Bells

(As background context, when I started at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton, I found an old fashioned school bell sitting on the pulpit, which inspired this sermon.)

I moved into my apartment here in Smithton a little over a month ago. In the weeks preceding installation of my internet access, I sat reading most evenings in my easy chair. On the first night of silent study, I was suddenly jolted out of my chair at 9:00 p.m. by the siren of the Volunteer Fire Department in the building next door. Apparently, they test the alarm with a single cycle each night at exactly that time. A few nights later, the alarm sounded three times in the wee hours of the morning. I have subsequently learned that our fire company responds to many emergency calls in the region, particularly accidents up on Interstate 70.

Roughly once an hour each day, I also hear the horns of the passing trains and the bells of the crossing gates on Peer Street and Second Street, just a few blocks north and west of the church. The laying of the old Baltimore and Ohio line preceded the founding of this congregation in 1860 by just a few years. Now run by the CSX Corporation, the track running through Smithton hauls materials from as far north as Detroit and as far west as Chicago and St. Louis, and from a wide range of destinations throughout the Southeastern United States.

And, periodically throughout the week days here in Smithton, the carillon of the Hope Lutheran Church just down the street chimes. The sound of traditional Protestant hymns float through the air, bringing a calming lilt to the small town quiet. Hearing the tones makes one bemoan the lack of a town commons at that intersection, perhaps with a gazebo for summer concerts and a grassy space for playing children.

Bells serve a myriad of roles in our lives. Doorbells and telephones announce the approach of visitors, heralding their desire for our company and conversation. Dinner bells, often used on farms where the sound must traverse great distances to reach the listener, proclaim the availability of food and the time to cease work and begin the meal. Clocks chime the hour and awaken us from our restful slumbers to start the work day. Timers alert us to completed tasks, and warn us not to exceed set limits.

At a race, a bell announces the final lap. While on Wall Street, a bell proclaims the start of the trading day. In a store, a bell may summon us from the front of the line to someone who will assist us. While in a hotel, we may use a bell to summon that help to us. At school, bells signify the time to move and change our locations and the focus of our studies. Around the neck of a cow or a cat, a bell notifies of comings and goings. And, wind chimes simply resound with the gentle tinkling of just being in the breezes.

Here at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton, we have our own bells. The bell in our steeple was donated when our current structure was built in the late 1880’s. For more than 100 years, our name was the Thomas Universalist (then Unitarian Universalist) Church, in honor of that donor. The ringing of our bell continues to announce to the surrounding community the commencement of our Sunday morning service each week.

We have another bell – a far less imposing figure of a bell. Going through the historical files of our congregation, one finds many mentions of “Mr. Thomas from Philadelphia,” who donated our steeple bell in spite of never seeing our building in person. But, it wasn’t until I found this lone slip of paper that I learned the story of this other bell. It reads:

My mother, Barbara Hermann Bolling was born in 1881. When she was 18 years
of age she became ill with Typhoid Fever and to summon help she was given this
bell.
I am donating this bell to the church for its use only and to remain a part of the church.
Please record this donation in the minutes at your next meeting.

Signed, Clarence Bolling, August 14, 1983

Several aspects of this piece of paper intrigued me. A common disease around the world, typhoid plagues have ravaged human civilizations for centuries. The earliest recorded outbreak occurred in Athens in the fifth century B.C.E., when one-third of the population of this then-thriving metropolis succumbed. In the late 19th century, typhoid fever was well known in American cities, where the typical mortality rate in cities like Chicago averaged 65 per 100,000 people a year. The most notorious carrier of typhoid fever was New York cook Mary Mallon, also known as Typhoid Mary. In 1907, as the first American carrier to be identified and traced, she was associated with 53 cases of the disease and three deaths.

A vaccine was developed by the U.S. Army around that same time. With vaccinations and advances in public sanitation and hygiene, most developed countries saw declining rates of typhoid fever throughout the first half of the 20th century. Antibiotics were introduced in clinical practice in 1942, greatly reducing mortality from typhoid. Today, the incidence of typhoid fever in developed countries is around 5 cases per 1,000,000 people each year. Yet still, an outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2004-05 recorded more than 42,000 cases and 214 deaths.

Probably more curious to me, however, was the wording of the letter, especially when combined with the nature of this unusual gift. Now, I am somewhat knowledgeable of antiques, although I will admit that bells are not a specialty. But, I have little reason to imagine that this bell has any particular monetary value. So, placing conditions that the bell’s donation is contingent on its being used for the church only and that it remain a part of the church is unusual at the least. Even if an item has significant resale value, the recipient of a charitable gift is typically under no obligation regarding the item’s use or eventual disposition.

And yet, upon my arrival, I found this bell not only in the building, but prominently placed here on the pulpit, literally at the nexus of our worship center. I can well imagine that the impetus for putting this bell here is long past and inertia has allowed it to remain in its place. But, as one who tries to stay attuned to the little synchronicities that occur in life, I am inclined to see some meaning in the intersecting vectors of my life with this bell.

For instance, its shape is reminiscent of traditional school bells, when teachers taught many grade levels in a single large room. So, this bell can represent for me my teaching role as minister, and our commitment to lifelong learning. This bell can represent our collective search for truth and meaning, whether that portrays our individual efforts, or our collective labor to provide religious education for children, youth, and adults.

Like other elements of this congregation, this bell represents our long history, serving its function for 120 years. It becomes part of the rich legacy that this building and its hundreds of inhabitants forged in this region, bringing the message of hope and love to the frontier bursting with industrial growth, and the eventual booms and busts of our economy.

But, what strikes me most about this simple bell is the story of its origin. The original purpose of this bell was to summon help. The ringer was calling out from her sickbed for someone to come and offer assistance, to provide sustenance, to support her resistance to a terrible disease. In this way, our lives do indeed resound with the sound of bells. All across the world, bells are tinkling, ringing, chiming, sounding, clanging for help.

(ring bell) When Port-au-Prince, Haiti was rocked by a catastrophic earthquake on January 12, 2010, it affected close to 3.5 million people, leaving hundreds of thousands dead and causing untold suffering for those who survived. Already the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere, Haiti is rife with radical inequality, its society systematically leaving out large numbers of people. For them, daily survival was a challenge even before the earthquake.

(ring bell) The genocidal war in western Sudan's Darfur region has raged for five years, killing more than 300,000 and forcing 2.5 million to flee their villages. The war has particularly targeted women and girls, who face armed attacks each time they leave their camps to find firewood, food, or work. The Sudanese security forces and their allies have used rape and sexual violence as a deliberate strategy of war as a way to shame and destroy families and communities. The violence and subsequent displacement weaken women's support networks and their access to livelihoods, even as many more of them are now heads of households, making it all the more difficult for them to survive.

(ring bell) In this country, our state and federal governments continue denying men and women who love each other of basic human rights. Gay and lesbian couples face discrimination, and still fight for their rights in areas including adoption, employment, taxes and benefits, and their ability to openly serve in their country’s armed forces. This same government that purports to support the family enforces unjust immigration laws. We spend billions of dollars rounding people up, breaking up families, shutting down businesses, and deporting people who are working, learning English, and putting down roots here. Our broken immigration system divides families and keeps loved ones apart for years and even decades, which discourages them from following the rules and working within the system.

(ring bell) The Unitarian Universalist Service Committee stands with those who are working to reverse the cycle of collapse and dependence that has historically plagued Haiti. As hundreds of thousands of survivors stream out of the city in search of water, food, medicine, and shelter, the very structure of the Haitian countryside is changing. Many villages have doubled and tripled in size, and people are scrambling to feed and house everyone. UUSC is partnering with Haitian organizations and social movements to ensure that their vision becomes reality. We can answer this bell by contributing our financial resources, and by becoming members of the UUSC.

(ring bell) While the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee supports a viable peace process to end the conflict in Darfur, action now is needed to weave a web of protection for women and girls in this war-torn land. The UUSC is working to improve women's livelihoods and leadership skills, as well as providing human rights training, coordinating among humanitarian aid agencies in Darfur, and improving security for women living in camps. We can answer this bell by supporting advocacy campaigns, such as the UUSC’s Drumbeat for Darfur campaign, which calls for constant action urging the White House, Congress, and other institutions to make ending the genocide one of their highest priorities.

(ring bell) The Standing of the Side of Love campaign of the Unitarian Universalist Association is building interfaith support for equal treatment for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people in all matters of law. We are working with coalitions and lobbying governments at all levels for laws that protect everyone who face violence, intimidation, and discrimination because of their identities. We affirm the full humanity of all people: harnessing love’s power to stop oppression; honoring the spark of the divine in each and every person; pledging to uphold love as a guiding principle in our treatment of others.

We live in a time when most organized religions are experiencing a decline in active participation. Like Barbara Bolling, we lie ailing in our beds calling out for help. We call out for people to listen to us. We call out for people to be with us. We call out for people to share their lives with us in common purpose and commitment. We do that by sounding the bell of freedom of belief, a well recognized sound in this great nation, made famous at least figuratively by our steeple bell’s cousin across the state in Philadelphia. And, while we may respond to bells ringing for specific causes or concerns, the framework within which we hear that music and respond to those vibrations are the principles of Unitarian Universalism.

So, we will continue to ring our steeple bell at the beginning of services every Sunday. But, we ring our bell not just to proclaim the start of worship to the neighborhood. We ring our bell as a way of answering all of those calls for help that we hear each day. We ring our bell to summon help from others as we struggle to nurture spirits and heal the world. And, we ring our bell in remembrance of those who have gone before and kept this Unitarian Universalist pulpit serving Smithton, Southwestern Pennsylvania, and the world vibrant and free.

Buzz

Intangibles. Intangibles pack our lives, from the depth of love that causes us to weep to the collective exultation of thousands as their home team scores winning points.

After the worship service today, the buzz in the coffee hour lived. The energy of those present flowed like current through a hot wire and filled the kitchen with the vibrant sound of excitement. Conversations rose and crashed like waves across the tables and you could sense the ideas flickering across the room like the light bulbs of an old-time theatre marquee.

I couldn't be happier. When we write sermons, we can never be sure how congregants will receive them. What will people take from our talk? Will people hear the message we intended to transmit? Did the service we designed give people the opportunity to be with each other in spiritual communion; to connect with something beyond our mundane experience; perhaps even to glimpse that nanosecond of ecstasy?

The buzz today gave me my answer, at least for this week. When you look for that intangibles, keeping your senses attuned to the vibrations around you, you never know what impact they can have.

A Nighttime Walk

I took advantage of the wonderful warm weather this week to walk around my new town and explore. Last night, I decided to walk home via the railroad tracks that parallel the Youghiogheny River. The evening quiet was broken only by the sound of the river, swollen from the melting snow, and the occasional car driving over the crossing in the distance.

Then, I heard a whistle far off in the distance. So, I stepped over the tracks and down the sloped, heavy gravel roadbed to a place where I could sit. A minute or so later, I heard the bells of the crossing ahead and saw the incredibly bright lights of the engine approaching. I sat and watched the vague form of the behemoth rush past me in the dark.

Car after car flew by, probably one hundred or more, filled with who knows what going who knows where? What struck me was the massiveness of the creature zooming past and its relatively quiet passing. The well-greased wheels spun noiselessly and one could hardly imagine that thousands of tons were speeding by in the starless evening.

On the one hand, one can hardly help but feel insignificant next to such a marvel that would dwarf a blue whale, or even a herd of elephants. However, the train and thousands like it across the globe was built by us and controlled by us in a complex array of technology and effort.

I returned to the tracks, the sounds of the train now faded, replaced by the gurgling of the water and the occasional scurrying of a nocturnal animal. I breathed in the cool night breeze and looked again at the cloudy sky obscuring the cosmos I knew lie beyond. In spite of our modern accomplishments, nothing yet can replace the calm of strolling, feeling the crunching and shifting of stones beneath one's feet, and reflecting on just being in that noisy quiet.

An Architecture of Hope

There are many famous architects in our denomination’s past. Charles Bulfinch was perhaps the first native born American architect, and whose famous works include many state houses and the U.S. Capitol. Frank Lloyd Wright is perhaps the most famous Unitarian architect of the past century. Some, however, might make a case for Buckminster Fuller, inventor of the geodesic dome and many other futuristic building notions.

A less well-known Unitarian architect was Bernard Maybeck, who was a prominent figure in the Arts and Crafts movement in California in the early 20th century. Charged with overseeing the creation of a master plan for the University of California at Berkeley, Maybeck wrote the following for the competition’s prospectus.

The University is a city that is to be created – A City of Learning – in which there is to be no sordid or inharmonious feature. There are to be no definite limitations of cost, materials or style. All is to be left to the unfettered discretion of the designer. He is asked to record his conception of an ideal home for a university, assuming time and resources to be unlimited. He is to plan for centuries to come. There will doubtless be developments of science in the future that will impose new duties on the University, and require alterations in the detailed arrangement of its buildings, but it is believed to be possible to secure a comprehensive plan in harmony with the universal principles of architectural art.

Bold words; the kinds of words that inspire and make one want to drop everything and become part of something great. Perhaps Maybeck left a less imposing legacy of projects than Bulfinch, Wright, or Fuller. But, then, an architect’s vision, whether built of stone or of words, best reflects his or her true legacy.

Sermon – An Architecture of Hope

Recession, high cholesterol, terrorism, global warming, unemployment, drugs, genocide, poverty, road rage, carcinogens. Our lives abound with threats: threats to our well being; threats to our happiness; threats to our very lives. Like most life forms, we possess certain instinctive reflexes at birth that protect us from harm. But, human society – civilization – cultivates our fear response like a masterfully crafted crop sown in fertile soil. We learn from our earliest days to fear sources of legitimate harm to our bodies and our souls. Elders teach us how to behave to avoid being ostracized – how to blend in. Our media bombard us constantly with warnings about everything from rare medical conditions to what constitutes unacceptable physical appearance and lifestyle choices.

Our ever growing and complex social infrastructure follows a blueprint aimed at guarding us from ourselves and from others, at controlling unwanted urges and fantasies, and at reducing the chance that our choices may cast us too far adrift of established paradigms. That blueprint represents the work of many architects, some working deliberately and others not, toward building an orderly society to manage human community.

We guarantee the progressive growth of our culture with safeguards and laws, checks and balances, and systems of vested interest. We buy insurance to protect our homes, our cars, our possessions, and our lives. We set aside earnings to fund our living costs decades in the future. We invest in corporations, which in turn invest in other corporations, with a goal of accumulating wealth as increasingly measured by electronic ledger entries and quarterly statements.

The events of September 11, 2001 seemed to escalate our architecture of fear in this country. But, I can remember a time when our collective anxiety cut like a honed blade. As a youngster, for instance, I remember that a day hardly passed without seeing a television commercial about the dangers of stray blasting caps to playing children. Thankfully, I just missed the era of students huddling under desks in response to the detonation of an atomic bomb. But, we still grew up in a period when the destruction of the world loomed as more than just a statistically significant probability.

I loved science fiction and horror television shows, from Boris Karloff’s Thriller to Rod Serling’s brilliant and timeless Twilight Zone. The best of these offerings, sadly, lasted only two short seasons. The Outer Limits premiered ominously just two months before President Kennedy’s death. The network deemed the original title of the show, Please Stand By, as too frighteningly similar to Civil Defense messages to broadcast.

You may remember the opening sequence as images of oscilloscope sine waves and a commanding voice informing you “for the next hour, we will control all you see and hear.” When that voice took over the horizontal and the vertical control of my television screen, I sat in rapt attention to see how this week’s bug-eyed monster would wreak havoc on humanity.

Of course, as a seven-year old (who probably had no business watching the show in the first place), I did not comprehend that the “monster” was usually humankind itself, finding some new way to self-destruct, or learn too late that a hubris-induced course of action was horrifically misguided. Like the network executives, I wanted monsters, not morals. The challenge laid in creating a horror of entertainment that somehow surpassed our own endeavors to create terror in real life.

The third episode of the series, titled The Architects of Fear, involved a group of eminent scientists facing the imminent nuclear holocaust. In hopes of staving off an apocalyptic military confrontation between nations, they stage a fake invasion of Earth by an extraterrestrial power in an effort to unite all humanity against a perceived common enemy. To represent the attacking species, the scientists effect biological transformations on one of their own, Dr. Allen Leighton, using genetic material from a rather small and unimposing alien life form already in their possession. The transformed Dr. Leighton is launched into orbit with plans to land his craft in the United Nations plaza.

Of course, in the grand tradition of Greek tragedy and Shakespearean drama, the plan goes awry. The space ship fails to perform as expected, and fearful hunters fatally wound the horrific-appearing Dr. Leighton. The story concludes with the pregnant widow of the sacrificial lamb castigating the other scientists for their thoughtless inhumanity. The show ends with the following control voice narration:

Scarecrows and magic and other fatal fears do not bring people closer together. There is no magic substitute for soft caring and hard work, for self-respect and mutual love. If we can learn this from the mistake these frightened men made, then their mistake will not have been merely grotesque, it would at least have been a lesson. A lesson, at last, to be learned.

I love the juxtaposed phrases here, so let me repeat one sentence. There is no magic substitute for soft caring and hard work, for self-respect and mutual love. This language reminds me of another voice from that era, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., when he described the beloved community. King envisioned a completely integrated society, a community of love and justice, in which men and women would live in true equality and peace in all aspects of social life.

Who are the architects of fear today, whether malicious or benign, for I believe both exist?

• Our news media, which with the passage last year of icon Walter Cronkite, displays the demise of journalism today. We have dozens of news outlets of marginal quality from which to choose, most owned and controlled by the same corporations with their own agendas as to what constitutes news.
• Our government, which continues to engage in questionable military adventures against alleged enemies whose origins often lie within our own attempts at economic control or geo-political domination.
• Our system of law enforcement, which after the sad arrest and treatment of Henry Louis Gates in Boston last year reminds us that it remains a rich and viable culture for sustaining racial bias and judicial double standards.
• Our overburdened educational system, asked to do more tasks and fulfill more oversight requirements with fewer resources each year.
• Our medical establishment, which produces mammoth profits for the few and inadequate care for many.
• Our organized religions, which preach rigid adherence to ancient views often with divisive and violent results.

And, lest we feel too comfortable among these indictments, we also shoulder some of the responsibility for this design work. For every time we fail to speak up against oppression, or quietly acquiesce to systematic power dynamics, we sign our own names to that blueprint as fellow architects of fear.

Who, then, are the architects of the beloved community? Who will craft our architecture of hope? First, let us look to our history. Nearly five centuries ago, the Protestant Reformation elicited waves of violence among people of differing religious belief. In Poland, one group seeking asylum from the violence created the Minor Reformed Church, later known as the Polish Brethren. A woman named Jadwiga Gnoinska persuaded her husband to obtain the necessary charter to form a new town where religious toleration would be guaranteed. Racovia immediately attracted many people of liberal Christian belief.

Racovia became the center, not only of the Polish Brethren, but of great scholarly activity. A school was established that trained over 1,000 students, and a printing press later produced a constant flow of books and tracts. One seminal publication, the Racovian Catechism, refuted the Christian doctrine of original sin as a founding precept of salvation. Baptism was described as a merely symbolic gesture and not a requirement for either infants or adults. Communion was reduced from its sacramental status to that of a common meal perhaps accompanied by preaching and prayer. And, finally, the Racovian Catechism denied the right of a Church institution to exercise authority over individuals, and that a church exists wherever truths are accepted and expounded.

Unfortunately, religious violence continued in Europe and began in Poland. Fighting between Catholics and Protestants broke out regularly and the Polish Senate eventually ordered the Racovian school and press closed. Residents were given four weeks to leave their homes to exile.
After seven decades, the Racovian experiment ended. But, the legacy lived on in the Catechism and other writings, influencing people from the philosopher John Locke to Thomas Jefferson.

An example of intentional beloved community from the 19th century derived from the work of Universalist and Unitarian minister Adin Ballou. Ballou believed in temperance, abolition, and a form of pacifism called Christian Nonresistance. The signatories of his "Standard of Practical Christianity" announced their withdrawal from "the governments of the world" that used force to maintain order.

Ballou came to believe that Practical Christians were called to make their convictions a reality and should begin to fashion a new civilization. After studying other utopian community plans, Ballou and others began to design their own community. In 1841, they purchased a farm and christened it Hopedale.

Hopedale included a boarding school, where many children came to live and learn, including some escaped slaves. One day, Adin called a student who persistently misbehaved to the front of the room. He told the boy that whipping was the usual punishment in most schools for disobedient students. He got a rod and said to the boy, “I cannot bear to whip you; perhaps it will do more good if you whip me. At any rate, I have concluded to try it.” Adin handed the boy the rod and told him to whip him for as long as it took to make him a good boy. The boy looked at his teacher, and at the rod, and began to cry. He promised he would not disobey again and gave no further trouble after that.[i]

After 15 years, the Hopedale Community ended. Two brothers who owned the majority of the shares withdrew their assets, claiming that the community was not using sound business practices. Lacking these resources, the community collapsed. Ballou later wrote, "Times and generations are coming that will justly estimate me and my work...for them, it has proved, I have lived and labored...to them I bequeath whatever is valuable and worth preserving of my possessions."

As the beneficiaries of the legacies of Racovia and Hopedale, we owe it to our descendants to keep trying to design a better society. And we start with our congregations. First, we build and sustain sanctuaries where worship occurs in an atmosphere of beauty and caring; sustained by generations; and open to all who enter. Second, we support a free pulpit, whose occupants speak truth to power; speak truth in love; and speak the truth of ageless wisdom. Third, we provide an institution of education, of liberal thought and learning, where people of all ages study and seek meaning together with open minds and open hearts.

In his first Inaugural Address, Franklin Delano Roosevelt said that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. This sentiment may oversimplify reality. But, fear is a worse enemy than all the objects of our fear. Later in that speech, he added:

Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow men.

We have built a strong foundation in the 1,000 Unitarian Universalist congregations across this nation. Here in Smithton, we possess a sound and attractive physical structure, ministerial resources that staff a vibrant pulpit, and and the will to continuously educate ourselves and, in time, once again provide religious education for all ages. Every reason exists that the blueprint for this congregation could serve as a model for others struggling to respond to the economic challenges of the past year and to peoples’ desperate need for community.

But, to do that we as individuals must also emulate our churches, living as sanctuaries of caring and sharing, speaking as prophetic voices of truth, and engaging as lifelong teachers and learners. We can expand our religious selves into a 24/7 enterprise, spreading our beliefs and commitments into all aspects of our lives. We can use every opportunity available to us to become truth seekers and meaning makers in the world. And, we can never stop teaching, learning, and connecting in vital life experience with brothers and sisters everywhere.

This last point may be the most important. The will of society’s fear architects is powerful and their pockets are deep. We can be sure that the forces arrayed against those of us who stand on the side of love come fully armed with humankind’s most devastating arsenal of conflict. But, whatever calamity ensues, we can endure. We can endure the setbacks if we learn the lessons of our mistakes. We can endure any failures if we keep our toolbox filled with the fire of commitment, the warmth of unconditional love, and the torch of liberal theology. We can endure if we never stop imagining the beloved community, and strive to become its architects of hope.

Ours is an ever evolving religion – A Church of Learning and Experience – in which there is no room for sordid or inharmonious features. We should not limit ourselves due to cost, materials, or style. All should be left to the unfettered discretion of our members and their congregations to record a conception of the ideal religious home, assuming time and resources are unlimited. We should plan for centuries to come. There will doubtless be future developments that will impose new duties and require alterations in planned details. But, we will succeed if we never stop imagining that beloved community, and strive to become its architects of hope.

===========
[i] Pearmain, Elisa Davy. “Adin Ballou and the Hopedale Community.” from Faithful Journeys: A Tapestry of Faith Program for Children, field test draft, 2009.
www.uua.org/religiouseducation/curricula/tapestryfaith/faithfuljourneys/session12/faithfuljourneys-12-psv.doc

The Weight of the World

Beat writer Allen Ginsberg once wrote that poetry is “that time of night, lying in bed, thinking what you really think, making the private world public.” The same can be said of worship. Let us bring into this space of light, seated in community, our commitment to be with one another openly in search of deepest worth and meaning.

Reflection Reading
“Song” by Allen Ginsberg

The weight of the world is love.
Under the burden of solitude,
under the burden of dissatisfaction the weight,
the weight we carry is love.

Who can deny? In dreams
it touches the body,
in thought constructs
a miracle, in imagination
anguishes till born in human –
looks out of the heart burning with purity –
for the burden of life is love,
but we carry the weight wearily,
and so must rest
in the arms of love at last,
must rest in the arms of love.

No rest without love,
no sleep without dreams
of love – be mad or chill
obsessed with angels or machines,
the final wish is love –
cannot be bitter, cannot deny,
cannot withhold if denied:

the weight is too heavy – must give
for no return as thought
is given in solitude
in all the excellence of its excess.

The warm bodies shine together
in the darkness, the hand moves
to the center of the flesh,
the skin trembles in happiness
and the soul comes joyful to the eye –

yes, yes, that's what
I wanted, I always wanted,
I always wanted, to return
to the body where I was born.

San Jose, 1954

Sermon – The Weight of the World

This congregation will soon celebrate the anniversary of its founding 150 years ago in 1860. Entering these doors, one might feel daunted by the rich history those years represent, the hundreds of souls who essences occupied this space, and the energy of heart and mind expended within these walls. The first time I entered this building, I immediately sensed the Universalist roots of this congregation. From the architecture of the structure to the warmth and friendliness of our members, I felt the sense of love, hope, and openness central to our Universalist core. Also, one can hardly help but notice the impressive proclamation on our wall that “God is Love.”

That phrase derives from the fourth chapter of the First Epistle of John the Apostle, which calls on us to “love one another, because… God is love.” The letter’s author explains that God’s love was revealed by sending his only Son into the world so that we might live through him. “Since God loved us so much, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God lives in us, and his love is perfected in us… God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.”

Since the merger of the Unitarian and Universalist churches in 1961, congregations have wrestled with how we carry on the heritage of the founders of our distinct religious denominations within our new Association. In modern times, I can imagine people attending services here pondering these words and wondering, “What exactly do we mean in 2010 when we proclaim that ‘God is Love’ from a Unitarian Universalist pulpit housed in a religious community founded in Universalist traditions?” Do the words of an apostle nearly two millennia ago have meaning for us today?

The founders of this congregation likely agreed that “God” was the god of the Christian texts, the Father of Jesus, whose life and deeds brought the Word to the world. Today, however, “God” can mean many things for many people. And since our adult members were often raised in other religious backgrounds, we should consider the various definitions of this term for current and potential congregants.

For some, God may still represent some version of the Christian God. And, within this broad category lies a wide range of Protestant, Catholic, Orthodox, and other representations of God. For others, God may be Yahweh, who made the covenant with Abraham and imbued Moses with the power to part the waters. Some people may view God as Allah, who spoke through his messenger Muhammad, Ever Forgiving, Ever Providing, the Lord and Cherisher of the Worlds.

Like many Deist founders of this nation, one may consider God the instigator of the universe, the Creator, but not a being involved in the intimate details of human history or in our daily lives. Another, like the Hindu, may consider God the ultimate seed of soul stuff from which we ourselves emerge and to which we will someday return. Still others view God as actively manifest in Nature, either here in the elemental components of our Earth, or perhaps beyond to the nuclear core of suns and the endless vacuum of space.

Then, there are those for whom the term God lacks practical meaning – the atheist who disbelieves God’s existence; the agnostic who lives life accepting that adequate knowledge of God may never arrive; or the nonbeliever who sees participation in a religious community and a theistic theology as mutually inclusive. For these tens of millions in this country alone, we need to be aware that this term may present a barrier to communication and mutual understanding.

I count myself among this latter group. As a child raised Christian, I accepted the Nazarene into my heart. As a teen, however, I grew disillusioned with a distant father God who allowed misery, hate, and violence to run rampant in our world family. As an adult, I rejected all notions of God as outdated, outmoded human concepts created to institutionalize oppression and localize power into the hands of the few.

Many years passed before I moved beyond the anger and hurt I felt when confronted with the term “God.” So, I understand how some people might feel entering our worship space. I know that tension in one’s vulnerable core longing to join with others in the search for truth and meaning. I have experienced that erection of mental barriers in the mind to unwanted messages. I have been that outsider, the Other, unwilling to bend his will to that of the prevailing dogma surrounding him. I know the pain of rejection, of betrayal, even when unintended, by caring people of faith.

Sadly, language does often hinder communication and understanding. “Love” is a term with many meanings and often misconstrued in its various contexts. When I say “I love you” from this pulpit, the assumed meaning differs significantly than speaking those same words at a gathering of friends and family, during the toil of shared labor, or over a candle lit dinner. And, when we proclaim that “God is Love,” one can well imagine these and many more meanings found within the infinity of human circumstance and emotion.

In his 1960 book, The Four Loves, C.S. Lewis discussed the ancient Greek terms defining types of love. For instance, affection or storge, describes fondness, such as that shared between family members or people who have become familiar with each other. Friendship describes the bond between people who share a common interest or activity. The Greek word, philia, is the root of the name Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love.

Eros, the root of our modern word “erotic,” means romantic love, passionate love, with sensual desire and longing. Eros, however, does not have to be sexual in nature. Eros can represent a love for someone for whom you feel more than the love of friendship. Plato added an appreciation of the beauty within that person as eros.

Lastly, charity or agapē often referred to a general affection rather than the attraction suggested by eros. Lewis saw agapē as the greatest of loves, a specifically Christian virtue. His chapter on agapē focused on the need to subordinate the other forms of love to the love of God, who is full of charitable love. Lewis compared love with a garden, charity with the gardening utensils, the lover as the gardener, and God as the elements of nature.

I suspect that long before Lewis’ analysis, our Universalist forebears embraced this interpretation of agapē. For them, “God is Love” emphasized ultimate love felt for the source of love itself. Universalists long plowed the fields of justice, planting the seeds to improve the human condition, cultivating the rights of the oppressed, and harvesting the brotherhood and sisterhood of humankind in common purpose.

So, in my garden, I welcome any definition of God, especially from those who resist the concept entirely. I cultivate the notion that “God” merely represents a term we use as a shortcut to encompass all of the magnificent mysteries of life that bring us together and through which we may experience moments of joy, of insight, and of peace. And, my intentional use of the term allows me to walk hand-in-hand not only with my own faith family, but with those of other religious traditions to effect meaningful change in the world.

Standing on the Side of Love is a public advocacy campaign recently created by the Unitarian Universalist Association that harkens back to this attitude and commitment to agapē. As the campaign materials explain, we live in a time of great hope and possibility, yet our communities are threatened by the increased prevalence of acts motivated by fear and hate. No one should be dehumanized through acts of exclusion, oppression, or violence because of their identities. In public debates over issues such as immigration and the rights of gays/lesbians, bisexuals and transgendered persons, religious people must stand on the side of love and call for respect, inclusion, and compassion.

Now, what does that mean for us, as individuals, or collectively as a congregation? Let us return to our previous discussion, because we still have one more word to analyze. Is. God is love. We do not proclaim merely that God was love. That is, our emphasis lies not solely in the doctrinal assertion that God was made manifest in the body of a first century Jew named Jesus and through whom salvation lies. We do not only proclaim that God will be love. Universalism historically distinguished itself from other Protestant faiths by affirming a belief that a loving God would not condemn us to eternal torment in hell and that all men and women will someday return to a blessed reunion with God in the afterlife. But, in the 21st century, our emphasis lies not simply in the future promise of heaven.

No, our Universalist forebears as well as our colleagues today proclaim that God is love – in the here and now. We may debate over the words of various prophets, or the interpretation of archaeological findings. We may engage in theological discourse over the nature of existence after the death of our mortal bodies. But, by Standing on the Side of Love, our congregations are asked to commit to increased community activism, to exploring new tools of social networking, and to enhancing the amount and quality of our outreach to the media. We commit to equipping ourselves to counter fear and to make love – the charitable love of God – real in the world.

So, as your minister, I am committing to stand on the side of love here in Smithton and in the surrounding communities. I will explore with you your current commitments to social justice and ways that we might expand our impact for change. A redesigned congregational web page and new Facebook group, which I hope you will all visit and offer feedback on, enhances our presence on the internet, reaching out to new generations through their tools of interaction and learning. And I hope to work with you to deliver our liberal religious message to a broader population seeking solace from the stress and strife of the world.

This work is the imperative of our 21st century congregation, for the weight of the world is love. Too many souls struggle, crushed under the burden of solitude, under the burden of dissatisfaction. The weight, the weight we carry is love.

We dream of a just future, construct in our minds a miracle of fairness and equality, which lies anguishing in our imagination until made real by the work of our hands. The burden of our lives, burning with purity in our hearts, is love.

And, as we strive every day to achieve our goals, we must occasionally rest. We rest in the arms of love, of the philia we share in this religious community. For, though we may disagree on the nature of the universe or on the existence of or appearance of any higher powers, we cannot deny that the final wish is love.

This weight is too heavy to bear alone. For all the excellence of dedication and commitment, of ideas and emotions, salvation is not attained in solitude. Here, in this place, our bodies can come together, shining in happiness. Taking a stand for love, proclaiming that God is Love, our souls will come joyful to all eyes.

Back in the Kennel

Well, dear readers, I have been on hiatus for some time as life has intervened. I completed my ministerial internship in New York, moved back to Pittsburgh, spent January in Chicago finishing my last seminary classes, and started my new job as the Consulting Minister for the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Smithton. I am thrilled to be at the helm of this intrepid little church, which is celebrating its 150th anniversary in June.

A great irony in all of these massive changes is moving from our wealthiest congregation back to the real world -- a church building with no computer, no DVD player, and no photocopy machine. But, we've got a wonderful structure, complete with a working bell in the tower, and a feisty group of folks who very much want this congregation to grow and have pinned a large lot of their hopes on my ideas and energy to help them make it happen.

It is a daunting task. Smithton is a town of 400, with one grocery store, one bank, and four bars. But, it also has a tiny public library (the volunteer librarian is a former Lutheran minister) and, the town's pizza shop serves amazing food. I find both of these auspicious coincidences.

So, stayed tuned as I expect my muse will be keeping me very busy in the coming months. And, if you ever find yourself on Interstate 70 south of Pittsburgh, take a one mile detour at exit 49 and stop in for a visit.

Trepidation and Trauma

Back on September 6, I was shocked in the pulpit (literally), when my defibrillator fired during the closing hymn. After a serious increase in medication dosage, my ventricular tachycardia seems to be under control. However, the medication does have side effects with which I am learning to cope.

One side effect I did not expect has occurred when I have been in the pulpit since that event. Each time, I have endured 5-10 minutes of cold sweats, high anxiety, and fear that my device was going to be set off once again. I have fought through each instance with deep breathing, some water, and focus.

After sharing my experiences with a colleague and expressing the fear I was feeling about my ability to continue pursuing a life in the pulpit, she suggested that I had in fact suffered a trauma. She offered some ideas about reclaiming my sacred space and regaining some equilibrium in my life.

I found this suggestion incredibly wise and wondered why I had not thought of it myself. Of course, that is perhaps the first quality of trauma – that we can see it in others but rarely in ourselves. Ironically, I have been leading Building Your Own Theology sessions, where we have discussed definitions of words like sin as separation, and evil as that which prevents creativity from occurring. Anyone who has taken Suzy Pangerl’s course in “Evil, Trauma and Ambiguity” at Meadville Lombard Theological School can certainly relate.

A valuable lesson for me in this ordeal has been the reminder of the delicate connection between body and mind, between physical and mental health. I’m not sure all the pills in the world will help me reclaim my pulpit, and spiritual practice alone will not cure the electrical failings of my heart. Like many things in life, I must find a balance if I am to achieve an equilibrium that will sustain my prophetic voice and my passion for ministry.

Trauma comes in many guises in our lives. If you are suffering and pills provide no relief, perhaps this perspective will be useful. And remember that life is too short to let guilt, shame, or inertia prevent you from seeking the happiness and fulfillment you deserve.