12.23.08
Posted in Rev. Gail Seavey, Sermons at 10:53 am
December 14, 2008
The Rev. Gail Seavey
Many of our beloved holiday stories tell of simple people with few worldly goods wondering what to give those they love: stories of little brothers making trains and balls for their brothers and sisters, of little girls giving handfuls of red flowers, of drummer boys giving their song, of shepherds giving sheep, of Wise Men giving balms to ease the pains of birth and of death. They each give a different presents, but they are all gifts of the heart.
Each Christmas Eve for the last 37 years, my mother takes twelve stoneware flat bottomed bowls out of the cupboard that I made when I was in art school. She ladles oyster stew in them to serve for dinner. Those bowls were gifts of the heart. I was not a good potter. The first stage of throwing the bowls was the hardest for me to do – centering the mound of clay on the potters’ wheel. But the difficulties did not end there. Flat bottomed bowls are much more difficult than round bottomed bowls to make. If the bottom is not perfectly even, they crack while drying or when fired in the kiln. Twelve matching bowls took a great deal of persistence for me the complete. This gift to my mother, from a student who had nothing else to give, were received with such grace by being made part of the annual Christmas ritual, has been a great gift to me.
Making gifts for others gives repeatedly to the giver. I perceived this long before I had words to describe the experience. When I was young, I was so very un-centered that throwing on the wheel was painfully difficult. But I loved clay with a passion. So I made most things out of little balls, coils and pinches of clay putting together vases and planters, sculptured figures and landscapes piece by piece. I did this alone in my studio for years. There I experienced what people call ‘flow’ – total focus and absorption in what I was doing, losing all sense of time and place. I was rarely conscious of what exactly I was making, so the results felt like they came from somewhere else, as if I had ‘channeled’ the images. When I looked at the completed work, however, I knew that the images were coming from parts of me that were cut off, broken, and torn. This was the first gift working with my hands gave me. It was making me whole.
When I told my minister about this she replied, “You are praying with your hands.” I protested, “I don’t pray.” But Rev. Doris Hunter had studied Japanese religion, both Zen Buddhism and Shintoism. She had learned the spiritual practices of the tea ceremony and of calligraphy. She knew that these practices of praying with ordinary actions where similar to Christian Apophatic prayers or prayers without words.
Apathetic prayer often involves the body: hands held together, genuflecting, bowing or prostrating. Eastern Orthodox Christians included the work of the hands painting Icons. Prayers without words are contemplative, meditative, and open to truths that cannot be put into words or symbols, what Christian mystics would call mystery or Buddhists would call Emptiness.
Apparently I had done a lot of praying. Praying with my hands had made me more aware, focused, and centered. It had helped heal my brokenness, mended my soul and made by body into a container that could hold light.
The Hindu traditions have helped me understand apophatic prayer more deeply. The Hindu sacred scripture The Bhagavad Gita teaches three sacred paths: action, knowledge and love. The path of action is the external quest, the way to spirit from the outside in. It consists of four parts. The first two parts are made up of Hinduism’s ethical principles or right actions: non-violence, no stealing, truthfulness, celibacy and non-greed, purity, contentment, self-discipline, self-study and surrender. The third part is the Asanas or yogic positions and the fourth part is the breathing. These four parts are active spiritual practices.
Working with my hands with the discipline of craft had a similar effect as practicing the asanas. It steadied my mind and consciousness so that I became totally engrossed, with dedication and devotion on an object of interest. The contemporary Yogi, Iyengar, in his commentaries on the Sutras of Patanjali, teaches that contemplation on an object is the foundation of mental stability. Total absorption in the object brings about direct perception of its essence, developing awareness and insight into both inner and outer nature. Yogis would say that the body is the bow, the disciplined action is the arrow, and the target is the soul. (Light on the Yoga Sutras, pg. 88.)
The second gift praying with my hands gave me was a spiritual practice, connecting to that which is greater than myself. Many Unitarian Universalists pray with our hands. In a classic Unitarian Universalist text, Everyday Spiritual Practice edited by Scott Alexander, UU’s talk about a variety of ways they practice with their bodies, from Yoga to creating alters, from giving to vegetarianism, from silent retreat to parenting. Several of the writers tell of everyday practices of praying with their hands, including cooking and gardening, needlepoint and painting. They all mentioned the gifts that praying with their hands gave them – they became centered, connected to that which was larger than themselves, and fulfilled. They all discovered in time that the objects that were a result of their hand-prayers transformed into yet another gift, the gift of giving. As they gave other people the products of their hearts and hands — a quilt, a jar of spaghetti sauce, a vase of fresh flowers, a drawing — those other people were warmed, nurtured, supported and energized. In each and every case, the gift-giver received the gift of connection from one heart to another.
During this holiday season we ask the transformative, magical question, ‘What gift can I give?’ I suggest that you give from the prayers of your hands. These gifts need not be sophisticated, professional or one of a kind. Instead, they could arise from the dreams of your lonely mind, your loving heart and your willing hands. By such giving you may receive the precious gifts of greater self-awareness, loving connection to another person, and mindful connection to that which is larger than us all. It is by such giving that we make a Christmas of our own devising.
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12.21.08
Posted in Sermons at 11:28 am
Siobhan is a student from Vanderbilt Divinity School. I am supervising her in her internship with Interfaith Workers Justice, our December offertory recipient, which works to help low-wage workers obtain living wages. The local chapter has been working with the Shur Brite car wash workers to that end.
- Rev. Gail Seavey
November 23, 2008
Siobhan Sargent
What is happening at Shur Brite is redemptive. It is definitely a success story and I have been blessed to be a part of it. I can recall the moment I began to see the owner of Shur Brite, Glenn, as a person, not as the ‘the enemy,’ or the ‘boss’ oppressing his workers, but when I really started seeing him and his face. It was weathered, almost leathery by years of laboring under the sun. I remember he looked rough, not unclean, just worn by time. I don’t remember the color of his eyes but I do remember them. And I specifically remember what it was like to look for the meaning behind those eyes, when he said angrily, “I have never disrespected my workers!” Yet, even in the midst of that heavy moment, I also remember his smile and the lightness of it, as we all laughed at a joke made.
Both parties walked into that room ready and prepared to fight, to engage with one another as enemies on a battlefield. But it was amazing. In the end, Glenn didn’t feel like my enemy anymore; he felt like my brother.
My anger had unraveled into a deeper connection with Glenn
There were concrete moments of reconciliation in the meeting among the bosses, employees and the community. It is those moments that have enabled us to work with the owners on developing things like an employee handbook and even figuring out whether they can put in a break room. Without relationship, without sharing with one another our hopes and concerns, without sharing a little of who we are we would not have been able to improve the working conditions at Shur Brite.
But there are moments that have colored this campaign which need remembering along with its success. It is those moments and those experiences that I want to talk about today.
Instead of exploring how we connected to Glenn and William Smith, let us now turn to the places of disconnect and brokenness that occurred in the relationship and that occur in relationship.
There were times when all our efforts felt in vain, when Walter was angry and frustrated because the owners of Shur Brite did not give him the respect and dignity he deserves as a human being. And there were moments when TC felt alienated and alone living on the streets, suffering from the brute reality of what it means to earn ‘poverty’ wages.
When one feels alienation or anger in these moments of injustice, it is not because we do not care, but it is precisely because we do. Think about an argument with a lover or, even a family member. We feel frustrated and disappointed in the argument not because of a lack of care or love. We feel angry and frustrated because there is disconnect, because something is broken in the relationship. There is a lack of sharing. Yet, in those moments of pain, anger, and frustration we still desire to understand and share with one another and that is exactly why we feel angry and frustrated. It is because we are unable to share. Anger, then, along with frustration and alienation do not indicate a lack of Love. They indicated the Spirit of Love urging us to connect and be in relationship.
Anger is not what prevents us from connecting with one another. Anger is the manner in which the Spirit of Love speaks to our souls, in a persistent voice, calling us back into relationship, calling us through the humiliation and rejection we feel in those places of disconnect. Love can be said to call us, then, by the presence of our anger to resurrect the broken relationship and make it whole again.
To ignore anger is to ignore love and, in turn, that is to deny ourselves and the ‘other.’ For we ought to remember that love, importantly, does not always manifest itself in wholeness. Anger, then, is not only an appropriate response in the face of human depravity, it is the manner in which Love Calls us to action, to reconcile and resurrect a mutually satisfying relationship that has been lost due to injustice. The question becomes how do we respond to that call?
In thinking of this I can’t help but be reminded by the feminist author Audre Lorde. In her book Sister Outsider she too understands that anger plays a very important role, yet it is what one does with that anger that we ought to focus on. She states “Anger expressed and translated into action in the service of our vision and our future is a liberating and strengthening act of clarification.” Reflecting on these words it becomes clear discernment plays a major role in embracing this call of the Spirit of Love, and Anger, as Lorde suggests, always needs translating. When we translate anger, we see that it is an important piece involved in loving one another. For in translating anger we see our own vulnerability to the ‘other.’ We see our denied ‘love’ for the other. Thus, always embedded in Love’s call is our vulnerability to the ‘other,’ to the one in which we where first hurt by.
As a result, we can say that anger is the place where the Spirit of Life and Love rises up and swells in the heart, mind and soul blazing like the sun in the face of darkness, in the face of denied love, in the face of denied relationship. But in order for us to persist and truly blaze like the sun, we must always recognize how anger only arises because we our vulnerable to the one who hurt us, who trampled on our human dignity, who cast our love aside. “Anger,” Lorde goes on to state, “is loaded with information and energy. . . . [One needs (she argues)] to stand still, to listen to its rhythms, to learn within it, (and) to move beyond the manner of presentation to the substance.” Meditating on these words, when we listen to the rhythms of our anger and move to the substance of our anger, it becomes clear that it is merely love saying a resounding “No!” It is saying no to that denial, and that ‘rejection’ of human relationship. To forget this fact, is to forget how the Spirit of Life and Love colors all human relationships in both wholeness and brokenness. In this, I recall the words of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber. He states “All reality is an activity in which I share without being able to appropriate for myself. Where there is no sharing there is no reality.”
Unpacking the words, “Where there is no sharing there is no reality.” We can understand Buber to mean that to share one’s self with another human being, and to really share one’s self with all of creation is the purpose of life. In order to do that, to simply share, there are times when we are called to be angry and to embrace our vulnerability.
If Walter and his co-workers did not embrace that pain and their anger they would not have been able to resurrect their broken relationship with the owners of Shur-Brite. If we had not been vulnerable, if we had not been angry at the injustices taking place in Glenn’s business, we would not have been moved to action. We would not have been able to see Glenn, now as what he is, our brother.
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11.23.08
Posted in Rev. Gail Seavey, Sermons at 7:28 pm
November 16, 2008
The Rev. Gail Seavey
Lullabies that acknowledge life’s suffering such as falling babies, daddies leaving, and overworked mommies, soothe frightened, lonely, crying children the world over into peaceful sleep.
I once heard a story about a father who soothed his children with a prayer. He tucked his child into bed every night singing:
“May the Lord bless you and keep you.
May his face shine upon you,
And grant you great peace.”
And with this prayer, his children would drift off to sleep peacefully. But one week, violence touched the children’s neighborhood. They started having nightmares, calling out in the dark, waking their parents. The first night the sleepy father ran in to their room, reminded them of their good night prayer and told them that they could say it to themselves if they had nightmares. “May his face shine upon you, and grant you great peace.” God is always with you, he reminded them. But the next night they had nightmares again and would not stop crying out until their father came. “Didn’t you pray for God to shine his face upon you?” asked the father. “Yes,” answered the children, “but we need a face we can see.” As they snuggled in his arms, they fell peacefully asleep.
Many of us heard the Rev. James Lawson deliver the Palmer Lecture a week ago Saturday night. Lawson studied Gandhi’s Non-Violent Resistance as a young man, and was jailed for resisting deployment in the military during the Korean War. He is known to us as the organizer of the non-violent sit-ins that desegregated the lunch counters in Nashville in the 1960’s. During his lecture, Lawson lamented that our culture increasingly teaches our children violence. Domestic violence is a way of life for children of every class, street violence is a way of life for children of every race, and war is a way of life for children of every religion. Lawson asserted that the need for disciplined, strategic non-violent action has grown even greater in this, our 21st century. He thought that we, as Unitarian Universalists had the sense and sensibility to carry on that work. We know that children the world over need a response to violence that they can see and feel.
After the lecture several of you told me that you found it difficult to imagine a non-violent world. You grew up seeing violence at home and or in school. One of you spoke of the hyper-vigilance you developed as a child in response to years of seemingly random acts of violence in your home. Another said that your good reputation at school depended upon your meeting the violence of bullies with more angry violence.
On July 27, the children of two Knoxville UU churches saw a non-violent response to violence that they could feel. They may not be able to imagine a non-violent world, but they were soothed and comforted in the aftermath of violence because there were people in their midst who could imagine a non-violent response.
We have all heard of that day. The children and adults of the Westside and Tennessee Valley U.U. Churches had worked together to produce the musical Annie. Reality was suspended as Annie was trying to escape from the orphanage to scary music. The rest of the cast knew that Annie would soon be stopped by a yell of discovery. Instead there was the sound of a shotgun. In the moment between the first and second shots, Dr. John Bohstedt, standing to the side with his head shaved to play Daddy Warbucks, snapped out of the play’s suspended reality and focused on the hands of a man holding a shot gun – for real. In that 1⁄2 second he thought, “you can take this guy out” – an assessment he attributes to playing soccer. He ran ten feet and tackled the hand.
At the same time at least three other men rushed the reloading shooter and helped subdue him, Robert Birdwell Jr., Jamie Parkey and Terry Uselton. Uselton, a high school science teacher, was there to watch his granddaughter in the play. He lunged toward the gunman to “protect the children.” Many other adults joined them in risking their lives by leading children to safety and shielding children with their bodies. Greg McKendry died using his body as a shield. Linda Kraeger, the other fatality, was standing over her 6-year old niece who had found a safe home with Linda. When the press told John Bohsted he was a hero, he pointed out the many heroic acts of that day.
When Bohsted and Birdwell, Parkey and Uselton were asked how they had the presence of mind to react quickly, to save so many lives, they had similar answers. In the past, when they had heard of random shootings in public places, they had wondered, what would I do? They had imagined shielding others, disarming, isolating or overcoming the shooter. They did not know if they could do such things if presented with the reality. Bohstead said he only did what he hoped he would do.
John Bohstead had given this a great deal of thought. A history professor at the University of Tennessee, he had taught his students about “Disciplined Imagination” by asking them to visualize what they would do in the face of historical events. Bohstead had used his imagination to make his own decisions about how to act before. He was a conscientious objector during the Vietnam War. This knowledge inspired a surprised conservative Knoxville resident to exclaim, “That shooter must have been a real wimp if he could be subdued by a pacifist.”
The American Gandhi, James Lawson, reminded us however, that such resistance to violence requires great discipline, courage and love. “Look what the good people of Knoxville did,” John Bohstead concludes…. “My conviction is that evil walked into the church, but love was stronger, and love will prevail.”
After that horrible day, the good people of the Knoxville churches wondered if the children would return to church. Their parents are good parents, they are protective and they would never take their children to a dangerous place. But the children have returned in droves. Yes, they saw violence, but they also saw adults give their lives to keep them safe. Yes, they saw one man act with hatred, but they also saw one hundred men and women act with love. Yes, they saw fear, but they also saw adults act with courage. That sacrifice, love and courage inspired them to be resilient. When asked why they come back they high-five those who asked and shout, “Courage.”
When the bough breaks and the rock-a-bye baby falls; when Daddy is sent off to war or when Mommy is too tired to sing another lullaby, they are no longer awakened by nightmares. Yes, bad things happen — really bad things. But good things happen too. These children have seen the faces of sacrifice, love and courage. They are comforted. They have seen what peace looks like. They don’t have to imagine it. They just want to do it.
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11.09.08
Posted in Rev. Jason Shelton, Sermons at 5:11 pm
November 9, 2008
The Rev. Jason Shelton
Meditation
I’d like to tell a story this morning that I think is worthy of our meditation and contemplation in this historic moment. I’ll begin with a quote from Alexis de Tocqueville, the nineteenth century French historian and political figure, who wrote the following in his two-volume study of this nation entitled Democracy in America (1835):
“The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.”
Our story* takes places in Monroe, North Carolina, just southeast of Charlotte, and the hometown of the late Senator Jesse Helms. In the 1950s, it was not uncommon for black housekeepers to bring their children with them to work, and for the housekeeper’s children to spend the afternoon playing with the white children in the neighborhood. One fine autumn day, two black boys, Hanover Thompson, age 7, and David Simpson, age 9, were playing with a group of white children. One of the girls, Sissy Sutton, innocently relayed to her sister that her friends had been playing the “kissing game,” and that the girls had gone around the circle, kissing the boys on the cheek. Sutton’s mother overheard, and when she heard that her daughter had kissed a black child she became furious. She called some friends, confirmed the story, armed herself, and went out in search of the boys. Later, Sutton claimed that she would have killed Hanover herself if she’d had the chance.
The police found the boys playing by the creek, though it’s not clear that they fared any better in police custody than they might have if Sissy’s mother had been first on the scene. With guns drawn, the police handcuffed the two boys and threw them in the car. When they arrived at the county jail they were beaten unmercifully. They were held for six days without being permitted to see anyone, included their parents or a lawyer. When they finally were brought before the judge, Simpson and Thompson were convicted of attempted rape and sentenced to a reformatory until the age of 21 – a sentence of 12 and 14 years, respectively.
About a month later a reporter from the London News-Chronicle, posing as a social worker, visited the boys, recorded their story, and with a camera smuggled in a bowl of fruit, captured a photo that made headlines throughout Europe and around the world. With the simple caption, “Why?” the shock and outrage turned into unbearable pressure on the Governor of North Carolina, and within two months the boys were home again.
Two things stood out for me in this story. One was the way in which it was the outcry in newspapers around the world – and not from the US itself – that called attention to this American tragedy. But the second was a date. The two boys had their hearing and were sentenced on November 4, 1958. Fifty years ago last Tuesday. Fifty years ago the headlines in the world’s newspapers decried the injustice being done in this country, and they brought about a change we could not seem to bring for ourselves. This week, the headlines in the world’s newspapers marveled at the new world that our democratic process has brought about.
All week I have heard liberals and conservatives, Republicans and Democrats, while not all thrilled at the outcome from a political perspective, nonetheless marvel at the social significance of the fact that the United States of America, a nation built to a considerable degree upon the broken backs of persons abducted from their homes in Africa and forced into slavery, has now elected Barack Hussein Obama, a person whose Kenyan father’s and Kansan mother’s marriage would have been illegal in 22 states when he was born, to its highest office. The profundity of that fact has been awe-inspiring, even among many of those who did not vote for him.
“The greatness of America lies not in being more enlightened than any other nation, but rather in her ability to repair her faults.”
Or as Sam Cooke sang, “It’s been a long time comin’, but a change is gonna come.”
As we continue to let this new reality take hold in our minds and hearts, let us share a moment of quiet reflection together.
*for more details on this story, see: Two Case Studies: Emmett Till and the “Kissing Case”
Sermon
Last night, those of us who were here for the Palmer lecture had the pleasure of hearing from one of our great proponents of non-violence and an icon of the civil rights movement, the Rev. James Lawson. Lawson trained local students and organized the protests that led to the integration of the lunch counters in downtown Nashville in the early 60s, and hearing from him just a few days from this historic election was especially poignant. He talked about his joy in seeing how far we’ve come in just a few short decades, but warned about becoming deluded about the state of the country based on any one election. We did not create the institutions of racism, sexism, violence and greed, he said. “We inherited them.”
Those isms played a significant role in this election, to a degree that none of us has ever really had occasion to see in such rampant and flagrant display. It’s a common political tactic to try to paint your opponent as “unlike” the people you’re addressing, but when the color of said opponent’s skin is different from those in the crowd, what does that mean? It’s common to try to show your opponent as “soft” on one issue or another, but when your opponent is a woman, does that have a different connotation? Accusations of flip-flopping on issues have been all the rage for decades now, but when your opponent is in his 70s, are you really trying to say something else?
The problem is, we can’t really know. If I am supporting a particular candidate, I’m probably going to see things through the lens of wanting that candidate to win. Nothing wrong with that. But there is something dangerous about pointing the finger at the other candidates and assuming motive for their statements. Given that I want my person to win, my tendency will be to see things in the light that is most helpful to my candidate, whether the ism charge is justified or not.
Of course, our new President-elect has been an especially interesting case. Race was certainly a factor in this process, a lens through which the “usual” political attacks took on a new shape and caused us to hear and see these “usual” things from a different perspective. But there was something else. For all of the comparisons that have been made between Obama and John Kennedy, the one that stands out for me is an ism I’ve never heard called by name, so I made one up: religionism.
In 1960, there was great turmoil about Kennedy’s Catholicism and whether he would simply be a puppet of the pope. Apparently that social unrest has ebbed a bit, because the second Catholic elected to the executive branch didn’t seem to have a religion problem with the electorate (that would be Joe Biden). But his boss? Well, that’s another story.
A couple of weeks ago the candidates made an appearance at the Al Smith dinner, a fundraiser for Catholic Charities in NYC named, ironically, for the first Catholic to run for president (in 1928). Historians agree that anti-Catholic prejudice was a major factor in his loss to Herbert Hoover, who, it turns out, presided over the great depression in one of the most disastrous presidencies in American history. But I digress…
The goal of the Al Smith dinner is to have the two major-party candidates come and make funny, self-deprecating speeches, while also taking a good-natured shot at the opponent as well. If you didn’t see it, I’d encourage you to find the YouTube video of this event. Both Obama and McCain’s speeches were hysterically funny.
Anyway, then-Senator Obama took the occasion to note the McCain campaign’s assertion that people really didn’t know who he was. He said:
Americans have a big choice to make, and if anybody feels like they don’t know me by now, let me try to give you some answers. Who is Barack Obama?
Many of you — many of you know that I got my name, Barack, from my father. What you may not know is Barack is actually Swahili for “That One.”
And I got my middle name from somebody who obviously didn’t think I’d ever run for president.
Of course there is some degree of unfortunate irony in the fact that the President-Elect shares a name with the dictator with whom our country has fought two wars. But the fact is that Hussein is an incredibly common name around the world in countries where Arabic is spoken, and it has no explicit connection to religion. Yet, Obama’s name became the central argument for those who tried to claim that he is a Muslim, and that he must therefore be connected to terrorists. Quite a leap there, isn’t it? A lot of energy went into denying this claim. “No, no, he’s a Christian.” “No, he’s not an Arab. He’s a good man.” General Colin Powell, just a few weeks ago, was the first national figure I heard come out and say that the response shouldn’t be an attempt to convince the accuser of Obama’s Christianity, but rather to ask, “So what? Since when did being a Muslim disqualify a person for public office? Show me that in the Constitution.” General Powell went on to tell the story of a Muslim soldier in the US Army who was killed in Iraq and is now buried in Arlington National Cemetery. Currently more than 15,000 Muslims serve in our armed forces, and American Muslim soldiers have died in every armed conflict our nation has been involved in since at least World War II – something we might all think about when marking Veteran’s Day this week.
In a diverse, pluralistic society it is unacceptable for us to allow the word Muslim to be used as a slur in our public discourse, yet this very thing spread like a virus as “rumors” about Obama’s religious affiliation spread from the moment he launched his candidacy. In North Carolina, Elizabeth Dole’s last ditch, and thankfully failed, effort to tarnish her Senate-race opponent’s reputation was to associate her with atheists. Just when some of those most concerned about it were finally convinced that Obama really is a Christian, we got out-of-context earfuls of Rev. Jeremiah Wright’s black liberation theology. Not to be outdone, liberals were quick to spread snippets of Sarah Palin’s Pentecostal minister talk about protecting her from the evils of witchcraft. And over and over again, we heard speculation about who would be a better friend to Israel. This is at the heart of “religionism.” It is designed to identify the person whose faith is unlike your own as the “other” and therefore unworthy of the dignity and respect afforded our “real” neighbors and fellow Americans.
Samuel Clemens, better known by the pen name Mark Twain, wrote,
So much blood has been shed by the Church because of an omission from the Gospel: “Ye shall be indifferent as to what your neighbor’s religion is.” Not merely tolerant of it, but indifferent to it. Divinity is claimed for many religions; but no religion is great enough or divine enough to add that new law to its code.
Of course, to fully understand his remark, we have to put it alongside the other injunctions Jesus gave about our duties to our neighbors. This is pointedly demonstrated in the parable of the Good Samaritan:
The Parable of the Good Samaritan
On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”
“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”
He answered: ” ‘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, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
“You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”
But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, took him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’
“Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”
The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”
Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
Now consider the context here – the parables are designed to shock the listener into hearing a deeper truth. For an Orthodox Jew in Jesus’ time, the difference between a priest, a Levite and a Samaritan would be like telling the story today as that of a Jew, a Christian and a Muslim. Who was the true neighbor? The one who was indifferent to the man’s religion, who saw only his inherent worth and dignity as a human being, and who showed him mercy.
Our compassion for others cannot be conditioned upon their creed or lack thereof, or on their gender, or age, or skin color, or affectional orientation. Doing so requires more than tolerance. It takes true indifference to those attributes, and indifference comes from humility. Recall the passage from the prophet Micah:
He has shown you what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you?
To act with justice, to love mercy
and to walk humbly with your God.
To engage in genuine relationship with another person, or with other faith traditions, requires humility. Relationship is not a debate – there will not be a winner or loser in the end. It is about mutually beneficial conversation – you getting to know me, and vice versa, so that we may better understand to how live with one another. In a debate one can and should proceed with confidence that theirs is the right position while seeking to show the inadequacies of the opponent’s argument. In relationship I want to hear and understand your tradition so that I may be richer for having had the experience. There is no place for arrogant posturing or the belittling of the other’s views. To have this conversation in a way that is open and constructive requires humility.
Coupled with humility, however, is the notion that my understanding of God is not fixed or final. It is in process, and cannot be expressed definitively. If it could, there would be no need for continued work in the areas of theology or philosophy. This is the opposite of religionism. The fact that we continue to struggle with our understanding of the nature of ultimate reality or of human existence says that what we believe to be true is based on our best efforts at explaining what we understand the world to be. Yet we know that this understanding will change, again and again.
Why did Micah choose to say “with YOUR God”? Why not just “with God,” or “with our God?” Perhaps he understood that true humility requires an acceptance of our evolving understanding of divinity. The prophet’s admonition is to go about the work of justice and kindness with the humble recognition that what you believe is ultimately true may well be different from what your neighbor believes, but the call to serve that person with indifference to their religion remains. Justice and kindness, not creed, will always be the standards by which a community is judged.
Like all of the other isms, religionism breaks down only when we have an experience that forces us to rethink our biases. What gives me hope is the knowledge that my daughters are growing up in world where diversity is increasingly celebrated rather than feared, which means that those biases have less of a chance to form in the first place.
True story…
About a month ago, the family is sitting at the breakfast table. I’m reading the paper, and Amanda (3 1/2) sees a picture of the two major party presidential candidates.
Amanda: Who’s that?
Me: That’s Barack Obama.
Amanda: Oh. And who’s that?
Me: That’s John McCain.
Amanda: John McCain? That’s a funny name!
By the time my children are old enough to vote, the world will be a different place than it is now. In what ways, I can’t say. But I can say that it is up to us to shape that future. I think it starts with little things, like actually caring for your neighbors while being indifferent to their religion, culture, relationships and political party affiliation. The political and social climate of the past have taught us to fear those differences, but if we have learned anything from the events of the past week it should be that, even when long overdue, change is possible. We can live up to our highest ideals and not be cowed by cynicism and fear. That’s the world I want my girls to know, and I look forward to building it with you.
So may it be, and amen.
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Posted in Rev. Gail Seavey, Sermons at 4:37 pm
November 2, 2008
The Rev. Gail Seavey
When I was at the UU General Assembly in Cleveland a few years ago, I visited the Rock and Roll Museum with my friend Nancy. There we saw an exhibit in memory of John Lennon, commemorating his death 20 years before. The show was like one big Day of the Dead altar, displaying a wide spectrum of objects belonging to Lennon: childhood drawings and report cards, Beatles outfits and his favorite guitars, song manuscripts and collages, personal photos of him with his family.
Many of Lennon’s everyday belongings were displayed in a wall with Plexiglas windows. You had to stand close to the wall and look right in the window before you could see what was inside. I was not a wild fan of John Lennon; the show personally lacked for me the emotional charge of, say, the display of Janis Joplin, whom I had wildly admired. So, I was getting bored, having seen one too many pairs of Lennon’s eyeglass displayed behind those Plexiglas windows. Bored, that is, until, I peeked through a window to find a carefully preserved common brown paper bag.
What was a paper bag doing in a museum display of this great singer-songwriter? As I looked closer, I saw that it was folded over and taped shut. On it were printed red block letters that spelled out, “Patient’s Belongings: Name:—– going to——: floor–/room–.” I still didn’t get it, so I read the museum label: “Bag of Clothing, 1980. This brown paper bag contained the clothes that Lennon was wearing when he was murdered, December 8, 1980. It was returned to Yoko from the Property Clerk’s office.” I burst into tears.
The people crowded around me all backed away. Concerned, Nancy rushed over to see what was wrong with me. Embarrassed, I pointed to the bag and tried to pull myself back together. She read the label and said, “Oh! That’s what my mother meant. I never even asked her!” Nancy’s response was just as strange as mine so we had lots to talk about. Her mother, a retired nurse, had cared for her dying father at home. It had not been an easy death. When Nancy asked her mother how she was doing just after her father died, her mother replied, “At least there was no paper bag.” It now appeared that Nancy’s mother was saying, “At least he didn’t die in the hospital, where we give out impersonal paper bags with the patient’s clothing to the bereaved family.”
Yet that paper bag felt like the most personal thing in the museum. It opened up a Plexiglas window to my soul where I could view carefully preserved memories of all the people I have loved and lost. When I looked in that window, I could see a row of mental paper bags full of their personal belongings. In those bags are all the gifts that could not be ungiven.
This year, I have been given several bags from the morgue to pass on to our dearly departed’s families – only now they are all wrapped in plastic. As All Souls Day approached and I planned our Day of Dead altar, I could see that row of paper bags lined up across it, full of gifts.
I could see a paper bag labeled: Joan Tillman from Alive Hospice, Nov. 24, 2007. Going to: her two granddaughters. In that bag are some of Joan’s gifts that could not be ungiven, such as her eye for beauty that she passed on to her granddaughters. Peeking into the window to my soul that carefully holds that bag reminds me that the most helpful service comes from doing what we most love doing and therefore do the best.
I could see another paper bag from Alive Hospice: Freda Wise, January 27. 2008: going to the church rummage sale. In that bag are some of her gifts that could not be ungiven, boxes of books given from a voracious reader for others to enjoy. Peeking into that window in my soul reminds me how reading opens the windows of our souls out onto worlds that we could never have imagined from our own limited experience.
So I made these paper bags for this altar. Here is one containing the quiet dignity of Elisabeth Gillespie, who died on December 29, 2007, and another containing Mary Lou Valin’s sure knowledge at her death on April 17, 2008, that the end of all her spiritual searching was found in love. Here is a bag from Morningside of Belmont, Roxy Bogigian Leiserson: July 6, abundant with growing flowers and the love of learning, grounded in the fullness of service to humanity. Next to it sits a bag from Caitlin Christine Lee, July 27, full of pure radiant happiness. And here is a bag from the city morgue: Sue Alley, September 27, full of drama, song and generosity.
These are luminous sacred gifts, the gifts of saints. All the more fitting that the gifts left to us by these saints are in common brown paper bags. Many of us have been taught that the gifts of Saints can only be placed in perfectly crafted reliquaries made of gold and jewels. But Universalist Saints are not perfect or super heroes or super natural beings. Our saints are All Souls. The Universalist tradition has always celebrated All Souls Day on this day of November 2nd because our saints are common human beings. John Lennon, Joan Tillman, Elisabeth Gillespie, Freda Wise, Mary Lou Valin, Roxy Leiserson, Caitlin Lee, and Sue Alley were not perfect people. Yes, we talked about them as if they were perfect for a few weeks after they died. But as the weeks went on we allowed ourselves to remember them in their full humanity. They were real. They made mistakes, and they learned. They hurt and helped those they loved. They completely failed at some things, at others things they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. “Dark into light, light into darkness, spin.” Such are the gifts that All Souls leave to us. Such are the gifts we will leave to others.
Today we light candles dedicated to those Souls who have gone on before us. You are invited to light a candle in memory of a person you have loved and lost. I invite you to do so looking into the windows of your heart for the gifts that person has left you, gifts that sit within a luminous paper bag in your soul.
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