Centering (5 minutes)

This is a time to make the transition from the busy world to the group experience. A member of the group may read these words from the twentieth century American religious leader Howard Thurman:

I will light candles this Christmas:
Candles of joy, despite all sadness,
Candles of hope where despair keeps watch,
Candles of courage for fears ever present,
Candles of peace for tempest-tossed days,
Candles of grace to ease heavy burdens,
Candles of love to inspire all my living,
Candles that will burn all the year long.

Check-in (10 to 25 minutes)

Each person in the group has the opportunity to share something about his or her life. What significant events have taken place recently in your life? Have you accomplished something meaningful to you? Have you experienced any losses or setbacks? Have you had any insights or new ideas?

Group Discussion (45 to 70 minutes)

Our spiritual theme for this month is Hope. We will explore the spiritual theme of Hope by asking questions such as these: How does Hope differ from optimism? Is Hope a gift? A duty? An achievement? What sustains Hope? How does our understanding of human nature inform our understanding of Hope?

For group discussion, please consider the questions associated with one or more of the following numbered sections. You need not address all of these sections, and you need not address them in this order.

1.What hopes do you have for our world? What hopes do you have for your family? What hopes do you have for yourself??

2. Physicist Freeman Dyson has written: “Hope is not the lucky gift of circumstance or disposition, but a virtue like faith and love, to be practiced whether or not we find it easy or even natural, because it is necessary to our survival as human beings.”

Would you agree?

3. The American religious leader Jim Wallis wrote, “Hope is not a feeling; hope is a decision. And the decision to hope is based on what you believe at the deepest levels – what your most basic convictions are about the world and what the future holds – all based on your faith. You choose hope, not as a naïve wish, but as a choice, with your eyes wide open to the reality of the world – just like the cynics who have not made the decision for hope.”

Would you agree?

4. Some would distinguish between optimism and hope in this way. Optimism reflects confidence that a particular outcome will occur. For example, if there are only a few clouds in the sky, one can be optimistic that it will not rain within the next hour. Hope reflects the way one’s values are woven into one’s being. Not to hope is to abandon one’s values, to stop being oneself.

Would you agree?

5. Kwanzaa, a holiday created in 1966 by Maulana Karenga to honor African history and culture, extends from December 26 through January 1. One of the seven principles of Kwanzaa is KUJICHAGULIA, or Self-Determination, which means: “To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves, and speak for ourselves, instead of being defined, created for, and spoken for by others. KUJICHAGULIA is saying who we are and who we will be, and not letting others say for us.”

Can you think of instances where a group of people has not been allowed to define itself, name itself, create for itself, or speak for itself? Could it be part of your hope for the world to encourage groups to say for themselves who they are and who they will be, and not let others say for them?

6. In a poem entitled “The Shortest Day,” Susan Cooper wrote:

So the shortest day came, and the year died.
And everywhere down the centuries of the snow-white world
Came people
Singing, dancing,
To drive the dark away.
They lighted candles in the winter trees;
They hung their homes with evergreen;
They burned beseeching fires all night long
To keep the year alive.
And when the new year’s sunshine blazed awake
They shouted, reveling!
Through all the frosty ages you can hear them
Echoing behind us – listen!
All the long echoes sing the same delight,
This shortest day,
As promise wakens in the sleeping land:
They carol, feast, give thanks,
And dearly love their friends,
And hope for peace.
And so do we, here, now,
This year and every year.
Welcome Yule!

Many of the customs we associate with Christmas have been borrowed from older world-views which pre-date Christianity. Susan Cooper offers a reminder of these customs and the people who originated and celebrated these customs: “Through all the frosty ages you can hear them echoing behind us – listen!” Nowadays we understand that the days will automatically grow longer after the Winter Solstice. How might the Winter Solstice serve as a symbol of hope?

Conclusion (5 to 10 minutes)

What will you take away from this discussion? What would have made this time together more meaningful or satisfying to you? What did you enjoy? A group member may share these words from Unitarian Universalist minister John Buehrens:

This holiday season, mend a quarrel.
Seek out a forgotten friend.
Dismiss suspicion, and replace it with trust.
Write a love letter.
Share some treasure.
Give a soft answer.
Offer encouragement.
Manifest your loyalty in word and deed.
Keep a promise.
Find the time.
Forgive an enemy.
Listen.
Apologize if you were wrong.
Try to understand.
Flout envy.
Examine your demands on others.
Think first of someone else.
Appreciate.
Be kind; be gentle.
Laugh a little.
Laugh a little more.
Deserve confidence.
Take up arms against malice.
Decry complacency.
Express your gratitude.
Welcome a stranger.
Gladden the heart of a child.
Take pleasure in the beauty and wonder of the earth.
Speak your love.
Speak it again.
Speak it still once again.