THIS IS OUR GREAT COVENANT:  Shared Ministry at PUUF

Rev. Kit Ketcham, Jan. 14, 2018

            Before I launch into my sermon for today, I want to take a moment to express my horror and outrage at the despicable words and attitudes spouted over the past months, and particularly this past week, by the man who was perhaps falsely elected president of our country.

            To hear the blasphemy coming from his mouth often and in the ugliest of ways is sickening and enraging me, as I imagine it sickens and enrages you.

            I want us all to remember that WE stand firm in our convictions and commitment to equality, compassion, and justice.  WE are true Americans, whether we are immigrants or native born, people of color or white, disabled or not.  We represent the true America; the man and his cronies who are trying to change our democracy to a tyrannical heartless kleptocracy do not represent the ideals and mission of the USA.

            We must resist, in the name and memory of those men and women who have lived and died for freedom for ALL of us, in civil rights battles, in courtrooms, in jailhouses, in simple acts of rebellion against evil.

            I ask all of us to double down on our acts of kindness, of resistance, of commitment to our ideals and the promises of a multicultural, pluralistic nation, the UNITED states of America, a nation which respects and honors diversity, exercises its strengths and works on its weaknesses.

            We are Americans.  What our so-called president is doing does not represent us.  He is an American only by birth, not by attitude or behavior or heart.  We are Americans and we have a duty not to obey a false and evil leader.  Say it with me:  WE are Americans and we will resist evil.

           And now for the sermon: 

            There’s a poem that came to my mind recently when I was looking for ideas for another Sunday service.  It’s called “Two Tramps in Mudtime” and it’s by American poet Robert Frost who wrote it around 1934,  shortly after the Great Depression of the 30’s descended.

            “Mudtime” is that soggy spring-thaw time of year in New England, where Frost lived on a small acreage which required a lot of chopping and dragging and stacking of oak firewood for the winter months.  Mr. Frost enjoyed those outdoor workouts, but it was a cold and hungry time of year for unemployed wanderers looking for ways to earn a few dollars or a meal.

            The early part of the poem describes Mr. Frost’s dilemma----should he give the job of splitting the cordwood to the two tramps who appeared in his yard while he was working?   They would clearly do a better job than he, as they appeared to be woodsmen.  Or should he keep the pleasure of that physical labor for himself?

            In a synopsis of the dilemma, Frost wrote these last three stanzas:

Out of the wood two hulking tramps
(From sleeping God knows where last night,
But not long since in the lumber camps).
They thought all chopping was theirs of right.
Men of the woods and lumberjacks,
They judged me by their appropriate tool.
Except as a fellow handled an ax
They had no way of knowing a fool.
 

Nothing on either side was said.
They knew they had but to stay their stay
And all their logic would fill my head:
As that I had no right to play
With what was another man's work for gain.
My right might be love but theirs was need.
And where the two exist in twain
Theirs was the better right--agreed.

But yield who will to their separation,
My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For Heaven and the future's sakes.

Robert Frost

            We don’t know how Robert Frost solved this problem---he gives no indication that I’ve found---but he did get a great poem out of the dilemma and maybe that’s enough.  I’d like to think that he gave the work to the two men who needed it and could probably handle an axe much better than an ageing poet.

            But he makes a good point---when we both love and need the work we do, we create a better world for ourselves and the future.  That’s what I want to talk about with you this morning:  our work as Unitarian Universalists, as humans, as lovers of humankind and of the work we are called to do. 

            When I moved to the North Coast a little over five years ago, I was tired.  Retirement was the right answer for me in June of 2012.  I’d loved my Whidbey Island congregation, but now I just wanted to go to church on Sunday, maybe bring refreshments occasionally, greet people as they came in the door, pay my pledge, the same kinds of things that any good church member does to support the faith community and increase the sense of belonging.

         I considered checking out some of the other congregations on the coast, but a little experimentation and looking at websites helped me see that I really am a Unitarian Universalist at heart.  Even a nice liberal bunch of Methodists or Episcopalians or Congregationalists probably wasn’t going to cut it for me.

         So I never visited anywhere else.  I was happy to sit in the pews on Sunday morning, listen to whoever was the speaker, take part in interactive services, and generally just be a member.  Joining immediately, however, was the right thing for me to do, as I’ve always belonged to whatever congregation I was serving or attending.  To just visit didn’t feel quite right; until I joined, I didn’t feel as connected.  Guess I’ve been sort of a Church Lady all my life.

         But as I observed to Kathy Matthews, the UCC pastor at the little green church where we used to be located, over coffee downstairs one day early in the relationship between you and me as minister and congregation, ……“a call to serve just doesn’t go away”.  

It doesn’t matter if you’re a minister or a teacher or an engineer or an artist or a parent or a musician or any other field to which we feel drawn by our own passion and talents.  Most of us need to be useful all our lives, it seems.

             A sense of call among members of a group like ours, the Pacific UU Fellowship, also contributes to the strength of our Beloved Community, both as members live out their own individual passion and as they offer their passion and desire to serve through the congregation’s outreach programs and the projects they support. 

Over these past years, I have seen this sense of call play out in the development of some of our programs and activities:  our discussion times and participatory, interactive services are unique and reflect the curiosity and skills of some of our most involved members, for example. 

We have worked to improve many of our processes to get tasks completed without overcommitting our volunteers. We are involved in environmental and social justice causes as a congregation as well as individually. This is how passion and skills make PUUF a Fellowship, rather than just another religious institution.

            Consider this:  at the beginning of every service over the past several months, we have repeated together our centering affirmation:  Love is the spirit of this Fellowship and service is its prayer.  This is our great covenant, to dwell together in peace, to seek truth in love, and to help one another.

            What does this mean, in its deepest sense?  Does it mean we will never disagree on issues, if we dwell together in peace?  No, it means that we will settle our differences by peaceful means, not by fighting. 

            Does it mean that we all agree on what truth is?  No, it means that we are all seeking truth in individual and collective, collaborative ways, respecting the various backgrounds that have shaped our search for meaningful truth.  And because we seek truth in love, we let our love for each other temper our differences of opinion.

            Does it mean that we only help one another?  No, it means that in addition to helping each other personally, we also help our Fellowship strengthen and grow by our efforts to do the everyday tasks of the Fellowship and to reach out to the larger community as well.

            Love is the spirit of this congregation and the way we pray is by our service to one another and to the larger community, giving our love freely to one another and to our neighbors and friends.

            The promise that we make in this affirmation is a Covenant, an agreement and a reminder of how we respect each other’s needs and concerns, welcome those who seek this spiritual connection, and offer our hands and hearts to the wellbeing of our Fellowship community and to the larger world beyond our doors.

            We, as members and friends of PUUF, are in an important phase of our growth together, looking ahead to the challenges of this spring and the months between now and my eventual retirement in June of 2019.

            To prepare the Fellowship for this transition, I have been consulting with our regional minister, the Rev. Sarah Schurr, about best steps to take as we strengthen our infrastructure, that is, the processes that support our volunteers, our staff, and the community outside these doors.  We need to do some work together before you undertake the task of searching for a new minister.

            In addition, I have convened a small group of longtime members, plus our president Tara Geraci, to talk about PUUF’s early years, the ups and downs of the Fellowship as it dealt with both crises and good times over the 25 years of its history.  I’m calling this group ‘the Pioneers”.

In our first meeting, we developed a timeline from 1992 through the present year, talking about the hard times and the good times.  The Pioneers will produce a report for our board describing the foundation that has been laid down by the multiple events which shaped the trajectory of the PUUF to this point, both strengths to build on and weaknesses to address.

When the board has had a chance to consider the foundation we build on, we will select a second group of newer members to assess the possibilities for the future and to develop recommendations for the congregation to consider.  I’m thinking of this group as “the Astronauts”.

            There will be opportunities throughout the next 18 months to give input into these processes, and feedback from the larger membership will be critical as we proceed into the future.

            You will learn important things about the protocols which surround a ministerial search, the requirements that I must fulfill, the ways I can or cannot be involved in the search process.  We will face a time of grief as we say goodbye in June of 2019 and also a time of joy as you take the big step of asking a minister to serve you as I have done.

            Our Great Covenant will continue to remind us every Sunday that we have responsibilities to ourselves, to each other, and to the larger community.  We will find joy in serving each other, of performing the many small acts of ministry involved in the tasks of preparing our sanctuary, providing our refreshments, as well as wrangling the tables for our potlucks, greeting our visitors and our many PUUF friends, working with our children, opening and locking up the building, leading discussions and preparing services, setting up our sound system, and all the other ways people volunteer to help. 

And being ourselves out in the community---involved in anti-oppression work, marches, resistance, volunteering, acting on our principles and values to spread the good news of Unitarian Universalism in our region.

            Yes, we will disagree about some things, but as we seek truth in love, which is the spirit of this Fellowship, we will be thoughtful in our differences of opinion, looking for the best paths to follow as we provide a liberal religious presence in this Columbia Pacific community.

            We will also take a hard look at our mission, our reasons for being a UU congregation in a secular world.  What do we offer that is different, that is meaningful to our young families as well as our retirees and middle-aged families who give us such strength.  How do we offer our gifts to a hurting world and at the same time, create a home for ourselves?

            As we close,  Mary Oliver, the poet, offers this beautiful work entitled “The Summer Day” to ask an important question.

Who made the world? 

Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean—
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down—
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

            Let’s pause for a time of silent reflection and prayer.

BENEDICTION:  Our worship service, our time of shaping worth together, is ended, but our service to the world begins again as we leave this place.  Let us go in peace, pondering what it is that we as individuals and as a Fellowship plan to do with our wild and precious lives, however much of life remains to us. May we find peace of mind and love for life in all its manifestations as we follow the paths that are opening to us. Amen, Shalom, Salaam, and Blessed Be.

CLOSING CIRCLE