Service is Our Prayer

The Crew from UUCAS helps with the community meal.

I was walking on a trail along the shore of a beautiful pond one winter’s day, relishing the sounds of the birds, the peace of the calm water, and began to notice a bottle cap here, a bit of broken plastic there. It seemed only right to do something to protect the beauty of this space this eco-system that had filled me with wonder and peace. I filled the pockets of my coat, and resolved to come back for a couple of cans that wouldn’t fit in my pockets. The next day I was happily picking up cans and bottles as I walked, until I rounded a corner and saw the pile of trash that had accumulated along the bank in the winter storms. It made the full bag of trash I was feeling so good about seem puny by comparison.

I decided two things in that moment- first, that I had hit my limit. My bag was full, I was tired. I was not up to tackling that oversized mess entangled in the steep bank. Second, I remembered that I am not alone. There were other folks in this community that I was visiting, I had to trust that others who cared about this beautiful place would also lend a hand as they were able.

There’s a wonderful group on social media called “the Glorious Trash Birds” who organize cleanups, and take photos of what they pick up while they walk. They have a tradition called “one piece Wednesday” where they encourage everyone, trash birds or not, to pick up a piece of trash on Wednesday, something easy and achievable. This encourages me when I get down on my small efforts. But still… There’s a lot of trash, much that is beyond my control. I can’t even get all the trash I see on my morning dog walks. Does it matter when I pick up a few loose bits? This was when I remembered the words we shared for our chalice lighting “service is our prayer” The act of bending down and picking up the plastic bag drifting across the sidewalk is like a body prayer saying “I love this place and want to protect it. I worry about the plastics in the ocean, and pray for a solution. The solution is bigger than me, but it is my heart’s desire. I pray for a day when the creeks and lakes and oceans are clean again.”

There is a great theological debate that has been argued along the centuries: “faith vs. works” – which is more important to our salvation, what we believe or what we do? [i]

It says in the book of James in the Christian scriptures:

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead. [2:14–17]

Whereas Paul says “a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ” so there’s a strong belief in some protestant traditions in “faith alone”

I bet if you’ve spent any time at a UU church you have figured out that we put a lot of stock in good works. We like to roll up our sleeves and as my seminary buddy used to say “build the kin-dom of God on earth”

Faith is where we can struggle. In prosperous, peaceful times, we see our little acts make a real difference. We work hard and the work pays off. But sometimes, in times of struggle, we see our work scattered and broken. We know clearly that the work of our hands alone cannot repair the world.

The history of the Ladies’ aid society of the Cortland UU church, begins this way: “The Aid society in the beginning no doubt grew out of groups of women who met together during the Civil War to sew for the Army.” I can only imagine what it was like to live through that time of the Civil war, here in Cortland. Far from the front, but worried for family members who were away fighting, dying. Here at home there were food shortages, and economic hardship. With a whole generation of fighters away at war, the women sewing those bandages most likely had additional responsibilities and burdens. There was much work to be done and not enough hands to do it.

Still thousands of people all over the country sewed for the soldiers. Imagine a time when the US army could not even supply it’s wounded soldiers with enough bandages, much less proper uniforms. It reminds me a bit of those first months of covid when there were not enough masks, how quickly industrious people set to making them for the folks near and far who needed them. It helped to be doing something when so much was out of our control. I know I was sure grateful for the beautiful handmade masks neighbors and friends made for me. The bandages made by the ladies’ aid society could not staunch the great would of the civil war, or bring their loved ones home safe, but I am certain that each and every bandage was a help and support to the nurses struggling in impossible conditions, and the people whose lives they helped save. And I’m sure it helped those women too, to come together in someone’s living room with tender anxious hearts to do the thing they could do. [ii]

I know when I knit a prayer shawl for someone in specific, they come to mind often as I knit. It really does help me hold that person in my heart, each time I pick up my knitting. This is what I think of when I hear those words “service is our prayer”

Now a hug shawl is not nearly so practical as bandages, but both require work and faith. The work of doing what things we can do, and the faith of knowing that it is not by our efforts alone that the war will be ended, that the wounds will be healed, that hearts will be made whole.

There are many ways to serve. Tasks of all shapes and sizes. What’s interesting to me about that word “serve” is that it is a transitive verb – we serve someone or something. So it is important to ask who or what am I serving? It is a humble word -- it puts the needs of others before ourselves. Humility is important here because we often think we know what someone else needs. Harms have been done over the centuries by people of faith deciding they knew what another needed; think of the Indian boarding schools, the great harms that were perpetrated there in the name of saving souls. Paternalism is a word that comes from a root that means “father” to help someone like a father would. Which means treating the person being helped like a child. It’s a characteristics of white supremacy culture.

This is something we were very aware of when the Athens congregation wanted to do something to support the black community. When we reached out to a group called “Mother’s Helping Mothers” to ask what they needed, the leaders told us that we were the only organization to ask what they needed, Most called to tell them what we wanted to do for them.

Here's another example, I was part of the project grow board as we chose exotic heirloom tomatoes to grow, excited about increasing the diversity of food species and keeping heirloom varieties going. We held an open meeting of our members and heard back from the community that people don’t know what to do with a green tomato, and could we just please provide some ordinary red tomatoes that was what they truly wanted, that trying to grow your own food and eat more healthy vegetables was already a lot for most families. Serving with humility means asking those we serve what it is they most want and need.

The Athens congregation takes as its mission “To live ethically, grow spiritually and serve lovingly” I think that’s important- that we serve lovingly. The love we put into the doing is important. There’s a line from the Hobbit movie, Gandalf the great wizard says to the homebody hobbit Bilbo, who is not sure how he can be of use in the epic fight of good and evil that is unfolding around him. Gandalf says:

“Some believe it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. It is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love.”

These are challenging times in which we find ourselves. It’s hard to know what we can do to ease the suffering of neighbors and friends, much less those far away whose stories break our hearts. But like the women who sewed bandages during the Civil war, we can make service our prayer. Spirit of life, May each stitch we sew, peace of trash we pick up, ride we give to a friend, hand we hold in the hospital, raised bed garden we build, tomato we harvest for the foodbank, may the work and the faith of our small acts of kindness and love be part of the healing of our world.

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[i] Here’s a deep dive if you are curious https://rsc.byu.edu/vol-13-no-3-2012/paul-james-faith-works and an overview of the divide from a catholic perspective https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/faith-and-works-0

[ii] http://civilwarrx.blogspot.com/2013/02/civil-war-bandages.html Here’s a lovely piece about “lint” for wounds https://civilwartalk.com/threads/the-lint-societies-what-women-did-and-why.156511/ One about what women sewed for themselves and the soldiers: http://www.lovetosewstudio.com/sewing-womans-clothing-during-the-civil-war-times/

The Wisdom of Traditional Meals

'Tis the season for traditional meals. Some we are looking forward to, some we are dreading, some we are skipping this year. Is there a meal in your family where you can count on the menu being pretty much the same year after year? For the purpose of this reflection, I'm thinking about all kinds of families, including both the ones we were assigned to and the ones we chose. I invite you to call to mind the meals that worked, the meals where you felt welcome, where it seemed like generally everybody found something to eat, no one went away hungry.

A lot of us have just celebrated Thanksgiving, and I remember growing up Thanksgiving was exactly the same every year. Was it like that in your family? Turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes made by Gramma, cranberry sauce made by the youngest cook in the family, Waldorf Salad and pumpkin pie with real whipped cream.

When I met my partner Eric, he was a little confused by the homemade cranberry sauce, (his was a canned cranberry family) but totally grossed out by the Waldorf salad- which is- anyone else have this for thanksgiving? It’s cubed apples, celery and mayonnaise. Eric had never had it before, and he thought it was pretty gross. That’s fair. I like it, but that’s fair.

But here’s the one that shocked me- he didn’t like Pumpkin pie. Can you imagine! In fact, his family didn’t have a traditional thanksgiving dessert! I didn’t realize how different family traditions could be when it was just us and the grandparents when I was growing up. I just thought that was Thanksgiving.

As I grew up my parents got divorced and moved out of our family home, now Thanksgiving was different every year. While I was in Seminary we often had thanksgiving with our Vegetarian friends, and stuffed acorn squash was a staple for a while. One thanksgiving I was introduced to a sweet potato casserole I actually liked- and thought “Where have you been all my life?!”

It wasn’t until I became interested in local seasonal food, that I noticed the traditional dishes for thanksgiving matched so well with what was growing at the farm. Potatoes, brussels sprouts, cranberries, pumpkins, apples- these are what is available in the fall if you live around here, where those traditions originated. Even though we now get almost any food we want at the grocery store any time of the year, the thanksgiving meal still has its roots in the wisdom of place and season- if you live in the north east that is.

It wasn’t until I was cooking for a family of my own, that I began to understand another wisdom. Those meals where everyone feels satisfied don’t just happen. It takes a lot of thought to have something for everyone- the niece that doesn’t eat meat and hates squash, the half of the family that loves giblet gravy, the others who find that gross. When I had to give up dairy, that might have meant giving up mashed potatoes, but we came to a new tradition -- the bowl scooped out for Darcey before the milk and butter go in. Well I thought it was a new tradition, but I just learned recently that PapPap also didn’t eat dairy, so this was not a new tradition, but an old one put into use again. When people eat together regularly, they begin to know what meals will satisfy them all.

Even when there were only 3 of us in our household, there was a tension between my dietary preferences and needs for a low-fat diet with whole grains and lots of diverse vegetables, and my son’s preference for more mainstream American comfort foods. Through years of trial and error we came up with a cannon of foods we all could enjoy. (And when I go out of town they make a giant tray of mac and cheese the first night I’m gone). Over a couple of decades eating with my partner’s family, I began to wonder about how those mealtime habits and traditions came to be. I thought of how our traditional family meals might be some combination of the foods that were available near our ancestors, and the unique genetic heritage of body and health in our shared genes. My husband’s family comes from Estonia on his father’s side, with a short growing season and cold winters, where it makes perfect sense they would be a meat and potatoes family, and live to a ripe old age eating the traditional foods of their people.

Over years of eating together, that core set of dishes- that can be made with local ingredients, and work with the dietary needs and preferences of those who share a table become the spread we see at the traditional meals.

This is the nature of tradition- like the holiday meal, they are honed over time, year after year as people use them. The wisdom of all those people, who cooked and ate, who shaped the meal, as the meal shaped them. In good times and in bad the tradition grounds us, connects us to those who came before, to the wisdom of our ancestors. And like all things, traditions change… need to change as the world evolves and grows.

One of the things we are working hard on, in our Unitarian Universalist tradition, is to notice who is not fed by the meal we are preparing. I bet most of you know what it is to show up for a meal with a new group, a new side of the family, and stare uncertainly at an unfamiliar spread. If you have a dietary restriction, you know that sinking feeling- there is nothing I can eat here. I’ll always remember my friends rehearsal dinner at a traditional and fancy Chinese restaurant- course after course of beautiful platters came out, but at our table most of our dining companions were vegetarian or vegan, and they sat with empty plates. Finally on the 4th course, the pork came with a shredded cabbage garnish, and my friends took their first bites of the night. The next day at he wedding the catering was all vegan, and I imagine different people were fed and bewildered.

The church potluck is a wonderful example of this process. We start to notice whose plate is empty, and talk about what would make us nourished and satisfied. As new folks come and go we realize the vegan soup is not gluten free, or that the beautiful vegan gluten free dish contains nightshades, which we didn’t realize made it dangerous for one of our friends.

But sometimes, if we pay attention, if we listen, if we say what we need, and contribute what we can, people go away fed. This is a wonderful metaphor for community. When we come together, week after week, we start to know one another’s needs, restrictions, desires. We learn a new recipe with almond flower when the birthday girl is gluten free. We put cheese on the side when we think of Bob, we make the special cake Elizabeth said she loved. I have seen you notice, and care. In a small congregation like Cortland, I know some of you actually have a running list in your mind of what each member can eat.

Once we’ve found a pattern that works, and settled in, it becomes easy. This past thanksgiving my partner made gravy, as he always does, I made my families’ cranberry sauce recipe, as I always do, and some extra vegetables for the table because I like extra vegetables. And Nonie made the mashed potatoes, and took some out for me before she adds the butter, like she always does. We don’t have to think too hard about it.

But when new folks join us, we have to add a new layer of consciousness to what we do. This can become a tradition too. My friend Suzanne who is an excellent hostess, always asks “is there anything you need, or anything you aren’t eating right now?” before I come to visit. I remember the first potluck I took my vegetarian friend to at my seminary. I was so worried there would be nothing for her to eat, but in fact there was no meat on the table at all, except one casserole that had a little tag sticking out of it “warning, bacon!” We can’t possibly expect to know everyone’s needs and preferences, so in the process of getting to know one another, of finding that just right meal that has a bit of something for everyone, we talk about it until we get just the right mix. When we are learning new traditions, or whenw e are including new people into old traditions, communication helps.

Then maybe it will take some learning- we have a chance to grow our knowledge and understanding. What is gluten anyway? And did you know some vegan hot dogs contain gluten? When we first started using the word “woke” what we meant was that we had woken up to the needs and experiences of others that we had been asleep to, that we had not been conscious of, particularly around race and racism. But another way to think of it is just old fashioned politeness, being a good host. At a good meal, everyone goes away with a full belly. And when know what’s in the food we are serving, and whether that is nourishing or toxic to the folks at our table, that is true hospitality, the kind we aspire to in this congregation.

We love when new people come to visit or to stay in this community, but when they do what’s on the table may change from “the usual” It usually takes time to find a new equilibrium. Eventually it is the tradition that at our holiday gathering, cookies baked with almond flour; we may not even remember that we first did this to make sure Betty had something sweet to end her meal.

In this community, though we love to eat together, we are really here to feed one another’s heart’s and spirits. On any given Sunday, maybe there is something on the table you can’t eat, but hopefully there is something you can.

ON our metaphorical table there are things like worship, or pickle-ball, or that book group coming up. In this congregation we have theists and atheists, folks who want more God talk, and folks who want less. Folks who want to run back and forth on a pickle-ball court, and folks who need to just sit. Folks who want worship to lift up the crucial social justice issues, and folks who feel worship should be a refuge from events of the day. Not every dish will be right for you, and that can be disappointing at times, but that’s the challenge and gift of community- to hold our diversity in mutuality and love. Please tell us what you like and need, think of others, make space for their needs too. And be sure to bring your favorite dish (real or metaphorical) just because we’ve never had it before, doesn’t mean it won’t become our new favorite.

As you move through this season full of traditions, I encourage you to get curious about where your own traditions come from, and who is fed by them. I encourage you to notice whose plate is empty, and ask what would nourish them, I encourage you to try new things, experiment and explore,

May this be a place where our tradition grounds us, connects us to the wisdom of all who have come before, and always makes space at the table for new people, new sources of nourishment and joy.

Sacred Places

Photo of Oak Flat by Sacred Land Film Project

In the mountains of Arizona, there is a place called Oak Flats, a sacred site used for ceremony by the Apache people. The Apache Stronghold describes it as “a place to pray, collect water and medicinal plants, gather acorns, honor the people who are buried there, and perform sacred religious ceremonies. Oak Flat is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a Traditional Cultural Property“[i] But this sacred place is located over a great triangle of copper, one of the biggest copper reserves in the country. And though it was protected from mining since 1955 by an executive order by President Eisenhower, in last minute addition to the 2015 national defense authorization act, a rider was added to swap this sacred space for some other land owned by the mining company. The save Apache Stronghold has been fighting a legal battle to save this land, and the Supreme court is scheduled to decide if it will take up the case on December 6.

I heard Wendsler Noise talk about this place when he came to speak at SUNY Geneseo. He told us that this is one of those places that tradition tells us must be protected to help the world start again when pollution and destruction have wounded our natural places. In November (2019) Noise went to visit the U S Forest Service officials, and, to quote Noise “ I … told them that I am vacating San Carlos reservation and I’m going back to Oak Flat (Chi’chil Bildagoteel), a sacred place that our people were forcefully removed from under the United States. I denounced all their negligence and the pending land transfer to the mining company, Resolution Copper.”

Then, says Noise “I left the reservation, I walked back the way they had brought in my family, forcefully, on foot, and I moved back to my ancestral homeland of Oak Flat. That’s where I reside today.”

When he spoke to us at Geneseo, he told the story of a woman who visited, a white woman, protestant. The place touched her, she said she could feel the power of the place, she felt connected with Spirit there. In this David and Golith court battle with the powerful mining company, they were collecting amicus briefs, and this woman’s story was included. But when Noise went through the final filing, her story wasn’t there. He asked his lawyer, but the lawyer said that, from a legal standpoint, land can’t be sacred to white people, because we are people of the book.

Having a sacred book you can carry seems like a survival adaptation of people who have left their sacred places. Perhaps your family is like mine- my family left another land and came to this. A grandfather fled antisemitism in Austria, a great grandfather came to farm. Others… we don’t even know what countries many branches of my family come from. I have never stepped foot on the continent of my ancestors birth.

This is normal for many people who live in this country. In our culture every place becomes a bedroom community for your job, or a resource to be turned into products and profit.

But we in this congregation have talked a lot about coming to know the places we live, to challenge the place doesn’t matter, and I know I feel a change in my own heart and mind gradually dawning.

I think how my heart would break if they cut down the honey locust trees across the street where the squirrel nests are.

I remember how we stood at Greenspring in a circle around the burial mound for our friend and member Jeff Singer, as we threw our rose petals on his grave, how the soil is our ancestors. That old phrase “dust to dust” – reminds us that the dirt beneath our feet is a sacred legacy of generations of beings, ready to become new life. Oak flats is such a place, where the ancestors reside.

Have you ever been to a place that felt sacred? I know when the Cortland congregation was talking about selling that building, we sat there in the social hall talking about all the memories, about the generations of people, of history that passed through there. We talked of the feeling of being there. It feels like a sacred space. And this space we hold so dear has only been loved by us for a couple hundred years old, not the thousands of years of Oak Flats.

More and more I believe that place matters. Places are not interchangeable, different places have different feelings, different stories to tell, different wisdom.

View from my favorite spot on Lake Ontario

Perhaps you have a special place where just being there changes something in you, nourishes your heart or spirit like no other place?  I think about a spot on Lake Ontario where my partner and I return year after year, how something lifts and lightens as we round the bend and catch sight of the lake. I think about a retreat center where my heart and spirit have been transformed beyond what I thought possible. The director says with a chuckle that it is the place itself that does the work, and I believe him.

The key to the case now before the supreme court is religious freedom. Whether or not you believe that a place can be sacred, it is a deeply held belief of indigenous peoples that place can be sacred, that certain places hold wisdom, connect us to our ancestors, help us be closer to Spirit. This is not just a theoretical belief, but a “direct experience of divine mystery and wonder” That different places have different wisdom to offer- one cannot simply pick a place and declare it sacred, the way we might find a new site to build a church.

When we understand that land is sacred, one is inclined to follow practices that do less damage, that are more harmonious with the community of beings who live in your place. I’m sure you heard in the news about the big Biodiversity report:

“Three-quarters of the land-based environment and about 66% of the marine environment have been significantly altered by human actions. On average these trends have been less severe or avoided in areas held or managed by Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities.”[ii]

Siham Drissi who works at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) says:

“When land is owned, managed or occupied in a traditional way, the word “traditional” refers to a knowledge that stems from centuries-old observation and interaction with nature. This knowledge is often embedded in a cosmology that reveres the one-ness of life, considers nature as sacred and acknowledges humanity as a part of it. And it encompasses practical ways to ensure the balance of the environment in which they live, so it may continue to provide services such as water, fertile soil, food, shelter and medicines.”[iii]
"UNEP also engages with religious leaders and communities to work with Indigenous Peoples. A focus of our work is the mutual recognition of the sanctity of life and nature, and the equality among the beliefs of the world’s religions and the traditional spiritualities of Indigenous Peoples. In doing so, we hope to contribute to the safeguarding traditional knowledge, while healing our planet by facilitating the reconciliation of historical conflicts between religions and Indigenous Peoples."

What can we do, so far away from the mountains of Arizona, so far from the halls of power in Washington DC? In the short term we can send donations, we can sign petitions, call our lawmakers. But starting now, and for a long time, we must first listen to  “the original keepers of the lands, those who obey natural law and are in the service of the lands on which you stand.”[Joy Harjo] [iv] When someone like Noise who was raised in the traditional ways and served as former Chairman and Councilman of the San Carlos Apache Tribe, chooses to give up his life in his home, to live for years in an encampment to protect one single sacred place, can we listen deeply? can we learn something about a radically different way of being in a place, of knowing a place, of protecting and living in reciprocity with a place?

Second, we can come to know our own places, even if we live, as I do, on a downtown street with the noise of heavy traffic competing with the twitter of birds. Even sitting on the porch watching the squirrels, scampering across the branches of the honey locust trees, noticing the patches where the soil looks healthy and happy, and the places where living things struggle, is a spiritual practice. It brings me joy and grounding, but also the intimate knowledge of the family of beings. The more we pay attention, the more we listen as if place can be a teacher, can be a guide, a wise elder, the more we will understand the importance of that relationship. The more we will see ourselves as relatives. We begin to look out for our tree neighbors, our bird neighbors the same as we look out for our human neighbors.

As Noise said in his talk with the Poor People's Campaign: “we really needed to come back and to re-strengthen the connection that we have with Mother Earth, and with ourselves, before we can go anywhere or impact anything. It really started from there.”

Our new Unitarian Universalist statement of values says:

“We honor the interdependent web of all existence. With reverence for the great web of life and with humility, we acknowledge our place in it. We covenant to protect Earth and all beings from exploitation. We will create and nurture sustainable relationships of care and respect, mutuality and justice. We will work to repair harm and damaged relationships.”

This practice is good for our spirits and hearts, but it is also good for the world, human and non-human alike. The more we know the land, the more we listen and love the land, the better protectors we will be. Let us listen to those known this land intimately for generations, and follow practices that nurture and protect these sacred places. And let us listen the earth herself, the spirit of life who are part of this healing. They will support us in this healing as they have always held and supported us. We, UUs, renew our commitment to listen and participate in restoration and healing as each of us is called in our own unique ways.

 

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[i] http://www.apache-stronghold.com/take-action.html 

Another helpful article about the Oak Flat campaign https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/oak-flat-exchange-arizona-sacred-site-mining-company

 [ii] Intergovernmental Science-Policy  study on Biodivserity https://www.ipbes.net/news/Media-Release-Global-Assessment

[iii]  The United Nations: [Siham Drissi is a Programme Management officer at the Ecosystems division at the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)]

08 Jun 2020 Story Nature Action

Indigenous Peoples and the nature they protect

https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/indigenous-peoples-and-nature-they-protect

[iv]  [Joy Harjo “For those who would govern” p. 74. ]

Love at the Center

Image by Tanya Webster (chalicedays.org)

If you want to know what it means to put love at the center, look no further than our congregations. Look at the way we show up for one another in good times and bad, the way we listen to one another, the way we extend welcome. Love has been at the heart of these congregations since their founding. Remember that story Katie told us about Sheshequin founding member Joseph Kinney and the way he shared what he had in a matter of fact way with those in need, “just what I owe” he said. Remember the women of the Cortland church who sewed bandages for soldiers, and were part of the underground railroad.

These past 4 years through and beyond the pandemic have been hard for everyone, but we kept love at the center. When other organizations were tearing themselves apart, letting fear and conflict take center stage, even in our anxiety, even in our loneliness, our grief, our confusion, we kept love at our center. That meant not only staying connected -- delivering goodie bags door to door, crying and laughing and sharing together -- It also meant when the zoom failed we all took a breath and remembered everyone was doing the best they could. When hard things happened we spoke the truth with love, Even when we were afraid of zoom bombers we kept our gatherings open to newcomers. We showed up in vigils and study groups to fight racism, we wore masks to protect the most vulnerable, we supported our neighbors when they needed help.

So Today I don’t need to explain how to keep love at the center, you know. It is the flame we keep burning all these decades, since the 1800s. It is the most precious gift and wisdom of our Universalist tradition. One of the things I respect and cherish most about these congregations is how you have helped me grow to be more loving, to keep love at the center. It’s in your DNA. It just feels natural and right to be loving when we are together. 

This past June all the delegates from all the UU congregations voted to pass a new statement of values. 7 values, with love at the center. Notice as you consider the 7 principles that we still cherish, notice the word “love” does not even appear. How might it change us to have love at the center of our UU values?

There was much drama and many opinions at GA this summer, but one of the things I noticed was the concerted effort to keep love at the center even when we were talking about hard things. There was a moment when we were discussing a Business Resolution, “Embracing Transgender, Nonbinary, Intersex and Gender Diverse People is a Fundamental Expression of UU Religious Values.” and the conversation was getting really hard for our trans siblings. Rev. JeKaren Olaoya got up to the microphone, and used her 90 seconds to just remind our trans uu siblings “I love you” she said “I love you, I love you I love you.” The resolution passed by 91.8%[i]

It's not enough to simply pass a business resolution that calls for love and acceptance, putting love at the center means the process too must be centered in love, even when it is hard.

Here are those words from our values statement, that are new to us now but will become familiar over time:

“Love is the power that holds us together and is at the center of our shared values. We are accountable to one another for doing the work of living our shared values through the spiritual discipline of Love.”

This language is a bit different than we often think about love in movies and valentine cards, because sometimes people misunderstand love in a way that ends up encouraging folks to stay in situations they shouldn’t, to put up with actions that are harmful. Much care was put into the writing of this statement, to challenge ourselves not to have love be just a feel good meme, but to get us through hard times, like we saw each other through the pandemic.

The words that keep this new statement of value from being more than sentimental poetry – accountable... work… living our shared values…spiritual discipline.

The word Accountability has been key to our anti-racism work. Some of you will remember that there was a proposed 8th principle to help us name our commitment to anti racism. This was part of what started us on the journey to our new “Article 2” – our new statement of shared UU values.

The 8th principle, which was adopted by many of our congregation says:

“We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association, covenant to affirm and promote: journeying toward spiritual wholeness by working to build a diverse multicultural Beloved Community by our actions that accountably dismantle racism and other oppressions in ourselves and our institutions.”

We see some of that language in our new UU values. .. accountable … work ... This love we are putting at the center is a rolling up your sleeves kind of love. It is also the kind of love that says “I’m sorry” when we hurt someone, a love that listens to voices at the margins,

Some of you remember that as part of our work to become welcoming and anti-oppressive, we talked about a platinum rule; to love your neighbor as yourself is golden for sure, but the greater challenge is to love your neighbor as they would like to be loved. That’s accountability- checking in with your neighbor about how our lives and loves touch one another.

Our new value statement describes Love as a spiritual discipline. A spiritual discipline is when you create an intention, and whenever you find yourself straying from that intention, you call yourself back.

A yoga teacher once suggested when in meditation your mind wanders, think of it as a puppy in you lap, and how you would gently encourage it to return to your lap when it wanders off to explore. That’s all a discipline is, calling ourselves back again and again in a compassionate and loving way.

When we adopted our dogs Rosie and Ginger, they had been mothers in a puppy mill, and hadn’t been raised to live in a home with humans. They were so reactive and anxious. Our vet recommended that there was no training goal as important as helping them learn that our home was safe for them, and that we loved them. It worked! They still have some quirky behaviors, and they still don’t know how to sit when I say sit, but they learned to trust us. And if we are in a confusing or dangerous situation, they look to us for guidance and comfort, they run towards us if we are apart. As Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in his speech, Loving Your Enemies said “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.”

This new statement that was years in the making with a long process that was open to all UUs everywhere. I hope folks will approach this as a time of exploration. We UUs don’t have a creed, it says right at the end of the statement that “Congregational freedom and the individual’s right of conscience are central”[ii] But I hope it is fun and interesting to consider this new statement and know that other UUs all around the country are studying it too, figuring out how we can live into it in our diversity and in our unity.

I’m so proud of our congregations, and how we have been leaders for a long time in keeping love at the center. I wonder how we will keep faith with the spiritual disciple of love in this next chapter of our story together.

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[i] https://www.uuworld.org/articles/uua-ga-2024-what-happened-recap-article-ii-a2-aiw-results-ware-lecture-unitarian-universalism

[ii] 1 Section C-2.5. Freedom of belief.

62 Congregational freedom and the individual’s right of conscience are central to our Unitarian

63 Universalist heritage.

64 Congregations may establish statements of purpose, covenants, and bonds of union so long

65 as they do not require that members adhere to a particular creed

Our Universalist Medicine for a Divided World

The internet has figured out that I love trees and moss and native plants, along with the usual cats getting into boxes and dogs pushing buttons. Recently a post came up in a “Native Plants” group, with the photo of a plants with tiny purple flowers I see all the time this season. The poster’s question- was this plant friend or enemy? Now I’m a native plant lover from way back, and I understand the harm that invasive plants can do as they push out native plants and all the critters that depend on them. But the post stuck with me- is this the enemy? It's hard for me to think of any plant as my enemy.

I’m pretty sure I have that plant, or one of its siblings in the front patch between my sidewalk and street, and based on how fast it grows it probably is invasive.

At the risk of being cancelled, I confess that a couple of years back I took (with permission) several of those plants from my neighbor’s front patch and planted it all over mine. Why? Because another invasive plant, lesser celandine, had so thoroughly taken over my front patch that when it dies back with the first heat of summer, it exposes the bare soil which runs off quickly in the rain. Then in the July droughts nothing grows and there are no plants to hold in the water. I needed something that didn’t mind that challenging soil between sidewalk and street and could fill in quickly when the lesser celandine died back. I think of that plant with the little purple flowers as my friend, because it protects the soil, and helps hold water in the tiny patch. What I love is life- all the beings willing and able to live and grow and fill in the barren places in the community of being where I call home.

Our Universalist faith tradition originates with the radical notion that God’s love is for everyone. The meaning of our lives is not to fight an enemy, but to know and manifest God’s love in the world. I believe there is a great, deep love – greater, wider, deeper than the harm, than the evil acts we see in the world today. In our UU congregations we are humanists, theists and agnostics, so not all of us would choose that language, so in modern times we find common ground by saying our Universalist core belief is that every being has inherent worth and dignity.

A couple of weeks ago, at Discover UU, we had a powerful conversation about what UUs believe about good and evil. The conversation turned to our prison system- as Universalists we would love to see our justice system really focus on rehabilitating people, instead of merely punishing. We agreed that we have a ways to go to support everyone in growing into their best selves. AND, We talked of criminals who harm and harm again when released. We told hard stories that reminded us there are some people, that do real, terrible lasting harm without industrial strength boundaries.

But I don’t need to hate someone to construct a powerful boundary. We UUs believe in firm, clear, effective boundaries to reduce harm, and processes to heal and restore after harm. But I don’t need to think of all those folks as my enemy. I think there’s a psychic cost to my own heart to hold too many enemies in there. Certainly I don’t need to be enemies with a plant.

Hosea Ballou was one of the founding parents of our Universalist Faith. He was a circuit riding preacher, at one time preaching at 7 rural congregations, traveling by horse! He famously wrote in his Treatise on Atonement:

“If we agree in love, there is no disagreement that can do us any injury, but if we do not, no other agreement can do us any good. Let us endeavor to keep the unity of the spirit in the bonds of peace.”[i]

I’m thinking of our recent discernment conversations about the future direction of our congregation. We shared a meal, and then gathered here in the sanctuary, where we have shared good times and hard times, witnessed weddings and memorials, where most times we gather we feel connected to that “unity of the spirit.” We paused in silent reflection, and then even though we talked about hard things, even though people had different opinions, we kept that unity of the spirit in the bonds of peace. It was a good meeting, people told me. It felt truthful and realistic. And then we came back a couple of months later and did it again!

Friends, I have witnessed church meetings where sides were chosen, voices were raised, where insults were spoken, where people stormed out. I don’t think Ballou said what he said because he was ignorant of church conflict, I think as a universalist preacher serving 7 congregations he said it because he believed in love.

Church conflict is as old as organized religion. In The book of Philippians, letters from Paul to the early church at Philippi, Paul encourages the congregation:“Do all things without grumbling or disputing, … in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation, among whom you shine as lights in the world, holding fast to the word of life.” In this congregation we strive to create a space different from the ordinary grumblings and disputings, we want to be a light that shines in the world."

10 years ago, when 12 year old Tamir Rice was shot by police officers, there started an email argument in our congregation about the UUA response. People chose sides. Hurtful things were said, one family left the congregation because they no longer felt this was a community committed to being truly welcoming to people of color. We were heartbroken. We had work to do. We called a listening circle, not to solve anything, but just to show up in a space where we could speak our truth, in the spirit of love and unity even when we disagreed about the nature of racism and how we were called to respond. This is the seed of that Universalist medicine -- to gather at a time of disagreement in unity of the spirit of love. Over the next few years we had many hard conversations. Sometimes sides were chosen, about whether and how we should speak out publicly, but always there were voices calling us back to that unity of spirit. This space we create together held us, as those hard conversations actually helped us strengthen our commitment to anti-racism. They helped us learn and grow and gave us the courage to enlarge the web of anti racism in the valley.

This year at General Assembly [where UUs from around the country gather to vote on important issues] we will be voting on an important change to our bylaws. These principles here in banners on our wall are part of our bylaws, they are part of our bylaws. When we first merged U and U in 1961, we came up with a list of principles that united us in our diversity. Not these, in 1985, our congregations finished a multi-year process and came up with new principles that were more inclusive of gender, and other diversities among us, those are the ones we have now on our walls and in our hymnal. A few years ago our congregation was proud to be part of a movement to call for a change to the first principle, from “every person” to “every being” at the same time there was a movement for adding of an 8th principle to explicitly remind us of our commitment to anti-racism. We were glad when the UUA board agreed to start a full review of our principles, a process also laid out in our bylaws. Well, that process has been going on since 2021, With many opportunities for input from UUs all over the country, and this year the final proposal is coming to GA for a vote.

Rather than just changing some words in the existing bylaws, as some had imagined, the proposal is something completely new- as different from what we have now as the current principles are form the ones passed at the time of merger. The new article 2 describes “values” instead of “principles”. I encourage everyone to give it a look- here's a link to the final draft.

So as you can imagine, folks have chosen up sides, and said hurtful things to people on the other side, with much talk of winning and losing. But here’s the thing. This graphic was made by a fellow UU to help us remember those 7 values, And you can see at the center is love.

Image by Tanya Webster (chalicedays.org)

The proposed article 2 says: “Love is the power that holds us together and is at the center of our shared values.” Love is at the center.

I’m not campaigning either way with you today, I have some preferences and some opinions, but what I feel most passionate about, what I am willing to speak up for, is Love.

"If we agree in love, there is no disagreement that can do us any injury, but if we do not, no other agreement can do us any good.”

What is Love? The Christian scriptures (in important source for the Universalist tradition) tell us:

[from 1 Corinthians 13] "Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”

I hear this passage most often at weddings, but recently I was reminded that it was part of a letter about how to be a church together, it follows another famous passage about all the parts of the body,

[from 1 Corinthians 12] “If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? … If all were a single member, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, yet one body.”

Love is how the parts of the body work together, it is “the better way. ”

AND remember we talked about the importance of boundaries. So many of us have endured harm because we had a definition of love that “endured all things”

The draft article 2 reminds us that real love, the kind of love that makes a difference in the world in good times and bad is a discipline: “We are accountable to one another for doing the work of living our shared values through the spiritual discipline of Love.” The kind of discipline that brings us back into the room, back into the hard conversation, with patience and kindness as we strive together for a kinder more just world.

This, to me, is the most critical part of our mission as Universalists today, when we feel that snarky comeback, that clever meme, how easy to it is to be irritable and resentful, to instead choose love, lest we become as a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal, (that is to say, just noise without the power of love within it).

It would be possible for us to go through this conversation about changing our bylaws with such a mindset, to use our cleverness to fight and parry with the other side. And what would result? Perhaps a denomination as wounded and fractured as we have seen the battles of neighboring denominations on headline news. It doesn’t matter what article 2 says, whether it changes or stays the same, if we “have not love”

Let our congregation continue to be a community that walks in the way of love. A place of healing and reconciliation. Let us create a space that rejoices with the truth, a non-binary space that can hold disagreement. That patiently, kindly endures as disagreements come and go.

“Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends.”

That last bit is important to me- that the love we are called to is not something we have to manufacture, it is always there, it never ends, and ours is only to tap into it. To remember it, to cultivate it.

Yes, love is that gentle joy of holding a kitten, a loved one, but love is deeper and wider and more powerful too. Deep enough, wide enough to hold our most challenging divisions, strong enough to endure even this moment in history, to hope for a kinder, more just world for everyone.

Beloveds, this is our spiritual discipline, to hold fast to love, to keep love at the center, to be a light in this struggling world. To return, again and again to love, as individuals and as a community, to be the balm, the healing medicine our divided world so needs.


Notes:
[i] Hosea Ballou (1828). “A Treatise on Atonement: In which the Finite Nature of Sin is Argued, Its Cause and Consequences as Such; the Necessity and Nature of Atonement; And, Its Glorious Consequences, in the Final Reconciliation of All Men to Holiness and Happiness”, p.236


[ii] “Final approval of the Article II proposal requires a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the 2024 General Assembly to adopted the revision as the new Article II of the UUA bylaws. If either 2023 or 2024 General Assembly votes fails, the process ends and a similar proposal cannot be considered for two years.”

How We Care for the Earth

This year for Earth Day, we are sticking close to home. This congregation has a commitment to earth care that goes back long before I became your minister. Our commitment to “the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part” has led us on some wonderful adventures, and we hope some of the stories we share today will give us some grounding and hope, remembering how we have made a difference, and perhaps will inspire us in thoughts of re-commitment and action as we continue to strive to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.

I remember the first green sanctuary team meeting back in October of 2010. I remember Katie, and Jack and Diane, and John and carol, Jane was there,  we were crowded around that table. And we were so full of ideas!

The Green Sanctuary program was created by the UUA to help congregations “bringing congregational culture into greater alignment with environmentally aware faith and practices” First, there was an assessment, to see where we were, then the action plan, the congregational vote. Then the UUA would approve the plan and we could get to work, but this little church that could we were already working on our action plan even before we had our application complete,.

We don’t have a lot of pictures of those days, but here’s a photo of me and my friend Andria and Sarah Christianson at a workshop about how to process and preserve fruit, after the kids went to an orchard and picked a massive amount of apples for us to use. This was just one of our Foodshed Education programs which also included workshops in drying and canning.

You can kind of see over my shoulder the “green sanctuary bulletin board” Which had some suggestions from Carol Doscher about recycling,

But we don’t have any pictures of our effots, but I remember Carol and Katie so mobilized about reuse and recycling, making church collections of things that might not normally get recycled [like plastics, grocery bags, building materials, computers and light-bulbs]

I found this picture of me and Katie and Aileen McEvoy. Part of Green Sancuaty plan was a program called “feed a friend” that we invented to try to bring our love of gardening and food into a community outreach program. [this picture is of us going door to door in the neighborhood giving out plants and letting folks know about the program] When Project Grow was being formed in our community, we noticed it had overlapping goals, and decided to fold up Feed a friend and put that energy into becoming a founding partner in Project Grow instead.

Here's a photo of a fun event of creek walking with mike Lovegreen to learn about our watershed, and how climate change might impact us here in the valley in a real way.

Mike Lovegreen Leads our Creek Walk

You’ll have to make your own mental pictures of our citizen science project, where our members took water samples in local creeks to see if toxins form the Fracking process had ended up in our watershed.

One of the biggest projects we did was almost invisible. I want to give a special shout out to Jane Land- the Green Sanctuary program assessment required an audit of our building, and because of Jane’s work experience before she retired, she brought in experts to create a very detailed building audit. See, most congregations when they think of going green they think “solar panels” but actually, you can save a lot of energy just by filling in the holes and helping the building be more energy efficient. Jane prepared a multi page summary with different options, and after the board considered carefully and voted to approve the funds, Jane brought in contractors and oversaw the work of making the building more energy efficient. In my first years int eh church I wore a coat and gloves in the pulpit when I fist got here, but now on Sundays sometimes I have to take my sweater of when I’m preaching. If you are not cold every time you come to church, now you know why!

That garden bed out front started as part of the Earth-centered religious education program our children and youth RE would do each spring.

One of the many CSN Public Forums

Of course our work with the Community Shale Network was a major part of Green Sanctuary.

And Chris Eng, who was worship queen in those days, was in charge of assessing our worship, and helped us bring Earth care into our worship traditions.

What was wonderful about the Green Sanctuary program was it encouraged a holistic look at how we could weave our care for the interdependent web into so many aspects of our lives together. We believe that caring for the earth is not a separate activity, it is a guiding principle in all we do.

I loved the creativity and the passion from our members. I loved how practical we could be. For example, thinking about what dishes we use at coffee hour- we could buy compostable plates, we thought at first, but why not just use the plates in the cabinet? We realized that using up all the bits and bobs of plates salvaged from birthday parties and picnic even if they were plastic or Styrofoam was better than buying new places, better than buying brand new even the most eco-friendly plates made today.

This became part of our “covenant of sustainable purchasing” -which is on the fridge:

“We will encourage members to provide post-consumer or compostable cups, plates and flatware or to use reusable dishes when planning a church event. We will use up existing stock of non-sustainable items (e.g., plastic flatware) before purchasing new items.“

We noticed that earth care lined up well with the natural frugality of our congregation- use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.

Being the little church that could, we completed all our actions as planned, but were daunted by the task of filling out the paperwork to submit our application to the UUA. I want to give a huge hand to Katie, who committed to working on that paperwork and getting our accreditation, which we received in 2017.

The Letter we got from the UUA says:

“Congratulations on work so well done! The review team agreed that your program is commendable…In the environmental justice arena, your multiple projects we think should be shared broadly. Your [education series on Hydraulic Fracturing- also called Fracking] is a commendable and inspiring example of broad collaboration. The team felt your collaboration with Community Shale Network is particularly important. Project Grow, conceived to promote local agriculture Valley-wide in collaboration with churches, school systems, and food pantries seems an excellent contribution to your local economy.”

Yes, Green Sanctuary program inspired us to do some things we might not have done otherwise, but it also showed us how much we were already doing, had already been doing for years -- like composting, or turning the water heater off when we leave the building, like preaching and teaching about the principles of sustainability and earth care. I hope hearing all these stories -- our stories -- reminds us that being a green sanctuary has been part of the fabric of our lives together for a long time. Let these stories remind us of our commitment back in 2017 as we sent in our final application to the UUA “we reaffirm our congregation’s commitment to continue growing in awareness and action to honor and protect the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part.”