of hope, of solidarity with their yearnings, of commitment to their cause, whatever the cost? The choice is ours, and though we might prefer it otherwise we must choose in this crucial moment of human history. Let it be so.

Extinguishing the Chalice/Closing Words

At the end of his speech, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. quoted Unitarian poet James Russell Lowell:
Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth and falsehood, for the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God's new Messiah, off'ring each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by forever twixt that darkness and that light.
Though the cause of evil prosper, yet 'tis truth alone is strong;
Though her portion be the scaffold, and upon the throne be wrong:
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow keeping watch above his own.

Two Historic Tuesday Speeches

2011-12-07T17:09:00.000-05:00

Yesterday certainly wasn't a boring Tuesday. Two important speeches with the potential for enormous long-term impact were delivered. President Obama fully embraced the language and message of the Occupy Wall Street movement in his economic speech in Osawatomie, Kansas. Not only is this one of the few times a politician has even recognized the economic forces behind OWS, this speech is a major public policy affirmation of the need for America to take serious aim at addressing the causes of our current financial woes. He frequently cited statistics that Occupiers have referenced, decrying the disparity of wealth in this country and the increasing inability of hard working Americans to pursue dreams available to other recent generations.

As if this speech weren't noteworthy enough, another speech by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton easily topped it for global import and potential impact. Secretary Clinton was speaking before the United Nations in recognition of International Human Rights Day at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. Her remarks laid before the world community in words clear and strong that the rights of LGBT people are human rights. She articulated in no uncertain terms that all nations should address LGBT rights with the same diligence that has been given since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights to women, to indigenous people, to children, to people with disabilities, and other marginalized groups.

In years to come, these two speeches may be remembered as watershed moments in these two movements. Both give the progressive community great reason for hope.

Chesna, the Chalica Chipmunk

2011-11-30T15:15:00.000-05:00

This is a Time for All Ages story I wrote for this coming Sunday's Chalica Eve service.
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There once was a chipmunk named Chesna. She lived above the ceiling in the roof of a Unitarian Universalist church. Chesna was very quiet and no one in the congregation knew about her. Sometimes, the minister thought he heard tiny footsteps. And after a potluck dinner, someone might notice that a cookie or two went missing.

But most of the time, Chesna stayed out of sight in the rafters where no one could find her. The church was a great home for Chesna during most of the week. Other than a few church staff, and people who came to some evening meetings, Chesna had the building all to herself.

She had the church all to herself except, that is, on Sundays. Sunday was the most dangerous day because all the people came for services. And though Chesna worried that the people may see her, or that she might scare the children, she still loved Sundays.

Chesna loved Sundays, because she loved worship services. She loved the singing and the sermons, she loved listening to musicians and readers. And she especially loved the Time for All Ages for the children. When the adults sang the children out, Chesna skittered along the roof beams to listen to their lessons. Chesna learned all about the seven principles, about the lives of famous Unitarian Universalists, and how to be kind and sure of herself.

Now, on the first Sunday of every month, this church held an additional worship service in the evening. Chesna loved these Sunday night services most of all. In the evening, the songs sounded even more lovely and the prayers seemed even more important. The Sunday night services were definitely Chesna’s favorite.

One year, right after Thanksgiving, the weather grew terribly cold. The temperature dropped so low that Chesna snuck into the church closet and took some of the small candles. She scattered them around her in the ceiling so she could stay warm if the cold grew too great.

On the first Sunday of that December, Chesna sat waiting for the evening service. It was snowing outside and ice was forming on the tree branches. The people entered and sat in the sanctuary and the service began.

Suddenly, in the middle of the worship, the lights went out! Ice had formed on the power lines outside until they grew so heavy that they snapped and fell. The sanctuary was now plunged in darkness. The younger children started to grow scared and the adults tried to calm them.

All of a sudden, right in front of the pulpit, there stood Chesna holding a stack of candles. She trembled because she was carrying as much as she could. Even more, though, she was scared that people might chase her out of the building and into the snow storm.

Everyone immediately hushed to silence. Then, a small child stepped forward, took one of Chesna’s candles and lit it with the chalice light. Another child stepped forward, and then another until seven children had lit the seven candles Chesna had carried from the rafters. Now there was plenty of light in the sanctuary and the worship continued.

The people were so grateful to Chesna that they built a little home for her right next to the pulpit. During that whole week, people came in with food for Chesna and material for bedding. And each night, they lit a candle so that Chesna could stay warm.

From that year on, the church celebrated the first week of December as Chalica. People lit a candle on each of the seven nights, one for each of our seven principles. And, Chesna the Chalica Chipmunk lived there in the church and was part of every worship service for many years.

Ministers Supporting Occupy Wall Street

2011-11-29T21:15:00.000-05:00

Fifteen Unitarian Universalist ministers throughout Southeast Michigan have affirmed their support for the Occupy Wall Street movement at their most recent meeting last week. The ministers reviewed and approved the following statement, similar to one also endorsed by more than 100 colleagues in Boston recently. Through this public expression, they encourage other clergy in Michigan and beyond to endorse Occupy efforts.
==========
As clergy and people of faith, we applaud the Occupiers in Michigan and elsewhere who are reigniting American democracy from the grassroots. We join them in the vision of a society where all people enjoy a fair shake, with equitable access to education, healthcare, housing, and other basics necessary to achieve a dignified life. We are appalled that the nation's poverty rate today is higher than when Martin Luther King Jr. organized the "Poor People's March" back in 1968.

Dr. King inspired people of all races and classes to walk for "Jobs and Justice." The national Occupy movement asserts the same goals. These protests are occurring for a reason. In the more than four decades since King's death, middle-class incomes have stagnated, the jobless rate has soared, and the super-rich have managed to manipulate financial regulations and tax rates to claim an ever growing share of the nation's wealth. The richest 400 people in the country now have more assets than the poorest 150 million of their fellow citizens combined.

The vast majority of Americans – the 99% and many of the other 1% – are angry when some of the biggest businesses in the country pay no taxes. We see banks that brought the country to the edge of economic ruin being bailed out with public money, while millions forfeit their homes in the mortgage meltdown these same banks created. We feel increasingly powerless when mammoth corporations, invested with all the rights of "persons" to spend limitless amounts of money in electoral politics, hand-tailor legislation to benefit shareholders and CEOs at the expense of citizens and workers.

Has Government "of the people, by the people, and for the people" now become government of, by, and for the specially privileged? In order to restore our democracy, ordinary people must rise up to restore control of their own lives and economic destiny. We call on all to join in supporting the Occupiers closest to you, logistically, politically, faithfully. Now is the time.

Signed,
Rev. Jeff Liebmann – Minister, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland, Midland MI
Rev. Gail R. Geisenhainer – Senior Minister, First Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Ann Arbor MI
Rev. Yvonne Schumacher Strejcek – Parish Minister, Community Unitarian Universalists in Brighton, Brighton, MI
Rev. Dr. Claudene F. Oliva – Minister, Unitarian Universalist Church of Flint, Flint MI
Rev. Andrew L. Weber - Ann Arbor, MI
Rev. Kathryn A. Bert, Senior Minister, Unitarian Universalist Church of Greater Lansing, East Lansing, MI
Rev. Karen J. McFarland – Dexter, MI
Rev. Dr. Nana' Kratochvil – Minister, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Central Michigan, Mount Pleasant, MI
Rev. Kimi Riegel – Minister, Northwest Unitarian Universalist Church, Southfield MI
Rev. Mark Evens – Associate Minister, First Unitarian Universalist Congregation, Ann Arbor MI
Rev. Suzanne Paul – Consulting Minister, Emerson Unitarian Universalist Church, Troy MI and Minister, New Hope Unitarian Universalist Congregation, New Hudson MI
Rev. Shelley Page – Grosse Pointe Unitarian Church, Grosse Pointe MI
Rev. Roger Mohr – First Unitarian Universalist Church of Detroit, Detroit MI
Rev. Laurie Thomas – Community Minister, Unitarian Universalist Church of Greater Lansing, East Lansing MI
Rev. Dr. Cynthia L. Landrum – Minister, Universalist Unitarian Church of East Liberty, Clarklake MI

(Affiliations are for identification only and are not intended to represent commitments by the congregations)

Life's Little Steps

2011-11-29T08:54:00.000-05:00

This past week provided a number of very interesting milestones in my life. Each, in their own way, reminded me of how life moves on in relentless small changes and realizations.

I took my first week of vacation since arriving in Midland this past August. I have found it challenging to force myself to take days off and to get away from my work. I love doing ministry and the temptation to constantly reflect, write, or tinker with even mudane tasks is great. But, I flew to Jacksonville to visit my daughter Ashley, her husband Kevin and my new granddaughter, Caitlin Elizabeth.

After 20-odd years, I had forgotten the crying, the endless string of feedings, and the cumbersome travel equipment. But, my week with Caity also reminded me of the tiny steps we take every day as we learn and grow. I watched her gaining control of her visual focus, searching out faces and voices. I got to see many smiles of gleeful recognition. And, as the video shows, she has just begun that first phase of controlling her body that starts with rolling over and holding your head up high.

I had promised myself that I would take an actual vacation over Thanksgiving. Other than checking emails, I shocked myself by doing just that. I refrained from writing, managing calendar events, or contemplating future sermons. And I returned home much refreshed and ready to jump into the busy December holiday season.

I also returned home to a phone message about the delivery of my new CPAP machine. After my cardiologist suggested a sleep test two months ago, the results determined (to my complete surprise) that I apparently have rather severe sleep apnea. Last night was my first wearing the manageable, yet still cumbersome gear while sleeping. It took several attempts to get all of the straps and hoses into their proper places (I think!) and I managed to sleep fairly well through the night. Needless to say, though, I felt completely like Caity performing her first rollover, or reaching out in an effort to clasp a toy.

Our lives are never finished products. When you take time to consider the challenges, the little steps from one age very much resemble those we take in every phase of growing and learning

Drilling to Our Spiritual Core

2011-11-18T12:22:00.000-05:00

We Unitarian Universalists pride ourselves on our commitment to social justice. We hold in deep reverence past acts of abolitionists, suffragettes, civil rights activists, and others promoting equality, freedom and democracy.

A new movement has emerged that does not ask, "Can you imagine yourself a slave?" "Can you feel how it feels to be a woman?" "Can you understand the experience of being African American; Indigenous; Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Intersex?" This new movement has turned the question around and asks, "Do you recognize that we are the 99%...that you are the 99%?"

Perhaps you are reading this on your home computer, or your smart phone, thinking that things are not that bad. Maybe you are very happy with your life and you cannot understand why these protesters just don't work harder to find a job, or suck it up and pay their student loans like everyone else. You see media reports of dirty-looking 60's leftovers whining about everything without any suggestions for real change. You ask yourself, "Why don't they run for office if they are so dissatisfied?" Or, "If they hate America so much, why don't they go somewhere else?"

All legitimate questions. Consider one answer.

Slavery was morally wrong. It took a century and a horrible civil war, but we eventually abolished slavery. Denying women the right to participate in the democratic process was morally wrong. It took a century of activism and protest, but suffrage eventually prevailed. The exclusion of Blacks from the rights due all American citizens was morally wrong. It took a century of lynching and violent sacrifice, but the Civil Rights Act was eventually passed.

Are these problems now magically solved? Of course not. Millions of undocumented immigrants, who have come to America just like our ancestors did, suffer in indentured bondage under crushing bureaucracy, hunted by an indifferent and overzealous paramilitary army with little or no oversight. Women remain objectified in virtually every medium as objects for the sexual pleasure of men, their paths to leadership stifled by images created by corporations whose only bottom line is profit. And GLBTQI people still suffer thousands of discriminating laws, the rejection of the most basic human right of marriage, not to mention all too frequent violence and even murder simply because of their identities.

And now we have Occupy Wall Street - a bunch of poor, dirty hippies grousing about rich people, if you believe the mainstream media. But, is that the reality?

The reality is that the United States in the past 50 years has made conscious decisions - moral decisions - to place profit over people. Industry regulations have been eviscerated in the name of promoting economic development. At the same time, we have carved away iindividual liberties in the name of security. With the stroke of a pen, the highest court in the land has declared that a corporation is a person. Racial minorities, women, gays and lesbians, and immigrants have been fighting for that recognition for 200 years and have yet to achieve their goal.

And what is our reward? The free press, with the possible exception of a few small outlets, is essentially dead - held in a corporate vice grip by a literal handful of wealthy individuals intent on maintaining their Divine Right. Ten of millions of Americans still suffer from untreated illness and disease because we have invested in bailouts instead of universal healtcare. Washington continues to insist on fighting unjust and illegal wars across the globe, and looks to our social safety nets of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and others to foot the bill. Our corporations rape our environment unabated, shelter billions in earnings from fair taxation, gamble with the economic life of our nation through unscrupulous speculation, and then are handed over the keys to the treasury to cover their losses - money that should be educating our children, creating jobs, caring for our elders, and giving young people reasons to hope that their belief in hard work and the American Dream is not just playing them for suckers so CEO's can get another million dollar bonus.

Religious people of every faith should be outraged, because every text we hold sacred preaches against these moral choices. Here are just a small portion of the wisdom taught in every religion

The love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, and in their eagerness to be rich some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains. (Christianity, NRSV Bible, 1 Timothy 6:10)
A lover of money never has his fill of money, nor a lover of wealth his fill of income...A worker's sleep is sweet, whether he has much or little to eat; but the rich man's abundance doesn't let him sleep. (Judaism. Jewish Study Bible, Ecclesiastes 5:9 and 11)
Woe to every slanderous reviler, habitual defamer, who hoards wealth and incessantly counts it! He thinks his wealth will immortalize him. Most surely, no, indeed! He will be hurled in the Crusher. (Islam. Qur'an Surah 104:1-4)
The gateway of this [self-deluded] hell leading to the ruin of this soul is threefold: lust, anger, and greed. (Hinduism. Bhagavad Gita 16.21)
This foolish mind is greedy; through greed, it becomes even more attached to greed. (Sikhism. Guru Nank Dev, Siri Raag, p. 21)
There is no calamity like now knowing what is enough. There is no evil like covetousness. Only he who knows what is enough will always have enough. (Taoism. Tao Te Ching 46)
Fetters of wood, rope, or even iron, say the wise, are not as strong as selfish attachment to wealth and family. Such fetters drag us down and are hard to break. Break them by overcoming selfish desires, and turn from the world of sensory pleasure without a backward glance. (Buddhism. Dhammapada 345-6)
As long as a person does not know the richness of joy and peace that comes from within, he tries to fill his empty and insecure existence with the clutter of material acquisitions...One must impose a limit on one's needs, acquisitions, and possessions such as land, real estate, goods, other valuables, animals, money, etc. The surplus should be used for the common good...This Jain principle of limited possession for householders helps in equitable distribution of wealth...economic stability, and welfare in the world. Non-possession, like non-violence, affirms the oneness of all life and is beneficial to an individual in his spiritual growth and to the society for the redistribution of wealth. (Jainism, Twelve Vows of a Layperson, Aparigraha (Non-Possession)

The Occupy Wall Street movement has, at its core, a moral imperative. As a society, we make choices about resource allocations, about what matters to us as people. In recent years, we have chosen to support corporate idols over the needs of people. But, corporations do not have souls, the moral capacity to act ethically, to sacrifice, to love. OWS reminds all religious people, it reminds all of us, that the decisions are ours to make.

I don't know the direction OWS will take. But, as Theodore Parker said in "Of Justice and the Conscience" (1853): "I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice."

Funeral for the Death of the Middle Class

2011-11-17T23:21:00.000-05:00

At our Occupy Midland demonstration today, we had a funeral for the victims of corrupt politics and failed economics. Here is the text of the eulogy.

=====

Dear Friends,

Welcome to this solemn occasion, and join together in loving community as we lay to rest our dear brothers and sisters. We assemble today, people of all ages and races, men and women of all backgrounds and identities, spirits of all faiths, united in common cause against insidious invaders intent on destroying the America of our founders.

Let us treasure the memory of Participatory Democracy and an economic system that benefited all who built this nation, conquered on all fronts by politicians bought and sold by corporate “persons” and by hijacked elections.
Let us remember our pursuit of Life, Liberty, and Happiness, murdered by the unfettered corporate control of our media and unregulated financial institutions.
Let us recall the once healthy and vibrant American Dream, victim of spiraling medical costs, disproportionate distribution of wealth, and cruel repressions against immigrants desperately seeking to follow the lead of our own ancestors.
Let us mourn our Homes, Retirement Savings, and Safety Nets being sacrificed in order to maintain colonialism and unlawful military actions across the globe.
And lastly, let us especially grieve our dying Earth, whose pillaging, defacement, and reckless abandonment through oil spills, fracking, waste contamination, and violent abuse leave us homeless of spirit, and without anchor in our chaotic universe.

But, let us not grieve so deeply that we fall into a melancholy of inaction. For new children stand ready to take the place of these, our dearly departed. The 99% does not seek two-car garages, but equality and fairness. The 99% pursues not personal glory and isolation, but revels in teamwork and action with our neighbors. The 99% opens their arms to all willing to work side-by-side in peace and nonviolence, leaving no one behind. The 99% warmly hugs every tree, bush, and stone of our Mother Earth, knowing that living in partnership with our environment benefits all.

The forces opposing us are wealthy and determined. But, in the end, they fight only for the illusion of money. For power is only ours to keep or to give away. Let us leave this sad occasion with a new resolve to retain the power of self-determination, of mutual concern, and of fairness and love.

Let it be so. Amen. Shalom. Salaam Aleikum. Om. Blessed Be. Namaste.

Where is our Port Huron Statement?

2011-11-01T22:38:00.000-04:00

I have had a number of spirited conversations in recent weeks over the Occupy movement. While I think the movement has been unfairly criticized for lacking focus or specific suggestions for change (it's not even two months old!), I do believe that we need to start thinking about this direction. For years, I have watched individuals and agencies all fighting for their individual causes, and found the lack of a unifying progressive agenda in this country frustrating.

So whenever this topic arises regarding Occupy, I can't help but think of the Port Huron Statement, the manifesto of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) completed on June 15, 1962. Whatever one thinks about the 60's and how the movement eventually went astray, I still find this Statement a compelling articulation of the liberal, progressive mind of America.

Now that I find myself in Midland, Michigan - home of the Mackinac Center for Public Policy - I yearn even more strongly for a voice of fairness, compassion, and reason. What is stopping us from gathering together our best minds and our most passionate leaders to take the New York General Assembly statement to the next level of clearly explaining our vision for a future America? What is stopping us from creating a plan of action for the next decade?

The beauty of such a statement today is that the Port Huron document was the reflection of only one generation. The Occupy movement could bring together literally every demographic in this nation. And today, the technology certainly exists to bring together people of every socioeconomic group without a concern over travel expenses and lost wages. We could even use the New York General Assembly Statement as an outline to frame the document that could eventually be distributed and ratified by General Assemblies in countless cities.

I want a Declaration of Independence for 21st century America - independence from the corruption of the democratic ideal, from the perversion of capitalist economy that our corporate complex has created.

The Real War on Terror

2011-10-30T17:28:00.000-04:00

I imagine that I pestered my parents quite a bit as a seven-year-old child. It was 1963, and a new show – Shock Theater – was airing late Friday night. Starring Ghoulardi, one of the first in a long line of horror hosts continuing even today, Shock Theater presented B-grade monster and science fiction films to the generation born during the imminent threat of nuclear holocaust and Communist invasion. We were a demographic ripe for the fertile nurturing of terror.

I had already seen The Twilight Zone, and The Outer Limits would burst on the scene later that year. So, I couldn’t wait to stay up past my bedtime for this offering. What made Shock Theater different was that Ghoulardi was cool – a funny and irreverent Beatnik. Ghoulardi became a master of the catch phrase. If you happen to remember minor novelty hits like "The Bird is the Word," and "Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow" by The Rivingtons – that was Ghoulardi.

Between cinematic classics like Kronos and The Deadly Mantis, Ghoulardi also exposed me to the classic Universal horror monster films of the 1930’s. Even if you have never watched a minute of these movies, you know the themes. These characters pervaded 20th century media and still represent icons of modern cultural literacy.

Dracula, the Vampire – a soulless, loveless creature of seemingly overwhelming strength and ability. Modeled after Vlad the Impaler, an historically notorious slaughterer of enemies, Dracula lives on today in endless film and print versions. Vampire stories on the small screen range from Buffy and Angel, to Being Human and True Blood. And who could be oblivious to the new interpretation of the vampire myth that has a generation of young girls rapt in the Twilight series?

The vampire represents the terror of powerlessness, a hypnotic horror that doesn't just kill your spirit quickly, but slowly drains it away. The vampire is no force of nature, but a conscious and malevolent power bent on the deflowering of the innocent and the tainting of the pure. Protection exists for those with unwavering faith, and especially strong believers can wield the tools capable of destroying the monster. Ironically, mortal love is the one variable most able to foil the vampire’s plans.

In some ways quite the opposite of Bela Lugosi’s Count was Imhotep, the Mummy, a reanimated flesh golem whose sole purpose of existence is to complete the execution of an ancient curse. The Mummy is less popular, especially among the ladies, perhaps because of his lack of independent initiative or creativity – and the dirty bandages don’t help. The Mummy is a brute, pummeling or strangling victims, with none of the subtlety and finesse of the vampire.

The Mummy represents the terror of inevitability, because no matter what you do, the monster will eventually catch you. Unlike the vampire, little can put the Mummy off your track as his slow but relentless pursuit wears you down until you relax your guard just once. But, like the vampire, the Mummy has one key weakness that makes it ultimately vulnerable – his forbidden love for the Princess Ankh-es-en-amon. And while his body is impervious to attack, the paper scroll containing his life-giving spell can be burned to end his threat.

A much more human character was Larry Talbot, the Wolfman – a gallant, but innocent soul infected with a disease that transforms his body and subjugates his mind. Over time, writers have often pitted the werewolf and the vampire against each other, most notably in the recent Underworld series and the aforementioned Twilight books and films. For, while we helpless rabble might lump one monster with another, these two are irrevocably different. The vampire is lifeless, a heartless killing machine with only vague memories of mortality. But, the werewolf is still a living human inflicted with the disease of lycanthropy.

The Wolfman symbolizes the terror of corruption, an unyielding virus that insidiously attacks the body from within. The lycanthrope has the mighty power of animal nature, driven by the mysterious power of the Moon, an eternal metaphor for darkness and mystery. The true evil of the werewolf lies in the non-death of the circumstance. Unlike the mummy or the vampire, lycanthropy steals away one’s free will, but not one’s life. Once again, in death there lies release, but only when delivered by the hands of a loved one.

And then, there is the ultimate Monster, the unnatural creation of Dr. Henry Frankenstein. This once human, now perverse sacrilege of God’s handiwork, the Monster evokes equal parts pity and revulsion, awe and rage. Given our routine exposure to mayhem and carnage today, one can hardly believe that this film once caused fainting spells and heart attacks in theaters. Most would agree, however, that Boris Karloff’s performance made the Monster the memorable figure it remains today – humane and childlike, yet savage.

The Frankenstein Monster exemplifies the terror of profanity, the vile and blasphemous embodiment of humanity’s inflated ego and arrogance. This creature, at the same time both trauma-inducing and tragic, makes us look in the mirror and question our purpose in the world and our relation with the order of the universe. Only when his monster threatens his bride on their wedding day does Henry Frankenstein recognize his error and fight to end his creation’s reign of violence.

All of these terrors – powerlessness, inevitability, corruption, and profanity – alone are enough to vanquish the weak and to conquer those lacking the skill and devotion to battle their power. But, there is one more terror, a terror perhaps worse than the others combined. For this power, however, we must leave the comfort of cushioned theater seat and the delight of a tub of buttered popcorn for the all-too-real world. Because, this terror only exists in a universe where the monster can actually emerge victorious when the credits roll.

In June 1876, a real-life character not unlike Henry Frankenstein in his boldness and arrogance took on an overwhelming force of Lakotas, Northern Cheyenne, and Arapahoe in the Battle of Little Big Horn. George Armstrong Custer was among 268 soldiers of the 7th cavalry killed in the action, which has acquired mythic proportions in American history. One item nearly always omitted from the popular account is that Custer was found with shots to the left chest and left temple. He seemed to have bled from only the chest wound, meaning his head wound may have been delivered post-mortem. Some Lakota oral histories assert that Custer committed suicide to avoid capture and subsequent torture.

Being right-handed, historians generally discount reports of Custer taking his own life. However, several accounts of Indian witnesses note that soldiers committed suicide near the end of the battle. Walking Blanket Woman told of the mass suicide of C Company, which was described by Black Wolf, Pine, Limpy, Bobtail Horse, Rising Sun, Red Fox, and Dives Backward – all Northern Cheyennes. Wooden Leg, also a Cheyenne, described the same incident to his friend, Dr. Thomas B. Marquis, who later wrote a book titled, Keep The Last Bullet for Yourself: The True Story of Custer’s Last Stand. Wooden Leg later recalled: “[T]he white men went crazy. Instead of shooting us, they turned their guns upon themselves. Almost before we could get to them, every one of them was dead. They killed themselves.” Other Indian combatants spoke of still more suicides among the American soldiers, including He Dog and Turning Hawk.

Now, many of Custer’s men were the rawest of recruits, with no experience fighting the Native Americans, and little practice even firing their weapons. One might imagine how their heads had by then been filled with accounts of brutal mistreatment and torture at the hands of this particular enemy. This combination of fighting an unknown enemy to whom all manner of atrocities had been attributed understandably made these soldiers succumb to this most powerful of terrors – the terror of hopelessness.

This addition brings us a complete picture of true terror. True terror makes us feel powerless and as if relentless bad outcomes are inevitable. We see the causes of terror as corrupting that which is innocent and pure and profaning our foundational principles and beliefs. Worst of all, true terror robs us of any hope that we can cope with these feelings. In the face of our recent history, the exploits of Freddy Krueger, Jason, and Michael Myers cannot possibly complete as threats to really terrifying us beyond the confines of 90-minute entertainments.

For the real terror today wields almost limitless financial power and political influence; its doors may only be open from 9:00 to 5:00, but its efforts require no sleep or sustenance. The real terror has taken a sound theory and corrupted it, not only creating chaos and confusion, but then trying to convince us that chaos and confusion are eventually good for us. Millions without jobs…millions without medical care…millions homeless and hungry…millions robbed of futures…millions of dreams destroyed…millions deprived of the hope that is America.

The real terror today is the Frankenstein monster that we have built, that we have assembled part by bloody part, often through our own indifference or our own pursuit of comfort. The real terror today is the perversion of capitalism and democracy generically labeled “Wall Street.” We see evidence of its attacks on our communities every day. Our jobs can disappear overnight taking with them pensions and insurance; organizations devoted to improving workers’ rights and workplace conditions are being dismantled by our elected officials; and greed can erase home ownership and the fruits of a lifetime of hard work with the stroke of a pen or the tapping of a calculator.

This monster possesses an insatiable appetite and will never rest until it owns everything. This monster knows no law but the backroom deal, the special interest group, and the campaign donation. This monster will happily gobble up all the sacrifices we make to placate it, and then come back for more.

We are not Custer’s raw recruits. We know our enemy well and have too often turned a blind eye to its misbehaviors. Individually, we may not have the skills needed to combat the monster, but we know how to acquire them and how to work together to share our available talents and energy.

In recent weeks, people with hope have begun to act. People from all walks of life, from 9 to 90, dock workers and doctors, people of all faiths, races, identities and backgrounds have come together in more than 1,000 cities and towns across the country. The grassroots Occupy Movement continues to grow everywhere where people feel the monster at their doorstep.

Despite the best efforts of corporate-owned media to make the movement sound unfocused and leaderless, a statement approved by the general assembly of protesters at Liberty Square in New York City articulates a widely-held call to action.

As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments…
• They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage.
• They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses.
• They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one’s skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation.
• They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization.
• They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless nonhuman animals, and actively hide these practices.
• They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions.
• They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right.
• They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay.
• They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility.
• They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance.
• They have sold our privacy as a commodity.
• They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press.
• They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit.
• They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce.
• They have donated large sums of money to politicians supposed to be regulating them.
• They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil.
• They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantive profit.
• They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit.
• They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media.
• They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt.
• They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad.
• They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas.
• They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts.

To the people of the world, We…urge you to assert your power. Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone…Join us and make your voices heard!

Where do our churches fit in this movement? As Unitarian Universalists, I believe that a connection with this movement – if you agree with its assertions – is undeniable. We affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person, which includes the 1% and the 99%. And, a corporation is not a person. We affirm and promote justice, equity, and compassion in human relations, all of which have been under assault in recent years. We affirm and promote the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process, another area facing challenges from unjustified arrests and detentions, to efforts to undermine our constitutional rights. We affirm and promote the goal of world community, a goal unattainable so long as primacy is giving to profits over people.

I think that we as religious people, laity and clergy, wield the one force capable of slaying all monsters. We possess the one tool able to saving their victims, of curing the afflicted, and motivating even the most unruly mob to coordinated action.

We are the agents of love. No silver bullets, no garlic and stakes, no torches and pitchforks. Just pure love. Innocent love. The love of a child, of a parent, of a brother or sister, of a neighbor. We can bring the power of our love to this movement, helping to heal the pain felt by the 99%. By standing on the side of love, we can once again show that our churches are relevant in our day-to-day lives, and that a strategy of nonviolence can overcome any obstacle.

I intend to stay involved in this particular war against terror. I ask you to get informed and make your voices heard.

Enraged?...Engage!

2011-10-26T13:37:00.000-04:00

Like many of you on the Internet, yesterday I watched live feeds as police raided the Oakland Occupy site and assaulted peaceful protesters with clubs and tear gas. I sat, dumbfounded, watching the kind of violent action I expect from totalitarian regimes in third world nations taking place in my country, in my America. I watched, helpless to stop this outrage, able to do nothing more than make a phone call and send messages of support and love.

I felt tremendous anger at the police, using tactics reserved for criminals against citizens exercising their constitutional rights to assemble, speak, and seek redress of their grievances. I marvelled that the protesters (as has been the case at all of the Occupy sites I know of) responded nonviolently and did not try to answer these unprovoked attacks with violence.

I felt conflicted. I have long supported our law enforcement workers, who routinely put their lives on the line to protect us and our communities. The nation has extended tremendous support to these officers since 9/11 in recognition of their labor and commitment. But, these police actions only evoked in me a sense of shame; shame that these men and women were acting as agents of my nation.

Then I felt pity. I imagined how some of the police must have felt. Surely some of these men and women - who are all part of the 99% in the Occupy movement - hated following these orders and would have refused if not for the threat of losing jobs and benefits. It is always easy to Monday morning quarterback decisions made by people in such situations.

But, my sympathy only goes so far. If you are a law enforcement officer, I ask you to consider how far you are willing to go following orders that violate our rights as American citizens. I ask you to consider whether you would be willing to tear gas women and children for any reason, let alone for being part of lawful, peaceful demonstrations. I ask you to start to question whether the people giving the orders for you to act as the police in Oakland did, are indeed living up to your mission to serve and to protect.

And to the rest of us who are not police officers. Are you enraged by the increasing hostility toward the Occupy protesters? If you are enraged, then get engaged! Now is exactly the time that this movement needs the support of the 99%. Whether you sleep in a tent in a public park, bring food and drink to other protesters, or simply shake a protester's hand in support, now is the time to let your voice be heard.

The Internet has taught us the fine art of lurking. Lurking serves a purpose when it comes to reading blogs or participating in listservs. But, the time for lurking while watching the live feed from Oakland yesterday is over. If you agree with the principles of the Occupy movement, then get off of the sidelines and jump into the game!

Occupy!

2011-10-18T12:17:00.000-04:00

I am normally not much of an "in-your-face" protester, and my body does not take kindly to long marches. But, the Occupy movement speaks so viscerally to so many people, that I jumped at the opportunity to get involved.

Occupy Midland held its first protest on Monday in front of a Bank of America branch at the corner of Ashman and Eastlawn here in Midland. About 50 people participated and I am proud to say that about a quarter of them were members and friends of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland.

I wore my Standing on the Side of Love shirt and we picketed as literally hundreds of drivers passing by honked their horns and waved encouragement.

Occupy Wall Street movements take hold in Mid-Michigan: Occupy Midland makes the top story.

Two points I made that didn't make the televised interview were these. The Occupy movement is expressing the rage and frustration of hundreds of millions of Americans who feel betrayed by their institutions and politicians. What better place for ministers to be in this time of national distress. Second, the emphasis of the Occupy movement spans all demographics, including religion. Every religion teaches that the love of money and the pursuit of wealth only leads to unhappiness and despair. Every religion teaches the value of charity and being our brothers' and sisters' keepers. Every religious person is part of the 99%.

Not Dead Yet

2011-10-16T23:20:00.000-04:00

As a lifelong book collector (a.k.a. nut), I have bemoaned the death of so many used book stores in recent years, not to mention chains like Borders. One of the few disappointments I experienced during my year in New York City was the scarcity of stores once so plentiful in Manhattan. I'm not knocking Ebay and Amazon.com. I have accumulated considerable customer ratings without ever selling anything online, so I am just as much to blame for the trend as anyone.

But with the birth of Kindles and the immense growth of online texts, I worry for the future of the printed word. Only a warm and loving caress can beat the security and ambiance of shelves packed with one's favorite novels, histories, and art books. And nothing has me whipping out my wallet faster than to purchase a desired hardback.

So, imagine my surprise going to my first library book sale up here in Michigan. Library book sales are big business in Western Pennsylvania, and the collector must develop sharp elbows to brush aside the hoards of dealers crowding the front of the line upon opening. But, here in Mid-Michigan, I thought that perhaps the competition might tax my resolve - and require fewer body checks - less than I was accustomed to.

I arrived my customary hour early, and saw the expected handful of dealers already waiting on the windy sidewalk. I eyed my competition, to better plan my attack on the tables of waiting titles. I chatted with the people alongside me in line. One was an older fellow looking for mysteries; the other a young mother who had once lived in Japan looking for picture books for her child's school - excellent, no competition from them! I was so engaged in conversation, that the appointed hour crept up unexpected. When I glanced back, I saw a line of people stretched as least 50 long down the sidewalk and around the corner. And, these were all people actually paying $10 for Friends of the Library memberships in order to gain access to the sale a day early.

Once inside, I went into fast scan mode. Early in a sale, taking time to actually read titles wastes valuable time, so the collector learns to look for books by appearance and keywords. For instance, as a collector of accounts of Nazi Germany, the word "quisling" caught my eye on one book - a biography of Vidkun Quisling who assisted Nazi Germany as it conquered his country of Norway...snatch.

Going upstairs, I found the specially-priced books and was shocked to see some nice modern leather-bound editions I was familiar with. I nabbed the titled I wanted and then walked away before I talked myself into books I really didn't want simply because the price was right. Literally a minute later, the dealer I had spied at the front of the line came up and cleaned out all of the titles I had left behind. You know, beating out a book dealer is not equivalent to a fine meal, or a warm hug...but it sure is close.

I left the book sale more upbeat about the future of my favorite medium. I had found some cool additions to my library. Even better, though, that finding neat books for myself is finding books for other folks. Looking through the Religion section, I found a book about Shinto temples in Japan - exactly what the young mother and I had been talking about. I found her over by the kids tables and handed her the book. Nothing beats connecting a person with just the right book.

No, the book is not quite dead yet.

Coming Out

2011-10-11T09:54:00.000-04:00

Two days of note this week have raised my impatience for the future. Last night, the Director of the Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways spoke at our Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland about the seven teachings of the Anishinabe (which greatly resemble our seven principles) and on the significance of reframing Columbus Day as Indigenous Peoples Day. The event was a spiritual experience and gave me great hope for the day when humanity will choose the path of compassion over destruction. And today is National Coming Out Day, which promotes a safe world for LGBT individuals to live truthfully and openly.

I welcome both of these celebrations. I welcome the opportunity to recognize a gradual shift away from unbridled colonialism, from hatred based on our differences, and from inequality. I welcome the chance to acknowledge that much work remains to be done and to advocate for a fair and just world.

My frustration lies in our retention of labels at all. Gandhi is widely attributed to have responded to the question of whether he was Hindu by saying, "Yes I am. I am also a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist and a Jew." I have always admired this quote and have seen it as a path toward an eventual reconciliation of our human differences.

Now, I am not so sure. The Anishinabe believe that there are four races of humankind - white, black, red and yellow - and that all must exist in order for balance to be retained. All must learn from each other and understand the cultures of the other. But, as long as these differences exist, our natural human tendency will be to elevate our race, our culture, or our religion of birth over others - to always hold our birth identities as just slightly "better" or more important than others.

So while I completely support my LGBT brothers and sisters today as they continue their struggle for equal rights and a world without value judgments, I wonder when we will start moving away from our labels. Because, in the end, every person on this planet eventually goes back to a single source. And from that source arises all of our unique attributes. From that one source arises white and black, male and female, gay and straight. When I say that I am a white, straight male, I deny my human genetic heritage that includes being black, gay, and female.

So, on this Coming Out Day, I am coming out. I am coming out as human. I am not only gay or straight. I am not only male or female. I am not only white, black, red, or yellow. I am not only Muslim, Jew, Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, or Unitarian Universalist.

Because in the end, I don't find my joy in life as any of those labels. I find my joy in life as a human being seeking to find relationship with all sentient creatures and with the universe and with all of existence. I love you whether you are a man or a woman. I love you whether you follow the teachings of Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, or Buddha, I don't care about your appearance, ability, or age. I love you.

It is true that I enjoy enormous privilege at this moment in time that perhaps enables me to come out more easily than those who do not have the same rights and opportunities as I do. And I do not want anyone to think I am making light of the hard decision to publicly own any individual identity. So I will work to be a good ally to all people of all identities until the day comes when we can all rise above all of our identities. I will work to create a world where everyone feels free to come out, as a human.

Simple Joys of Days Long Gone

2011-10-04T17:39:00.000-04:00

Thoreau I ain't. But I do like the occasional walk through the woods...along an established trail...of a known and manageable distance...as long as the bugs aren't too annoying. I am far more inclined toward B.F. Skinner's Walden Two than its namesake original.

But I can appreciate nature as well as the next urbanite, so I sauntered off into the untamed wilderness of the Potawatoni State Park forest for a 1.7 mile adventure. The first surprise was the enormous racket. From the incessant chip-chip-chip of quite possibly thousands of chipmunks to the munch-crunch of squirrels rotating acorns in their dainty paws, to the blaring warnings of geese aimed at flying interlopers, a cacophony of sounds surrounded me. Not the least alarming was the occasional thud of a heavy-husked black walnut pummeling its way through the branches.

I wandered up and around the toboggan run, down past a playground and into the Nature Center. Inside I found a nice collection of turtles (sadly they were missing my favorite spiny softshells from my recently departed Youghiogheny River walks) and a wonderful viewing window displaying a bird feeding station just outside. Flittering all among the dozen or so stations were sparrows and finches, woodpeckers and nuthatches, and of course the perennial mourning doves.

I continued on down a now less thoroughly paved path back toward the Inn. I am always amazed at how our minds over time are so apt at categorizing sensory inputs. I recognized every creature as I spied or heard it rustling through leaves or announcing its presence as I approached.

Suddenly, I spotted out of the far side of my vision an unusual hopping motion. I stopped and turned, hoping to determine more accurately its location and cause. After I few seconds, I saw the hop again and spied a toad. I imagine it was your basic American Toad, living across lots of states. I found myself instantly whisked back through time to my childhood, when such finds seemed endlessly plentiful and tirelessly exciting. I honestly could not remember the last time I saw a toad, but I distinctly recalled the joy I experienced when I discovered them as a child. I fondly reclaimed memories from deep in my mind's archive of holding their warty, cold bodies in my hand.

I wondered if everyone, no matter how challenging, stressful, or simply awful their youth has similar memories - simple delights that bring smiles to faces and carry away concerns and fears. I certainly hope so. I fervently hope that everyone has some trigger back to a time in their lives that was relatively free of cares and scares, of anguish and pain, of loss and betrayal. I hope you can take a moment today - perhaps even every day - to saunter someplace in your mind where a toad sits waiting for your curious finger to stroke its smooth, bumpy skin.

Does It Get Better?

2011-09-27T15:43:00.000-04:00

The It Gets Better Project specifically addresses the question many LGBTQ youth have when they experience bullying and discrimination. Does this ever get better?

You don’t have to be LGBTQ to ask that question. You may find yourself in a job that seems to be going nowhere. Your relationship with parents, children, or significant others may be mired in seemingly endless cycles of misunderstanding and hurt. There may never seem to be enough money, no matter how hard you save or cut expenses. It may seem that only destructive behaviors are able to alleviate the stress of your everyday life.

Does it ever get better?

The simple answer is yes, usually things do get better. But, the complicated answer is that we are human beings – flawed and imperfect. We live in a world that is unpredictable, filled with random noise and chaos. And anyone who tells you that life is fair is trying to sell you something.

Does it always get better? No. Does it get better and always stay better? Probably not. Given the reality of life, then, you may ask yourself, “Why bother?” You should bother for one simple reason.

TANSTAAFL. Readers of science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein know this acronym. TANSTAAFL means, “There ain’t no such thing as a free lunch.” In other words, the only things worth having in life only come to us through hard work and sacrifice.

Can we go through life without risk, without taking a chance? Sure. And in America, one can quite possibly live a perfectly satisfying and safe life without taking that leap of faith, without jumping off that cliff. But, you won’t achieve the really great things, the “wow factor” in life without commitment, sweat, and compromise.

And compromise is a big one. By compromise, I don’t mean selling your soul or abandoning your principles. Compromise means negotiating and constantly renegotiating our covenants with each other – what we promise to others and how we will treat each other. And in order to compromise effectively, you must identify what matters most to you in life, the things that are non-negotiable. Everything else is on the table, because in the end, the rest really doesn’t matter as we pursue our goals.

The rest doesn’t matter because all of the really important goals involve other people. I can’t be the best at my profession without clients for my services. I can’t be an effective parent, child, or sibling without family and committed partners to make the journey with me. Unless I seek the life of an ascetic, I cannot be truly happy alone, and no drug can give me that happiness.

Identify priorities, work hard, and compromise. They will not guarantee success, but they will certainly improve the likelihood that you will achieve your goals, and will certainly make the effort more fulfilling.

Truth and Spontaneity

2011-09-21T22:37:00.000-04:00

This morning, I attended a meeting of my cluster ministers, an important part of building collegial relationships and, quite honestly, staying sane. We began the day with a worship service, which was about excellence. At one point during the sermon, the leader looked at me and suddenly asked me what I viewed as my strength.

Now, almost any other time, I might have had several answers to that question - answers that I have considered over years of discernment and many hours of reflection. I am a preacher, teacher and lover of knowledge. I am a boat rocker. I am a paradigm shifter. I am a facilitator and guide.

But, none of those carefully constructed answers came to my mind. Before I could even begin to think about what I should say, I said, "Being a parent."

Obviously, the events of the past week likely influenced my answer. My daughter Ashley and her husband Kevin made me a new grandfather of a lovely baby girl, Caitlin Elizabeth Stack. And my son Tyler got a richly deserved promotion, a just recognition of his hard work and dedication. It was a banner week for the Liebmann clan and I could not be prouder. So, I could be excused for having my kids at the forefront of my thinking.

But, I think my spontaneous answer revealed more than I might have suspected. I was blessed to have tremendous parents and I strove to be the best parent I could be. And clearly, many parenting skills come in handy in ministry, not to mention many pursuits in life.

A good parent teaches, but is just an avid a learner.
A good parent knows when to talk and when to listen.
A good parent leads by example.
A good parent is on the clock 24/7/365, but also knows how to have fun.
A good parent provides opportunities for success and can turn any failure into a teaching moment.
A good parent loves unconditionally.
A good parent fosters creativity, rewards imagination, and welcomes a challenge.

So thanks Mom and Dad. Thanks Ashley and Tyler. Thanks to everyone who has helped hone my parenting skill set.

Waiting on a Delivery

2011-09-12T16:12:00.000-04:00

I sit here, cell phone in hand, waiting for a call. My daughter is now several days passed her due date to deliver my first grandchild and my anticipation is massive. I hate waiting.

But, I love deliveries. I gleefully go to my mailbox every day. My email accounts remain open constantly. I am even a glutton for the immense noise of Facebook updates.

So, this “package” weighs heavily on my mind. While the pressures on a PGK (Preacher’s Grand-Kid) may be mild, I do feel a special responsibility for contributing to her spiritual growth. My own children did not grow up with a minister for a father as I entered the clergy after they set out on life’s adventure as adults. But, this child will grow up with my ecclesiastical influence (albeit from a distance).

I have already dutifully provided some appropriate books for the nursery. And, beyond doing my share of grandfatherly spoiling (that is our primary job, after all), I do expect to plant the seeds of religious thinking in her developing mind.

I realize, however, that the most effective way of influencing others is simply by being the best person I can be myself. And, I must satisfy myself that if I do the best I can as a person, then a little of that will rub off on her. It will take many year, perhaps a lifetime.

I hate waiting.

Crickets in the Basement

2011-09-05T09:31:00.000-04:00

The other day, I was reminded of my Unitarian Universalist evangelicalism by a strange sound coming from my basement. Standing in the kitchen, I heard something I should not have been hearing inside my house -- a loud chirripping from the floor below. Going down the stairs, the sound was so loud, my ears had difficulty locating it. A cricket had somehow found its way in and was making its presence abudantly known.

My first thought was that you have picked the wrong place to seek out a lady cricket. I wondered why the insect would make such a racket, lost in such an unfamiliar environment devoid of familiar plants and night air. Perhaps it was just sending out sounds like sonar waves, trying to discern its location. Perhaps it was angrily railing against the misfortune that carried it into a barren land, devoid of friends or food.

More than likely, I then thought, the poor thing is probably just calling out for help. Panicked, the solidary creature was literally "screaming" for help in the chance that Providence would restore it to its rightful home. I couldn't help but wonder what the tiny bug was thinking of the books and boxes, the carpet and closets.

My mind couldn't help but wander to all those people out there, lost in unfriendly circumstances, lacking friends and familiar surroundings. Walking down the street, is the woman I just passed screaming silently for someone to help her? Is that young man desperately reaching out figurative hands pleading for someone to crasp hold and pull him from his hole? How many helpless, hopeless persons out there are crying out however they can, praying for their world to make sense.

Our congregations are often wonderful places and those who find their way to our doors are very often rewarded with deep fellowship and lifelong guidance along their spiritual paths. But how many never see our buildings or hear our messages? How many never smell the pulpit flowers or feel the touch of a helping hand pulling them toward sanctuary?

The world is filled with crickets in the basement, desperately trying to find a way home. This coming Sunday is Homecoming for many of our churches. Our congregations can help people deal with all the noise of their daily lives. So, listen for the chirps in your life and invite someone to a worship service. In their own ways, so many people are hoping they will be noticed and offered a hand of fellowship. A basement may not be a dangerous place, but it is devoid of sustenance and leads nowhere.

Extreme Welcoming

2011-08-30T07:13:00.000-04:00

In my travels among different congregations, I have found many healthy, happy churches. Unfortunately, finding them often takes a good deal of work on the part of the searcher. We have many wonderful religious communities in our denomination. But, too often we make the task of locating and entering those communities onerous.

The consequences of our inattention to outreach ministry was struck home to me last week when I attended a local folk music festival. The odyssey started with driving to the fairgrounds and entering one of the two main entrances. I shortly found myself facing a barricade with no indication of exactly where I was supposed to park my car. After crawling around two such obstacles, I found a grassy area with cars and stopped.

Seeing no obvious starting point for the event, I walked over to the main building. Inside I found an information table and some vendors selling instruments and music. However, there was no starting place and no obvious location for the visitor to talk to someone about the schedule of events. In fact, quite the opposite, no one spoke to me, offered assistance, or even said hello.

I walked around the room and was again astonished at the lack of interaction or interest in my presence at all. When I did talk to people, their interest waned quickly when the realized that I was not "one of them." And although the posted information indicated that food was available, I found nothing but one small table selling bags of popcorn.

The event could have been very interesting. Perhaps the group might have engaged me in what could have become a long and fruitful relationship. Instead, I doubt that I will ever have much interest in the organization or its events again.

It saddens me to think of the many times I have heard similar stories from people visiting our churches. Knowing how I felt that day, I would never wish that feeling of unwelcome on anyone, particularly someone looking for a religious home.

So, while you may be perfectly happy with your own congregation, take a moment and examine it through the eyes of a visitor, a stranger. How welcome would you feel? How would you want to be treated upon entering the space and in the days after? Are the things you would want really all that extreme, or simply practices that should be commonplace?

Some Assembly Required...

2011-08-22T16:20:00.000-04:00

That's a phrase every parent has dreaded at one time or another (especially at 4:00 a.m. on Christmas Eve as the bicycle lies strewn in uncooperative pieces on the floor). Lately that phrase has run through my mind as I construct my new life here in Midland. From the metaphorical (assembling new relationships with congregants and a new town) to the literal (a desk, three bookcases, an office chair, and a still-not-quite-functional filing cabinet) my life lies in pieces on the workbench waiting for Geppetto to assemble the puppet who would be a boy. I've put together quite the collection of Allen wrenches and instruction manuals.

As much as I like to receive packages, I am beginning to yearn for some end to the chaos. Something in me wants at least one room in my life to be finished. Just once, I want to look around me and be satisfied. As one of my favorite movie bad guys once said, "When Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept for there were no more worlds to conquer."

The real problem, though, is believing in the illusion of completion. There really is no such thing as being finished with anything. Just as the elements that comprise our universe are in a constant state of flux, so our lives consist of an endless stream of shifts and changes. I suppose if I ever got everything that I think I want, I would immediately identify some new desire or place for improvement. I've come to believe that enlightenment is not a stagnant state of serenity and wholeness, but rather an attitude that nothing is permanent and that no current state of anything really matters at all.

In the meantime, I've got piles of unsorted books beckoning for my attention, a sad recliner due to fall apart suddenly as I sit to watch the next episode of Hell's Kitchen, and a garage full of shipping boxes awaiting the next "heavy item" garbage pick up day. Until I achieve a transcendent state, I will seek that balance between the nirvana of the perfect home and a disorganized and unmanageable hovel. And I will continue to embrace the many opportunities before me to assemble my life.

Floating Logs in the Stream of Life

2011-08-16T07:23:00.000-04:00

Before my move to Midland, I took one last walk south along the railroad tracks out of Smithton toward Jacob's Creek. The summer temperatures had fallen, but the air was still muggy and warm. I went to an opening along the bank where people launch kayaks and canoes to drift along the Youghiogheny River. I have sat there before watching the water flow by, but the log I had used before to sit comfortably was nowhere to be seen. Doubtless some camper tossed it onto a fire not knowing they were depriving me of my resting place.

So, I wandered along the fishermans' trail, tossing branches and stones into the water. Unable to find a place to sit and rest in solitude, I grew restless and unable to allow my mind to wander unfettered. I headed back along the road.

I soon came upon an old, partially-rotted piece of wooden guard rail post. Still close enough to the water, I tossed the semi-log in. It hit the surface with a low plomp, sank, and quickly resurfaced. In no time, bulky block of wood sped along with the river.

Now walking with the current, I found that I could easily keep pace with the floating wood. With its large exposed surface, it reminded me of a Mark Twain raft drifting along the mighty Mississippi. I started gaining ground and stayed paces ahead as I walked. Occasionally a car would pass by, forcing me to hug the guard rail and check up on my small ark.

Watching the steady progress, I thought of my kids as they grew and went off into the world. Had I wanted to, or really needed to, I could have lumbered down the bank and jumped in to retrieve my child from the current. But in reality, I was consigned to watching its inevitable journey, knowing that I had provided the initial impetus and castoff.

As the foliage grew taller, I only caught fleeting sight of the floating log until the weeds grew too high. At the same time, the road started to dip slowly away from the water, and I knew that ever a herculean effort would not rejoin us again. I began to imagine its future course down the river, knowing that I could do nothing to influence its path significantly.

Returning home, I couldn't help but think of all the times in our lives that we give birth to activities and ideas and how soon they develop lives of their own, quickly moving out of our control. When theologians talk about the cycle of birth and death, they often only include consideration of salvation of the individual or the progress of the soul along the path of reincarnation.

But, in fact, our lives abound with little births, giving rise to lives - some fleeting and others carrying on long after our own demise. More often than not, we are completely unaware of our continual creations and the impact they have on others. Perhaps a respect for the interdependent web of all existence begins with such awareness.

My Life as My Books

2011-08-08T10:29:00.002-04:00

I don't suppose a therapist would classify this an addiction, but I am inordinately fond of books. Having just moved to a new home in Midland, I find most of my time consumed by organizing books, buying shelves for books, and grieving the loss of a handful that fell victim to a spill in the moving van.

People ask why I want to possess so many books. Why do I keep books I have already read? Why do I buy books easily available in libraries, even online? And why would I keep a book that I am entirely unlikely to ever read?

I will admit that my bibliophilia borders on the obsessive. I do use libraries liberally and love the growing availability of documents on Google Books and other resources. Logic certainly would not explain the contents or size of my personal collections.

But, there are reasons for my madness. I am comfortable around and among books. Sometimes I feel smarter or more insightful just knowing that all of that collected knowledge resides in immediate proximity. There is an art to the library, from dust jacket illustrations to bindings. And, the symmetry and line of rows of texts appeals to my design sense.

The primary reason for my peculiar compulsion, however, is how my books help my spiritual practice. Just as I love to saunter along streets and pathways, I also love to walk among ideas in my mind. I cannot count the number of times a worship service design changed direction after a casual glance at a neighboring book, or the coincidental discovery of a text related (often in an obscure way) to the subject of my sermon. I know that virtual libraries will in time replace my beloved stacks. But, I will miss wandering among the towering shelves of Dewey-decimalled dusty tomes.

General Assembly: Opportunities

2011-06-26T07:05:00.000-04:00

This amazing week of talking, singing, listening, and worshipping continues here is Charlotte. Yesterday, we heard a number of reports during the Plenary sessions that gave me great hope. Both reports gave me tasks to pass onto my new congregants at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland as possible new initiatives.

During his report on the activities of the UU-UNO (Unitarian Universalist United Nations Office), Bruce Knotts related the enormous impact we have in that body. From women's rights, to the safety of children, to the protection of LGBT individuals, Unitarian Universalists are at the forefront of United Nations efforts.

Our office in the UN works with a network of congregational representative network of Envoys. Envoys connect the congregation to the UU United Nations Office and get important information on current UN activities. They receive information on our program initiatives and then plan events in their congregation to promote the program. Envoys are extremely valuable to the UU United Nations Office because they are the link between the office and the global UU community.

As someone committed to the work and purposes of the United Nations, I hope to enlist someone in my new congregation willing to serve this important function. Being connected to the United Nations is one important way to stay in touch with the entire world, bringing our message to people everywhere and helping people in need or whose rights are being abused.

In another report Bill Schulz, former President of the Unitarian Universalist Association and subsequently President of Amnesty International, reported on new initiatives being undertaken by the UUSC (Unitarian Universalist Service Committee). As Schulz powerfully articulated, the UUSC is involved in basic and simple efforts to help people access potable water, find economic justice, and end torture across the world. He announced the creation of the College of Social Justice, designed to give all Unitarian Universalists the chance the opportunity to live out their religious values through an institution founded on UU values through learning on on-site service opportunities. I hope to encourage every member of my new congregation to join the UUSC in its important work.

So, get ready Midland. We are going to rock the world!

A Call to Ministry with Youth

2011-06-25T11:46:00.000-04:00

People often ask ministers about their call to this work, this life of ministry. The seed of my call was working with our teenage youth. I taught junior and senior high religious education classes in my church, wrote curricula, attended youth conferences and trainings, helped develop youth leaders through district and continental events and organizations, and simply listened. As a youth advisor, I met amazing people, many of whom I now see as congregational and denominational leaders, workers for justice, even other ministers.

When I entered seminary, I had to leave my youth work behind so that I could expand my base of experience and knowledge. A major element of the discernment process involves finding the direction of one’s ministry. Some people find their path in chaplaincy. Others find attraction in community ministry and lives of public service. Of course, many aspiring ministers pursue a dream of parish ministry, eventually serving as the spiritual leader of a congregation and speaking from our free pulpit with the prophetic voice spoken by generations of courageous forebears.

I now enter my first settled position, having been called to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland, Michigan. Unexpectedly, I find the cosmos wending full circle on one element of my ministry, calling me back to youth work. My new congregation stands poised to expand its outreach into the community, and I have every reason to believe that many new faces will cross our threshold in the coming years. In particular, I hope to build a lifelong learning ministry that attracts many children, youth, young adults, their families and friends.

New ministers face many demands and choosing where to devote their time and energy presents a daunting challenge. I have decided that among my commitments will be providing my leadership and energy to the Youth Group. And, beyond a broader emphasis on addressing the needs of young adults – be they students, single, young parents, mobile professionals – I hope to specifically focus on ensuring that youth and young adults in those tumultuous years know that they are loved, that this congregation cares about their spiritual development, and that we invite their active engagement.

Every year at General Assembly, I listen to the recounted history of the struggles of the Unitarian Universalist Association with anti-racism and anti-oppression. I cannot count the times I have read about and heard accounts of infamous events and actions in recent decades during which we learned in painful ways the hurt felt by people of color in our movement. The Unitarian Universalist Association continues to travel toward wholeness and must never forget its legacy of effort and growth.

We also possess a checkered past with regard to our youth ministries. One does not minister with youth long before hearing about past betrayal: the abdication of adult participation in the late 1960’s and 1970’s; the dismantling of Liberal Religious Youth in the early 1980’s; and the recent refocusing of efforts away from the directions taken by Young Religious Unitarian Universalists in the past 30 years.

At the Synergy Bridging ceremony at General Assembly in Charlotte on June 24, 2011, Betty Jeanne Reuters-Ward spoke of this most recent bend in the historical road of youth ministry. Her passionate words resonated with a visceral pain, much like the hurt I have heard for years from LRYers. As a long-time youth advisor, I shared Betty Jeanne’s emotions, and I felt that tightening in my chest of loss; that pang of grief for a life ended prematurely.

Our denomination has what can only be considered in my opinion a shocking record of failure to retain Unitarian Universalists as active congregational participants from youth into young adulthood. I have often heard estimates that 90% of our youth leave our churches as they bridge into young adulthood. Many never return.

I am enraged by this statistic. I seethe with fury that we, as a denomination, too often accept this effect as expected, even normal. I never want to lose any member of our churches for any reason. But to accept the loss of so many talented, loving, and dedicated people – most of whom were born and raised in our movement – without massive outcry and response i s appalling and unconscionable.

So, I am rededicating my effort to minister with youth. In my congregation, through denominational effort, through distance outreach and social networking, I will do whatever I can to minister with our youth. And, I call on each and every Unitarian Universalist minister to increase their commitment to this important ministry and to heal this history of disappointment and neglect. Meet with your youth groups. Help them learn more about worship and spiritual growth. Work with them on service projects. Dance, sing, and act; dream and envision; teach and be taught; empower them to lead. Be their ally. Sit with your youth in person and in spirit and guide them toward a lifelong love of our religion, commitment to our principles, and fellowship in our congregations.

General Assembly: Painful Reminders and the Work Ahead

2011-06-25T07:38:00.000-04:00

As joyous as this week can be, General Assembly also reminds us of our failures and mistakes, and of the enormous challenges still lying ahead for us as a denomination. Many program sessions this week have spoken of declining church attendance and the urgency for our congregations to be more relevant in peoples' lives and in our society. One speaker after another reminds us that church cannot simply be about the Sunday morning service, but must be the about the way we live every day.

Today, thousands of Unitarian Universalists and others marched in downtown Charlotte to call people to act against proposed actions before the North Carolina legislature discriminating against gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transgender individuals, their families and friends. The rally featured dynamic speakers and members of the broader faith community in impassioned appeal to act for justice. The gathering reminded me that I must remain diligent in the ongoing struggle of people seeking rights I take for granted, and equal treatment in the eyes of our society.

In the evening, the annual Synergy worship service honoring the passage of our youth into adulthood featured many speakers addressing our history of ministry with youth. Betty Jeanne Reuters-Ward spoke of growing up in Young Religious Unitarian Universalism (YRUU), and the hurt felt by many when the program was dismantled a few years ago. As a long-time advisor and advocate for youth, her words brought back that pain for me, as well. And even though I know bear the full portfolio of ministerial responsibilities, Betty's words reminded me of the roots of my calling and moved me to once again reach out to our youth and, hopefully, help to heal the wounds caused by our reorganization efforts and our chronic inattention to the spiritual growth of our children and youth.

And, throughout the week, conversations with my colleagues from seminary have reminded me of the enormous challenges facing Meadville Lombard Theological School. Faculty departures, the sale of our historic campus, and other administrative actions have left many of us feeling estranged from our alma mater and concerned for the future of ministerial education in our denomination.

I love the singing, the hugs, the warmth and caring of dear friends. But, General Assembly also reminds us that we still have much work to do. One speaker today discussed the notion that "god" is a verb. Our spiritual beliefs are not some static bunch of words, or ritualized acts we repeat without further thought or commitment. Being a Unitarian Universalist is a full-time vocation and every day provides us a variety of opportunities to live our principles, to walk the path to justice, and to reach out to others in compassion. Every new dawn presents a fresh day for action, for healing, and for love.

How will you live your faith today?

General Assembly: Traditions

2011-06-24T07:00:00.000-04:00

A vital element about attending General Assembly (or any denominational event beyond the walls of our congregations for that matter) is the experience of traditions - rituals that we may not conduct in our own religious communities, but that unite us with other Unitarian Universalists, wherever they call home. For me, the Service of the Living Tradition is one of the most important of our rituals.

Every year, the Service of the Living Tradition celebrates Unitarian Universalist ministry, particularly highlighting the achievements of fellowshipping, retirement, and the lives of ministers recently passed. I have worked five years to become a Unitarian Universalist minister, and waited five long years to walk proudly and sing loudly in this jubilant event.

In recent years, applause after each read name was discouraged. This year, the organizers recognized that in our tradition, the recognition of ministerial authority arises from our congregations. So, rather than march us to the stage in one unbroken line, this year we all sat among the attendees until our names were called, able to join with our congregants, family and friends. When called, people were free to applaud, whoop and holler as we rose and walked to the stage.

My adrenaline spiked as I heard my name and leaped from my seat surrounding by the voices of congregants, friends from seminary, and colleagues. In particular, I was thrilled to have my daughter Ashley and son-in-law Kevin in attendance, who drove from Jacksonville just to see the old man get his "diploma." I couldn't have been happier...joyful...jubilant. Ashley is carrying my first grandchild, due to arrive for my spoiling pleasure in early September.

There is simply no greater rush than singing Rank by Rank Again We Stand with thousands of Unitarian Universalists. A tear rolled down my cheek during the Chalice Lighting, and the rest was a blur until the recession. I walked back through the auditorium, singing at the top of my voice, robe flowing, to For All the Saints. I then hugged everyone, from former congregants, to fellow ministers, to young adults I have known for many years as advisees and now lifelong friends and colleagues.

This was a special night that will forever live in my memory. When people ask me about my call, the work and sacrifice, and living the life of a minister, if you see a little smile arise on my lips, then you will know I am thinking about this celebration, this wonderful Unitarian Universalist tradition.

General Assembly: Reconnecting

2011-06-22T23:32:00.000-04:00

The first time one attends General Assembly, the worship services dazzle and the vast array of programs impress. In my 10th General Assembly, it's all about reconnecting with dear friends, past acquaintances, and valued colleagues.

During the Ministry Days programs, I chatted with cherished friends from Meadville Lombard Theological School, some still finishing their course of study. Others, like me, are newly minted ministers facing the challenge of settled positions in new congregations.

Walking through the exhibit hall, I rediscovered fellow curriculum writers at the UU Curriculum and Resource Developers booth and others like my good friend Jennifer who prefers to be called an "extremist" (rather than "fanatical") vegan and animal rights advocate.

At the Mid-American region meeting, I ran into long-time acquaintances from youth and religious education work who are now serving as district staff for either Heartland (my new district), Central Midwest, or Prairie Star. And I found my two on-site delegates from my new congregation, Judith and Sara, from the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland. I am proud that we also have two more delegates participating off-site, back home in Midland.

Then, at the banner parade, I met old pals from the Unitarian Universalist Congregation at Shelter Rock, from my original home congregation, the First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh, and from other miscellaneous travels over the years in UU circles.

Reconnecting with people makes General Assembly special and reminds me of the critical role churches play creating and fostering relationships. In our modern world, where the focus is so often on individual over community, "me" versus "us," our religious homes ground us in valuable and often lifelong relationship with others.

Days like this remind me of the origin of the word "religion," which shares the same root as the word "ligament. Re-ligio means to bind together again and again. For me, reconnecting in meaningful relationship is the key to successful congregational and denominational life.

General Assumbly: Ministry Days

2011-06-22T07:00:00.000-04:00

I spent most of the morning over my keyboard as my sermon muse arrived early. I have learned to never ignore her visits, and so dutifully attended until my July 3 piece was completed. I had a basic theme for this sermon in my head already, an important message since it will be my last visit to my home congregation, the First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh. I welcome the opportunity to say goodbye to old friends and long-time acquaintances. This will also be for me a sort of pre-launch to my new called ministry position in Midland.

In the evening, the ministers gathered together to socialize, worship, and listen to the President of the Unitarian Universalist Association, Peter Morales. While I do not consider myself much of a social butterfly, these events reunite me with dear friends from seminary - fellow travellers on this crazy path to ministry. The food was great, the drinks pricey, and I could have done without having a glass of wine spilled on me by a senior colleague!

During President Morales' talk, one theme struck me again and again. We are a denomination with an opportunity to grow, to reach out to millions of people in search of our message who no longer find solace in traditional religions. But, for the most part, congregations are on their own to address this opportunity. The root "grassroots" arose many times, indicating that we should not expect a lot of help from the UUA in terms of funding or extensive staff support in order to expand programs and reach out to our communities.

While I do not welcome the content of this message, I do accept its honesty. I very much want to see this religious movement grow in membership and influence on our society. As a minister, I will be a primary mover and shaker in my community. But, my principal task will be to encourage, harness, and support my congregants to become ambassadors of Unitarian Universalism.

In the search process, one observation appeared over and over again to me. Our churches are often fantastic places - if one actually manages to find us. It is natural that we build loving communities and then work to sustain them, even against perceived threats that new blood might visit upon us. But, we must shed our fears and address those thousands (I would argue millions) of people out there who need us. We must open our religious homes to the stranger out there desperately searching for spirituality, for comfort, and for the chance to make the world a better place.

Will reaching out to others change our congregations? I hope so! Will we lose what we love so much about our religious communities? Not if we work with intention, with love, and with commitment to sustain them. So, while I wish we had vast resources to fund innovative efforts and broad-reaching programs, I accept the challenge laid before us. The task of changing the world and offering the hand of fellowship to our friends and neighbors is ours to accept or to ignore. And I vote that we embrace that grassroots challenge.

General Assembly: Arrival

2011-06-20T16:50:00.000-04:00

I just checked into my hotel here in swelteringly hot Charlotte. I swear that the temperature rose 20 degrees as I crossed the border from Virginia into North Carolina. The drive was thankfully uneventful, although I find myself taking more breaks than in my youth. Ah, the delights of growing older!

I stopped at a couple of antique malls on the way down and spotted a few more that I will catch on the return trip. Otherwise, it was a gorgeous drive with one tree-covered mountain after another. There was a stretch in Virginia where the view was breathtaking. Even in the slightly overcast sky, I imagined that I could see at least 20 miles into the distance. There was an ominous looking mountain rising up from the plain, which (being the geek that I am) reminded me of Mount Doom rising from the dark lands of Mordor. I suppose had it been nighttime, I might have seen the eye of Sauron watching for me.

Official activities do not begin until tomorrow afternoon, as Ministry Days begin for the Unitarian Universalist Ministers Association. The UUMA events precede the opening of General Assembly each year, and offer a great opportunity to put faces to names and meet new colleagues.

General Assembly is intended to be a business meeting and an opportunity for learning and interaction. But, for me (and this is my 10th GA), this week has always been about remembering that we are not just individual churches located here and there - a blip on the religious radar of America. GA reminds me that we are a significant religious movement, a denomination with a storied history and the potential to impact our society still today.

I always return from General Assembly invigorated and loaded with ideas. As the week progresses, I hope to check in with all of you. I especially recommend that you check out the live streaming events throughout the week here. If you can't be here in person, these broadcasts are the next best thing.

The Unfulfilled Dream

2011-06-06T14:21:00.001-04:00

My dear friend and mentor, David Bumbaugh, has written this article, his latest work exploring the dilemma of the lack of a clear Unitarian Universalist message -- what defines us as religious people. As an agitator and self-proclaimed windmill tilter myself (dare I say, a "pre-curmudgeon"), I identify with much of David's frustration. I, too, find enormously frustrating our lack of a clear answer to the simple question, "What is a Unitarian Universalist?"

David is correct when he points out that we too often let our fear of offending anybody steer us toward language loaded with ambiguity than fails to clarify or inspire. But, as David points out, I suspect that his deep roots and prodigious contributions to our movement perhaps influence his perspective and weigh his hopes down with excessive expectations.

As a relatively new Unitarian Universalist (I've only been a UU for 25 years), I have no personal pre-merger history that influences my foundational thinking. And, while I do fashion myself an historian, I believe this discussion depends far more on how we envision the future than the path we travelled to reach the current state.

I think one key piece missing from our equation will help define us as a religious denomination, both to ourselves and to the world. Like other religious traditions, we interpret great truths; we help people cope with challenge and tragedy; we celebrate joys and life passages; and we educate ourselves and our children about our principles and traditions. Specifically, however, we must declare boldly and proudly exactly what differentiates us from other religions.

For me, three things clearly separate us from most religions.. I believe that collectively they define us as a wholly distinct religious body.

Courage -- Unitarian Universalism celebrates individual and collective acts of courage, specifically acts that challenge the authority of institutional power and dogma. We not only elevate martyrs and people of great accomplishment to pedestals of admiration, but we encourage each and every Unitarian Universalist to do the same. By holding no individual or congregation to creedal tests, we literally demand of everyone a commitment to crafting a unique philosophy of moral conduct.
Reason -- Unitarian Universalism places the power of human thought above any sacred text, holy object, tradition, or vow of obedience. The opinion of no single member of our denomination -- be they minister, administrator, or even the President of the UUA -- matters more than that of any other. And, we promote the notion that Truth can be discerned through the application of reason.
Universal Love -- Unitarian Universalism is not unique among religions promoting love of our neighbors. We aspire, however, not to pick and choose which neighbor receive that love unconditionally. This phrase also has the double meaning of portraying our love for our universe, a belief that all of existence is sacred and deserving of our caring devotion.

So, my "elevator speech" in response to the question "What is Unitarian Universalism?" is this.

Unitarian Universalism is a religion promoting the use of human courage and reason in the pursuit of universal love.

For me, that's it. No long preambles. No "whereas" or "be it resolved." All of the rest can wait. All of our principles and sources are covered.

On Memorial Day

2011-05-30T10:41:00.000-04:00

When I was 12 years old, my brother Jon went to Vietnam. The experience was formative for me in many ways. Other men in my family had served in the military. But, this was the first time that someone so close to me, someone I loved so deeply, was facing such danger on a daily basis during my lifetime.

Of course, I could have no sense of the suffering Jon experienced, or of the impact that time would have on his life after returning home. I did know the daily anxiety, exacerbated by nightly news broadcasts of the carnage in Southeast Asia. I felt the pang of separation with every letter I wrote. And I felt elation the night he walked in the door, safe at home once more.

Jon brought me a copper bracelet given to him by the Montagnard natives where he was stationed. He told me that it was a friendship bracelet, that once given should not be removed. I wore that bracelet for many years, partly because it was the one tangible way I could share my brother's experience of war. That bracelet helped me imagine that there were real people over there that he had helped.

On Memorial Day, I join others honoring the enormous sacrifices of our veterans. I especially hold my brother Jon in my mind, because I know that he paid - and continues to pay - a great price for his service to his country. I owe him and those thousands of other vets a debt of gratitude for their sacrifice.

I also honor the sacrifices of the families and friends of veterans - the parents, brothers and sisters, spouses, children, and others - who waited, sent packages, prayed, and kept the dream of home alive. And, while I hope for the day when we never need to take up arms again, let us always keep strong our will to support those who sacrifice for the good of others and never forget their dedication to preserving our freedoms.

One More Death for Peace

2011-05-02T08:19:00.000-04:00

Relieved, disgusted, hopeful, anxious, confused. I felt these and a host of other emotions Sunday night as I heard the news of the death of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. I felt relieved that this inglorious episode in my nation’s history might finally draw to a close. I felt disgusted at the hordes of people publicly rejoicing at the death of another person, no matter how deserving that person may have been of stern justice. I felt hopeful that, rid of its greatest advocate for chaos and violence, the world might begin to heal from the wounds of recent decades. I felt anxious that the remnants of bin Laden’s machinery might react in unexpected new acts of mayhem against innocent men, women and children. And I felt confused, not knowing exactly how I should be feeling at this moment.

Evidence would indicate that Osama bin Laden willingly established himself as an enemy of order, reason, freedom and democracy. He advocated violence over diplomacy and chose to murder noncombatants indiscriminately in his war against the United States and its allies. Of course, as history repeatedly teaches, the philosophies that generate such fanaticism rarely develop in a vacuum. In ways small and large, we are all complicit in the global systems that create movements such as al-Qaida.

I read one newspaper account that labeled current efforts to oppose these transnational military organizations as asymmetrical warfare. The pace of change in the ways humanity chooses to murder itself change faster than societies can ever hope to keep pace with them. So, as we celebrate another death occurring in the name of peace, I pray that we look forward to a future without war by any adjective. How can we hope for such a future?

As individuals, identify and own the ways in which we contribute to the oppression and objectification of others, and commit wholly to the loving unconditionally.
As communities, set aside false "us-them" dichotomies and recognize that achieving our human potential requires patience, acceptance, cooperation and understanding.
As countries, make human welfare and happiness our highest priority over the acquisition of wealth and the use of power to impose our social, economic and political will over others.
As humanity, respect the worth and dignity of all people, including their right to determine their own way of life, as well as our responsibility to answer others’ calls for humanitarian assistance and to sustain their basic human rights.
As a world, explore ways to survive and thrive on this planet sustainably.
As one mote of star stuff in a vast universe, open ourselves to experiencing the wonder and mystery of all existence, seeking out cosmic truths that rise above the boundaries of planet, species, nation, tribe, and body.

A Pre-Mothers Day Observation

2011-04-23T14:41:00.001-04:00

I consider myself a fairly organized person. But, I never quite know where my muse will take me when I write a sermon. Nearly finished with my Mothers Day message, I decided to take a break and walk down by the railroad tracks. The trees finally budded out of their winter slumber. And birds chatted their differing songs the further I got from the road. I watched the water in the river and soaked in the sun.

Just as you often see alongside highways, one commonly finds animals along the tracks hit by trains in the night. I came across a muskrat, another victim of a passing locomotive. The body was recently dead and I noticed a small, unborn baby muskrat in the tangled remains. I shook my head at the grim discovery and thought, “Oddly appropriate that I find this poor animal as I write my Mothers Day sermon.” I reflected on this fresh reminder of the emotionless process of evolution in nature weeding out the weak so that the strongest and smartest live on.

I suddenly heard the crunching of gravel and looked up to see an older man walking along the tracks behind me. We exchanged greetings and I told him I had never run into anyone else on the rails before. He asked, “wasn’t it terrible about that young girl?” After a second, I realized that he was talking about a 15-year old who had been struck and killed by a train last December. He went on to explain that we were standing where the accident had happened and, from the details he provided, I imagined that he could have actually discovered the body.

We talked a little more, and then he moved on. I stood staring at the spot for some time, and a deep sadness came over me. Sadness for Erika Stefan’s family and friends. Sadness for the conductor faced with the impossible task of stopping a train or alerting the girl wearing earphones and unable to hear his warnings. Sadness for the mother and grandmother, wife or partner, the woman that Erika Stefan would never become.

I finally crossed the tracks. Unable to reach blossoms on trees up the steep incline, I broke off a small budding twig. Dropping it on the tracks, I said, “Little one, wherever you are, I hope the universe treats you more kindly.” And I began the walk home.

As I walked, I thought about what I could say as a minister to a parent who loses a child, especially under such tragic circumstances. As the conversation went through my mind, a monarch butterfly flitted towards me. And as it passed, a voice inside said, “It’s alright…everything is going to be OK.” I turned as the butterfly winged passed, and found myself asking, “Is that you, little one?” The monarch just continued on past in the direction from which I had come.

I realized at that moment that Erika Stefan will never be the mother of her own children. But, for one passing moment, this young girl mothered me. She comforted me in my sadness, and reminded me that death really just represents a transition of one state to another. The universe comprises an inconceivable amount of star stuff and we are all made up of that same material that existed four billion years ago at its very beginning. Little 15-year-old Erika reminded me of the interdependent web of all existence of which I am a very tiny part.

There are times when I wish I could just take a walk and have it be just a walk. But, I guess the universe just has too many stories it wants to tell me.

Cosmic Tumblers

2011-04-21T13:43:00.000-04:00

Five years ago, I began this journey to Unitarian Universalist ministry. This part of the trek neared its conclusion a couple of weeks ago as the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland invited me to candidate for their settled ministry position. I am thrilled and share their excitement at the potential for finding a good fit after years of hard work and dedication. I can hardly wait to drive up in a few weeks and meet the folks I hope to spend many happy years with.

Of course, the cosmos needed balance and a few days later the plumber came to fix the blocked sewer line at the house. When the plumber tells you that he has never seen a situation before, you know it is bad news. Apparently my property had a septic tank that no one ever knew about (including the boro), which county codes demand must be removed. So, my ant of financial flexibility to get me through until I start my new position just got stomped by a total bill of $16,500.

As the events unfolded, the scenario morphed from the merely tragic to the existentially comic. It is amazing how we can agonize over a $1.00 coupon at the grocery store, but then once the damages hit five figures, the amounts simply become a blur.

Driving back to Smithton after getting the news, my mood sank. Suddenly, the traffic ahead of me on the highway ground to a halt. A few minutes later, the three lanes of traffic inched around an accident that must have happened literally a minute before I got to it. Pieces of a car lay splayed across the road and emergency vehicles were just starting to arrive. I immediately called my son back at the house and left a message that we would figure out a way to get through this, and that things could always be far worse.

As I wrote this posting, I got a call from my daughter Ashley, who had just returned from her sonogram appointment. My first grandchild, due in early September, is a girl and looks very healthy. There is also no sign of cleft palate/lip, which was a worry since Ashley's mother was born with it.

So, all in all, I would say that the cosmic tumblers are still falling in my favor. I may not be buying many books or records in the near future, but I have my health, two great and happy adult children, and the hope of a fantastic ministry for years to come -- and that's enough for me.

The Heart's Voice - Prayer for Theists and Atheists

2011-04-04T14:23:00.000-04:00

My dad read voraciously. Before I learned to read, he read books to me – books way beyond what should have been my comprehension level. My mom signed me up for the Dr. Seuss reading club and I anxiously awaited those periodic packages containing classic picture books like Go, Dog, Go and One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. By the standards of the day, I was a quite well-read individual.

My parents enrolled me in kindergarten in a local church basement. My sole memory of the experience was a less-than-inspired finger painting of a truck. Apparently after a few months, the teacher asked for a conference with my mother. She suggested that my mother withdraw me because I had grown quickly bored of the program being offered. So, I spent the remainder of that school year reading Sam and the Firefly and other gripping illustrated novels.

You can imagine my disappointment, then, upon entering First Grade and being introduced to basal readers and the middle class whitebread world of Dick and Jane. Every day we read the exciting exploits of this little boy and girl, Mother, Father, Spot the dog, Puff the cat, and Tim the teddy bear. The books relied on the whole word reading method (in contrast to phonics) and repetition, using phrases like, "Oh, see. Oh, see Jane. Funny, funny Jane." The turgid plots and cardboard characterizations scarcely inspired awe.

Little did I know that these primary grades readers were a centuries old tradition in education. Primers date back to the earliest days of the republic. Book aficionados may be familiar with McGuffey readers, which sold 120 million copies between 1836 and 1960 – easily the biggest selling textbook of its kind. But, primers go further back to the late 1600’s, and have clearly influenced dozens of generations of school children in countless ways.

One such influence impacted my home life. When I was very young, my parents taught me to pray. I vaguely remember grace before the occasional meal (although that practice died away at an early age). But, every night for many years I knelt at the side of my bed and said:

Now I lay me down to sleep

I pray the Lord my soul to keep

If I should die before I wake

I pray the Lord my soul to take.

Who would write such a prayer? I mean, seriously, looking back on it now, this seems like some twisted stuff. No wonder I had nightmares sometimes as a child – the last thing I considered before drifting off to sleep was my own death.

The prayer first appeared in the New England Primer in the 1700’s, clearly showing our Calvinist roots. A child, even a baptized child, couldn’t be expected to know whether he or she belonged to the chosen or not. So, prudence would warrant a request for divine intersession if needed. The New England Primer was the first and most widely used textbook in the American colonies.

The day finally dawned when I realized for myself how messed up this petition really was and I stopped praying. To this day I struggle to pray, perhaps subliminally recalling my own infant mortality.

Sadly, my education could have been different, for there are actually many different versions of this prayer.

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep,

If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

If I should live for other days, I pray the Lord to guide my ways.

This version, while still somewhat morbid, at least ends on the hopeful note that God direct one’s potential future, however long that may last.

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep;

Guard me Jesus through the night,

And wake me with the morning light.

In this version, the threat of nocturnal casualty remains. But, now our prayer pre-empts the menace with Jesus, the ultimate ward against boogeymen.

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep;

When in the morning light I wake

Teach me the path of love to take.

Now we’re getting closer. Gone is the threat of imminent demise and remaining is the promise of divine guidance at the dawn.

But, it wasn’t just the semantics and gloomy theology I found troubling. I found that the expectation that I pray every night before going to sleep removed all of the motivation. I felt that prayer should somehow involve my own determination regarding not only content, but choice on the time and place of my petitions for holy intervention. We prayed at church every Sunday morning, and the adults prayed at Wednesday night congregational meetings in our homes. But, no one taught me to pray at other times.

Of course, kids figure out other good times to pray: before a test in school; on the eve of the expected run-in with the playground bully; certainly preceding the gift-giving Bacchanalia of Christmas; and whenever an older sibling deserved a fresh meting out of justice. My prayers were all intercessionary in nature, asking God to give me something, prevent something, or to somehow step in and change the course of events. Prayer seemed less religious and more negotiation.

That’s exactly what my childhood prayers were – negotiations with God. Please give me this and I’ll do that. Of course, I did some of the obligatory “I love you, God” prayers. And at least on turkey day, I thanked God for my mother’s stuffing and a carb-loaded, sleep inducing meal. But, I never talked with God…I only talked at God.

In part, my one-sided conversation probably made my gradual shift away from a belief in God easier. If the other end of the phone offers only silence, I can easily believe that you simply put the receiver down in favor of other diversions. Only a small step remains to imagine that no one ever picked up the call at all.

So, how can I find prayer meaningful in my life now? I might explain that my view of the cosmos can, in a way, encompass others’ vision of “god.” Nature, the universe, mystery…if calling those “god” makes someone happy, great. But, I cannot see myself praying to Nature, or to the universe, and certainly not to the mystery of existence.

Then it occurred to me. Maybe I’m just using the wrong preposition. Could it be that prayer isn’t about praying to anything? Perhaps prayer is about talking with something or someone. When I minister to you, the action goes in a single direction. But, when I minister with you, then we are in conversation, whether that conversation includes spoken words, exchanged glances, the touch of hands, or simply a shared silence.

For several decades, Dr. Larry Dossey has studied the impact of prayer on the recovery of patients with severe illnesses. His research follows meticulous standards and is regarded by many as convincing evidence that people who are th object of prayer have a statistically better chance of surviving disease than those who do not.

I find scientific research into the effects of prayer on healing fascinating. If I believe in prayer with, then the potential for the collected prayers of a group of people to help someone with an illness exists. As such, prayers could actually infuse some form of energy, a spiritual sustenance, into one’s life force.

Imagine a time in your life when you faced enormous adversity, perhaps a decision with the power to alter your life. You might have gone for a walk to “clear your head” and consider your options without life’s distractions interfering. One might call this prayer about. Prayer about represents spiritual contemplation about actions and consequences with the goal of making a “right” choice – not necessarily the statistically correct choice, but the one most consistent with your morals, your philosophy, your inner essence.

Can you remember a time when someone close to you experienced a great trauma, or the potential for pain from loss or despair? Nothing you could “do” would help, but you still wanted to “be” with that person in their time of emotional need. Perhaps you thought about them, sent them messages of encouragement, or helped them in other ways so they could focus their energies on the big problem. To pray beside someone is to target a specific person, opening a spiritual conduit between you to allow your positive energies to flow into them, and for their negative influences to escape their mind or soul. We pray beside those we want to help for whom we can offer little tangible assistance.

Do you ever do something outside your normal or expected routine – something that would surprise others about you, but that you feel compelled to do? For me, as well as for many of my ministerial colleague, a call to ministry provides one example of such otherwise often inexplicable behavior and massive shifts in life directions. You might agonize over your motivation, or your inability to control irresistible impulses.

You may search within yourself for guidance, for understanding, for reconciliation. I think we pray despite ourselves when we contemplate the unexpected, when we search for spiritual knowledge to explain our actions. We pray despite the burden of expectations when we search for empathy, to comprehend how the pieces of our lives come together to form a greater picture.

Sometimes, we don’t want to pray to anything or with anybody. Imagine yourself at the symphony. You close your eyes and allow yourself to leave your body and just become with the music. Normal space and time go away and you dissolve into a disembodied spirit exploring a transcendent place and moment. Your mind’s boundaries drop away, leaving you open to that wonderful flush of epiphany. When we open ourselves that fully, unafraid of consequences or limitations, we pray during. Perhaps we pray during while walking wooded paths listening to the chirping cicadas, resting quietly on a beach watching the circling gulls, or driving long and empty highways.

What about those times when life becomes unbearable? Ups and downs call on our reservoirs of resilience throughout our lives, often when most consumed with the pain of grief, betrayal, hurt, and anger. At times of inner strife, perhaps we pray from. We may ask for deliverance, but know that nothing will extract us from our difficulties but our own strength and resolve. So we pray from our pain in order to relieve its burden, and perhaps to weaken its grip on our souls.

And then we all face times of uncertainty, when the future holds a vast unknown of potential for good and bad. We examine choices and weigh our options. But, we face paralysis by analysis, locked like deer on the headlight of the oncoming future – a future that can be anything from the dawn of a new day to the lamp of a speeding train. At these times, we pray upon our futures, clearing our thought of data and argument, of rational weights and logic. Prayer upon lies in the sphere of intuition, that marvelous and unique gift of our humanity. When we pray upon, we trust our natures to point the way, to signal the path.

When we speak to each other, we don’t just listen to our words. We look for that slight smile or twitch of frown; we sense emotions underlying the conversation; and we listen for variances in tone and pitch. Our mouths speak with many voices. So, why should our hearts not also speak with many voices? “Prayer” is one of those words that some Unitarian Universalists find difficult; loaded words with trunks of baggage from discarded theologies and outmoded social constructs. But, we can resurrect prayer if we allow the chorus of our heart voices to sing. Maybe you already pray with. Perhaps you regularly pray about and beside, despite and during, from and upon, but simply lacked the acceptable label. Consider prayer as spiritual practice and listen to your heart singing.

A Saturday Saunter - Part Two

2011-03-17T19:41:00.000-04:00

Even the best spiritual practice ill prepares one for the stomach kick of major disappointment. So, after a brief stop at my usual perch overlooking the river, off I went today – this time on the southbound railroad track out of Smithton.

Another unseasonably warm March day for Western Pennsylvania left me carrying my jacket once again. I will get a sunburned bald spot if I keep this up. But, I will take sunny and 65 over snow any day.

Just past the Second Street crossing, the tracks were covered with splinters and twigs, the fragmentary remains of a wayward tree that must have fallen in harm’s way. Ahead I saw what looked like the remains of another muskrat. Approaching nearer, however, I realized that the body was far too big and I worried briefly that a local dog may have wandered into the path of a train. Upon reaching the carcass, I saw a tell tale hoof in the wreckage. A dozen feet away on the other side of the rails lay the young deer’s decapitated head, confirming my identification.

I couldn’t help but think of the unimaginable power of a 100+ car train plowing into an obstacle. Companies probably don’t bother clearing the tracks of much because these mammoth engines likely pulverize anything standing in their way. When I stand near passing trains, especially from a vantage point below the tracks, the metal bulk hurtling past makes me feel insignificant in comparison.

Moving on, I heard before I saw a stream rushing down an embankment, forming a quite beautiful little waterfall over the stones. In the middle had popped up a bunch of yellow wildflowers. I couldn’t get close enough to identify them (poppies or yellowfields?), but they added a wonderful shock of color to the still early spring scene.

With the rushing brook in front of me and the river behind, the force of all that water moving, changing course, eroding, covering and uncovering earth impressed upon me the power of this change agent. This is an area capable of flooding, although it has been several decades since the water level rose to seriously threatening conditions. But, nature never lets us forget for long the devastation possible from water given the circumstances.

I again felt small and somewhat weak against such elemental power. I felt…vulnerable, an unpleasant sensation – one that only makes me want to walk along railroad tracks even more. So I did.

Up ahead on the hillside sits a long row of coke ovens, unused for more than a century. Many of the brick domes lie crumbling, with gaps in their ceilings and walls. But others remain remarkably intact, given that nothing has disturbed their rest except weather and plant for years. Looking at these holes in the hillside heartened me. Here were human creations, many decades old and discarded, still intact in spite of exposure and being ignored. The sudden impact of a train and the gradual fluid force of water’s movement dwarfed my own power. But, here in the hillside exhibited humankind’s power – endurance and persistence. Structures built to adapt earthen products into metals for construction, transportation, equipment still survived, a sign of our industrial heritage.

I thought back over the events of recent days. I remembered how results of my work left me fragile despite all my preparations and all my cautions. Then, I remembered (as I often do) one of my favorite movie scenes. In The Outlaw Josie Wales, Chief Dan George provided a marvelous performance as Lone Watie. He tells Clint Eastwood of visiting Washington D.C., where he and other tribal leaders were shown in the newspaper with a caption explaining how they would “endeavor to persevere.” He adds, “We thought about it for a long time, ‘Endeavor to persevere.’ And when we had thought about it long enough, we declared war on the Union.”

Well, I’ve had a couple days to think about it. And I plan to endeavor to persevere, as well.

Inspiration

2011-03-16T13:32:00.000-04:00

Safe to say, I've had a miserable week. Fortunately, I got some inspiration in the mail today from my friend Annie, who makes the most amazing dolls ever. I commissioned this piece months ago and she arrived at just the right time.

Katarzyna Zalasowska was born in Poland around 1460 and raised Roman Catholic. She married Melchior Weigel, a merchant and councilman of Kraków, who died and left Katarzyna a widow.

At the age of 70, Katarzyna (her name often appears Westernized as Katherine Vogel) appeared several times before an episcopal court in Kraków for professing nontrinitarianism, likely influenced by the book De operibus Dei. Published by Martin Borrhaus in 1527, De operibus Dei (which roughly translates as “Concerning God‟s Works”) was the first document to openly question the doctrine of the Trinity in print anywhere in Europe, and predated Servetus's On the Errors of the Trinity by four years.

Katarzyna was imprisoned for 10 years for confessing heresy. She tried to promote her view of the unity of God and opposition to the notion of the Holy Trinity in the biannual debates of the Polish Parliament in 1538-39. Shortly thereafter, the Bishop of Kraków charged her with apostasy (the crime of renouncing one‟s religion and criticizing its assertions) before the Queen, and Katarzyna was sentenced to be burned alive.

A white-haired woman of 80, Katarzyna was led to the center of the Little Market place of Kraków. According to written testimonies, even on the stake she refused to renounce her beliefs, which she confessed loudly until the end. Her last words paraphrased Socrates: “Neither in this life or the next can anything evil befall the soul of one who stands loyal to the truth as one is given to know it.”

When I have a setback, and feel like I've just come in fourth at the Olympics yet again, I imagine walking to the stake. I wonder if I would face that fate with even a fraction of the bravery of Katarzyna Weigel. I hope so.

A Saturday Saunter

2011-03-12T17:58:00.000-05:00

My future weighs heavy on my mind. I am happy. But, finances, housing, job, relationships…nearly everything lies balancing on a tenuous slope with the spring thaw in sight. I could not stalk my apartment for another day awaiting phone calls and emails, and so I set out on a saunter.

In his essay "Walking," Thoreau describes sauntering, "which word is beautifully derived from...à la Sainte Terre — to the holy land...having no particular home, but equally at home everywhere. For this is the secret of successful sauntering...For every walk is a sort of crusade, preached by some Peter the Hermit in us, to go forth and reconquer this holy land from the hands of the Infidels."

I needed to hear the voice of the grace of the world in my mind. Mindful wandering is my spiritual practice and I turned to it now so that I could listen without distraction.

I loaded fresh batteries in my seldom-used camera and set off to the railroad tracks that run along the Youghiogheny River by Smithton. I don’t know why the railroad tracks are my favorite place to saunter, but I did not hesitate. To the left lay my church and relatively familiar territory. To the right, a few houses and then the unknown as the tracks followed the bend of the river.

I had not gone far in this direction before. Since my heart problems two years ago, I have found myself cautious about placing myself far away from help and cell phone signals. But, today, I knew that I needed to cast all cautions aside.

I always wear sneakers on these walks. Every time I return, I tell myself that I should wear boots, to better cope with the tricky footing. But, somehow I like the feel of the ballast rocks through my shoes and the almost-skating motion of walking on the trackbed gravel. The sun warmed me quickly for early March, and I removed my jacket after a short time. I passed the last house and ventured forward, the steep hillside on my right and the swollen river on my left.

Soon, I approached the signal towers on either side of the tracks. This was as far as I had ever gone in previous walks. The sound of traffic crossing the Smithton Bridge had receded, and I hesitated for just a moment before proceeding.

After only a few minutes, an ominous omen (are all omens ominous?). I saw the body of a dead muskrat lying between the tracks, clearly run over in just the past day or two. Not an unusual sight – I saw half a dozen or so last year starting in early spring. The message, however, seemed clear. Death lay ahead. I kept walking.

Another few minutes and another animal remnant. This time, only the hoof and bottom half of a deer’s leg lie between the northbound and southbound rails. That’s it – no other bones or any other reminder of the substantial body that once was. Death lay ahead…and dismemberment. A superstitious person might need no other signs.

The tracks had rounded another bend. Ahead lay some pieces of wood strewn around the tracks. Approaching closer, I recognized what remained of a century-old telephone pole – just a little of the cross piece and one glass insulator. I was now cut off from all communication with my past, figuratively and literally.

Another bend and I saw three houses nearing on the river side of the tracks. The smell of burning wood drifted toward me and I saw a man clearing away some dead branches and brush in a smoldering barrel. He raised his hand in greeting and I returned the gesture. I had emerged through the warnings. Was I now being welcomed into some precognitive peek?

I caught a glimpse of what looked like bleachers coming up on my right and I wondered for a minute what spectator event could possible take place here. Then I remembered. The Smithton Hole racetrack – a very distant and poor cousin of Nascar and home to demolition derbies, truck pulls, and quad rallies. The road that served as access to the houses I had passed crossed the tracks here. A patch of color caught my eye. In a ditch I saw a swath of green plants in a heavy-flowing runoff ditch – the first green I have seen this year. Was something telling me that it was time to leave the railroad tracks?

On cue, I heard the whistle of an approaching train. I walked over to the crossing sign to watch the behemoth rumble by. Since I was a child, I delighted in counting the cars in long trains. Only as an adult did I learn that this was one of the many relatively harmless obsessive-compulsive symptoms that seems to run in my family. Nonetheless, I now find myself resisting the urge to keep track of the passing containers. Instead, I feel the quiver of the ground and watch the vibrations of rail succumbing to the mass.

After the train went by, I turned and walked up the road. I soon came to a junction. I knew the road to the right led to Fitz Henry and a dead end. The road to the left led up a steep hill. I turned toward the open road.

Only a few buildings remain of what was once the town of Port Royal. In the late 1700’s, this area provided valuable access to the river and grain mills and iron furnaces. George Washington once owned land just to the south near Jacob’s Creek. What remains hardly qualifies as a town, however, and I soon approached a substantial climb out of the river valley.

By the time I reached the top of the tiny mountain, my joints ached. A constant wind now blew against my face, invigorating me again. No thought remained of needing my jacket again, as the sky supporting only one tiny wisp of cloud in the distance.

I knew that the old Port Royal School House sat ahead on this road. I had researched this structure last year for the 150th anniversary of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton. Here, in 1860, the 11 charter members of the Universalist Church of Port Royal agreed on a covenant, creating the community that survives to this day. I could not help but wonder if school children from Port Royal actually walked to this school house. The thought put those clichéd parental stories of childhood struggle and hardship in a whole new perspective.

Also coming into perspective, still miles from home on this gorgeous day, was a calm. My mind calmed. For the first time in perhaps weeks, I wasn’t worrying about things over which I had no control. I wasn’t trying to control things I couldn’t control. Ironically, I’ve become addicted to an online game called Rebuild. The game recreates survivors of the apocalypse trying to rebuild a city still infested with zombies, disease, and shortages of food and housing. It now occurred to me that I had spent the last five years rebuilding – my job, my home, my marriage, my mind, and my soul – so that I could set forth on this future as a minister. In recent months, I kept thinking about all this effort and all that I have done and accomplished to poise myself at this gateway. Now, I thought, maybe the time has come to stop focusing on the rebuilding and start living in the new life I had built.

Because, in the end, we can only build the best life we can and then we have to live in it. We can renovate occasionally, but we can’t control everything – in fact we can control precious little. So, my joints ached, but I walked a little freer, with just a slight spring to my step.

I walked by the old school house building and thought about those 11 people back in 1860. The formed a church that still meets today. But, little did they know that the nation would soon enter into an ugly Civil War. They could not foresee the rocky future of the little congregation, constantly struggling against all odds to stay afloat. I imagined the unbridled joy of those men and women starting something special, something that has endured.

I kept on, reaching the truck stop at the intersection Interstate I-70. Ironically, the store lay in disarray due to major renovations (OK, I get it!). I bought a Naked smoothie and a diet Mountain Dew. I drank the smoothie too fast, but my poor out-of-shape body needed the 22 strawberries and 1.5 bananas. I cracked open the pop and headed home. The remaining mile down Dutch Hollow was all downhill – a stretch I have driven at least 100 times.

Whatever happens in the next few days, the world will continue. I may be a little richer or poorer, a little more or less secure. But, I will endure and I will do whatever I need to do and go wherever I need to go to continue my ministry.

Wonderful Resource for Victims of Abuse

2011-03-10T11:13:00.000-05:00

Regular readers of the muse kennel and pizzatorium know that I love zombies. I watch zombie movies, read zombie books, and have on occasion dressed up like a zombie and shambled with hundreds of other similarly afflicted fans of this genre.

I can speak at great length about the relevance of “zombie theology.” In fact, I recently spoke at a horror convention, delivering a session titled “Sermon of the Living Dead.” Afterwards, I bought more some movies, picked up a couple more books, and examined zombie artists and news of upcoming zombie media events.

But, the highlight of my day was the opportunity to meet Lori Cardille. Lori is the daughter of Bill Cardille, known to many Pittsburghers as Chilly Billy Cardilly, host of Chiller Theatre for many years and one of the first horror movie hosts in the country. Lori starred in the lead role of George A. Romero’s third installment of his Living Dead series, Day of the Dead (the 1985 original and not the awful 2008 remake). I remain a huge fan of this film and particularly of Lori’s portrayal of Sarah, a scientist engaged in the hopeless search for a cure to the plague destroying humankind.

After waiting in line for 20 minutes or so, I introduced myself to this lovely and charming woman. We chatted and she signed my DVD of the movie (she donated the proceeds from her appearance to Pittsburgh Action Against Rape). And, I learned something fascinating about her. She had written a short biographical account of her life, called I’m Gonna Tell. Always on the lookout for pastoral care resources, I bought a copy and read it that night.

Lori's account is frank, visceral, and incredibly informative. For me, her story provided me with incredibly valuable insight into an experience I can only begin to comprehend. She explores her journey and pain, relationships with relatives and friends, and her eventual confrontation with her abuser. I would imagine that for a victim of abuse, her book would be healing and wonderfully supportive.

Irreverent Humor

2011-02-08T11:10:00.000-05:00

I love comedy. I especially love "irreverent" comedy. I howled when Richard Pryor made fun of White people, when George Carlin speared countless taboos in our society, and when Andrew Dice Clay personified the misogynistic narcissist. Objectionable? Absolutely. But, in my opinion, hilarious.

I grew up reading National Lampoon, and distinctly remember their humorous takes on the tragic circumstances in Biafra. They pushed every boundary of humor, a mantle that continues to be pressed by South Park, The Simpsons, and other animation shows.

Satire provides a verbal version of risk that couch potatos like me prefer to downhill skiing on black diamonds, hang gliding from cliffs, and bungee jumping off bridges. Of course, satire is a katana-sharp blade, cutting both ways. Slapstick is OK, and insult comics have their place (Vegas and the Poconos), but for my money satire represents the pinnacle of the art form and should only be attempted by the seasoned professional.

As if watching my beloved Steelers bungle through the Super Bowl last Sunday weren't painful enough, America was exposed to a botched National Anthem, a talentless halftime show, and generally uninspiring commercials. In the latter category, we also witnessed quite probably the most offensive ad campaign ever launched on television.

Groupon's parody of public service announcements were, in my opinion, so offensive and insensitive as to make me visibly wince with anguish. One example, which tried to parlay the decades-long misery of a people into a cutesy ploy for your disposable dining dollars, left me in shock. And despite a subsequent torrent of online criticism and derision, the company CEO remains unconvinced of his colossal heartlessness in approving these multi-million dollar spots.

Groupon cashed in on the pillaging and destruction of the rainforests, whales, and Tibet in making their play for your business. What's next? Mocking the Holocaust to promote the local deli? Citing the hilarity of Christina Taylor Green's murder to hawk discounts at the local gun shop? How about recalling the joy of 9-11 to sell us low-cost flying lessons?

Lest I be labelled politically correct, let me clarify the important distinction to be made between these various forms of comedic "art." When I bought National Lampoon, I knew exactly what my money secured. When I watch Joan Rivers, Kathy Griffin, and Comedy Central roasts, I am making the conscious choice to expose myself to shock humor. I do this because these people are paid specifically to challenge boundaries and afflict my comfortable sensibilities. I do this because when they make Big Macs of our sacred cows, it empowers me to do the same against other injustices that I witness. Their work at the edges of comedy opens the frontier for the likes of Michael Moore and John Stewart to populate our mainstream. And, on occasion - such as the cases of Lenny Bruce and George Carlin - a comedian can actually promote incredibly worthwhile social commentary and criticism.

But, Groupon's ads were an ambush in the name of nothing but pursuing the almightly buck. These commercials mugged us not just with failed satire, but cruel profiteering garnered specifically at the expense of others' suffering. All of which I could forgive if the company either showed some level of compassionate understanding of peoples' negative responses, or if they exhibited a legitimate commitment to helping alleviate the destruction caused by the situations they were exploiting. But, a weak attempt at matching $100,000 of donations pales in comparison to the expense of producing these marketing ploys and purchasing network time to display them.

So, if you use Groupon and are equally offended, cancel your subscription and tell them why. And when local businesses use their services, tell them why you will not be availing yourself of their products as well.

All Handguns Must Go - "Logic and Lawn Darts" (2/6/11 sermon)

2011-02-06T14:33:00.000-05:00

Sometimes when I recall with romantic nostalgia my childhood, I wonder how we made it out of our formative years alive. My friends and I routinely played with toys that no company would consider manufacturing today. We romped on steel playgrounds anchored into crushed stone yards. And, we generally roamed the neighborhood unsupervised for hours at a time without fear of predators, abductors, molesters, or stray bullets.

Enough accidents and tragic occurrences raised the safety consciousness of a generation of Americans, so that now we can hardly avoid warnings of the mayhem possible from even the most innocent products. A few years ago, an online publication called Radar Magazine published a list of the most dangerous toys of all time. Obviously one can hardly expect such a list to be terribly scientific, but apparently the choices were made according to the ability of these toys to kill, maim, or generally be hazardous to the well being of children receiving them as gifts. I credit the authors of the list with spanning the last few generations of ingenious toy craft. I have no doubt that each of you will identify with at least one of these deliverers of destruction.

In tenth place was the Fisher-Price Harley Davidson Power Wheels Motorcycle. The throttle of this motorized vehicle apparently got stuck in full acceleration mode on occasion, sending the rider on an uncontrolled journey toward collision. In ninth place landed several 1979 Battlestar Galactica Missile Launchers, which propelled projectiles small enough to fit into unsuspecting throats.

Now, for the older children among us, we have our eighth place finisher, the Johnny Reb Cannon. While people apparently had no problems with its glorification of the Confederacy upon its release in 1961 (the centennial of the start of the Civil War), the Reb fired small, hard, plastic cannonballs up to 35 feet. Apparently, our toy makers don’t learn their lesson about small projectiles from one generation to another. At number seven, we have Creepy Crawlers. Of course, one could take one’s pick here from Easy-Bake Ovens to my personal favorite from my childhood, the Vacuuform. Nothing says safety like an open hot plate and exposed 100-watt light bulbs.

Another toy for the older generation comes in at number six. The Bat Masterson Derringer Belt Gun combined the cap-firing fun of a gun with a belt buckle. Number five brings us Sky Dancers – a toy of which I was blissfully ignorant before writing this sermon. Sold in the late 1990’s, one apparently stuck their little fairie feet into a launcher, pulled a string, and sent the twirling toys into the air.

We probably all remember those hideous (in my personal opinion) Cabbage Patch Dolls and number four brings us the 1996 Snacktime Kids Doll, which apparently had no shut off switch for its ravenous, munching jaws. At number three, Mini-Hammocks from EZ Sales. Unfortunately, children often found themselves emulating a chrysalis with no chance of emerging as a butterfly.

My personal favorite chimes in at number two. Gilbert, the company that gave us the infamous Erector Set, in 1951 produced the U-238 Atomic Energy Lab. For a mere $49.50, the kit came complete with four actual samples of Uranium-bearing ores, a Geiger counter, and a Spinthariscope (to see “live” radioactive disintegration). Lucky kids also received a comic book (Dagwood Splits the Atom) and a government manual titled, "Prospecting for Uranium."

And now – drum roll please – the number one most dangerous toy of all time. Lawn Darts! Sort of a javelin-version of horseshoes (my set was known as Jarts), one lobbed the metal tipped arrows underhand toward a plastic hoop lying on the grass. The large spear impaled itself in the dirt, hopefully scoring points for the thrower.

Now, lest you think this particular survey unfairly castigates the dignity of these fine products, let’s review the known findings of reputable analysts. According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, Fisher-Price recalled more than 200,000 of the Power Wheels Motorcycles in 2000 after receiving nine reports of the foot pedal on these mechanized deathtraps sticking. One 3-year-old boy suffered cuts and bruises when his out-of-control bike ran into a home. Mattel offered a “Missile Mail-in” to replace the small, red plastic bullets launched from the Battlestar Gallactica toys. Even though the product met or exceeded all existing and proposed safety standards at the time, there were instances of accidental swallowing of missiles, including one reported death of a four-year-old child.

One can imagine similar reports from the Johnny Reb Cannon, and the danger from Creepy Crawler burns were probably only exceeded by the nauseating taste of the toxic chemicals comprising them. One product safety organization reportedly claimed that the Bat Masterson belt gun’s caps “can be ignited by friction and cause serious burns.” I won’t speculate what kind of friction they thought a 10-year old boy would experience on his belt.

Injuries from Galoob’s Sky Dancers reportedly included scratched corneas and temporary blindness, mild concussions, broken ribs and teeth, and facial lacerations that required stitches. Nearly nine million Sky Dancers were eventually recalled by 2000 and the company fined $400,000. After 35 fingers and ponytails fell victim to Snacktime Kids’ appetites, Mattel removed them from shelves forever, and offered 500,000 customers a full $40 refund.

Between 1984 and 1995, twelve children between the ages of five and seventeen years old became entangled and died when using the Mini-Hammocks. A seven-year-old girl suffered permanent brain damage from a near-strangulation. A mother found her five-year-old boy entangled, but was able to resuscitate him. As a result, three million of the devices were recalled.

I won’t even hazard to speculate about the impact of the Atomic Energy Lab.

After deciding that voluntary agreements on stricter labeling and marketing were not having the desired effect, in 1987 the Consumer Product Safety Commission voted to ban lawn darts. The Commission had records of three deaths associated with lawn darts since 1970. Lawn darts were linked with an estimated 700 emergency room visits each year. Commission Chair Ann Brown went so far as to recommend that "Parents should destroy these banned lawn darts immediately." Commissioner Anne Graham added, "What limited recreational value lawn darts may have is far outweighed by the number of serious injuries and unnecessary deaths…There are numerous alternatives to lawn darts, and I would urge adults who have lawn darts to throw them away now."

Created in 1972 (sadly too late for some of our examples), the Consumer Product Safety Commission is a federal agency charged with protecting the public from unreasonable risks of serious injury or death from thousands of types of consumer products under the agency's jurisdiction. The Commission’s work to ensure the safety of consumer products is believed to have contributed to the 30% decline in the rate of deaths and injuries linked to such products.

The Commission has jurisdiction “over more than 15,000 kinds of consumer products used in and around the home, in sports, recreation and schools.” But, the Commission does not claim jurisdiction over all categories of products. For example, food, drugs, cosmetics, and medical devices fall under the purview of the Food and Drug Administration; automobiles, trucks, motorcycles, and tires are the responsibility of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Pesticides are included as part of the sphere of activity of the Environmental Protection Agency, and boats lie under the authority of the Coast Guard.

But, let’s move away from kid’s stuff (literally) and jump to the big three. Alcohol and tobacco are regulated by the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, whose primary function is to “ensure that only qualified persons engage in the alcohol beverage industry... [and] enforcing the laws relating to tobacco products advertising.” And firearms fall under the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. BATF’s mission statement describes it as a law enforcement agency “that protects our communities from violent criminals, criminal organizations, the illegal use and trafficking of firearms, the illegal use and storage of explosives, acts of arson and bombings, acts of terrorism, and the illegal diversion of alcohol and tobacco products.”

You may note a subtle distinction between the roles of these various entities. The Consumer Product Safety Commission regulates the distribution and the design and manufacture of consumer products. The Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau and the BATF, on the other hand, only regulate the distribution of the products within their sphere of operation, as well as the improper use of them by consumers. So, while the government empowers the Consumer Product Safety Commission to prevent companies from producing a dangerous product, the other agencies can only penalize those who abuse the laws regarding the sale, distribution, and use of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms once they have already been manufactured. One agency recaptures the cow after leaving the barn. The other keeps the calf from being born at all.

I am sure that critiquing the operations or the relative success of any of these important government bodies provides ample employment to various watchdog groups and analysts. Given their particular notoriety, one could certainly spend significant time examining the merits (or lack thereof) of certain historic BATF actions. Instead, I offer a suggestion that will simplify the work of every BATF agent by removing any ambiguities from their mission to protect this nation’s communities.

I call for a total ban on privately-owned handguns and for the confiscation and destruction of all such weapons in existence. I call for the elimination of all private ownership of handguns in this country and a ban on the production of handguns for the use of anyone but authorized law enforcement agents forever.

I understand that efforts to control handguns in this country have met with one failure after another. Since the shooting of James Brady in 1981 during John Hinckley’s attempted assassination of President Ronald Reagan, gun control advocates have run into one roadblock after another, largely due to the furious lobbying efforts of the National Rifle Association.

But, I do not call for gun control. I do not advocate for expanded background checks, or increased regulations on vendors. I do not care what the founders wrote 200 years ago or how even the most impartial jurist might interpret their meanings today. The time is long overdue for us as a nation to completely and forever cut our ties with all handguns as being inimical to human life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Now, I suspect even the most peace-loving among you might contemplate certain questions that arise from this call:

What’s wrong with owning a handgun for target shooting?
What’s wrong with carrying a handgun for my personal protection?
How will we get handguns away from criminals?

Legitimate questions – let’s address each one.

Some people own handguns merely for the enjoyment of target shooting. I myself have fired pistols at a shooting range and understand the pleasure of the sport. Let’s recall our list of infamous toys. All 10 combined resulted in fewer than 20 deaths. Obviously, the preventable and unnecessary death of even one child should deeply sadden us. But, lawn dawns caused only three reported deaths over 16 years, and were banned by the federal government.

In contrast, even the most ardent supporter of handgun ownership must agree that many hundreds of thousands of people have died from handgun homicides, accidents, and suicides during my lifetime. If we can ban businesses from even manufacturing a toy with only the potential of personal injury, why can we not ban a product with a long-proven track record of far more death and destruction?

But, criminals still have guns and I need to protect myself. Yes, you do. Let’s examine our actions in response to other similar circumstances. The federal government began establishing standards to phase out the use of lead additives to gasoline when the harmful effects to human health and the environment became apparent. Environmental protection regulations caused the automobile industry to turn itself on its collective ear to alter vehicle design and assembly, and the oil industry was forced to change its gasoline production and distribution processes. And, aside from the reported deaths of original research team members early on of lead poisoning, leaded gas was not likely linked directly to any deaths. From January 1, 1996, the Clean Air Act banned the sale of leaded fuel for use in on-road vehicles. Possession and use of leaded gasoline in a regular on-road vehicle now carries a maximum $10,000 fine.

The point is that we identified an inherent danger. We found a usable alternative – unleaded gas – and we banned the dangerous product. So the obvious question arises. Does an alternative exist to handguns for personal safety purposes? Of course it does. And one alternative – the taser – works just as effectively, is much less prone to accidental misuse, and results in death only in rare cases. Tasers can already be legally carried (concealed or open) without a permit in 43 states.

What about handguns already being used by criminals? As gun ownership advocates fondly say, when we criminalize guns, only criminals will have guns. Baloney. I know that I should be more theological and intellectual about my response to this argument. But, if we banned handgun manufacture and importation, then only time and the enforcement of laws stand between us and a relatively handgun-free America. Handguns are not marijuana – people can’t grow pistols in their backyards.

Will a handgun ban stop violent crime? Of course not. Kids will find ways to injure themselves no matter how many sharp edges and toxic substances you remove from their environment. Likewise, criminals may well use rifles, knives, clubs, hand grenades, or just their fists to commit acts of violence. That argument, however, offers no reason to oppose efforts to attempt to reduce and even eliminate deaths directly associated with private handgun ownership.

What solutions do I offer if we attempt this transition? Given our government’s propensity for throwing money at solutions, I ask for a relatively modest sum to fund the following initiatives:

For one year, offer every recreational owner who turns in a handgun $100 in cash, or an appraised trade-in on a bow and arrow, rifle, shotgun, or other legal firearm of their choice – after that, all handguns will be confiscated and destroyed;
Provide every collector of historic handguns free conversion of their weapon, making it incapable of firing to avoid confiscation;
Offer every registered owner who turns in a protective handgun a free taser;
Provide research and development funding to Colt Manufacturing and the New Jersey Institute of Technology, who are working to perfect “smart guns,” and then convert every handgun used by law enforcement agents to incorporate biometirc recognition; and
Make mandatory sentencing associated with handgun-related crime so onerous, that no sane criminal will consider their use.

What would these initiatives cost? Estimates place the number of handguns in America at 200 to 300 million. We could partially offset the cost of the handgun buy-back program with modest taxes on the huge expected increase in taser sales and permit fees. Given our history of industry bailouts, and our exorbitant military expenditures over the years, the remaining costs far outweigh the direct potential gain in human life and reduction of human misery.

Now, I am no lawyer and have no interest in haggling over budgetary priorities and implications. But, as a clergyman, I must address certain recent decisions in our halls of government. A 5-4 Supreme Court decision in June 2010 on McDonald v. the City of Chicago, cited the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms – and specifically the right to possess a handgun – as "fundamental to the Nation's scheme of ordered liberty" in trumping the ability of local governments to protect their residents by creating common-sense regulations on handguns. Also, in July 2010, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal signed into law a bill authorizing persons who qualify to carry concealed weapons, and having passed necessary training and background checks, to bring them to churches, mosques, synagogues, or other houses of worship.

After Columbine, Virginia Tech, and now the senseless murders recently in Tucson, I say, “enough.” I don’t care if you are a bodyguard, a state policeman, or a secret service agent charged with protecting the President, I welcome you into this house of worship. But, I do not welcome your weapons and I specifically do not welcome your handguns. Arrest me, sue me, fine me. But, I will never knowingly allow anyone to bring a handgun into any congregation I serve. If we take a stand against handguns, then let it start here in our houses of worship. Here, where we dedicate ourselves to loving our neighbors and to bringing about a better life on earth – here is where we say “no” now and forever to handguns.

Our government routinely bans products with only the potential to cause harm. Drugs that may well cure diseases face rejection after years of development and study. Foods that may only cause illness are regularly ordered destroyed. And companies that manufacture toys that perhaps may harm a child face fines, lawsuits, and bans. Saving just one nine-year-old like Christina Taylor Green would make a handgun ban worth any price.

So, where is our equivalent collective outrage against this far-greater ill plaguing our populace? I say it should reside here, here in our churches, mosques, synagogues, and other houses of worship. Here, as children of a higher purpose and universal laws of humanity and love, we should demand the protection from these threats to our well-being and to our lives.

A Pacifist's Love for Hockey

2011-02-03T04:39:00.000-05:00

In a cynical and imperfect world of human chaos, one occasionally glimpses scenes of flickering sanity. I may be a pacifist, but as a lifelong Pittsburgher, I am by definition a sports fan. That, of course, means that I root for the Steelers, Penguins, and even the Pirates (I still remember the glory days). Watching last night's Pens match against the Islanders, I witnessed an event that gives me hope for humankind.

First, I must preface my comments with an editorial on fighting in hockey. I have watched hockey for 40-odd years now. And in all that time, I don't think I have ever seen anyone really get hurt in a hockey fight. Oh, I've seen bloody noses and bruised egos. But, I can't recall ever seeing a combatant actually seriously damaged in a hockey fight. That is because hockey players rarely engage in fights to damage each other. Hockey players fight for far more important reasons -- to change the momentum of a game; to respond to an action perceived to be beyond the acceptable parameters of play; or to remove a particular player from play for a short time for strategic reasons.

So, I argue that fighting in hockey is no more about violence than Greco-Roman wrestling, or log rolling. Hockey fights are physical, but fundamentally about game tactics and player motivation rather than intending to harm another.

In last night's Pens-Islanders game, the Pens were up 2-0 as time ticked down. The Islanders pulled their goalie in order to put an extra attacker on the ice and the Pens scored an empty net goal, sealing the victory. Here is where not only game strategy, but long-term team strategy enters the game. Matt Cooke of the Penguins is a player who specializes in disrupting opponents' strategy. He is a master of checking players into the boards and interrupting play development. Cooke also likes to "get into your head" by building the threat of intimidation. The last time these two teams played, Cooke especially worked his talents on Islanders goalie Frank DiPietro -- he was actually penalized twice for goalie interference. So, while we received the penalty of playing a man short for four minutes, we gained the strategic advantage of putting just that moment of hesitation in the mind of the opponent's goal tender whenever Cooke was around.

Now, fast forward to last night, with the Pens up 3-0, the game essentially over, and 16 seconds left in the game. As Cooke skated by DiPietro pursuing the puck, the goalie swatted at Cooke's head with his blocker, knocking him into the boards. While unprovoked, DiPietro's illegal hit was clearly a retaliation for all of Cooke's previous attention to him. Brent Johnson, the Pens' goalie, did not hesitate for a second before racing the length of the ice, and flattening DiPietro with a left to the chin.

Now comes the interesting part (to me). Johnson is now poised over the prone DiPietro, fist cocked and seemingly ready to do some serious damage. He held that pose for a few seconds, clearly showing that he had the ability to inflict damage. But he chose not to. A Just War advocate might argue that Johnson exhibited a text book response to aggression. His action against the aggressor had just cause, was rightly intended, and was exactly proportionate.

Now, maybe I am rationalizing my love for a Neanderthal sport that has no place in a modern, gentile society. But, I hold that competition has merit in society and that competition, whether it is marbles, poker, or yodeling, is inherently violent to some degree -- violence in the sense that competitors try to exert dominance over opponents and, thereby, show their mastery not just of a particular skill, but of the way the skill is displayed, i.e. the rules of the game.

Does hockey go "over the top" sometimes. Sure. But, I believe that the benefits far outweigh the potential for real harm. Living in Pittsburgh, a city that our economy has long forsaken, I have seen the vital role that sports play in raising the spirits of the community and bringing people of all colors and stripes together in common purpose. And, occasionally, one is even provided the gift of a lesson in humanity while being entertained. Thanks, Brent Johnson.

Oscar's Back in the House

2011-02-02T08:57:00.000-05:00

Yo, cousin Phil! What's up with this crazy weather? All this ice and snow is cramping my style, you know? Jeff doesn't like to drive in bad weather, so I'm stuck here while he works on sermons...booooring!

And don't give me that "I can't control my shadow" stuff. Haven't you heard about the interdependent web and all that? We are one with nature! Empower yourself to take control of the situation and let's have an early spring this year.

Oscar

(editor's note -- sorry, folks. Oscar got hold of my cell phone while I was in the shower)

Channelling H.P. Lovecraft

2011-01-25T10:13:00.000-05:00

As a teen, I loved science fiction and horror, especially H.P. Lovecraft. After reading one of my favorite books of all time - William Hope Hodgson's The House on the Borderland - I took a stab at writing short stories. I imagine they were terrible and I didn't persist long in the effort. But, I retained a hankering that, one day, I would craft an awesome story that was at least tolerably written.

About 10 years ago, I tried again. The family was returning to Nags Head for a restful week of ocean and sand. And, since I have little fondness for sitting on a beach for hours in the baking sun, I told everyone that mine would be a working vacation. I wrote five short stories during the week, at the end of which I still harbored at least a whisper of a dream that I possessed a modicum of talent.

I only shared the stories with one other person, who let me down very kindly, and I have restricted myself to nonfiction and homiletics ever since. Sermon writing suits my skill set far greater and also employs my oratorical abilities. But, that little scribe in the back of my head still wishes that I could find an unimaginative but able crafter of language with whom I could collaborate to create the next great pantheon of outre fiction.

I just watched an absolutely delightful documentary on the life of my literary hero, Lovecraft: Fear of the Unknown, who was famous for ghost writing/editing for many published authors. How I wish he were still alive that I could correspond with him today! I'm not sure H.P. would have ever considered owning, let alone writing on a computer. But, I have a direction I would love to explore that would suit his talents immeasurably, and for that even I would gladly write longhand.

I have in recent years been exploring what I call mystical humanism through the experience of affect in worship services (building on Thandeka's work on Affect Theology). Combined with Jungian notions of synchronicity, I have hypothesized a cosmos of infinitely connected threads constantly bombarding our lives with synaptic stimuli from which we can discern meaning and ultimately wisdom.

So, I have imagined an epic collection of tales about an intrepid minister (gee, ya think this might be just a little autobiographical?) exploring this web of existence, encountering colossal beauty, cyclopean terror, and unfathomable truths across vast and endless planes and universes. Of course, every time the portal opens, it exposes our fragile little world to more of these enormous forces and influences.

All I need now is someone with the output capacity of Stephen King to produce the 49 books (or whatever our kindle-kind call them nowadays) needed to encompass this tome. Then, I need the reincarnation of Rod Serling to produce a revisited Twilight Zone for the video generation. Video games, soundtracks, 3-D movies, virtual reality sensatoriums - I could become the next Gene Roddenberry.

Sigh...what a wondrous vision!

Never Pass Up an Opportunity to Minister

2011-01-01T09:46:00.000-05:00

My new year began with what is probably the most unusual experience I have ever had in ministry, either as a lay person or as a freshly minted fellowshipped minister. It started a few days ago in the pizza place up the block. Justin, the owner and a fun and engaging young man, has done a lot to help me feel at home here in this little town of 400 souls.

"Pastor Jeff," he started, "would you be interested in blessing the first beer of the New Year at the American Legion?" I found myself agreeing immediately and he began making phone calls to confirm the event. Back at home, I wondered about my decision. Does blessing a bar condone alcoholism and all of its related maladies? What would my temperance leading predecessors think? Would my participation sully the general attitude among townsfolk toward ministers and the church?

After a little consideration, I decided to go through with my commitment. One reason is that the American Legion is one of the few things holding this battered and broken town together, and any opportunity to support them helps Smithton survive as a community. In a town where virtually all other businesses long since died, the bars are booming. I certainly couldn't expect many other invitations from them to ply my trade. And, for a congregation struggling to survive with only a handful of active members, I reasoned that if I can't get locals to come to the church, then I would bring the church to them.

So, I wrote a short blessing, and headed over at 11:00 p.m. Justin met me at the door and began shepherding me around the club, introducing me to everyone. Any reservations I might have had about attending quickly vaporized. One man asked me repeatedly to bless his wife in the coming year. One woman had just survived a brain aneurysm and was anxious for a sign from God about how she should devote the remainder of her freshly minted lease on life. A couple had just lost their 19-year-old handicapped son, who had lived bedridden for most of his life. Another woman asked for advice on how to get her husband to let her take her two children to Sunday School. And, of course, being a veteran's organization, a number of people wanted to honor loved ones past and present who had served.

What had begun as a bit of a lark now became quite probably my most intense ministerial experience to date. As the countdown finished and the champagne toast was completed, the chapter president introduced me and handed over the microphone. I began by offering everyone the chance to speak aloud the names of people important to them during the past year, and voices spoke out several dozen names. I honored their memory and asked the bartender to pour a beer. Lifting it, I said:

     May the spirits consumed here in the coming year empower our spirits:
     To fan the flames of friendship and community;
     To relax our worried minds and troubled hearts; and
     To promote only happiness and joy in our lives.

I then blessed all present and wished everyone a Happy New Year. I stayed for another hour or so, talking and taking pictures. The unanimous consensus was that having the blessing was a good idea, with people actually taking some pride at possibly inventing a tradition to be continued in future years.

So, the next time someone tells you that religion is passe, or that we have outgrown the need for churches, don't believe them. The need out there for what we offer is massive. And I certainly hope in the coming year to do everything I can to meet this need head on.

Support for Transgender Folk

2010-12-03T11:23:00.000-05:00

The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review recently published two opinion pieces: "Bending gender in sports" by L. Brent Bozell III (11/28/10) and "Choosing one's TSA groper" by Ralph R. Reiland (11/29/10). Sadly, both articles chose to use ill-informed sarcasm and generally snarky tones to portray transgender folk as some new enemy for people to fear.

I drafted the following letter to the editor and submitted it for publication on behalf of the Westmoreland County LGBTQ Interfaith Network, a group of clergy and lay people who affirm the spirituality of all LBGTQ people and their friends and allies. With a limit of 200 words, the challenge was daunting, but I hope it makes a good first step in promoting education and compassion in the region.

====================
To the editor:

Two recent opinion pieces cruelly vilified transgender people, oversimplifying this complex issue. We encourage fairer and more balanced dialogue.

Our culture limits its understanding of sex to male and female, and gender to man and woman. “Transgender” as an umbrella term describes other gender identities. Specifically, transgender people are born one sex, but self-identify as a different gender. Many simply live their identity as crossdressers, third gender, or genderqueer.

Transsexuals actually make the physical transition from one sex to another. This well-defined procedure involves surgery and years of hormone treatment and psychiatric therapy.

Perhaps one in every 1,500 births results in an intersex child, in which both sexes are present. The Intersex Society of North America recommends assigning a gender without surgery, using medical procedures to sustain good physical health until the child can later decide on a gender identity.

Transgender folk do not make gender identity decisions frivolously. People deserve respect for their identities and labels they choose, particularly when making choices that result in discrimination. As marvelous creations in a wondrous universe, every person has inherent worth and dignity. Compassionate responses include first educating ourselves to facts, not allowing unfounded bias and fear to dictate our judgment.

Jeff Liebmann (Consulting Minister, Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton) writing for the Westmoreland LGBTQ Interfaith Network

Giving Thanks

2010-11-25T11:37:00.000-05:00

I give thanks for every day of life. May we all be granted the awareness to never take that gift for granted.

I give thanks for men and women who have moved me to tears and mountaintops of emotion through their acts of commitment and the fire of their devotion to what is right. May we all be granted such inspiration.

I give thanks for those unique attributes that make us human -- the ability to reason beyond base needs for sustenance and survival; the capacity to act courageously, especially when logic tells us not to; and the power to love with every fiber of our souls. May we all proudly own our humanity.

I give thanks for the wondrous engine of the universe and every accidental collision of molecules that created stars, rivers and mountains, and every form of life from the moss to the sequoia and the whale to bacteria. May we learn to be better stewards of our planet.

I give thanks for the opportunity to forgive those who have wronged me; I especially give thanks for the chance to, despite my best efforts, forgive myself for my mistakes. May each of us be granted the gift of such forgiveness.

I give thanks that every day life provides me the chance to be a better person and to help others to do good. May we never rest until all slaves are set free, all hungry are fed, and all lost find a path.

I am thankful for young people, who through their innocence and fearless curiosity have been my best teachers. May everyone have children like my own who every day show us the reality of eternal life.

So, to dear friends and caring relatives; to Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Michael Servetus, Norbert Capek, and Theodore Parker; to past, present, and future congregants; to Mom and Dad; to Ashley and Tyler...Thank you and Happy Thanksgiving.

Chalica Readings

2010-11-23T19:51:00.000-05:00

Chalica was originally conceived in 2005 as a way to celebrate and put into intentional practice the seven principles of the Unitarian Universalist tradition - one a night - for seven nights.  Chalica begins on the first Monday of December, and is marked by the lighting of a chalice each day. Gifts that reflect the principle for that particular day may be given, or you can choose to focus more on mindfulness and action.

I have prepared daily readings for Chalica this year, which individuals and families can use in their home celebrations. I encourage you to read this draft and offer any suggestions or comments you may have to improve it. I plan to record these readings and post them to the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton web site for all to use this year.

Day One (Monday)
Chalice Lighting
Within us all burns the fire of life.
We share this common flame,
     symbol of our precious being.
Each flame burns with a unique glow,
     signifying the inherent worth and dignity
     of every person.

Reading
Hymn 131, Love Will Guide Us, has the following lyric:
If you cannot sing like angels,
     if you cannot speak before thousands,
     you can give from deep within you.
You can change the world with your love.

Message
Each of you is one of billions of humans inhabiting this planet. Billions – a scary number. But, a billion represents just a tiny fraction of the grains of sand here on earth, or snowflakes that fall every winter. And yet, each grain of sand, each snowflake is different. In every case, perhaps microscopic variations make every grain, every flake unique.

But, sand does not think. The snow crystal has no capacity to reason. The desert feels no emotion. And the blizzard cannot love.

On the other hand, each and every person thinks and has the capacity to reason. Each and every person feels and has within them the seeds of love. So, while sand has usefulness when melted into glass and the snow melts to provide life sustaining water, one would not miss a single grain, a stray flake.

Each and every person, however, has worth. Regardless of our status or our accomplishments, we impact the lives of others. In addition, each and every person possesses dignity – the right to self-determination, the right to pursue noble deeds, and the right to grant and earn respect inherent in the human soul.

On this first day of Chalica, we affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person. Amen.

Discussion
So, today, exchange gifts that honor people in your life. Ask yourself these questions:

Are there people I don’t understand, and what can I do to bridge the divide between us?
Are there people with whom I have disagreements, and can I work to find a common path for us to walk together?
Is there someone I have disrespected to whom I can make amends?
Is there someone who has helped me that deserves my special thanks?
Is there someone in need of assistance that I can help and what can I do to help them?

Day Two (Tuesday)

Chalice Lighting

Fire cannot be grasped,

or held within the hand.

Fire is transparent,

giving light and warmth to all.

May this chalice represent justice,

fairness and compassion.

Reading

Hymn 140, Hail the Glorious Golden City, begins with the following lyric:

Hail the glorious golden city,

pictured by the seers of old:

Everlasting light shines o’er it,

wondrous things of it are told.

Wise and righteous men and women

dwell within its gleaming wall;

Wrong is banished from it borders,

justice reigns supreme o’er all.

Message

A glorious golden city where wrong is banished and justice reigns supreme. If such a place existed, wouldn’t you move there in a second? You might be willing to do whatever it took to relocate to that city, because the benefits would be worth any cost, any sacrifice.

Well, the gleaming walls don’t reflect the sun. There is no off ramp from the highway of life to this place. You won’t find a dot on any map, or a link on Google or Wikipedia.

But, the glorious golden city exists. It exists here in your heart, and here in your mind. Every brick is laid by each act of justice you commit. The mortar mixes each time you demand fairness from friends and family, employers, government, and businesses. And, the everlasting light shines brightest when you love others with that purest unconditional compassion that guarantees that we are all equal in the eyes of whatever forces power our universe.

So, put away your boxes and cancel the moving van. For you already own a plot in the glorious golden city. On this second day of Chalica, we affirm and promote justice, equity, and compassion in human relations. Amen.

Discussion

So, today, exchange gifts that honor those in your local community that are less fortunate. Ask yourself these questions:

Are there local charities to which I can offer time or talents?
Can I donate food, clothes, whatever I can afford to others in need?
Are the people near me to whom a simple kindness would make a world of difference?
How can I learn or participate in ways that promote justice and equity in my community?

Day Three (Wednesday)

Chalice Lighting

This chalice is a lighthouse,

a beacon reaching across the vast spaces.

This flame beckons all travelers,

come, enter, and be welcome.

Join us on our mutual quest.

Reading

Hymn 402, From You I Receive, has only this one simple lyric:

From you I receive,

to you I give,

together we share,

and from this we live.

Message

Our chalice is a lighthouse, a beacon showing people a way to religious being, safe from the rocks and

currents of despair and hopelessness. But, lighthouses often reside in solitary locations, far apart from the bustle of home and business. In our search for individual spiritual growth, we might find so much comfort in a newfound belief, that we isolate ourselves from others. We might feel our beliefs too fragile to subject them to the scrutiny of others.

Perhaps a better metaphor is a steeple, whose bell peels out a welcome to all searchers, wherever they come from and whatever questions they bring with them. For our congregations are about community building and reaching out a warm hand of friendship to the stranger.

Many truths span national boundaries and cultural distinctions. One such truth particularly relevant to our congregations is this. A joy shared is twice a joy, while a burden shared is half a burden. Let us share our joys and our burdens gladly.

On this third day of Chalica, we affirm and promote acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations. Amen.

Discussion

So, today, exchange gifts that honor our fellow Unitarian Universalists and their spiritual journeys. Ask yourself these questions:

Can I take some time to look through a hymnal or book of reflections in order to better appreciate different points of view in our movement?
Are there words of peace or forgiveness I can extend to a fellow Unitarian Universalist?
Is there a unique gift or leadership role I can offer to my congregation?
Are there events I can attend more often to show my support for our religious community?

Day Four (Thursday)

Chalice Lighting

Our chalice is a lamp,

lighting dark corners of ignorance;

illuminating falsehoods.

We hold this sacred lamp,

applying knowledge with care

and abiding purpose.

Reading

Hymn 145, As Tranquil Streams, has the following lyrics:
Prophetic church, the future waits your liberating ministry;
Go forward in the power of love, proclaim the truth that makes us free.
A freedom that reveres the past, but trusts the dawning future more;
And bids the soul, in search of truth, adventure boldly and explore.

Message
The list of famous Unitarian Universalist thinkers runs long and deep in every field of human inquiry. But, thought without reflection breeds vanity and false pride. And ideas without the wisdom of application allow tyrants to run unchecked and the immoral to prey on the innocent.

Unitarian Universalism stands not just for unfettered research and learning; we stand for careful consideration of consequences. The hands that splice genes can unleash monstrous outcomes and the mind capable of splitting atoms can also lay waste to cities.

Education has the power to level all inequalities in life, but only if pursued with good intent and abiding will. Only the search for knowledge and wisdom will yield the fruits of meaning. And that harvest can soothe the greatest hurt and heal the deepest wound.

On this fourth day of Chalica, we affirm and promote the free and responsible search for truth and meaning. Amen.

Discussion
So, today, exchange gifts that honor another tradition, or to honor education. Ask yourself these questions:

Can you take time to read about, or participate in an event that celebrates another religion or tradition?
What do you know or love that you can teach others
What knowledge or talent have you wanted to learn and what is stopping you from doing so?
Can you give the gift of a favorite book to someone?

Day Five (Friday)

Chalice Lighting

This gentle flame is the roaring inferno of transformation,

for only through freedom of belief

may we become what we will

May our chalice melt the shackles of superstition and creed,

lighting our way on the path

of spiritual growth and freedom.

Reading

Hymn 135, How Happy Are They, begins with the following lyric:

How happy are they, born or taught,

who do not serve another’s will;

Whose armor is their honest thought,

and simple truth their highest skill.

Message

One of the ironies of language involves the word “religion.” Derived from the same root word “ligio” that gives us the word “ligament,” religion actually translates to “that which binds us together again and again.” And yet, the professed point of many religions is to liberate us from suffering and evil.

So, how do we find liberation by binding ourselves repeatedly? For some, the bond is dogmatic acceptance of a common creed. For others, it is the relinquishing of certain choices and responsibilities to divine Providence.

But, Unitarian Universalists viewed themselves as working hands of Providence in the world. We seek and achieve liberation through democratic community; by finding and celebrating our common commitments with souls engaged on the same spiritual journey. In our congregations, we give voice to our beliefs, and we amplify those voices through free discourse and a pulpit that inspires without dictating.

On this fifth day of Chalica, we affirm and promote the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large. Amen.

Discussion
So, today, exchange gifts that honor democracy. Ask yourself these questions:

What can you do to be of public service, or help those willing to serve in office?
Can you write a letter to an elected official on a matter of importance?
How can you help a committee in your congregation?
Would you be willing to host a dinner or gathering to discuss an important issue, or perhaps lead a class to study a significant ethical issue?

Day Six (Saturday)

Chalice Lighting

As we light this chalice,

may its flame consume the forces of violence in the world;

may its heat warm the chill of misunderstanding and hate; and

may its light brighten the lives of the sick of heart and mind.

Chalice, burn with the fire of peace and liberty.

Reading

Hymn 159, This Is My Song, has the following lyric:
My country’s skies are bluer than the ocean,
     and sunlight beams on cloverleaf and pine;
But other lands have sunlight, too, and clover,
     and skies are everywhere as blue as mine.
O hear my song, thou God of all the nations,
     a song of peace for their land and for mine.

Message
Nearly every religion preaches peace. And yet, our world still labors under the wraith of war, omnipresent poverty, and persistent harbingers of hate. We will never achieve peace in the world until each and every one of us finds peace within our own hearts; a peace that cannot be attained while the body hungers, limbs are shackled, and free will lies imprisoned.

As Unitarian Universalists, we can appreciate the sentiments of prophets of peace throughout history. We can also aspire to live lives in pursuit of peace for ourselves, our communities, our societies, and our world. As our love is unconditional, so must our struggle for liberty for others be unqualified. Every human being has the inherent right to live free, to love unrestricted, and to seek enlightenment via the path of their choice. We are all only as free as the most fettered among us.

On this sixth day of Chalica, we affirm and promote the goal of world community, with peace, liberty, and justice for all. Amen.

Discussion

So, today, exchange gifts that honor our global community. Ask yourself these questions:

Can I find a way to volunteer with, or donate to an organization that has global influence, such as UNICEF, or Doctors Without Borders?
Can I write a letter for Amnesty International?
How can I help the social justice committee in my congregation to hold a fundraiser, or run an alternative gift market?
Have I looked at the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee web site recently, and updated my membership?

Day Seven (Sunday)

Chalice Lighting

We ignite this elemental flame,

core of our earth and of our very being.

We call upon the foundation of molten rock.

We call upon the electricity of lightning.

We call upon the light of celestial stars.

Fire within, transform us with your power.

Reading

Hymn 298, Wake, Now, My Senses, closes with the following lyric:

Wake, now, my vision of ministry clear;

Brighten my pathway with radiance here;

Mingle my calling will all who will share;

Work toward a planet transformed by our care.

Message

Primitive humans understood and respected the power of the natural world. While humankind takes well-deserved pride in its modern engines and harvesting of resources, we would do equally well to hone our humility, remembering that we are insignificant creatures next to the might of a sun.

The temptation to succumb to the short-term benefits of our modern way of life is not sustainable. We know this well, and yet we continue to avail ourselves of our world’s bounty with little care for its maintenance.

As Unitarian Universalists, we must fight for the rights of our planet with no less diligence that we do for our own freedom and liberty. As congregants, we are stewards of our houses of worship; as citizens, we are stewards of our nation; and as human beings, we are stewards of our home, the earth.

On this seventh day of Chalica, we affirm and promote the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. Amen.

Discussion

So, today, exchange gifts that honor our earth and its creatures. Ask yourself these questions:

How can I do more to recycle bottles, cans, and more? If I can sell my recyclables, what environmental/animal aid society would I support?
Could I rescue an animal from a shelter?
How can I help plan and conduct an outdoor worship service in my congregation, weather permitting?

Remembering Veterans, Family and Friends

2010-11-11T16:23:00.001-05:00

Today we remember and honor the service of men and women throughout the years in dedication to the principles of freedom and democracy that are the cornerstones of this great nation. We also celebrate the ideal that the seeds of greatness and accomplishment lie within each and every person.

This holiday began life in 1919 as Armistice Day, in recognition of the ending of World War I, with these words by President Woodrow Wilson: "To us in America, the reflections of Armistice Day will be filled with solemn pride in the heroism of those who died in the country's service and with gratitude for the victory, both because of the thing from which it has freed us and because of the opportunity it has given America to show her sympathy with peace and justice in the councils of the nations."

But, it was a shoe store owner in Emporia, Kansas who turned this day into one honoring the service of all veterans to their country. Even though he never officially served in uniform, Al King always had a great respect for the military. He promoted his notion so much that the Chamber of Commerce of Emporia (a town not all that much larger than West Newton) decided to get involved, and businesses closed their doors that November 11, 1953, to celebrate the first-ever all-inclusive Veterans Day.

Today, many conflicts later, we recognize that those brave souls in uniform are not alone in their dedication and commitment to the ideals of this country. Spouses and family, friends and neighbors, teachers and colleagues stand behind each soldier wherever and however they serve. This holiday celebrates all of the sacrifices, large and small, of every veteran and everyone who has loved and supported a veteran.

We look forward to the day when there will be no war. We imagine, someday, children may ask their parents, “What was Veterans Day all about?” because the circumstances that cause nations to take up arms against each other with become passé, an anachronism in a world without hunger, disease, or want.

But, until that day, tyrants will arise to suck the will from the common person, and threaten our lives, our liberty, and our pursuit of happiness. Until that time, each and every one of us has a role to play defending our universal belief in human worth against those who would desecrate our humanity and defile our spirit. Whether we wear the uniform, or provide support for those that do – whether motivated by divine sources, words of inspiration, or real life heroes – our task as citizens is to remember, to honor, and to live lives of service.

Vulnerability

2010-11-06T17:33:00.000-04:00

Entering the ministerial search process is equal parts exciting and scary, mysterious and revelatory. The Settlement Handbook for Ministers and Congregations, maintained by the Transitions Office, is a fascinating document that masterfully outlines this incredibly lengthy and complicated process. One particular item caught my eye.

As the Congregational Record encourages congregational self-disclosure, so the Ministerial Record encourages self-disclosure by the minister. In most cases ministers have invested a great deal of themselves in completing the MR and look upon their expression of interest as an offer of their ministry and themselves. Their sense of vulnerability is often high at this point.

This statement succinctly expressed my feeling as I send my Ministerial Record out for the world to review -- vulnerable. But, as frightening as the prospect of bearing my soul to all interested parties may be, the wonderful anticipation grows.

And, of course, anyone who knows me will tell you that I have never been shy when talking about myself. So, self-disclosure is not the real concern. Rather, I can't help wonder if I have crossed every "t" and dotted every "i" sufficiently, so that the perfect match for me will read my Ministerial Record and call.

I have the luxury of not being geographically bound, so I have been reading incredibly interesting Congregational Records from Maine to California, Iowa to Florida, Texas to Michigan. The congregations range from just under 100 members to just over 500. Every record is different, but in other ways they are remarkably similar. Virtually every congregation wants a minister who will lead, inspire, share, and empower. Every church in search wants a preacher, teacher, administrator, counselor, and visionary. It is a daunting list.

What makes it all seem possible, however, is the level of honesty I detect in the Congregational Records. I have read dozens of accounts of church conflict, troubled ministries, resource challenges, and unfulfilled dreams. So whenever I grow anxious thinking of the challenge before me, I just remember how vulnerable these congregations have allowed themselves to be in looking for new ministers.

Wherever I end up this time next year, I know that I will not be facing the beautiful unknown future alone. I will be walking alongside hundreds of souls, braving the uncertainty with joy, with energy, and with love.

Stop Reading This Message

2010-10-27T13:26:00.000-04:00

If life teaches us one lesson, it is this. Never leave business with another person unfinished, because you never know when that person will be gone, leaving you with regret over the unsaid and the unfinished.

Yesterday, my 92-year-old mother-in-law Ruby was returning from one of her favorite outings, a trip to the casino. Getting off the mini-bus, the woman in front of her stumbled and Ruby tried to help her. In the process, she fell herself and struck her head on the pavement.

At the hospital, we were told that the extensive bleeding in her brain was inoperable. She never regained consciousness and died a few hours later.

Ruby lived a long and momentous life. She leaves two adult children and three grandchildren who all love her. Her death leaves a hole and an admirable collection of memories in many lives.

As this coming weekend approaches, we acknowledge various observances honoring the dead, from All Soul's Day, All Hallow's Eve, Samhain, and El Día de los Muertos. These holidays afford us the opportunity to remember our loved ones now gone and to honor their memory in our lives. These holidays also remind us not to procrastinate.

With medical advances lengthening our lifespans every day, we take for granted that friends and family will be alive for many decades. But, the universe can be a cruel classroom. So, if there is someone in your life with which you have had a disagreement, or with whom you have unresolved conflict or issues, then stop reading this message right now. Pick up the phone, or better yet, walk, drive, or fly to that person and talk with them. Tell them what they mean to you and try to work out whatever differences are keeping you from being an active part of each other's lives.

Do it now, because the winter is approaching for us all, and tomorrow may be too late.

I, Zombie

2010-10-23T09:25:00.000-04:00

As Halloween approached, a long-time friend asked me, “So why do you people like to get together dressed up as zombies?” Not surprisingly, this is a question I have asked myself as I shambled with thousands of people over the years at Monroeville Mall (site of the original Dawn of the Dead movie).

First of all, we Pittsburghers like to pay homage to one of our own, George A. Romero. Romero redefined the horror movie in 1968 with the release of Night of the Living Dead, bringing a gritty reality to a genre that had long ceased to really frighten anybody. Films like Frankenstein, which had caused heart attacks in the 1930’s, had become quaint anachronisms. And, viewers needed something at least more grisly that the nightly details of senseless mayhem occurring in Vietnam entering our homes daily on the evening news.

Second, Romero brought social consciousness to horror films. From his courageous depiction of strong minority and women characters to the insistence that only reason can overcome bureaucratic incompetence, mindless consumerism, and greed, Romero’s films exude a concern for the future welfare of human society. By showing the slow evolution of the zombies to greater awareness and unified action, he held up his mirror to our society rife with decay and self-destruction.

Third, zombie walks are a fantastic way for geeks and freaks and otherwise “normal” folk to get together and share their creativity and imagination. I have met some amazing folk through these events who I otherwise would never have known (I officated at the wedding of the couple in this picture a month later!). And the work required to pull off these often huge events brings friends together in common effort and joy.

And, in the end, it’s just fun. The fake blood, plastic brains, groaning and shambling are just a riotous good time, especially when you watch the faces of unsuspecting onlookers. In a world that appears too often to be going mad, dressing up like a zombie seems to me one of saner activities. So, this Halloween, get out the makeup, tear some clothes, and drag that leg with the rest of us zombies!

Becoming the Wind

2010-09-13T17:08:00.000-04:00

All my life I’ve been a blade of grass in the wind
Or like a stubborn tree, I’ve let the wind shape me
But now I’m feelin’ bold, enough to let go my hold
And I’ll not be a blade of grass again
I’m gonna be the wind
I’ll be the wind, I can wear the mountain down
And I’ll be the wind of hope, I can lift you off the ground
And I’ll fan the flames of love
You know they’ll never die again
Oh, I’m gonna be the wind.
-- lyrics from “I’m Gonna Be the Wind” by Laurie Lewis

Reflection from Islam: A Short History, by Karen Armstrong
Perhaps the central paradox of the religious life is that it seeks transcendence, a dimension of existence that goes beyond our mundane lives, but that human beings can only experience this transcendent reality in earthly, physical phenomena. People have sensed the divine in rocks, mountains, temple buildings, law codes, written texts, or in other men and women. We never experience transcendence directly; our ecstasy is always “earthed,” enshrined in something or someone here below. Religious people are trained…to use their creative imagination.

In Islam, Muslims have looked for God in history. Their sacred scripture, the Qur’an, gave them a historical mission. Their chief duty was to create a just community in which all members, even the most weak and vulnerable, were treated with absolute respect. The experience of building such a society and living in it would give them intimations of the divine, because they would be living in accordance with God’s will…

Muslims developed their own rituals, mysticism, philosophy, doctrines, sacred texts, laws and shrines just like everybody else. But all these religious pursuits sprang directly from the Muslims’ frequently anguished contemplation of the political affairs of Islamic society. If state institutions did not measure up to the Quranic ideal, if their political leaders were cruel or exploitative, or if their community was humiliated by apparently irreligious enemies, a Muslim could feel that his or her faith in life’s ultimate purpose and value was in jeopardy…Consequently, the historical trials and tribulations of the Muslim community – political assassinations, civil wars, invasions, and the rise and fall of ruling dynasties – were not divorced from the interior religious quest, but were the essence of the Islamic vision.

Becoming the Wind

Popular lyricists love their metaphors. Sometimes, a musical phrase takes on so much meaning, that our language and cultural understanding adopts the new interpretation. Pink Floyd made “another brick in the wall” synonymous with mindless bureaucracy and compliance. The “bridge over troubled water” is the loving support we offer each other when we are weary and tears are in our eyes. And whenever I use the word “imagine,” I cannot help but think about John Lennon’s utopian vision and Strawberry Fields forever.
Another often-used nature metaphor involves singing about the wind.

To Kerry Livgren of the group Kansas, the wind offers the vehicle for our searching, as we are all just “Dust in the Wind.” We are just drops of water in an endless sea, and all that we do crumbles to the ground though we refuse to see. Our physical bodies are insignificant next to the power of the wind. Wind is the endless, timeless, and steady progress of change in nature and only our spirits can connect with this force.
To Bob Dylan “Blowin’ in the Wind,” represents a more specific harbinger of change, of a coming time when injustice and war will no longer be tolerated. Wind sweeps away the wrongs of society and encourages us to act upon more important considerations of our life’s purpose.
To Jimi Hendrix, the “Wind Cries Mary” as a constant reminder of actions we wish we could take back, of words better left unspoken, of a love now lost. Wind reminds us to appreciate what we have and those we love and to never allow thoughtless deeds to jeopardize what really matters.
To Elton John, the wind represents a more permanent loss – the snuffing of a “Candle in the Wind” of a prematurely shortened life full of energy and promise. Wind is not just the methodical erosion of mountains, but can also be a tornado touching down with mighty destruction for just seconds.

In our popular music, wind is an elemental force of change, moving us to action, guiding us toward meaning and understanding. Wind offers closure, even the death of ideas, ways of living, or people important to us.
Nine years ago yesterday, September 11, 2001, we suffered a tragic act of violence and hate. To some, the horror of that day's events still burns vividly in their minds – images of smoke and flame, of destruction and death. The personal loss of loved ones and the broader shattering of confidence in our security and safety affected us all to some degree. The process of grief challenges each of us during our lives. But, grieving is made all the more difficult when the loss occurred through the intentional or irresponsible acts of others.

Every year at this time, we seem to hear sentiments from those still coping with the aftermath of that horrific day. While some focus on remembering the victims and the heroic efforts of rescuers, others stress their desire to punish any and everyone on which blame for the attacks can be assigned. Sadly, there are those whose wish to paint that brush of blame on any Muslim, as if all adherents of Islam supported radical acts of fundamentalist violence.

Recently, people have expressed much public consternation over the proposed opening of a mosque near the former site of the World Trade Center in New York City. One particularly troubling response came from the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida, which decided to make yesterday its first annual Burn-A-Koran-athon, finding and destroying as many copies of the Qur’an as a statement. Thankfully, the planners canceled the event, but not before raising concerned eyebrows across the globe.

Historically, book burning is a favorite tool of totalitarians and bigots with philosophies grounded in intolerance and contempt for the rights of others. Now, within the bounds of necessary local ordinances, I will affirm the right of anyone to build a fire, even for the purpose of burning whatever combustible products they choose. We Unitarian Universalists certainly affirm using flame as a symbol for the transformative power of love in our lives. But, I condemn as ignorant and hateful the burning of any books, let alone one deemed sacred by the followers of its teachings.

For the Qur’an is not just a book to a Muslim, and burning a Qur’an is not simply the misguided act of small minded people. Most traditional schools of Islamic law generally forbid Muslims, unless in a state of ritual purity, from even touching a Qur'an. The Qur’an is regarded as the literal word of God in its untranslated Arabic form. Muslims must always treat the book with reverence, and discarding worn copies requires specific rituals. Desecrating a copy of the Qur'an is punishable by imprisonment in some countries.

According to their web site, the “Dove World Outreach Center is a New Testament Church – based on the Bible, the Word of God.” The non-denominational church has a history of provocative public protests against what it considers sins. In the past, it has put up a sign on its property reading, “Islam is of the Devil,” and has joined the extremist Westboro Baptist Church in protesting homosexuality. Its self-proclaimed purpose is to get Christians to stand up for the “truth” of the Bible.

Now I wonder, is this the truth of the Bible where Jesus says in Matthew 7:12, “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you; for this is the law of the prophets?” Or is this the truth of the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:44), when Jesus invoked listeners to “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you?”

Perhaps, finding the truth in the Bible compels us to look for the truth in the Qur’an. So, in our spirit of promoting the free and responsible search for truth and meaning (and opposing the tyranny of the book burners of the world) let us examine what the Qur’an has to say about the wind. In Surah 3, The Family of Imram, verse 117 says:

The likeness of what they spend in the life of this world is as the likeness of wind in which is intense cold (that) smites the seed produce of a people who have done injustice to their souls and destroys it; and Allah is not unjust to them, but they are unjust to themselves.

Therefore, our acts during our lives that violate the commonly-held beliefs of the people act like an icy blast of wind that kills our crops. In other words, you get back from life what you put into it. Don’t blame God for punishing you, for you laid the seeds of your own destruction through your own misdeeds, unbelief, or disobedience. Sounds familiar doesn’t it? It should. Because in Matthew 26, verse 52, Jesus tells Peter to sheathe his sword drawn against the Romans, “for all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”
Paul later tells the Galatians:

…you reap whatever you sow. If you sow to your own flesh, you will reap corruption from the flesh; but if you sow to the Spirit, you will reap eternal life from the Spirit. So let us not grow weary in doing what is right, for we will reap at harvest time, if we do not give up. So then, whenever we have an opportunity, let us work for the good of all, and especially for those of the family of faith.

And Buddhists, like many other adherents of various Asian religions, believe that we possess free will to choose between good or evil without the need of God’s intervention to implement the consequences of karma.

Quite the opposite of what some proponents claim, the Qur’an is far more than a simple list of prescribed behaviors for all Muslims. The text often reads quite poetically. For instance, up until now, all of our metaphors described wind not just as a benign force of erosion and passing on, but of violent turbulence and destruction. Frequently, however, the Qur’an describes the wind quite differently. The wind is portrayed as sustainer, the medium by which nature spreads our seed and waters our crops.

In Surah 15, verse 22, the wind fertilizes, sending down the water from the clouds for us to drink. In Surahs 35 and 45, the wind brings the clouds that actually bring life back to earth that has died. This wind resurrects and is a sign of blessings to come. Other citations specifically label the wind as the medium for the good news before the Mercy of Allah. In Surahs 25 and 30, God uses the wind to send the pure water from the clouds, for which we should be grateful.

So, how may we apply this notion of the wind to our own circumstances? For 150 years, this congregation (the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton), rooted firmly in the Mon Valley of Southwestern Pennsylvania, swayed with the gentle breezes of the passing years, bent under the impact of shifting population demographics, and suffered the battering of economic downturns. These roots were important, for without roots, we wander aimlessly, with no past, no anchor. Lacking roots, our traditions and rituals lose their impact and the gifts of our ancestors crumble to the dust of discarded relics in forgotten attic crawlspaces.

Perhaps, however, there comes a time when we must uproot – when we must no longer be satisfied with being a blade of grass blowing in the wind. I don’t mean that we consider moving our building physically – although such a shift could someday reap benefits. I’m talking about lifting ourselves out of the packed earth of complacency. I am talking not just about the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton, but of our entire denomination moving beyond the self-satisfaction of having emancipated ourselves from dogmatic beliefs and creedal churches.

For many years, we as a congregation and as a denomination have stood firmly rooted in a belief in the unity of all that we find holy and in the basic goodness of humankind. Our own tall tree of knowledge has affirmed the use of reason to make of our own earth and lives the paradise that lies within our will and determination to create. Our branches have stretched far and wide into schools and universities, courtrooms and congresses, clinics and hospitals.

But, maybe the time has come to change our passive approach. We can retain our convictions, our strength of belief. We might want to consider, however, leaving the comfort of our houses of worship, spreading our message of universal love, freedom, and justice across a land growing ever more barren of those marvelous gifts.

Surah 90, The City, tells of how humankind is born with two eyes, a tongue and two lips, and that we know that two paths of life exist.

But [we] would not attempt the uphill road,
And what will make you comprehend what the uphill road is?
(It is) the setting free of a slave,
Or the giving of food in a day of hunger to an orphan,
Or to the poor man lying in the dust.
Then [we are] of those who believe and charge one another
to show patience, and charge one another to show compassion.

Like our abolitionist ancestors, we need to fight our modern slavery to money, material goods, and the bindings of social class. We must find ways to eat more ethically and to feed the hundreds of millions who hunger. We must seek ways to live nonviolently, to love unconditionally, and to dispel the dark clouds of fear and oppression.

In order to do that, we must become the wind. We must become agents of change – not the destructive change of fundamentalist certitude and prejudice, or the corrosive erosion of indifference and stale tradition; but nurturing change raining down on a land thirsty for a saving message from a drought of hope. Like a wind, we can blow onto the streets of the physical world. We can waft through the communities of social media, into the world of cyberspace. We can become the wind of good news, evangelizing our saving message.

Now, some equate such evangelism with proselytizing. You might worry that our message will get tied up in telling folks that ours is the only true religious option. So, in the name of tolerance, we end up not saying anything. But Unitarian Universalist evangelism is not about converting people to the “one true church.” It's certainly not about holding the keys to the doors of a kingdom locked forever to those who do not accept our version of the truth. Unitarian Universalist evangelism is about letting people know that we are here; it is about telling the world that there is a vibrant and compassionate alternative to the hate-filled, fear mongers who despise anyone who is different from them.

Unitarian Universalist minister Tony Larsen was raised Catholic. He went to parochial schools and attended catechism classes, where students were drilled on the important questions of their religion, and where they learned the right answers to those questions. Because of his experiences as a child, Larsen believes that our kids need something to help them formulate their own answers to those ultimate questions in life.

So, Larsen developed a Unitarian Universalist catechism that provides children, as well as people of all ages, with an answer to the question, “What do you believe in?” His catechism consists of three simple points:

Love your neighbor as yourself, which includes trying not to hurt people in any way;
Make the world a better place, which includes working for justice, peace, and freedom for all people; and
Search for the truth with an open mind.

Show patience and compassion; free the slaves and feed the hungry; and search for truth wherever that search leads you, whether it is the Bible or the Qur’an, the Bhagavad-Gita or the Tao Te Ching.

The popular 1980 Bob Segar song describes the experience of many adult Unitarian Universalists, who like Tony Larsen were raised in other faith traditions:

The years rolled slowly past and I found myself alone
Surrounded by strangers I thought were my friends
I found myself further and further from my home
And I guess I lost my way, there were oh so many roads.
I was living to run and running to live
Never worried about paying or even how much I owed.
Moving eight miles a minute for months at a time
Breaking all of the rules that would bend
I began to find myself searching for shelter again and again.

We found in our congregations shelter against the winds that rocked us. We found in our heritage and history the roots we had long sought that welcomed diversity and freed people from oppression.

But, we have also grown comfortable in these shelters, our loving religious communities. We have grown comfortable while countless others out there are buffeted as they run against the wind. Let us, therefore, stream out into the world. Let us spread the good news of Unitarian Universalism whenever someone wants to burn a Qur’an. Let us spread our good news when a gay youth gets beat up. Let us spread our good news when another corporation carelessly pillages our interdependent web of life. Let us spread our good news when hard-working, but undocumented families are ripped apart and denied the promise of America afforded to each and every one of us at some time in our past. Let us bring life, the life-giving waters of Unitarian Universalism, to a dying land, and let them know that we are here – that we are here to stay.

To worship God is nothing other than to serve the people.
It does not need rosaries, prayer carpets, or robes.
All peoples are members of the same body, created from one essence.
If fate brings suffering to one member
The others cannot stay at rest.
-- “To Serve the People,” by Saadi, Persian Poet

Where is the Outrage?

2010-09-07T09:43:00.000-04:00

As the anniversary of the September 11 attacks approaches, we are faced with a new threat to any hope of peaceful resolution to the challenges of religious plurality in our world. The Dove World Outreach Center, a self-proclaimed "New Testament Church – based on the Bible, the Word of God," plans to burn Qur'ans this coming Saturday "in remembrance of the fallen victims of 9/11 and to stand against the evil of Islam."

Like many of my colleagues, I plan to read from the Qur'an during our Sunday morning worship service at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton as a show of support of our Muslim brothers and sisters across the globe. But, after watching a CNN reporter interviewing the head of the Center, I must ask myself where are the same questions from the Christian majority of this nation? The silence of religious leaders, if to do nothing more but to ask them not to commit such a misguided act of desecration, is deafening.

To Terry Jones and the members of the Dove World Outreach Center, please do not go through with this planned action. Frankly, the threat alone of your protest has already accomplished its mission. But, do you not understand that to a Muslim, the paper containing the holy words of the Qur'an has the same import as the steel and stone of the World Trade Centers? By burning this sacred text, you are no better than those who flew planes on that fateful day. And no matter how you read your sacred texts, this is not how Jesus taught us to live in religious community with others.

I know you will cite the angry outburst at the Temple as the lesson that Jesus offered for the occasional need to "make an example." Do you not see that your action is not the same? Jesus did not defy the Pharisees by burning the Torah. He did not defile the idols of the Romans. Yes, he got angry, showing his all-to-human side. I put it to you and your congregation that that is the actual lesson of this incident - that his singular act of intemperance was so unusual, that even Jesus was not immune from feeling the hurt and betrayal of religious leaders gone astray.

And, from that lesson, we should learn that violence accomplishes nothing but breeding and spreading more violence. Religious leaders, please reach out to Terry Jones and his congregation and implore him to cancel this event. Encourage him to find more productive venues to express his opinions and make his points heard. Stand on the side of love for the hundreds of millions of Muslims who do not support terrorism and who will be devastated by this planned act of mutilation of their holy text.

Instead, join with me and others who this Sunday will explore the writings of a religion that also honors the contributions of Abraham and Jesus to our religious heritage.

Seeing Colors

2010-08-25T12:23:00.000-04:00

I find being colorblind at times annoying, but rarely does my disability seriously affect my functioning. I learned early in life that certain careers were closed to me -- electrician, pilot, interior designer -- but colorblindness largely makes itself known in mismatched clothing and the inability to see numbers among the dots.

But, one time I do miss the ability to discern colors better is walking among nature. I often cannot see certain creatures because they blend too well into the background. And I often cannot determine species of birds or insects because their color scheme eludes me. I imagine, however, that I compensate by perhaps seeing motion better than most, or that I can more frequently detect specific shapes in the mosaic of life (I have an uncanny eye for spotting coins in the dirt). I also have a deep fondness for brilliant colors, the bright yellows, oranges, and purples that stand out so magnificently among the green leaves.

Today, I wandered down along the railroad tracks, unaware that I was about to be ambushed by all manner of life. For one, I am not alone in noticing the abundant varieties of butterflies in the area this year. In just 30 minutes or so, I spied a Red-Spotted Purple, Silver-Bordered Fritillary, a Mourning Cloak, a Red Admiral and the ever-present Woollybear Moths, often dancing in pairs among the wild daisies.

As I took my usual place on the switchman's shed platform, I saw an old friend - a big Mallard - standing guard at his usual post at the end of the sand spit in the middle of the river. Suddenly, a goose or heron of some kind swooped over to the island from the other side of the river and I quickly lost it in the foliage.

Motion in my lower field of vision brought a young groundhog to my attention, just 20 feet or so below the platform. He kept eying me suspiciously and I tried not to move and startle him. Of course, behind it all was the constant droning of crickets and the deafening buzzing of male cicadas looking for a mate.

As I continued my journey along the tracks, a brilliant goldfinch darted by. I felt something on my arm. Looking down, I examined a bright red Ladybug with no spots. Now, depending on what culture I choose to acknowledge, that means that I will have no children (sorry Ashley and Tyler!), will soon get a pair of gloves, whatever ailment I have flew away with it (wouldn't that be nice), my crops will be good, or that fair weather is ahead.

Who knows what other critters busily went about their business as I walked along the tracks? Some I will always have difficulty seeing. Some may forever elude my observation, no matter how diligently I hone my visual skills. But, many of them lie within my ability to perceive them if I will only take the time to look.

UUA Blogger Survey

2010-08-04T14:47:00.000-04:00

The Best Practices for Unitarian Universalist Blogging report, originally published in August of 2008, is being updated and bloggers who promote Unitarian Universalism are being surveyed. We are being asked to post the questions and our answers to our blogs...so here goes.

1. Why do you blog? What goals do you have for your blog?
Well, that's a really good question. The main reason I blog is that I believe that all ministers should be blogging, offering our opinions, feelings, and insights in this important venue for modern seekers. For me, it is a form of Unitarian Universalist evangelism -- a chance for people to connect to our movement in one more way beyond the Sunday morning worship service or the weeknight committee/program meeting.

My goals are many: to continue my process of reflection and discernment as I prepare to enter into fellowship with other ministers; to interact with others in a public forum on relevant issues; and to let my muse run wild on occasion.

2. Who is your intended audience?
Anyone interested in the free and responsible search for truth and meaning; anyone who wants to sit across the table from me and share a pizza.

3. Who owns your blog? Does it belong to you as individual or to your congregation or other organization?
The muse kennel and pizzatorium is all me. I will certainly refer to my congregation on occasion, and post sermons, but my blog is my side of this virtual conversation.

4. How frequently do you post?
Not nearly often enough! I am one of the world's worst journalists. And, I guess that I feel that the only time I want to blog is when I really have something important to say. Needless to say, I don't "get" Twitter.

5. What is the tone of your blog?
I suppose the tone is essentially professional with an important touch of the personal. I really just go where my muse takes me in regards to tone.

6. What steps do you take to make sure that your blog is a safe space, both for you and for other participants? Do you have a code of conduct?
I filter comments (most of which are spam anyway) and will not post comments that are snarky or combative to the point of killing dialogue. As for me, anything I post is fair game and I assume is public. If I feel unsafe posting it, then I simply won't.

7. What kinds of boundaries do you observe around confidentiality?
I generally don't name people I discuss, but my stories are mostly about me anyway. I would endeavor never to discuss someone else in a way that they could be identified without asking their permission first. But, generally, if I do mention someone else, it is to praise them or give them props for helping me in some way.

8. How do you respond to comments and email from readers?
I will always post and respond to comments and emails that are respectful and that contribute to the ongoing dialogue. Sarcastic and excessively argumentative (those that in my opinion shut down discourse) comments are generally ignored.

9. What are the most challenging aspects of blogging in your experience?
Inertia is the biggest problem and I am my own worst critic. If I don't feel particularly qualified to comment on a topic, or feel that my opinion is not all that unique, then I tend to not post. I suppose that I just need to grant myself the permission to let others make that call.

10. What are the most rewarding aspects of blogging in your experience?
I feel the most reward when I can give voice to an idea or experience that would not likely have been expressed via other avenues open to me. I guess I feel that if my posts affect just one other person in some way, then the effort is worthwhile.

11. What advice would you give to Unitarian Universalists who are new to blogging and want to get started?
Stop worrying about it and let your muse off its leash! You will never please anyone, and you can never please anyone unless you give yourself the chance. So, just run off that diving board and cannonball into the pool!

12. How do you evaluate the success of your blog? What have been your most successful blog posts or series?
I don't. I'll admit to a twinge of pride when The World mentions my blog in its weekly summary. But, my blog simply is what it is. It is successful if I let it be what it is.

I believe that my best series was the one I did on my trip to New Orleans.

13. What do you wish you had done differently in your blogging?
Hmmm, nothing that I can think of.

14. What other online tools do you use to promote your blog? (i.e. social networking sites, Twitter, social bookmarking tools, etc.)
I set up my blog to automatically post to my Facebook account. I tell people about my blog on various web pages and other avenues.

15. Do you use an Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed? How many subscribers do you have?
I honestly have never even looked at that to figure it out.

16. Do you track site traffic? How many unique visitors do you have per day (on average)?
No, I think I would only find that depressing! And, I'm way too obsessive-compulsive, so I would waste too much time analyzing numbers. Frankly, I am always pleasantly surprised when I find that anyone has spent any of their valuable time reading my ramblings.

17. Do you find Unitarian Universalist Association resources helpful to you as a blogger? What additional resources could we provide to Unitarian Universalist bloggers?
Not really, although I use UUA resources for lots of other things. I'm not really sure how the UUA could contribute to my blogging. One possible idea might be for someone to come up with a weekly suggestion on a topic for UU bloggers to address. Then the posts could be assembled, or even summarized in some way. Such a resource might be really useful to somebody researching that topic.

18. Please write any additional comments or suggestions.
Peter Bowden is the man, and has been enormously helpful to me on a number of occasions regarding all things technical. And, if you read me blog, then please write/comment and let me know what you like, don't like, want to see more of, whatever!

One More Immigration Story

2010-07-23T11:59:00.000-04:00

The United States is keeping two young members of my congregation from living in their home and being with their friends in worship. You see, one happened to be born in Italy, so when her visa ran out, she was forced to return and seek a new visa. Exile to a foreign land is costing this couple many thousands of dollars, months of separation from jobs and loved ones, and untold anxiety. And, in the end, their fate remains up in the air.

America has an immigration problem. The good news is that so many people willing to work and especially perform some of the toughest, menial tasks gladly sacrifice everything to come here. They face a frightening unknown, often toil under intolerable conditions, and suffer great deprivation. The bad news is that the terrible state of our administration of immigration leaves states like Arizona little choice but to pass absurd and unconstitutional laws in a misguided attempt to solve their own local problems.

Ancestors of every citizen of this nation were at one time immigrants. Whether your people migrated across the Bering Strait thousands of years ago, sailed across the Atlantic on the Mayflower, a slave ship, or a crowded passenger liner, every American has roots from other lands. They came here for the same reason people cross our borders today – for opportunities, for a chance to better themselves, for the hope that this country stands for.

I am no immigration attorney. But, a better way must exist to extend a welcoming hand to those willing to become contributing citizens and to expanding the legacy of the fantastic ethnic and cultural diversity of this land. And, there certainly must be a way to prevent the breaking up of families over bureaucratic details.

By the way, one more detail about this couple. They are both women. Although married (in Canada), our federal government refuses to grant the rights to same-sex married couples given to heterosexual couples. There is a word for this. Discrimination.

And there is another word for this. Wrong.

The Transient and the Permanent

2010-06-07T22:24:00.006-04:00

I just learned that a small piece of my personal history was no more. The old South Hills movie theatre in Dormont has been demolished. Now, obviously, I am not the first middle-aged person to see his childhood movie house torn down, nor will I be the last. Nevertheless, I will mourn this passing and commemorate the place that the South Hills Theatre will always occupy in my heart.

Before being carved up into four ridiculously sized "cinemas," the South Hills Theatre was a cavernous place with a huge balcony. In the old days, the place had hosted all sorts of performances, such as organ concerts, before becoming predominately a movie house. But, I wouldn't know about the rest of the building because I sat in the same seat every time I visited.

It began in the summer of 1972 or 1973, when the theatre ran a promotion, showing a different classic film every night for $1.00 admission. My best friend Frank and I must have seen at least 30 movies that summer, mostly old black and white films like they would later show on AMC and Turner Classics. But, of course, this was before cable TV took over our leisure time. Frank and I would sit in the same two seats, about three or four rows from the front, on the right aisle. We often joked that we would someday buy those seats and have them bronzed in memorial of our loyalty.

Of course, summer came to an end as it always does. After high school, I found less reason and time to visit the South Hills. Like little jackie paper, I left my magic dragon behind and over time its scales fell off as well. I remember returning some years ago and feeling great sadness for its dilapidated condition. I suppose that the place (now renamed Cinema 4) actually died for me that day.

So, now the South Hills Theatre is irretrievably gone forever. Gone are those fantasies of hitting the lottery and buying the place on a lark. Gone are those dreams of reliving that wonderful summer of discovering a new classic every night in my personal seat. Like my youth, those wonderful times of learning to drive and eating Mineo's pizza with high school friends, live only in my memories.

But, while the bricks and mortar may no longer retain their solid configuration in the real world, the South Hills Theatre stands unmolested in my mind. My love of films engendered by that wonderful place lives on strong. My appreciation of classics stands strong against the wrecking balls of unimaginative writing and needless remakes. The body of the South Hills Theatre may be dead, but its soul lives on with every film I recommend to a young person who thinks that CGI can substitute for good acting. Rest in Peace, South Hills Theatre!

Behind the Clouds - A Flower Communion Service

2010-06-07T10:50:00.002-04:00

Opening Words
from “The Rainy Day” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary;
It rains, and the wind is never weary;
The vine still clings to the moldering wall,
But at every gust the dead leaves fall…

Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
Thy fate is the common fate of all,
Into each life some rain must fall,
Some days must be dark and dreary.

Time for All Ages

Following World War I and the establishment of an independent Czechoslovakia, Norbert Ĉapek founded a Unitarian congregation in Prague called the Liberal Religious Fellowship. He introduced the Flower Festival service on June 4, 1923 as a symbolic ritual to unite people in the new congregation. The traditional Christian communion service was unacceptable to many who had joined the new fellowship after leaving the Catholic church. Ĉapek decided to utilize the native beauty of the land to create a ritual unique to the new religious body.

People were asked to bring a flower of their choice to church and to place them in large vases at the entrance. During the worship service, Ĉapek consecrated the collected flowers. Afterwards, people returned to the vases and took a different flower home with them. It was such a success that it was held yearly just before the summer recess of the church. His fellowship grew into the largest Unitarian congregation in the world, with a membership of almost 3,400 by 1932.

With the outbreak of World War II, Ĉapek chose to remain in Europe, despite invitations to come to America. He delivered a series of sermons on the topic of freedom and justice that got the attention of Nazi authorities. In March 1941, the Gestapo broke into Ĉapek’s apartment, confiscated his books and sermons, and arrested him and his 29-year-old daughter, Zora. Ĉapek was charged with listening to BBC broadcasts (a capital offense) and with treason. The Nazis cited several of his sermons as evidence. A year later, he and his daughter were found guilty.

The court found Ĉapek innocent of the treason charge and recommended that, given his age, the year served in prison be counted toward his jail time. The Gestapo, however, ignored the court's recommendation, sending Ĉapek to Dachau and Zora to forced labor in Germany. Ĉapek's name appears among a list of prisoners sent on an invalid transport on October 12, 1942 to Hartheim Castle, near Linz, Austria, where he died from poison gas.

Reflection Reading
from Norbert Ĉapek’s 1927 sermon “Salvation”

This relying on help from outside instead of upon ourselves flows from the doctrine of salvation which various churches still impose on us…The Catholic Church…and many varieties of…evangelical churches teach us to look for salvation from some supernatural source and think it blasphemous when someone feels he must seek salvation through his own moral effort.

Jesus did not have the superstitious belief that an angry God required a sacrifice to reconcile himself with mankind because of Adam’s sin. We owe [that belief] to the apostle Paul, whereas Jesus’ teaching about salvation is expressed in the parable of the prodigal son…

Christian people were much harmed by the notion of the necessity of pacifying God’s anger through the blood sacrifice of Jesus…Jesus’ gospel was meant for the poor, the oppressed, the unjustly handicapped, and all other unfortunate people.

The German reformers, Luther and Calvin, tore the heart out of Jesus’ gospel and instead inserted the dogma about Jesus’ sacrifice for the atonement of sins…The[ir] religion…was suitable for a feudal social system, but how much did it do for the oppressed, the poor, and the enslaved people?

Salvation cannot come from something or someone outside ourselves… Salvation comes only through what a person achieves through his own effort and ability.

Sermon – Behind the Clouds

Once upon a time, in a not-so-magical kingdom, there was an ogre who owned a factory. Now, as befitted his natural demeanor, the ogre was very cruel to the factory workers. He would beat them regularly, and if a worker ever gave him cause for displeasure, the ogre would cast him out of the factory forever. In fact, it sometimes seemed that the ogre enjoyed mistreating his workers more than actually running the factory effectively.

There was a man who worked for the ogre. The man worked behind a tiny desk helping the ogre keep track of production in the factory and utilizing resources most efficiently. The ogre was terrible at counting, and so needed the man’s skills. But, that did not stop the ogre from tormenting him mercilessly. And the man could not complain because he needed the work to support his family. Over time, the man learned ways to please the ogre and to keep the ogre from getting too mad at him.

The workers in the factory toiled for years under the cloud of the ogre’s wrath. The workers were talented and committed to their craft, but the ogre took any joy they might have felt out of the work. It seemed that the factory always lay in darkness – not the black of night, but the murkiness of a sunless day.

Sadly, this all-too-real fairy tale is one with which each of us can likely identify. In school, at work, even at home, it sometimes seems that there are people whose sole purpose in life is to cause others suffering. We endure this suffering out of love, or duty, or obligation, or simply out of habit. And we pay a toll for our efforts, whether we realize it or not.

Thankfully, few of us will ever know the hardship possible under the fist of a tyrant. Oh, we may complain about our taxes, incompetent legislators, or soulless government bureaucracies. If you are non-White, a woman, gay, or a member of other oppressed minorities in our country, you probably have experienced abridgements of your rights, or prejudice at the hands and from the lips of bigots with the ability to affect your life and livelihood.

But, few Americans can even begin to comprehend genocide – police and soldiers dragging our neighbors into trucks and trains. Most of us will never experience living under the cloud of a dictator, where the sun is blocked not only by repressive rule, but by the ashes of people targeted as threats to those in control.

And yet, that is what Norbert Ĉapek faced when his beloved Czechoslovakia was consumed by Hitler’s power play with the Allies. At the global poker table, we blinked and in September 1938, the Nazis raked in the pot – more than one-third of Czechoslovakia. Seven months later, the Nazis occupied the remainder of the country.

As a Unitarian minister, Ĉapek would have been unquestionably suspect in their eyes. The Gestapo regularly attended his Sunday morning and Tuesday evening worship services. But, Ĉapek carefully measured his message and tone to one that might irritate, but not inflame the German authorities. In June 1940, Ĉapek was summoned to Gestapo headquarters, interviewed, and released. Like the man in our fairy tale, Ĉapek learned the craft of survival under the ogre.

In the ensuing months, Nazi rule over Czechoslovakia worsened. Jews were spirited away; school children were photographed and their racial characteristics measured. Ĉapek maintained his ministry and his church continued to grow.

Then, on March 28, 1941, five men in plain clothes burst into his apartment. Over four hours, they ransacked his belongings, taking hundreds of sermons and lectures, manuscripts and letters, his typewriter, and the radio given to him on his 70th birthday by his congregation. They arrested Ĉapek and his youngest daughter, and led them away from the home they would never see again.

Now, often in stories like the one I told earlier, a shining knight comes along. He slays the ogre, brings light to the factory, and frees the workers. But, in our all-too-real world, ogres are much too smart and cunning to fall victim of the knight’s lance. They convince the knight that fighting will entail a terrible cost and that the outcome may be worse than allowing the status quo to continue.

Even more often, the ogre persuades the knight that keeping his armor shiny requires lots of money and that new weapons are constantly needed to maintain the knight’s power. In time, the knight comes to rely on the ogre and ceases to hear the cries of the workers in the factory. The armor tarnishes and the clouds thicken.

Other times in our stories of fantasy, a fairy godmother flits down, wand in hand, to grant us our fondest desires by taking us from the drudgery of the factory to the magnificent castle. With a simple wave of her hand, she promises immediate gratification. With no effort on our part, she offers us the winning lottery ticket of life. But, in the world of non-fiction, the person promising to fulfill your wishes is a con artist at best, and at worst a predator poised to rob you of your very soul.

Am I recommending that we banish fairy tales from our children’s bedside? Would I relegate Cinderella to her ash heap and leave Camelot unimagined? No. Dreams are healthy things and the sign of an imaginative and optimistic mind. Envisioning a better future beyond today and tomorrow, or even beyond our own lives sets us apart from other species on this planet. Dreaming may sometimes lead us down frivolous paths, but dreams plant the seeds of great accomplishment and happiness.

There exist many people out there, however, who prey on our dreams to turn a profit without any real concern for our well being. Others pollute the air with their clouds of fear and despair to keep us sedated and inactive. The clouds we live under obscure from us the worlds of the possible, the lands of growth and change, the vistas of our dreams.

So, what happened to the man in the factory? Over the years, he learned not just survival under the ogre’s reign, but how to find joy in other parts of his life beyond the factory. He found love in his children and family. He found fulfillment serving his community and causes that helped other workers. And, he found peace and even moments of ecstasy in his house of worship. He began to realize that the factory, while a significant part of his life, did not define him as a person. Most important, he began to imagine what lie behind the clouds surrounding the factory.

These were not the passive dreams of one waiting to be rescued, or the unfulfilled wishes of one wiling away free time on idle pursuits. His dreams were not the wispy stuff of sleep or the intangible unreality of wonder. His dreams were solid things, built brick-by-brick through hard work and commitment. His dreams became a stairway of sacrifice, cutting through the clouds of the factory and extending beyond the reach of the ogre’s fickle anger.

And when the man ascended the structure he had built and climbed through the clouds, what did he find? He found what Norbert Ĉapek found. He saw in the bright light of day countless flowers of every conceivable color decorating the countryside. He saw the marvelous diversity of living things and the remarkable individuality we share that makes life interesting.

He felt an enormous burden lifted from his body. Gone was the pressure of the constant criticism and deriding doubt. But, also missing were the shame and the guilt from within; the resentment and even hatred that had festered and grown against the ogre. Vanished were those debilitating emotions that had distracted the man with their false hopes of self-satisfaction and their sugar-coated rationalizations of self-righteousness.

Behind the clouds, the man heard the calling of his life. Gone were the allure of salary and financial security. Banished were the accolades of double talk and the bromides of bureaucracy. He heard clearly his calling to become the person life had prepared him to be.
Twelve years before his arrest and imprisonment, Capek had prepared himself spiritually, oddly predicting the hardships he now faced, when he wrote:

How can a person be ready to undergo difficult trials? He must ask himself: “What is mine and what is not mine?” Suppose I am to be imprisoned; must I also then lament and be discouraged? Suppose I am to be exiled; is there anyone able to prevent my going peacefully with a smile, good humor, and my head held high? “We will put you in chains!” “Ah, dear friends, the chains you mean to put upon my legs may restrain me but no chains can restrain my will or my spirit.”…The result is a will that is very disciplined; no force on earth can make it do what it doesn’t want to do. Cleanse your own heart and put out of your mind pain and envy, ill will and passions you can’t control; then no one will be able to force you to do their will. You will be free as the west wind.

Throughout Ĉapek’s incarceration, he continued writing hymns. In Dachau, he was assigned to the “clergy hut” and ministered to other prisoners. A Catholic priest wrote to Ĉapek’s daughter: “Your papa…always was in a good mood and was able to encourage all the people around him, to bring them out of their bad situations…I cannot understand it in any other way than there was in it a higher power. “ Another prisoner told Ĉapek’s biographer, “If it hadn’t been for Ĉapek, I probably wouldn’t be alive now, nor would others who survived.”

No, thankfully we are unlikely to face the experience of Norbert Ĉapek. But, we can learn from his life and find inspiration in his work. The flowers we celebrate today represent not simply life, but the life that lifts us behind the clouds to the land of light. We can pull from his example the energy to strive, the commitment to sacrifice, and the courage to endure. Ĉapek saw these fragile representatives of nature as the heart of his congregation’s communion. And, while flowers may sometimes be crushed by the ogres of the world, flowers will always endure; flowers will always reach through the clouds until they find the light; the light of dreams, the light of love.

Closing Words

Norbert Ĉapek wrote these words just before his death:

It is worthwhile to live and fight courageously for sacred ideals. Oh, blow, you evil winds, into my body's fire. My soul, you'll never unravel. Even though disappointed a thousand times or fallen in the fight, and everything worthless seem, I have lived amidst eternity. Be grateful, my soul. My life was worth living. The one who was pressed from all sides but remained victorious in spirit is welcomed into the choir of heroes.

Memorial Day in Smithton

2010-05-31T14:16:00.005-04:00

When the Commander of the local American Legion post asked me to provide the Invocation and Benediction at their Memorial Day service, I didn't really know what to expect. I don't know why I thought that this would be a few aging vets and their families gathered around the town's memorial to fallen soldiers. The hand-written signs that popped up a few days ago in front of my apartment declaring "No Parking, Monday 12-1 for Parade," should have warned me that my assumptions were unfounded.

I walked over to the Legion (literally in the building behind my place) around 11:30 and started talking with folks. Dozens of Legion members in uniform, active duty soldiers, and women in the Auxiliary were buzzing around laying out food, setting up chairs, and preparing for the ceremony. Soldiers practiced retiring the flag and prepared to fire the salute. They couldn't find their microphone, so I ran (well, walked as far as my poor ailing heart allows) to the church and grabbed our karaoke machine.

At 12:30, I walked over to the main street to watch the parade. Hundreds lined the street to watch the procession. Vets and soldiers, classic cars, fire engines, the Yough Senior High School Band, little leaguers, and flag-adorned trucks passed by. In all, the parade took maybe 10 minutes. But, for a town like Smithton, it was Macy's on Thanksgiving.

Returning to the Legion, I saw that everyone was gathering for the ceremony. Families and children, old and young gathered all around. Suddenly I began to wonder if my words were going to be adequate for this auspicious gathering, this moment in the history of the town. Suddenly I realized the community role I was about to play in Smithton. Suddenly I thought that the next few minutes was going to define how people in town saw my congregation for the next few months, or even longer.

I delivered my invocation and returned to my seat. Several speakers and presentations followed, the band played, and we sang the national anthem. The main speaker, an impressive young man who lives two doors down from the church, spoke about remembering our soldiers throughout the year and not just on Memorial Day. I cheered inside, as my benediction was Rabbi Roland Gittlesohn's piece on remembering the lost during spring, summer, autumn, and winter, as well as other times.

The ceremony ended and the feast began. Chicken, deviled eggs, potato salad, the best baked beans I've had in ages, and endless cookies. I walked through the crowd chatting. While I have experienced this ever since moving in last February, I knew that I was now cemented in the community's mind as Pastor Jeff of that church down Second Street across from the old brewery.

I also felt proud of the work I did today. As a pacifist, it is challenging to commemorate the sacrifices of so many to causes I might find questionable - to honor the commitment, the expression of the best of human character, without condoning the violence of war. As an atheist, it is difficult to find ways to invoke the powers of the universe in ways that a largely theistic public can embrace without compromising my own beliefs. I did both today.

Rites of Passage

2010-05-27T15:25:00.004-04:00

I realized that ministry was my optimal vocation when I recognized it as the last great outpost of the generalist. My father always considered himself a "renaissance man," and I followed in his steps. But, in our increasingly specialized world, I found little appreciation for people who looked at the "big picture," and sought interdisciplinary solutions to problems. Clergy, though, tend to wear many hats - preacher, teacher, activist, counselor, administrator. And, under their suit of armor, they need a caring heart, a soft shoulder, a firm hand, and a stiff upper lip.

But, in spite of our Sears Craftsman toolbox with a thousand little drawers, we do manage to fit into certain types.

The Inspirer, the amazing preacher who should never be allowed into any committee meeting;
The Organizer, who can juggle a million tasks but has little skill at motivating others;
The Artiste, who designs moving worship services, but can't connect with children; and
The Counselor, whose one-on-one skills cannot translate to the pulpit.

I'm sure there are many others (and I'll leave it to others to assign me to my category!).

But, I was reminded yesterday of one simple way of identifying members of the clergy, and that is by which rite of passage energizes them the most. Specifically, I'm talking about weddings and funerals.

Now, some ministers simply rock at funerals. They tend to view times of loss and grief as our best opportunities to evaluate our lives and assess what is truly important. These clergy tend to be fantastic at hospice care, hospital chaplaincies, and emotional presence. Other ministers shine at weddings, where the purity and innocence shines light on all that is possible in our lives. These clergy tend to be outstanding teachers, public relations, and ministerial presence. Now, I'm sure that some ministers are great at both weddings and funerals, but even the most ambidextrous person probably has a preferred hand.

Yesterday, I officiated at a wedding at my church. It was a simple affair - just the couple and immediate family on both sides. No flowers, or fancy clothes. No wedding party or family drama. Brothers and sisters were moving around snapping pictures. At the end of the short ceremony, the groom's little sister wiped her eyes and said, "I don't know why I'm crying."

But, I do. Because weddings hold the potential for such raw joy that we forget all of those devices we carefully construct to shield us from sharing emotions with others. For that one moment, we feel no doubt, no fear, no hate - just unadorned, unrefined love. At that moment in space and time, only hope abounds.

For me, weddings are the one big surprise of ministry. I always knew that I would love preaching and teaching, and that I could comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. But, the rush I get from weddings, whether small and simple or massively elaborate, continues to surprise me.

Discerning Our Gifts

2010-05-25T20:18:00.002-04:00

'Tis the cup seen, not tasted, that makes the infant moan.
For once let me press firm my lips upon the moment‟s brow,
For once let me distinctly feel I am all happy now,
And bliss shall seal a blessing upon that moment‟s brow.1

Time for All Ages
The subject of our service today is Margaret Fuller, born on this day 200 years ago. As was the case with some other prominent women of her day, including many famous Unitarians and Universalists, Margaret did not have opportunities for formal education like that available to boys and young men. So, as a young girl, she obtained a classical education at home from her father.

Later, however, she was sent to a traditional finishing school, to learn the arts taught to women of the day in preparation for being wives and mothers. This was a difficult time for Margaret, as she was torn between the wishes of her progressive father and a society that did not yet allow women to enter libraries, enroll in colleges, or speak on the lecture circuit.

So, today, I would like to lead you in a brief guided meditation. Close your eyes and imagine that you are in a large gymnasium, standing on the floor in front of a crowd of onlookers…You are a gymnast and before you stands the balance beam…As you mount the beam, your feet grip the four inch plank beneath you…The arena is silent as your arms stretch out to your sides for balance.

Imagine how women like Margaret Fuller felt in the early 19th century…pulled on one side by societal expectations and limitations defining the roles of women…pulled on the other by a well-meaning father who cultivated a love of learning and knowledge…Imagine these forces pulling you one way, then another…your feet cling tightly to the beam while your body makes constant adjustments…The pressure is intense, giving you a taste of the conflict women like Margaret Fuller experienced…outcast in one world, but not fully welcomed in another.

Now, feel within your core, at the pit of your torso, an inner strength…Something that helps you maintain your balance…This force sends tendrils of power through your arms and legs to your feet and hands, helping you to maneuver on the narrow path. As we will learn, Margaret Fuller found her core strength, her unique gift, that helped her to cope and to thrive in life. You, too, can find that gift, or if you have found it already, you can work constantly to hone that gift not only for your own benefit, but for the good of all humanity.

Reflection
Margaret Fuller was born 200 years ago today, on May 23, 1810. Although an educated and intelligent person, many occupations were closed to Margaret and other women of her day. So, at the age of 29, she began holding Conversations at Elizabeth Peabody‟s bookstore in Boston. For four years, Margaret offered two conversation series for women each year on subjects like education, health, and culture that were not typically part of a young woman‟s education.

She also regularly met with transcendentalists of the day, such as her friend Ralph Waldo Emerson. In that same year of 1839, Margaret was asked to serve as the editor of The Dial, a transcendentalist literary quarterly journal. As one of America‟s first literary critics, she began working on a manuscript eventually published in 1844 titled Woman in the Nineteenth Century. The work was the first book-length treatment on the equality of men and women, and spoke frankly on issues including economic and social barriers, prostitution, and homosexuality.

Hired as a journalist on Horace Greeley‟s New York Daily Tribune, Fuller became one of America‟s first foreign correspondents when she sailed to Europe, met famous authors, and wrote about the conditions of the poor and the common worker. In Rome, she met and fell in love with a nobleman named Ossoli who fathered her son Angelino. Both were active in the Italian Revolution, and were eventually forced to flee, sailing for America. In July 1850, their ship struck a sand bar during a storm off the shores of Fire Island, drowning Margaret, Ossoli, and their son. She died at the age of 40 and her manuscript on the history of the Italian Revolution was never recovered.

Sermon – Discerning Our Gifts
Imagine at the moment that you are born, you sit in a large chair at the head of a long table. This table stretches out away from you, so far that you cannot see the end in the dim shadows. Covering the table are wrapped presents of every conceivable shape and size. Some are wrapped in bright cartoonish patterns and colors. Some have elaborate ribbons and bows adorning their sides. Others sit simply in plain shades or foil.

Without lifting or unwrapping them, you can guess the contents of many of the packages. One large, irregular shape is clearly a bicycle. Another box has circular holes, perhaps providing air for a puppy or kitten. A spherical shape is almost certainly a bowling ball. And many have that distinctive shape of a folded shirt, or even worse, a row of socks.

Smaller packages abound as well. Flat and rectangular boxes for ties or scarves, long and thin boxes for bracelets and a few small cubes for earrings and, perhaps, even a ring? But, many of the contents remain mysterious, with no obvious clues to divulge their identities merely based on visual observation.

As you scan the horizon of colors and shapes, you sense that one of these packages somehow differs from all the rest. You perceive, perhaps on an instinctual, irrational level, that one of these presents contains something special and unique. You feel that there is one gift before you that no other person has on their table of life.

You have no idea what this special gift looks like, its shape or size, where it lies on the table, or what other presents surround or even cover it. Perhaps it sits in clear view, apart from other gifts. Or perhaps it lies buried beneath a mountain of other gifts of varying importance. Your special gift may be the first one on the table, right under your nose. Or it may lay far off in the unseeable future. But, somehow, you know that that gift is there, somewhere, in the world of things you will receive in your life.

“Discernment” is a very popular word among those involved in preparing candidates for the Unitarian Universalist ministry. Evaluations rely very little on actual knowledge or accomplishments. Instead, committees charged with admitting aspiring ministers into fellowship place the most emphasis on the growth the person showed during the process of preparing for the ministry, the discernment process.

Sadly, we don‟t place a similar emphasis on discernment in everyone‟s life. Instead, our schools and places of work depend on memorized facts and formulae, rather than the actual course of learning itself to evaluate students and employees. In fact, I might argue that far more important than diplomas and certifications rank the development of the love of learning, the openness to new ways of thinking, and the appreciation of the unique over the mundane.

So, with the help of Margaret Fuller, let us today explore a three-pronged hypothesis: first, we must acknowledge that we have gifts to be discerned; second, that in order to discern these gifts, we must suffer as that is the natural catalyst for identification; and third, we must know that this gift is not ours alone, but belongs to all of humanity.

Margaret Fuller‟s work on women‟s rights and equality helped people understand that the possession of unique gifts was not merely the purview of men. The classical education she developed with her father equipped her to consider life options outside the realm of possibility for most women of her era. After a brief career as a teacher, Margaret realized that education was not her life‟s vocation. Her felicity with language, however – both in conversation and in writing – was her expertise. In her landmark treatise on the status of women, Fuller wrote:

Whether much or little has been done or will be done, whether women will add to the talent of narration, the power of systematizing, whether they will carve marble, as well as draw and paint, is not important. But that it should be acknowledged that they have intellect which needs developing, that they should not be considered complete, is important.
So much is said of women being better educated, that they may become better companions and mothers for men. They should be fit for such companionship. Earth knows no fairer, holier relations than that of a mother. It is one which, rightly understood, must both promote and require the highest attainments. But a being of infinite scope must not be treated with an exclusive view to any one relation.
Give the soul free course, let the organization, both of body and mind, be freely developed, and the being will be fit for any and every relation to which it may be called.2

This last part offers a spectacular wisdom from this otherwise common sense advice. If you find your unique gift and put yourself wholly into it, the result will prepare you to face every challenge of your life. The return on your investment in your gift will
far exceed any specific goals associated with its direct tasks in ways unknowable at the outset.

As we learned during our Time for All Ages, Margaret was deeply conflicted by her father‟s views on women‟s education that varied wildly from the social norms of the day. The conflict handicapped Margaret in her young adult years, leaving her feeling isolated among her friends. Unitarian Universalist religious educator Betsy Hill Williams writes that Margaret Fuller‟s life was “a constant balancing act between being part of the world in which she lived and being her own true self…She loved being a sister, daughter, wife, and mother, but she hated that many women were forced into being those things – even when they didn't want to be.”

Beyond this conflict of spirit, Fuller also suffered from chronic migraines and insomnia for much of her life. The notion of the centrality of suffering in our lives would have been one of common discussion among Margaret‟s transcendentalist friends. The recent influx of the writings of Asian philosophers and religions would have exposed her circle to Buddhist thought on the subject.
The four Noble Truths of Buddhism center on the knowledge that Life is suffering. The source of suffering is our attachment to transient things, things that lack permanence. The core of Buddhist teaching consists of instruction in how to cease the suffering in one‟s life. In her Memoirs, she indicated an awareness of this philosophy when she wrote:

When disappointed, I do not ask or wish consolation – I wish to know and feel my pain, to investigate its nature and its source; I will not have my thoughts diverted, or my feelings soothed; ‘tis therefore that my young life is so singularly barren of illusions. I know, I feel the time must come when this proud and impatient heart shall be stilled, and turn from the ardors of Search and Action, to lean on something above. But – shall I say it? – the thought of that calmer era is to me a thought of deepest sadness; so remote from my present being is that future existence, which still the mind may conceive.3

Therefore, while no Buddhist herself, Fuller acknowledged the relationship of Life to suffering. Rather than simply ignore pain, she sought out ways to better understand how pain arose in her life. And, rather than avoid pain, she inquired into its revelatory possibilities.

The study of religion, and beyond to the nature of the human spirit, was a subject of deep interest to Margaret Fuller. Throughout her adult years, she identified increasingly with mysticism and that the “real church was the inward life of solitary spiritual illumination, not the building…whose very steeple pointed beyond itself.”4 Again, from her seminal work on women:

Mysticism, which may be defined as the brooding soul of the world, cannot fail of its oracular promise as to Woman. "The mothers," "The mother of all things," are expressions of thought which lead the mind towards this side of universal growth…if it be true, as the legend says, that Humanity withers through a fault committed by and a curse laid upon Woman, through her pure child, or influence, shall the new Adam, the redemption, arise. Innocence is to be replaced by virtue, dependence by a willing submission, in the heart of the Virgin-Mother of the new race.

Fuller and the other Transcendentalists saw mysticism as an intuitive quest for spiritual emancipation. Margaret especially saw mysticism as critical to defining the democratic individuality at the heart of this world view for women. And yet, she also possessed a Taoist appreciation for the cosmic implications of mysticism – what would today be a very modern quantum approach to a Universalist theology. Once more from her Memoirs:

I remember how, as a little child, I had stopped myself one day on the stairs and asked, how came I here? How is it that I seem to be this Margaret Fuller? What does it mean? What shall I do about it? I saw how long it must be before the soul can learn to act under these limitations of time and space and human nature; but I saw, also, that it MUST do it – that it must make all this false true – and sow new and immortal plants in the garden of God before it could return again. I saw that there was no self; that selfishness was all folly, and the result of circumstance; that it was only because I thought self real that I suffered; that I had only to live in the idea of the ALL, and all was mine.5

So, our conversation with Margaret Fuller today explored the notion that we must acknowledge that each of us has a unique gift to be discerned; that in order to discern these gifts, we must suffer as that is the natural catalyst for identification; and that we must know that this gift is not ours alone, but belongs to all of humanity. In a sense, we check this gift out of the cosmic library and may use of it throughout our lifetimes. Margaret Fuller‟s gift was her ability to see women as complete souls, deserving of the same rights and privileges of men, and able to contribute equally not only in the home, but in the community and the world. And, her gift included possessing the voice and the hand to speak and write that vision for others to heed. We have Margaret Fuller to thank for an unknown number of women and men influenced by her words.

The tragedy of our modern world is that, perhaps for the first time in human existence, every person has the capacity to discern their truly unique gift, their purpose in life. And yet, greed and ignorance, lingering tribalism, and ever present courage-sapping fear keep us from achieving this marvelous transformation of society. For if every person were free to discern and to act upon their gift, our reliance on systems of ownership and control would shrink into insignificance; our worship of celebrity would dwindle into the quaint purview of nostalgia; and our culture of violence would fade into a pseudo-history of myth and legend whose only remaining purpose would be to frighten small children and provide us with amusing anecdotes.

Have you sought out and identified your unique gift? What forces push and pull you as you walk the balance beam of life? And, once you find your gift, how will you utilize it to better not only your own life, but the lives of those around you?

Closing Words
Let me but gather from the earth one full-grown fragrant flower;
Within my bosom let it bloom through its one blooming hour;
Within my bosom let it die, and to its latest breath
My own shall answer, “Having lived, I shrink not now from death.”6

1 From Memoirs, (cited in The Wit and Wisdom of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, ed. by Laurie James, p. 1)
2 From Woman in the Nineteenth Century, (cited in James, p. 29)
3 From Memoirs, (cited in James, p. 17)
4 Schmidt, Leigh Eric. Restless Souls: The Making of American Spirituality, p. 48.
5 From Memoirs, (cited in James, p. 16)
6 From Memoirs, (cited in James, p. 1)

An Empty Seat of Sadness and Satisfaction

2010-05-17T02:55:00.003-04:00

Yesterday was my commencement ceremony from seminary. But, my seat stood vacant as circumstance kept me from attending my graduation from Meadville Lombard Theological School and receiving my Master's of Divinity degree. Months ago, I made the decision to skip this milestone event based on predominately financial reasons. As the date drew closer, health issues had also intervened to make participation troublesome. But, I will admit that much of my decision derived from indifference of attending yet another similar celebration after a lifetime of educational efforts. I had convinced myself not to care about my absence.

Then I received a message from one of my dearest friends - a fellow seminarian whose life path has paralleled mine many times over the years in spite of physical distance separating us. She mentioned my empty seat next to hers and all I felt was sadness for missing a special and unique opportunity and sharing a moment with this loving colleague. I was reminded of a time perhaps 10 years ago. It was midweek preceding a youth conference I was attending as a sponsor, chaplain, and van driver. I learned that my favorite uncle had died and that the funeral was being held that weekend - in a distant city. I did not have the money for the trip, but what really prevented me from going anyway was my desire to fulfill my obligation to our youth and to be with them at the con.

You see, my uncle was a lay Baptist minister who served a small congregation for many years. I knew as truly as one can know in my heart that he would rather I spend that time ministering with my youth than flying to spend time with unknown cousins and other distant relatives. As it turned out, the con was an amazing experience and I felt the vibrant presence of my uncle with me during that Saturday night worship service.

Similarly, yesterday I preached at a neighboring fellowship on one of my topics of evangelical calling - atheism. I find that when I preach on the subject that many listeners, who otherwise find little of themselves in our spoken and sung religious messages, finally feel that a clergy person is speaking directly to them and inviting them into the fold of community. It was a joyous opportunity for me, as it always is, to experience that frontier of potential for ecstasy and transformation.

I suppose that that is when you know that you are truly living life. When you have so many opportunities to serve and to celebrate, to experience and explore, that you cannot achieve them all, then you know that you are not just existing. I wish I could have filled that empty seat, that seat of momentary sadness in my life. I would have loved to be with my colleagues celebrating the sacrifice and hard work of completing our seminary training. But, I overflow with the sensation that my choice afforded me yet one more opportunity to do the work of ministry - to inspire and inform, to encourage and empower, to be with other people in all their vulnerability and courage in an atmosphere of worship.

Maybe someday, I'll find a way to physically occupy that seat of sadness and satisfaction. For now, only my spirit sits as my body continues walking.

Rethinking Our Holidays

2010-05-13T07:07:00.003-04:00

Most Americans know Unitarian Julia Ward Howe as the author of The Battle Hymn of the Republic. But, her signature song is only one landmark in a long and active life. Howe was involved in many social reform movements. She opposed slavery and later worked with Lucy Stone and others on women’s rights issues. But, her early career in the 1840's began as a writer. She published a number of scholarly articles in the New York Review and the Theological Review. Ten years later, after publishing collections of poetry, she wrote her first play, Leonora, that was “condemned as immoral” and closed after one week in New York City. She certainly was a woman possessed of many talents.

But, back to The Battle Hymn of the Republic. A year or two before Leonora was shut down, a South Carolinian named William Steffe wrote a stirring campfire spiritual song. In no time, the song spread across the country. Two years later, on the eve of the American Civil War, John Brown died leading a raid on the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry. Out of his death came the infamous John Brown’s Body version of the song, which inspired the anti-slavery forces. Shortly after that, the Civil War began, pitting the Confederate states of the American South against the Union forces of the Northern states.

Two years later, Unitarian minister James Freeman Clarke heard Union soldiers singing the song and asked Howe to write more uplifting lyrics. That night by candlelight, Julia wrote the now famous lyrics. That is the story of how a Southerner, with the help of two Unitarians, is responsible for the most patriotic song of the Union forces in the Civil War. By the way, for those of you who love irony, the music for the song Dixie was written by a Northerner.

The Battle Hymn of the Republic was all but forgotten until the 1940's, when choral conductor Fred Waring re-introduced the song on his network radio show during World War II. The tune was such a hit for the Pennsylvanians, that Waring featured it as the closing number in his live concerts for the next 32 years. During the Civil Rights era, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. referenced lyrics from the song in sermons and speeches, including his last public words. The Battle Hymn of the Republic lives on as a cultural icon in film, music, books, and even video games.

Reflection (from “Our God is Marching On,” by Martin Luther King, Jr. )

On March 25, 1965, the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke from the steps of the Courthouse in Montgomery, Alabama. In this speech, he quoted the first and fourth verses of Julia Ward Howe’s Battle Hymn of the Republic. The following is a short excerpt from that speech.

The battle is in our hands. And we can answer with creative nonviolence the call to higher ground to which the new directions of our struggle summons us. The road ahead is not altogether a smooth one. There are no broad highways that lead us easily and inevitably to quick solutions. But we must keep going.

My people, my people, listen. The battle is in our hands. The battle is in our hands in Mississippi and Alabama and all over the United States. I know there is a cry today in Alabama, we see it in numerous editorials: "When will Martin Luther King...and all of these civil rights agitators and all of the white clergymen and labor leaders and students and others get out of our community and let Alabama return to normalcy?"

But I have a message that I would like to leave with Alabama this evening. That is exactly what we don't want, and we will not allow it to happen, for we know that it was normalcy in Marion that led to the brutal murder of Jimmy Lee Jackson. It was normalcy in Birmingham that led to the murder on Sunday morning of four beautiful, unoffending, innocent girls. It was normalcy on Highway 80 that led state troopers to use tear gas and horses and billy clubs against unarmed human beings who were simply marching for justice. It was normalcy by a cafe in Selma, Alabama, that led to the brutal beating of Reverend James Reeb...

The only normalcy that we will settle for is the normalcy that recognizes the dignity and worth of all of God's children. The only normalcy that we will settle for is the normalcy that allows judgment to run down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream. The only normalcy that we will settle for is the normalcy of brotherhood, the normalcy of true peace, the normalcy of justice.
(http://www.historicaldocuments.com/MartinLutherKingOurGodIsMarchingOn.htm)

Sermon – Rethinking Our Holidays

After Julia Ward Howe wrote The Battle Hymn of the Republic, the American Civil War raged on for four more bloody years of death and destruction. Five years after that, the Franco-Prussian War broke out in Europe and Howe acted. She began a one-woman global peace crusade, starting with an appeal to womanhood to rise against war. She went to London to promote an international Woman's Peace Congress. That effort failed, so she returned to Boston and initiated a Mothers' Peace Day observance on the second Sunday in June. That meeting was observed for a number of years.

Now, there were other movements afoot to create a day honoring mothers. Ann Jarvis was a young Appalachian homemaker who tried to improve sanitation through what she called Mothers' Work Days before the Civil War. When Jarvis died in 1907, her daughter Anna worked to found a memorial day for women. The first such Mother's Day was celebrated in Grafton, West Virginia on May 10, 1908, at St. Andrew’s Methodist Episcopal Church, where Anna’s mother had taught Sunday School. From there, the custom caught on and eventually spread to 45 states.

In 1913, Congress declared the second Sunday in May to be Mother's Day. The following year, President Woodrow Wilson made Mother’s Day a national holiday. Now, this is long before radio and television, and advertising was still a new industry. But, the growing American consumer culture had successfully redefined women as buyers for their families. Politicians and businesses eagerly embraced the idea of celebrating the private sacrifices made by individual mothers. As the Florists' Review, the industry's trade journal, bluntly put it, "This was a holiday that could be exploited."

The new advertising industry quickly taught Americans the best way to honor their mothers – by buying flowers. Since then, Mother's Day has ballooned into a billion-dollar event. Again, for those of you who appreciate irony, Anna Jarvis became increasingly concerned over the commercialization of Mother's Day, saying, "I wanted it to be a day of sentiment, not profit." She opposed the use of greeting cards, calling them "a poor excuse for the letter you are too lazy to write." In 1923, Jarvis filed suit against New York Governor Al Smith, over a Mother's Day celebration. When the suit was dismissed, she began a public protest and was arrested for... disturbing...the peace.

Most Unitarian Universalist congregations routinely observe Easter, Christmas, Passover, Hanukkah, Palm Sunday, and Yom Kippur, in addition to other holidays derived from Christian and Jewish traditions. We can understand the rationale for these celebrations and even concur with our commitment to them. But, harder to understand is our lack of uniquely Unitarian Universalist religious holidays. We engage in a Flower Communion in June – a deeply moving and meaningful practice honoring our service and dedication to justice across the globe. Many of our churches embrace a Water Communion ritual at the end of summer that embodies a spiritual depth and that unifies us in our common human experience. But, we do not set aside whole days to perform these worthy worship elements, nor do we plan our life activities around them for preceding days or weeks.

We can acknowledge the importance of Christmas and Easter to our Christian colleagues, both within this congregation and without. We can respect the place of Yom Kippur and Passover to all of our Jewish comrades. Thankfully, some of our churches offer solstice celebrations for our Wiccan and neo-pagan members and friends. But, where are the religious holidays that every Unitarian Universalist can embrace as his or her own, not just out of a sense of shared joy and reverence, not just out of tradition or habit, but out of true ownership?

The battle is in our hands. And we can answer with creative nonviolence the call to higher ground to which the new directions of our struggle summons us. In doing so, we too can disturb the peace. We can disturb the peace of normalcy that for too long has suffered the manipulations of the self-righteous and the war profiteers. We can disturb the peace of normalcy that turns every decent expression of sentiment and honor into an opportunity for retail sales and advertising bonanzas. For we can and should reclaim Mother’s Day for the purpose Julia Ward Howe intended. The Mother’s Day for Peace should rise up again to help us create a normal world where every person is regarded with inherent worth and dignity; a normal world with justice, equity, and compassion; a normal world with peace, liberty, and justice for all.

Three years ago, Unitarian Universalist women in Kansas City began planning an event for the upcoming Mother’s Day. “Julia's Voice” is a group of mothers and others joined together to return Mother’s Day to its original intent. They peacefully assembled along a public sidewalk and, standing shoulder to shoulder, were joined by Julia Ward Howe re-enactors, musicians, and other special guests. That is one way to reclaim our holiday. There are many others. We can take the money we spend on greeting cards and use it to send letters to politicians and businesses and tell them what we think about war.

We can take the money we spend on flowers and use it to provide microloans, or to buy alternative gifts for women across the world in need of our assistance. We can use the day to write, to study, to talk with each other and plan for our future. And, we don’t have to wait for Mother’s Day to honor the mothers in our lives.

The original Mother’s Day for Peace envisioned by Julia Ward Howe possessed deep meaning. The origins of Father’s Day lack even this hint of significance beyond a maudlin celebration as manipulated by commercial interests. The beginnings of the first Father’s Day celebrations derived from people listening to Mother’s Day sermons in the early 1900’s. It was not until the 1930’s, however, when the Associated Men's Wear Retailers formed the National Council for the Promotion of Father's Day, that a concerted effort to legitimize the holiday arose.

People were slow to accept Father’s Day because they saw the holiday for the marketing device that it was. And yet, people increasingly felt compelled to buy gifts in spite of the facade, and the custom of giving gifts on that day became progressively more accepted. By 1937, the Council calculated that only one father in six had received a present on that day. By the 1980’s, the Council proclaimed that they had achieved their goal: that one day holiday had become a three-week commercial event, a "second Christmas."

Well, if Madison Avenue can create a holiday celebrated across the country by millions of people, why can’t we reshape that holiday into one with deeper meaning and perhaps with broader purpose? Why can’t we, as we reclaim the Unitarian Universalist heritage of Mother’s Day as a day promoting world peace, recast Father’s Day with a new intent and with a new range of activities and ways to involve everyone in our religious communities?

As Unitarian Universalists, we affirm and promote the free and responsible search for truth and meaning. What exactly does that mean to you? When you come here for Sunday School classes, how do you see yourself freely and responsibly searching for truth and meaning?

For me, it means that I will think for myself and not let other people do my thinking for me. It means that when I decide to do something, I will do it because I want to, not because other people want me to. And, it means that whatever I think or do in my life, I want those thoughts and actions to mean something – to be important.

Now, I hope that everyone here has had a father, or one or more people in your lives who served the role of fathers. And I hope that the relationship that you have with that person is a loving one. You should feel free to take the time to honor and to share your thoughts with that person anytime, and not wait for the calendar to limit you. There is no rule that says that you must wait until Father’s Day to reach out to the fathers in your life. So, what then do we do with the Father’s Day holiday? As we reclaim Mother’s Day for world peace, let us rededicate Father’s Day as a celebration of domestic peace – peace in our homes and peace in our hearts. Responsive reading #602 in the back of our hymnal quotes Lao-Tse, the central founding figure of Taoism 2,500 years ago.

If there is to be peace in the world, there must be peace in the nations;

If there is to be peace in the nations, there must be peace in the cities;

If there is to be peace in the cities, there must be peace between neighbors;

If there is to be peace between neighbors, there must be peace in the home; and

If there is to be peace in the home, there must be peace in the heart.

The essence of this wisdom is this. We must have peace within ourselves and our families before we can become peacemakers in our communities and in our world. Father’s Day can become a time for reflection and study about our own lives; a time for families to bond and resolve differences; a time to strengthen the foundation of peace that can lead to a world without war. For the more practically-minded, Father’s Day can become a day to support agencies that combat domestic violence and that support healthy lives for children.

Mother’s Day and Father’s Day as we currently celebrate them can represent a noble exercise. Those who fulfill the roles of mothers and fathers in our society deserve our respect and our recognition. The question we must ask ourselves, however, is this. How do we best honor our mothers and fathers? How do we best honor the parents of all the other children of the world? How do we best honor those who assume this responsibility for tomorrow’s children?

Considered together, a Unitarian Universalist revisioning of Mother’s Day and Father’s Day can celebrate men and women as role models for children and as partners for each other. As religious celebrations, these holidays can represent our commitment to the principles of our covenant, from the inherent worth and dignity of every person to the goal of world community, with peace, liberty, and justice for all.

An essential broader message overlays this idea to remember when you leave here today, when you sit at your desk this week, or when you return to school in a couple of months. Ask questions when you do not understand why things are the way they are. Challenge rules and beliefs that you see as unfair or oppressive. Use what you acquire here on Sunday morning to shine a religious light on all aspects of your life. Use that religious lens to rethink every aspect of your life, of our society, and of our world.

Closing Words (adapted from the Mothers' Day Proclamation by Julia Ward Howe, 1870

Arise, then, men of this day! Arise all men who have hearts, whether forged from fire or from fears! Say firmly: We will not have our families damaged by outmoded stereotypes. Our partners shall not come to us, cowering and frightened. Our sons and daughters shall not go into the world equating manliness with malevolence, but with mercy. Our children will know men capable of compassion with strength; patience with wisdom; and forgiveness with justice. We men of one community must be too tender of those of another community to allow our sons to accept violence as a tool of communication. From the bosom of our devastated homes a voice goes up with our own. It says "Men of the world! The fist of anger cannot wield the touch of parental caring and of spousal love."

Living with a Little Assassin

2010-05-09T21:22:00.002-04:00

Anyone who has a pacemaker/defibrillator can explain the feeling. That flush, rush of temperature and cold sweat. That sinking, rising feeling in your upper chest. That sudden dread that the device in your chest (which I call my hockey puck) is going to fire and shock your irregularly beating heart back into a normal rhythm.

Sometimes, it is nothing and you quickly return to your life. Other times, you sense that the pacemaker did its job and corrected the fault. Then, there are those wonderful moments - that second right before it happens - when you know the defibrillator is about to slam that baseball bat at your rib cage.

I had my second shock last Friday. I had enough warning to grab the side of the building and tell my daughter to wait before my device sent a 25 joule shock to my misbehaving ventricle. Of course, I should be happy. My hockey puck did exactly what it was supposed to do. And, I am still alive because of it, for which I am immensely grateful.

I suppose that if this is the worst that life has to throw at me, I should live every day to its fullest and be happy for each sunrise. There are clearly people worse off than me in our world. Were I not fortunate enough to have medical insurance and access to quality health care, I would have left this plane a year ago.

But, there is a special challenge to suffering from ventricular tachycardia. I have been told that I will never know the cause, and finding the right pharmaceutical concoction to control it is going to be a trial and error process for some time to come. And, every day, I am reminded that a small bit of hard wiring in my heart rests posed to flare up and rob me of my future. There is no cure but containment, sort of like having a caged Black Widow strapped inside my chest. I simply must trust the bars of that cage and somehow go on living without the constant fear that it can break out at any time.

My condition makes life an interesting contrast of gratitude and terror, of caution and carefree. I am more committed than ever to making the most of my ministry, of telling people important to me exactly how I feel about them, and truly letting unimportant things go.

So, on this Mother's Day, the lessons are familiar ones. Never wait one minute to tell someone that you love them. Never wait one more hour to set aside pointless worry, shame, and guilt. Never wait one more day to start doing what you love with your life. And, don't wait for your body to get this message through to you.

Setting a Course

2010-04-19T11:36:00.003-04:00

Steward is one of those fascinating words that acquired a multitude of meanings over the centuries. Today, steward generally means one who carefully and responsibly manages something entrusted to their care. Appearing first in early Middle English, the stīweard cared for the pigpens, the ward of the sty. In time, people applied the term to those employed in large households or estates to manage domestic concerns, such as the supervision of servants, the collection of rents, and the keeping of accounts.

As civilization and technology expanded, steward took on the new role of the naval officer in charge of the officer's quarters and mess onboard the ship. The word later became applied to all employees on ships, trains, buses, or airplanes responsible for the comfort of passengers, taking orders for, or distributing food. In early 20th century America, the shop steward became the union representative responsible for dealing with management. High quality restaurants and resorts employ wine stewards – quite a long way from tending the pig’s sty.

Today, stewardship expands even further. The Earth Charter resulted from worldwide, cross cultural dialogue on common goals and shared values. The project began as a United Nations effort, but was carried forward and completed by a global civil society initiative. Launched in 2000 by the Earth Charter Commission, an independent international entity, the work is a declaration of fundamental ethical principles for building a just, sustainable and peaceful global society in the 21st century. The Charter asserts that “common destiny beckons us to seek a new beginning…This requires a change of mind and heart…a new sense of global interdependence and universal responsibility.” In a sense, the Earth Charter stakes the claim that every person is a steward of every community and of our entire planet.

Every other year, the delegates at the General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association select a Study Action Issue for a four-year process of examination. The issue selected in 2008 and currently under review among our congregations – Ethical Eating – may seem from its title to concern only issues of meat consumption and vegetarian or vegan diets. We are certainly not the first religious organization to discuss the production, distribution, and use of food. But, the Ethical Eating Study Action Issue goes far beyond this issue, to include the broad aspects of planetary stewardship.

For instance, some people enjoy many food choices while others remain hungry. The food industry produces wealth, but small farmers and farm workers are often poor. Food production and transportation contribute to many environmental problems. The scope of the discussion encompasses a wide range of stewardship issues, many of which bear relevance as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of Earth Day this coming Thursday. Let’s briefly review some of those issues.

Climate change
Scientific research increasingly links our food production and distribution systems to climate change and the energy crisis, uncovering deep-seated problems with our agricultural infrastructure. Leaders from many faith traditions now call for politicians, business leaders, the agriculture industry, and religious institutions to assume more responsibility for our planet’s health. Ordinary people – not just environmentalists or those working for social justice and rights issues, but people who are busy balancing issues of everyday living – are recognizing that the true cost of food far exceeds what we pay at the cash register. These costs include global warming, pollution, the destruction of ecosystems, and the degradation of fresh water supplies and arable land.

Hunger
We waste over 3,000 pounds of food per second in the United States. According to the Department of Agriculture, each year 27% of food produced for human consumption in America is lost at the retail, consumer, and food service levels. That’s nearly 1.5 tons of food for every man, woman, and child in the United States who face hunger. Globally, 4.3 pounds of food are produced daily for every woman, man, and child on earth – enough to make all of us fat. Yet every year, six million children across the globe die as a result of hunger and malnutrition – that’s one child dying every five seconds. Hunger and malnutrition are responsible for more deaths in the world than AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined.

Trade
In a system of Free Trade, agricultural goods and services flow among countries unaffected by government-imposed restrictions like tariffs, taxes, and quotas that generally increase the costs of goods and services to both consumers and producers. Proponents assert that free trade makes society more prosperous and qualitatively improved by increased commerce. Free trade has been said to decrease war, reduce poverty, enrich culture, enhance security, and increase economic efficiency. Free trade is also understood as a sovereign right of free nations.

In a system of Fair Trade, agricultural goods and services flow among countries based not only on classic economic considerations, but also social, environmental, labor, and sustainability requirements. Fair Trade relies on consumer readiness to pay slightly more for products that empower, rather than exploit, vulnerable populations. Most Fair Trade standards also mandate progress requirements that ensure continuous improvement in the conditions of workers, communities, and the environment.

Fair Trade advocates suggest that we should be at least as concerned with sustainability, environmental considerations, and fairness as we are with efficiency measured in dollars and cents. Also, we must recognize that the conditions in which Free Trade might lead to the best outcomes are not present in much of the Global South with whom the North trades. These include classic economic assumptions such as perfect market information, access to credits and markets, and the ability to change equipment and techniques in response to changing market conditions.

Labor
Historically, large farms in the United States consistently depended on poorly paid labor, often to the point of exploitation. Much of our agricultural system was built on the backs of indentured and enslaved agricultural workers, and in the 21st century farm workers remain among the lowest paid laborers in our economy. In recent centuries, immigrants from Europe have been able to leave America’s fields within a single generation; immigrants from Africa, Latin America, Asia, the Caribbean, and the Pacific Islands have fewer options, however, and disproportionately toil under inhuman conditions for less than living wages for generations.

In addition to its low wages, agricultural labor today features some of the economy’s most dangerous jobs. From physical demands to operating unfamiliar and ill-maintained equipment to exposure to animal bacteria and massive doses of chemical pesticides and fertilizers, agricultural work ranks as the second most dangerous occupation according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. And, workers who do not speak or read English are often at greater risk for injury due to insufficient notification of occupational hazards.

Neo-colonialism
Neo-colonialism exists when a nation or state appears sovereign and independent, but has its economy, politics, and/or culture largely directed from outside, often by a former colonial or imperial power. Modern trade, immigration, and foreign aid policies in Europe and the U.S. continue to exacerbate the historic ravages of colonialism for indigenous and subjugated peoples worldwide.

Poor regions of the world shift from producing crops that support their self-sufficiency to “cash crops” valued by the dominant world economy, like cotton, tobacco, sugar, tea, rice, coffee, cocoa, bananas, pineapples, corn, soy beans, and livestock. Combined with free market economics, this perpetuates dependent, inequitable relationships and a system of poverty, malnutrition, and exploited labor. Because indigenous and poor populations lack access to traditional hunting, gathering, and farming lands, they must resort to foreign diets, whose poor quality and highly processed nature lead to nutrition related diseases.

Environmental justice
Just as power in society has been misused to oppress various social groups in the U.S. (people of color, women, GLBTQ people, people with disabilities, and so on), power has also been misused to create vast areas of environmental devastation throughout the world and to thwart attempts at environmental reform and preservation. Today there is growing realization that negative environmental impacts disproportionately burden socially marginalized groups in developing countries abroad.

Proponents of environmental justice argue that one of the significant reforms needed is a shift in the dominant worldview that commodifies land and objectifies living things. Proponents of environmental justice encourage a shift from viewing the environment as a resource to exploit to a web of interconnected living things, and the source of life itself. In addition, proponents advocate for prioritizing the needs of low income people, people of color communities, and other oppressed groups, who disproportionately lack access to nutritious food, clean air and water, parks, recreation, health care, education, transportation, and safe jobs. Self-determination, participation in decision-making, and gaining control over land and resources are also key components, since justice making activities not accountable to oppressed communities tend to perpetuate the very oppression they try to fight.

Animal rights
The simple act of eating expresses one of our most basic and profound relationships with Earth and life. For some of us, our main connection to non-human animals is through our forks and knives. But, the freezer pack wrapped in cellophane bears little resemblance to the creature that sees and breathes and sighs. As Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, “You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity.”

Zoologists, biologists, and cognitive ethologists all now agree that animals are emotional beings, and that like us, they evolved capacities for satisfaction and frustration, pleasure, and suffering as biological necessities. Though animals are often considered part of “the environment,” the complexity of their experience suggests that they are much more than animated gardenias or slabs of granite. Animals are not so much a part of environment as they are subjects moving through the environment, with experiences all their own. As anyone who has gotten to know a dog, cat, bird, pig, or cow can tell you, animals are experiencing, sentient creatures with wants, needs, and frustrations. At the heart of the impulse we call religious is the desire to lessen suffering and to extend justice and compassion.

Climate control, hunger, trade, labor, neo-colonialism, environmental justice, animal rights – this is a massive agenda. Even the combined energy, courage, and faith of the more than 1,000 Unitarian Universalist congregations in the United States cannot hope to address all of these issues in significant ways. Some religions comprise mighty armadas in the ocean of social, political, and economic issues. Relatively speaking, one might imagine us a single light cruiser patrolling the shores against the currents of circumstance and the waves of human need.

But, we should not let our size, whether we consider our denomination or just this congregation, limit our dreaming and striving for a better world. O. Eugene Pickett, one-time President of the Unitarian Universalist Association once said, “We pray that we may live not by our fears but by our hopes, not by our words but by our deeds.”

Ours is an empowering faith. We may not make huge inroads in every field of social justice. Sometimes, we are just the jounaling observer of the beauty around us, or the barking dog bellowing for justice. Whatever role we play, we can ever steer our steward-ship in the direction of action and service to humankind and to our planet. Every one of us can live by our hopes and deeds, setting a course toward a world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all.

The Earth Charter begins with the following Preamble.

We stand at a critical moment in Earth's history, a time when humanity must choose its future. As the world becomes increasingly interdependent and fragile, the future at once holds great peril and great promise. To move forward we must recognize that in the midst of a magnificent diversity of cultures and life forms we are one human family and one Earth community with a common destiny. We must join together to bring forth a sustainable global society founded on respect for nature, universal human rights, economic justice, and a culture of peace. Towards this end, it is imperative that we, the peoples of Earth, declare our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life, and to future generations.

In our individual lives, as a congregation, and as Unitarian Universalists, may we find ways to steer the course of our stewardship to such lofty purpose.

NOTE: Much of the material cited in this sermon comes from the Ethical Eating Study Action Issue Study Guide, a wonderful resource of information and links for further research.