Living Words

A sermon by Sheila Schuh, DRE
May Memorial Unitarian Universalist Society of Syracuse
March 30, 2003

I’d really be ok with it if the Reverend Bill Sinkford, president of our Unitarian Universalist Association, had started out by saying: “My fellow UUs, I have to tell you something. I have written these Principles of ours into my heart and have tried to live them. I have combed our Sources for some inspiring words by which I can cultivate a deep and profound spirituality, and fully express our faith to others. But I have been unsuccessful. I need your help. We need better language.” But this is not the way his recent sermon on the language of faith began. Toward the start he says:

I went and reread the Principles and Purposes. I know, I know… I’m supposed to know these by heart. But as I re-read them, I realized that we have in our Principles an affirmation of our faith which uses not one single piece of religious language. Not one. Not even one word that would be considered traditionally religious. And that is a wonderment to me; I wonder whether this kind of language can adequately capture who we are and what we’re about.

They serve us well as a covenant, holding out a vision of a more just world to which we all aspire despite our differences, and articulating our promise to walk together toward making that vision a reality, whatever our theology. They frame a broad ethic, but not a theology. They contain no hint of the holy. Now while UUs reject any hint of creed, we do affirm the importance of individual credo: we are all charged, individually, to pursue our own free and responsible truth and meaning. And I wonder whether the language of our Purposes and Principles is sufficient for that purpose. I fear that “They describe a process for approaching the religious depths but the testify to no intimate acquaintance with the depths themselves.”

I would like to see us become better acquainted with the depths, both so that we are more grounded in our personal faith, and so that we can effectively communicate that faith- and what we believe it demands of us- to others. For this I think we need to cultivate a “vocabulary of reverence.”

Essentially I heard him say, “I know I should know what our principles and sources are, but let me go look them up and read them again. Then I’ll let you know how inadequate I feel they are.” No doubt, lots of UUs may feel this way.

The problem is not a lexical one that we need a language of reverence, more religious language, the problem is for me we lack a reverence for language we already have. It is exactly the fact that these words don’t mean enough to him that he would know them. And I mean also in the biblical or religious sort of way…that he would love them, be intimate with them, take them into his heart and dare I suggest it- want to incarnate all they hold.

What a trap, (a typical UU one nonetheless!), to think that if we only had more verbiage- more spiritually sophisticated words, if we only had better words, that we would better know who we are, what we believe, and be able to express it more fully to other faiths! I don’t think we need any more words right now. We need an experience of our words. We need more living of our words so we might better hold their meanings in common. And when we do that, if we arrive at new words, then we will know what they are and won’t need to cry out for them. They will come through us, just as these did in 1985 through the General Assembly.

If the purpose of religion, from the Latin religio, is “to bind or reconnect,” how much more appropriate for that purpose can you get than the word covenant? Covenant is for me a religious word. It is a really good word. I’d say it is a sacred word in my book, a holy word, and I wish we’d have more of it living in the world. Covenants have been in the Judeo-Christian tradition for centuries: I am your God, and you shall be my people. Or in Jesus, the promise that all the sin of the world would be reconciled. Why don’t we recognize this as religious language and treat it with the reverence it deserves? Why don’t we recognize this as a way that we have evolved and enriched our heritage? Why hasn’t it become a more central feature of our relationships to other congregations, ourselves, the earth? What I see us needing is not a better word, but the flesh of us on it. We need to explore embodying it in the ways of our worship, our finances, our commitments, in ways that have real implications for the way we live---from parenting, to what we drive and eat, and how we expend our life energy. I know from the Board’s action plan at May that we are moving ahead in living these more fully. Ya How!*

We need religious language??? Take a look at the sources of our living tradition from which we draw. We have the largest, most inclusive library of inspiration and truth in the religion business! And not only the truth in words: sacred scriptures from the world’s religions, stories, poems, and writings and teachings, hymns; but also experiential wisdom: the deeds of prophetic women and men, your own ongoing experiences in life- your wonder, the harmony of the natural world, observations of science. Are these what we want to be more clearly defined? Even if we did want to narrow them to some common religious language, whatever that may be, I don’t think we will know what it is until we plum the depths of our sources together.

Have you tried to live these principles? Have you draw from these sources for your living? Sinkford says that the man who headed the committee largely responsible for the current wording had wondered out loud how likely it would be that many would ask to have these read on their death bed for solace and support. I think he was trying to make the point that few would. I’d be in the minority on that one! I would say yes. Read them to me. Tell me I was faithful. Tell me I did my best to try to help children live them. Tell me I lived them to the best of my ability… that I was just, compassionate, that I had honored your dignity. Tell me that I have tried to work for global peace, that my relationships were equitable, that I listened to my conscience and worked with you every day to make decisions that would better this world. Tell me about the sources that I grew from--Read me the sacred stories. Share memories of when we sat on a beach or hiked a mountain, when I listened well to you when you were confronted with a death of someone close, or the joy of the birth of a child. Tell me that I am passing with the voices of the prophets etched in my ears, and their deeds remembered in the work of my hands. Tell me I have confronted the evil that I seen, that I have loved you as my neighbor, even that I have loved my life. That I took the knowledge of science in to account and walked softly on the fields, not leaving much harm in the wake of my living. Tell me I have fulfilled my promises to try to live these things well.

Look at our society! Look at our global crisis! This covenant and these sources are inadequate words to invite you to the depths? Have you been in any covenanted relationship and have been driven by your intimacy to the depths of who you are, ethically and spiritually? The world is not bleeding from lack of religious language; it is that we haven’t been living in some kind of state of “mutual trust and support”. Something is wrong with professions of beliefs in God existing along side bombs and terror. In America alone you know the statistics: a 50% plus divorce rate, high rate of violence, pollution, over consumption, the list goes on. Not to mention how overloaded we are with words and information. We are bombarded every day with things that ache to sever us from each other and the earth and even ourselves.

The task of the religious community nowadays ought to be to put some weight on the sources that are of great importance and to help people to live in relationship to themselves, each other, and this earth. Our sources and principles aim to do that and I feel they are answering the call of our time. I know for myself the real freedom I seek from this liberal faith is not to believe what I want, but help me be responsible for living my beliefs and upholding principles that flow from them, especially in a culture that I do not seen them embodied.

I am proud of these words. They are quite beautiful in their simplicity and accessibility. Take “compassion.” This is not a religious word? Compassion is a word all religions are steeped in and there it sits in ours, like many others… “Justice” and “peace.” No need for translation. It is in plain English. I don’t need to share with every person the whys of biology, cosmology, theology, or mythology, nor that a prophet or divinity said it was a good principle to affirm and promote. I enter into practicing it myself- from the sources I have drawn from that have taught me how to live it… and I can continue to expand my living of it in the ways I most need to learn.

These sources stretch me to deepen my credo- my answers to the questions that arise in the depths of me. And these principles challenge me to live it fully and continuously in the context of relationships. I love that you can find what is meaningful and true for you and try to express it in the world. That, in itself, is holy…for children, for every individual. I agree with Sinkford, these do define “a process of becoming acquainted w the depths,” but have we forgotten the words of Jesus who said, “ I am the Way. I am the Truth. Where two or more are gathered, there I am.” What about the Tao, the inseparable Tao?
If we need any language at all, the only helpful thing I see missing is a language of sin or separation, as Reverend Blanchard spoke of last week. We might benefit from a word that would name and cause us to take pause when we violate the covenant of our faith, when we are not in unity with others but separated them by not being compassionate, not being just, using our authority over another.

Call it “sin” or “separation.” Every Sunday we sing, “Come, come, whoever you are.” I find it interesting that we left out the line “…even though you have broken your vow 1,000 times. Come, yet again come.” I’m not hopeful that we’ll ever find the words though. I remember someone at a visioning session said they didn’t want someone to shake a finger at him and say he was violating UU Principle number seven! No, but I think might merit sitting around a table and discussing how we could do better in respecting the interdependent web in our recycling practices, or that we can sit together and discuss the value of our every infant in our care. A covenant is people entering into an agreement together, with mutual support and trust. It is not shaking of fingers. It is not unilateralism. Might the way we are relating be the Good News of Unitarian Universalism we are professing?

“Unitarian Universalism,” these are some words! Here’s what Sinkford had to say about them:

Our resistance to religious language gets reflected, I think, in the struggle that so many of us have in trying to find ways to say who we are, to define Unitarian Universalism. I always encourage people to work on their “elevator speech” for when you are on the 6th floor and you’re going to the lobby and somebody asks you, “What’s a Unitarian Universalist?” What do you say? You’ve got about 45 seconds. Here’s my current answer: “The Unitarian side of our family tree tells us there is only one God, one Spirit of Life, one Power of Love. The Universalist side tells us that God is a loving God, condemning none of us, and valuing the spark of divinity that is in every human being. So, UUism stands for: One God, no one left behind.

Do you agree? He goes on to say:

Now as with every elevator speech, mine is still a work in progress. It says where I am right now, and it doesn’t say anything about where you are.

Needless to say, I’d guess this elevator speech wasn’t where many humanists or atheists were. To have the President of your Association saying you believed in God, regardless of how he translates It, made them feel pretty left behind! Some even misunderstood him to mean that he wanted to return to Christian language. Not so.

I don’t think his elevator speech is defining. God language for me is not helpful in that way, though I deeply respect other’s use of it. Tell me what you mean by “God” if you are a theist, and I will probably tell you I am not an atheist. Better yet, start trying to live your idea of God, and I will believe in you. Tell me you are an ardent humanist, and then profess to me what is most meaningful to you. Then live in fullest relationship to that in our relationship, and I will share in your belief. I am your humanist. I usually can find some truth in theirs. So to say we all believe in this or that seems separating. There are so many sides to the coin of belief and meaning that I relate to in my own view, that Oneness or Unity for me gets better at what is ultimate… more like a verb or a state of being. I see his speech as another sign of somehow not integrating the language we have in a living, present way, and not fully taking notice that referents to God and that no one is left behind have been folded in to what I see as a wider UUism.

“Unitarian,” originally referred to those who believed in the “unity” of God, as opposed to “Trinitarians” who believed that God was three in one. Hence Sinkford states, “Unitarian, one God.” Often people say the clearest sign of this root in our Principles and Purposes is in the free and responsible search for truth and meaning, and related to that, and inclusion of all diverse sources. In other words, what we took from our Unitarian history was not the specifics of a belief system as it once was, but the fact that Unitarians were people who believed in the use of their reason and the free search for truth.

“Universalism,” originally referred to that belief that salvation was “universal”, that no person would go to hell as Calvinists asserted some would. The most visible sign of this in our current words are the affirmation and promotion of the inherent worth and dignity of every person, loving your neighbor as yourself, and “the transformative power of love” for all as a modern notion of salvific hope. But these are somewhat complicated evolutions to describe to people, or teach children for that matter!

If someone asks me what Unitarian Universalism is, I usually say simply, “It is a covenantal faith with seven principles, drawing from many sources of truth.” That usually gets a conversation going about the free and responsible search, what a covenant, creed, and credo are, how it is possible that truth is wide, unfolding, and also affirmed in our living. What I really wish I could say is, “Unitarian is a word that has evolved to mean not belief in the unity of God, but belief in Unity itself. What is most important and sacred is not separable. And Universalism means that we are all transformed through relationships that express that great Oneness. But that would be defining sort of a relational theology, inclusive of our individual credos. It would be saying that for all of our mutual experience, our separate conclusions are in some essential way the same. Which I think they are, but it is hard to say you believe in unity in infinite variety and have it mean anything to a stranger! And, I don’t really think these words would be any more defining or get at the all of what any human being could say or name that hasn’t been better expressed in a poem or psalm or story of great truth.

Sophia Lyon Fahs was well before her time as one of the most famous religious educators in our history. In her booklet “Developing Concepts of God With Children” (10 cents in 1959!), she shares anxieties about teaching children some biblical tales too young. She said we ought not teach children through words about things they should come to believe in, like “God,” but through the same primal experiences that humans had which were the impetus for the development of those words in the first place. If we expose them to experiences, her thought was, they would come to define the ultimate for themselves with wonderful reverence. Sounds to me suspiciously like our sources! She ended up sharing lots of sacred stories from around the world with them and encouraging direct experiences of nature often… Experience being the best teacher, which I hope it will be as we move forward in the religious education program in the years to come.
As Rumi says, “You are the truth from foot to brow. Now what else is it you need to know?” We are not just about searching for truth, we are about living truth. I don’t hear the call for more religious language in my ears; I hear a call for more religious living. When so much freedom abounds, and so much truth is known already, the choice is now what to do with it. Continue to evolve it, yes. And, to reveal it in our living, yes. I think ultimately, it is our living together that is the ultimate word of this faith. You want to wage peace? You must be peace. Shall I create compassion in the world? I must be it. Am I a walking expression of the talk of these things?

We all may be speaking in many, many, beautiful languages, but we have some common words to help us drive the sky upward, or the peace outward, or the oppression downward, or the hope of a higher order forward……..

Let us proceed. Ya How!
Let us not wait another minute.
May it be so.

References:
“The Language of Faith,” A sermon by the Reverend William G. Sinkford. Preached at the First Jefferson Unitarian Universalist Church, January 12, 2003.

“Developing Concepts of God with Children,” Council of Liberal Churches Inc. Division of Education. 25 Beacon Street, Boston, Mass. Based on an address given at the Conference of Sunday School Teachers, Board of Jewish Education, December 6, 1959.

*Ya How! meaning “Let us proceed.” From the story, “Lifting the Sky,” a Skagit tale from the Pacific Northwest in Peace Tales: World folktales to talk about. Complied by Margaret Mead MacDonald, 1992. This tale was used as opening words for the celebration of life service on March 30, 2003.

Unitarian Universalist Association
25 Beacon St. | Boston, MA 02108 | 617-742-2100