We Laugh, We Cry: the role of the Holy Fool in Unitarian Universalism

     Had a hard time entering the text of the sermon, so am posting this link to the recording of the service:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-tFUveBfFs&ab_channel=PacificUUFellowship

Covenant, not Creed

 COVENANT, NOT CREED

March 12, 2023

PUUF, Rev. Kit Ketcham

 

How many of you grew up in a religious environment where you recited a set of statements that you were expected to believe, things about God and Jesus, salvation, and other weighty expectations, particularly if you were a little kid at the time, growing up in a Christian household.

Do you remember the names of any of the various creeds that you learned or recited in a church service?  Creeds are statements of theological belief and they can be pretty demanding.

Take the Apostles Creed, for example, which is often included in traditional church services:

I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord,
      who was conceived by the Holy Spirit
      and born of the virgin Mary.
      He suffered under Pontius Pilate,
      was crucified, died, and was buried;
      he descended to hell.
      The third day he rose again from the dead.
      He ascended to heaven
      and is seated at the right hand of God the Father almighty.
      From there he will come to judge the living and the dead.

I believe in the Holy Spirit,
      the holy catholic* church,       

      the communion of saints,
      the forgiveness of sins,
      the resurrection of the body,
      and the life everlasting. Amen.

This fairly typical Protestant creed sets out the beliefs that traditional Christians espouse and commit themselves to.  More progressive Christian churches do not recite the Apostles creed in services, but it still stands as representative of many Christians’ core beliefs, whether they are taken literally or not.

As a Baptist preacher’s kid, I didn’t quote any such creed in church.  However, it was made abundantly clear that God ruled, Jesus was God’s son and therefore the true Son of God and also God.  The Holy Ghost was mainly a mystery to us kids.

Creeds lay out the most important beliefs of a religious faith and they differ somewhat, depending on the faith’s sense of importance for each statement.  To state in public a Creed that says the things that the Apostles Creed stands for is quite a commitment to an ancient theology that has given way to science and its denial of the possibility of a physical resurrection, virgin births, and other of the tenets of faith that conservative Christians cling to.

Our Baptist set of beliefs was not set in stone, like the Apostle’s Creed seems to be.  But it was pretty clear that there were certain beliefs we HAD to subscribe to or go to hell.  And that was pretty scary!

Unitarian Universalists don’t have creeds.  Oh, we tend to hold similar values, like democracy, equality, justice, and we state these and other values in our documents of faith.  Interestingly, there’s nothing in our values and sources that state that if you want to be a UU, you have to toe the line with everyone else.

It's been said that UU’s can believe anything they want, and I suppose that’s true on a very limited level, but it doesn’t matter.  What does matter to us UUs is how we behave toward each other and our fellow beings in the world.  In other words, how do we live out our values and honor our sources?

A creed is a hard thing to hold everybody to; everyone who has had a different experience than the typical creed professes, or has different needs from their religious experience, or just plain doesn’t believe in non-provable statements about such things as resurrection and other miracles---they aren’t going to be very happy with a creed that everyone is expected to agree to, at least in public.

My cat and I have been arguing lately, late at night and early in the morning, about our household creed.  My statement of faith about nighttime behavior is that I will sleep 6 hours or so uninterrupted by the cat’s needs for food or companionship or whatever it is that a cat needs at 1 a.m.  

Her statement of faith about nighttime behavior is that she is a creature who sleeps a lot in the daytime and needs to do a little par-kour exercise at night so that she can have her regular time at the litterbox, which she needs to have cleaned out asap. And if the par-kour court is off limits, she will let off that unreleased energy in a series of loud vocalizations.

You can easily see that our creeds don’t match up.  We have different needs, different preferences, different styles of living.  We’d have to find different roommates.  We don’t need a household creed; we need a covenant so that we can live as compatibly as possible together, because we love each other and we meet each other’s needs in many ways.

When I first came into the ministry, in 1999, serving a small spin-off congregation in Portland, we were pretty much creed-based:  that is, many congregations had a certain bent toward humanism only as a creed.  If you weren’t a humanist, you couldn’t be a UU.  That was unstated, of course, but there was a definite preference for humanism as the one true faith.

This little congregation seemed welcoming to me, and my honeymoon year with them was full of appreciation and enthusiasm.  By year two, there were clearly cracks in the veneer though I didn’t know exactly what to do about them.   

Early in year three, I was invited to have coffee with the board president, where he presented me with a letter signed by eleven congregants listing all the things I had done wrong (so far), generally centering on my too-Christian, non-intellectual sermons, my failure to provide adequate pastoral care to a non-member whose daughter was one of the signatories, plus assorted other complaints.  I was a big mistake, in their opinion, and they wanted me gone.  

I learned that this group of eleven had formed a special email list just between them, in which they exchanged their opinions, egged each other on, criticized my presence at board meetings and committee meetings, and were making plans to complain to the UUA about my shortcomings.

I was taken aback.  Some of the eleven signers were women and men whom I particularly liked and had considered allies.  Yet they were talking behind my back, rather than coming to me directly to work things out.

It almost felt like a junior high school gang of kids bullying a kid they didn’t like.  Fortunately, I had taught junior high kids and had counseled them through their own disputes for 25 years.  I had herded cats before and I knew a thing or two.  

I called upon the services of our district executive, a woman I found supportive and knowledgeable, read her the letter, and asked for her thoughts.  She listened, told me of the background of this contentious little group-- which was rather murky--, assured me that she thought I was doing fine, and told me that help was available through the district.  

She organized a congregational meeting to hear the complaints from all sides, in a group.  Both detractors and supporters AND I had a chance to participate in this round table discussion.  It was orderly, honest, revealing of old wounds on both sides, and we came through it.

I had a choice, at that point.  I could resign and look elsewhere for a job, or I could face what had happened and work through it.  I have been a 12-step aficionada for many years, dealing with alcoholism in my husband, and I knew that some of the things this group was saying I had done were true.

At the time we had no way established of solving conflicts other than to gripe to each other, gossip in the parking lot, criticize others’ behavior while feeling self-righteous, and letting things simmer rather than facing them head on, or even acknowledging the pain we were causing ourselves and each other.

So on Thanksgiving Sunday that year, I made amends, as completely as I could, acknowledging the rookie mistakes I’d made, and asking for their help in bringing us all back together.  That was not an easy year, but during that year, several of the signers of the critical letter had come to me asking my forgiveness for their treatment of me.  And I apologized directly for ways I learned I had hurt people myself.

As it turned out, I left at the end of my fourth year with them, but we were on better terms, several of the dissidents had quit, and the atmosphere was less strained. 

  But there was still anger, particularly among the folks who were my supporters.  They were angry that I had been hurt, angry that I had (in their opinions) been chased out by the dissidents, angry with themselves for not speaking up sooner.

This little congregation was still in pain and, to judge from reports by those in the know, they are still hurting and have had up and down luck with subsequent ministers.

If I had known then what I know now, what would I do?  First of all, even though I was eager to be in Portland, I would have asked the search committee and individual members “how do you resolve disagreements?”

“What do you need most from me?” “Is it okay here for me to be a UU Christian?” and that sort of thing.  I would have asked for us to create a covenant, rather than accept people, particularly a new minister, on the basis of how humanistic they were.

         I would have asked that the covenant provide pathways for dealing with dissent, with the new minister and with their fellow members, so that all felt welcome in the congregation.  And I would have asked that the covenant provide promises of good will and commitment to those promises.

         A new minister comes in not knowing much about the congregation.  And the congregation knows little about the minister.  Maybe the minister comes on too strong, doesn’t seem to listen well, and makes wrong assumptions about the congregation.

         A congregation is often set in its own ways, which are unfamiliar to the minister and may seem inappropriate or non-productive to the minister.

         To quote my colleague Rev. Paul Langston-Daley: “ In small congregations I’ve served, I have said something like this:  We are not centered on a creed.  We are centered on covenant and always have been, as a denomination, and we are in covenant with other UU congregations.

         “Covenant gives us guardrails, to help us manage conflict and disruptive behavior and sets explicit expectations about how we will be together.”

         In our Sunday service, we offer a Gathering Affirmation.  We say together “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.”

         The thing about our Great Covenant, is that it is an action promise, not just pretty words.  If Love is the spirit of this Fellowship, how do we show it, not only to our members but also to others.  If Service is our prayer, how are we serving?  We promise to dwell together in peace; how do we manage disagreements?  We promise to seek truth in love; how do we welcome the many diverse threads of truth under our roof?  And we promise to help one another; how are we doing that?

         I’d like to ask you to give me a parting gift, the assurance that you will do all you can to be in covenant with Rev. Mira.  I would like to ask you to develop, with Rev. Mira, a covenant of right relations.  It would be a wonderful thing for me to know that this Fellowship, which I love so much and have worked so hard for, had taken steps to create a process that promises that disputes and tough decisions will be worked through in a loving and kindly way, that so that Mira and following ministers will not have to endure without recourse the kind of treatment I had when I was in my first ministry.

         As Rev. Paul said: “Covenant gives us guardrails, to help us manage conflict and disruptive behavior and sets explicit expectations about how we will be together.”

         I plan to talk with Rev. Mira and encourage her to work with you on a covenant between you and her and between you and your fellowship members.  I can guarantee you it will be worth it.  New people coming in will know right off the bat how this congregation fulfills its Great Covenant.

         Just as a sample, I’d like to share with you the Covenant of Right Relations that the Whidbey Island folks and I created when I was there years ago.

         It’s pretty simple and it has worked over and over again to deal with disputes.  It came out of a painful situation in the congregation’s past when a former member polarized the group with accusations and misbehavior.  Here it is:

Love is the spirit of this congregation and service is its practice. This is our great covenant: to dwell together in peace, to seek truth in love, and to help one another.

•   We warmly welcome all.

•   We speak with honesty, respect, and kindness.

•   We listen compassionately.

•   We express gratitude for the service of others.

•   We honor and support one another in our life journeys, in times of joy, need and struggle.

•   We embrace our diversity and the opportunity to share our different perspectives.

•   We address our disagreements directly and openly and see conflict through to an authentic resolution.

•   We serve our spiritual community with generosity and joy, honoring our commitments.

•   We strive to keep these promises, but when we fall short, we forgive ourselves and others, and begin again in love.

I hope you’ll consider it.  I would be very proud to know that you have created such a meaningful document to use in times of dissent or disagreement after I’ve moved away.

You’re probably wanting to know how my cat and I are doing in creating our own covenant of right relations.  We’ve been working on it for about a week now, trying to figure out a nighttime process that respects both of our personal needs, my need for sleep and her need to feel loved.  And I think we’re making progress. I found myself getting so mad when she’d yowl that I couldn’t sleep.  And she felt scared when I got mad.  

Cats live by different rules than humans and sometimes the human needs to give more than the cat----because we understand how it feels to be scared of someone else’s behavior.  The cat, on the other hand, responds to the kindness the human shows.    And both of us are happy.

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

BENEDICTION

As Laura extinguishes the chalice flame, here is our 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, remembering that how we are together as a group matters, that when we have disagreements or angry moments, we can solve these problems in a positive way, respecting one another’s differences and loving each other beyond those differences.  May we find peace together, find truth in love, and find help for our pain.  Amen, Shalom, Salaam, and Blessed Be.

 

CLOSING CIRCLE

 

 

When I was a little girl...

 

Children's Story: “When I was a little girl”…..Feb. 28, 2010

When I was a little girl, I was kind of adventurous. I liked to be a little bit different from everyone else and try things that others didn’t want to try, like standing on my hands and using my cape to try to fly. I wasn’t too afraid of getting in trouble because my parents didn’t usually spank me and all I had to do was very sincerely say sorry and promise never to do it again.

The worst punishment was to have to go to my room and be on my bed and NOT READ! That was the worst of all.

One day my little sister Jeannie and I and a little boy named Drew who my mother babysat, were out in our backyard in Portland playing. I had my big rubber boots on, because it was wet and muddy.

We had two big strong old clothesline poles made out of iron and shaped like a T with heavy wires strung between them for the wet clothes to be hung on to dry, because we didn’t have a clothes dryer.

I had just learned how to hang by my knees on the monkeybars at school. Do you know how to do that yet?

And it looked to me as though our T-shaped clothesline pole would be a good place to practice this important skill. So I pulled an old bucket over to the clothesline pole and hoisted myself up onto the T crossbar.

The clotheslines that ran between the two T-shaped supports were heavy wires, which had been anchored to the support crossbar by twisting them around the bar. The wires stuck up (like this) with a sharp end pointing up.

I thought I was so cool! Here I was hanging by my knees and upside down, making faces at Jeannie and Drew, who were looking at me with their mouths open, obviously very jealous of my superior abilities!

 

Until I was tired of hanging upside down and wanted to get down---then I discovered that the sharp end of one wire had poked through my rubber boot and I was stuck, upside down. I couldn’t get down from the pole because my boot was caught by the wire and I couldn’t reach it to untangle it.

I wiggled and I stretched and just couldn’t manage to untangle my boot, and finally I started to cry. It was so embarrassing to be stuck upside down in front of Jeannie and Drew. I felt so helpless and kind of scared.

Now, I have to admit that I often teased Jeannie and Drew a lot; they were younger than I was and I kind of bossed them around, maybe too much. Because when I pleaded with Jeannie to go get Mom, she took her sweet time.

Our family story has it that Jeannie played a little more in the yard before she went in and announced to our mother that I was hanging from the clothesline.

Naturally, my mother came rushing out into the backyard and untangled me and lifted me down. And she sat all three of us down and explained that when someone was in trouble, it’s really important to get help right away, not goof around while that person is feeling scared and crying. 

And, she told me in no uncertain terms that my teasing might have caused Jeannie to feel kind of glad that I was stuck and embarrassed and scared, because I might have made her feel that way with my teasing. I learned something important that day.

 

I’m glad to tell you that my sister grew up to be a woman who really loves and cares about people when they are hurting and in trouble, especially kids. And I don’t tease her any more and she always comes to help me when I need her. 

I hope you’ll remember this the next time you feel mad when someone teases you or when you tease someone and they get mad. Because it’s important to know.

I'm going to be talking to the adults in a little while about how we treat people when they are in trouble and things aren't fair. We're talking about Love in this story and I'll be talking about Love in the sermon. I bet you'll be talking about Love in your classrooms, too. Let's sing you off to your classes now.

 

SIDING WITH LOVE

 

SIDING WITH LOVE

Rev. Kit Ketcham, Feb. 12, 2023

 

            The story of Unitarian Universalist advocacy for civil rights for sexual minorities and Marriage Equality for all couples started many years ago, in the 70’s, as we began to question many of traditional religions’ homophobia and outright discrimination toward sexual minorities---and our own shortcomings in that area. 

            One Source of UUism is the one that states that we draw from Jewish and Christian teachings, which call us to respond to God’s love by loving our neighbors as ourselves. 

            However, as we considered this deeply, it became abundantly clear that we as a religion were NOT loving our neighbors as ourselves.  At least not those neighbors whom we perceived as different, as having sexual attractions that were not “normal”, that were hidden and somehow worthy of ridicule or even persecution.  We had no right to cast stones at other traditions.

            We had ordained ministers serving congregations who lost their jobs because of their sexual orientation.   Not because we had church policies against homosexuality, but because we were afraid.  We had fears about being perceived ourselves as gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender, if we defended or befriended certain people. 

We were afraid we’d become known as “the gay church or the transgender church”.  Even though we knew intellectually that there was nothing intrinsically wrong with being gay or lesbian or bisexual or transgender, there was still a lot of fear and confusion about homosexuality and gender. 

            We felt uncomfortable knowing that there were human beings whose sexual attraction or gender identity was different from our own.  Sometimes we questioned whether we ourselves might be gay or lesbian or bisexual or transgender.  We weren’t completely comfortable with our own sexuality.  Somebody else’s sexuality---well, that was more comfortable to obsess about.

            We often didn’t think twice about using derogatory terms to describe people whose sexuality made us squirm.  We joked and laughed, even when we had friends who were openly gay and lesbian. 

We were baffled by males who felt female and wanted to change their gender and females who felt male and went to the extent of having surgery to transform their bodies.  It was scary!   What did it all mean?

            It rapidly became clear that we had a job to do—on ourselves.  We had ministers and members desperately unhappy because they could not be themselves, who even committed suicide rather than deal with the prejudice they were facing, even from their own congregations.

Some Jewish and Christian groups were refusing to allow them to join congregations, to serve as leaders, and to ordain them, they said, was totally against God’s law.    Marriage, of course, was impossible!    

What did it really mean to love our neighbor as ourselves? 

            I remember my first introduction to the idea that I actually knew people who were gay and lesbian.  I was about 35, living in Denver with my husband and small son, when one of my best friends from Linfield wrote me a letter.

            “Kit,” she wrote.  “I don’t know how you’ll feel about this, but I am tired of hiding who I am.  I recently attempted suicide by driving into a steel beam on the Hawthorne Bridge but paramedics patched me up and I’ve decided to be honest about myself.  I’m lesbian, I love women, not men, and I’m telling the people that I can trust.  I hope we can still be friends….  And by the way, I’m going to be in Colorado in a few weeks.  Can I visit you?”

            Well, I was definitely in the “fear” stage at that time.  I was scared to see her but couldn’t bring myself to jettison somebody I cared for because of my fear.  So, Fern came to visit and it was fine.  She was the same person I knew in college, still funny, still an artist, still my friend.  And the honest way she answered my questions opened a door in my heart.

 

            In the years after that experience, I was a teacher and school counselor, where I met teenage students who were desperately unhappy because of their attraction to the “wrong” people, whose churches preached openly against same sex attraction.  Some of these kids attempted suicide.  Some just endured the bullying and the public ridicule.  Some I didn’t find out about until years later, when they wrote me notes and told me their news.

            This became my personal civil rights cause.  In 1994, I asked our minister at Jefferson Unitarian Church, the Rev. Robert Latham, to help me put on a service about gay/lesbian rights.  As far as I know, it was the first time ever that homosexuality and the pain of injustice had been linked at JUC. 

A group from the local Rainbow Harmony chorale, a mixed group of Denver men and women, performed selections from “Boys and Girls with Stories”, composed by David Maddux .   And, my knees knocking, I offered a reflection on my own experience entitled “My Friend Fern”.

The sanctuary was packed that morning.  I saw people there who I didn’t know were gay or lesbian, friends who had never dared say who they really were.  A teacher from a school I’d served—and his partner; the parent of three of my students; a colleague who was a counselor at a local high school.  The extent of my ignorance felt overwhelming.

 

As a minister, in the next few years, I had chances to extend my knowledge and my experience and my group of friends.  My friend Fern had given me a great gift that continues to affect my life today and, I hope, all my days.

When I moved to Portland in 1999, to serve Wy’east UU Congregation, Oregon was debating Lou Mabon’s hateful ballot issue, a measure to forbid any mention of homosexuality in the schools and to discipline teachers who dared to discuss the topic with students.

We UUs and other progressives fought back and defeated that referendum and turned our sights on civil rights legislation to protect sexual minorities from job and housing and insurance and inheritance discrimination.

In 2003, I moved to the Puget Sound area to serve the Vashon and Whidbey Island congregations and immediately became involved in an interfaith clergy group we named the Religious Coalition for Equality. 

As a clergy group of Jews, mainline progressive Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, pagans, and UUs, we accompanied four couples who went in a group one day to the King County Clerk’s office to apply for marriage licenses, kicking off a years’ long campaign to secure increased civil rights for all couples, starting with anti-discrimination laws and domestic partnerships for same sex and older unmarried couples, culminating in legislative action approving Marriage Equality.

Marriage Equality legislation was approved in Washington in 2011, when the legislature passed a bill granting the right of civil marriage to same sex couples, after a tense session on Whidbey Island in which our Island County senator, Mary Margaret Haugen, was persuaded by an impassioned group of Whidbey Island citizens to be the 25^th “yes” vote on the legislation in the divided Senate, forging the final link in the chain of progress.

The legislation was, of course, challenged and then survived a vote statewide , becoming the law of the land in 2012.  I had moved here by that time and could neither vote on the issue nor take part in the celebrations, except at a distance, but, as is always true, it doesn’t matter who gets the credit as long as the work gets done.

As the opposition dominoes have begun to fall, one after another, as state and federal judges nation-wide have recognized the terrible injustice of denying equality to loving couples on the basis of sexual attraction, marriage equality has now become a reality in all of our United States. 

Even Alabama, once the stronghold of George Wallace and the attempted fortress of dissent of Justice Roy Moore, is now granting marriage licenses to same sex couples in Alabama.

  

None of the horrific consequences predicted by opponents has come true.  Instead, women who have been loyal partners to each other for 50 and more years are now married.  Men who grew old together, caring for one another through sorrow and illness, no longer hide their relationship but sport their wedding rings.

I’ve had the joyful opportunity to marry women and men whose relationships have survived the insults, the discrimination, and the fear of discovery.  Being part of this remarkable sea change in our nation has been one of the greatest satisfactions of my life.

Love and Marriage, love and marriage, go together like a horse and carriage, as the old song goes, but we UUs gradually recognized that this wave of social change meant that our slogan “standing on the side of love” didn’t just mean romantic and marital love.  

And we began to realize that loving our neighbor means more than just our gay neighbor.

What about homelessness?  What about immigration and the treatment of families split up by troubling deportation policies?  What about racial profiling and the treatment of young black men who are presumed to be thugs?  What about economic injustice, the fearful prospect of oligarchy, the rule by the wealthy, as corporations wield more influence than individual voters?  Where does love stand then?

 

         One of the columnists that I read most mornings, Robert Hubbell, wrote recently of an experience he had had, attending the funeral of a Jewish friend.  The rabbi spoke of the plight of the Israelites when they were enslaved by the Egyptian Pharoah, back in the days of Moses. 

He wrote this about what he heard as the rabbi spoke about the plagues brought down upon the Egyptians in response to Moses’ pleas to his God to save the Israelites:

“The moment the Rabbi described the ninth plague as the inability of enslavers to see the humanity of their countrymen, my mind turned immediately to the beating of Tyre Nichols—and by extension, the dehumanization of Blacks, Hispanics, Muslims, Asians, and LGBTQ people that animates discrimination against each of those groups. That dehumanization is part of the playbook of the (right wing’s) politics of division and hate. By denying the humanity of others, it is easier to deprive them of full participation in the life, liberty, and security our Constitution guarantees to all.”  And he went on in this way:

“The police who beat Tyre Nichols into a senseless stupor did so because they did not see him as a fellow human. He was a “perpetrator,” “suspect,” or “presumptive felon” who (in their minds) did not deserve to be treated with the dignity and humanity that is the right of every person in America. The failure to treat Tyre with basic human decency infected the first responders who were called to render medical aid to a victim of a police beating.”  

Here’s what I think: 

Several of the arresting officers and other responders were also black.  What if that taint of dehumanization had affected those black humans who may have succumbed to the poison of dehumanization and had begun to see themselves as non-human, therefore permitted to act toward Tyre in non-human ways, injuring him to the point of death as a trained animal might kill the hunted prey to please their masters.  A predator animal feasting on the weaker prey.

I believe that systemic racism and white superiority has flourished by inviting traditionally oppressed people such as these SCORPION officers and other first responders to enrich themselves with authority by adopting the attitude of non-humanity toward others of their caste or race or class.  It’s the classic bully role which has evolved from childhood intimidation of those weaker to adult threats and violence, often enforced by gunfire and beatings.

We ourselves may have been bullied.  We may even have experienced the thrill of being a bully-er.  It is the classic struggle to see ourselves and others as equals, not as weak or easily overpowered or superior.  

Unitarian Universalism has, as a faith tradition, grown strongly in the years since we decided to stand on the side of love.  I think of the closing words of the song we sang together a little while ago:

 “We are standing on the side of love, hands joined together, as hearts beat as one.  Emboldened by faith, we dare to proclaim we are standing on the side of love.”

We have set forth on this course, to defend and protect those who need love, those persons who are hungry, exhausted, lonely, homeless, and sorrowful.  They need our love.  And we, as fellow human beings, have the ability to provide that love.  

And, because we also love this planet, our home, we stand on the side of love for our natural world, ready to defend and protect it, ready to stand against harmful practices toward the land, water, and air which provide us with life, the animals and vegetation which depend on us for their care, as we fulfill our place in the interdependent web of life, of which we humans are only one part.

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, thinking deeply about what it means to love our neighbor as ourselves, as we have learned from our Jewish and Christian spiritual ancestors.  May we find in ourselves the resources to act in love toward one another, toward the universe, and toward ourselves.  Amen, Shalom, Salaam, and Blessed Be.

 

 

 

 CHALLENGES:  our Comfort, our Concerns, and our Creativity

Jan. 8, 2023

Rev. Kit Ketcham

As I’ve enjoyed our Coffee Klatches in December and have thought about the topics discussed, it’s become clear to me that each region of our parish has common thoughts about certain subjects, many of them similar.

         It’s exciting to see the positive effect of the new energy and ideas that have come with folks who have arrived in our parish in the past couple of years.  Not only did we survive the pandemic in pretty good shape, but we gained some really incredible new members and friends.  We are not the PUUF of the past; we are becoming the PUUF of today and the future.

         Let me run down the list of topics discussed in December and make some connections between what’s been discussed and what our membership is thinking about.

         Here’s a quickie summary of topics and themes in the coffee klatches.  Socializing, of course,  has always been the bedrock of coffee klatch groups, but ours at PUUF tend to go a lot deeper than gossip or gripes about political events, although those are also touched upon!

          In December, we swapped stories about how we found UUism and what it has meant in our lives.  For some it was a life stage moment, something that changed a life.   It may have changed our trajectory in life.  Sometimes it changed our relationships with family members and sometimes it brought peace and purpose after chaos. 

         Ageing and health concerns in our own small UU community spark a lot of discussion; care for our elders and care for ourselves, the difficult work of caretaking a struggling relative or friend, the lack of adequate facilities to treat our friends and family members—and ourselves—as we do our best with beloved adults who cannot adequately take care of themselves.

         Scary health episodes and the blessing of music as healer; relearning skills we lost because of ageing or health issues; finding understanding from others when we are having a difficult time; handling our hurt feelings when a quick joke stings and feels personal.

         Memories of the way things used to be---at PUUF, in our families, among our friends, the effect of political divides, both the sweet memories and the painful ones, the losses of friends and loved ones who have died.

         The excitement of seeing new faces participating in our services and other activities, getting to know these interesting people and listening to their ideas, thinking about the ways we might tweak the ways we’ve been doing things, to include new ideas and processes as we grow and thrive as a community.

As I put this homily together, I’ve noticed several C words that bear mentioning:  the Comfort we love, the Concerns we have for our own area, and the Creativity that is emerging, as we are energized by the presence of so many newer and younger folks in our midst.  And as an umbrella over all the C words, yet another:  the Challenges that we share as a Unitarian Universalist congregation.

So I’ve entitled this homily “Challenges:  Our Comfort, Our Concerns, and Our Creativity” because I think that’s where we are in our PUUF journey, taking stock of where we are and where we need and want to go.  

I see our major Challenges as these:  we need to address the uneasiness about change which threatens our Comfort level; we need to examine our Concerns about our communities carefully to see how we as a congregation can help with those concerns, and we want to welcome and include our newer folks by listening to their Creative ideas and implementing the ones which can strengthen PUUF and help us grow.

And at the bedrock of our Challenges is the constant awareness that we are a Unitarian Universalist Congregation, with an identity that is spelled out by our Principles.

I’d like to introduce something here that I found on the internet, on the UUMA Facebook page.  It’s a restating of our familiar Principles, expressing our values and amplifying them. You may not recognize the author’s name:  ChatGPT.  Yes, it’s written by a ChatBot, a device of Artificial Intelligence.  But ChatGPT seems to have a strong sense of what our Principles and our Values stand for.  I was pretty amazed when I encountered this version.

 

 A beacon of light in a sea of uncertainty,

We embrace the Principles of Unitarian Universalism

 

We affirm each person's inherent worth and dignity,

Respecting the diversity of each individual's beliefs

 

We commit ourselves to justice, equity, and compassion

Interconnected by a spirit of acceptance and understanding

 

We seek to further truth, beauty and goodness in our world,

Living within a circle of trust and mutual respect

 

We celebrate our spiritual heritage,

The legacy of the great Life Giving Spirit of Love 

 

We work together to build a beloved community,

Seeing in each person a reflection of the holy

 

We strive for peace, justice, and liberty for all,

Embodying the spirit of a Liberal Faith tradition.

 

These are the principles of Unitarian Universalism,

Bringing us all closer together in Light, Love and Liberty.

 

         Whatever you may think of Artificial Intelligence, of its dangers and its benefits, this seems to me to be a pretty succinct and useful stating of who we are, as a congregation and as a member of the parent group, the UUA.

         As a UU congregation, we have the responsibility to live up to our heritage, to our principles and values.   How are we doing that presently and how might we better fulfill that responsibility?

         Let’s think about the “C” words I mentioned.  I’d like to ask some questions and see what you have to say.  In order for our Zoom folks to participate, we require that you come to the mic to speak.  You are inaudible otherwise and we miss out on your contribution.  Laura Janes, are you able to take notes for the record?  Thank you so much.

         What is the Comfort we seek at PUUF?  What are the Comforts you particularly enjoy and how do they serve our identity as a UU congregation?  What are the blessings of Comfort?  What are the hazards of Comfort?

         What are our mutual Concerns for our larger community?  How are we addressing them, as a congregation and as individuals?  How are we serving our own membership’s personal concerns?  Is there more we could do?

         And how are we welcoming and celebrating the Creativity that our newer folks have brought?  What are some of the Creative ideas you’ve witnessed in the past year or two?  What are the fears that something new and different might arouse  in our minds?      

         Thank you for your thoughts and your participation this afternoon.  I think this discussion may be helpful as you look ahead to issues that arise, those that suggest change and those that address growth and faithfulness to our responsibility as a UU congregation.

BENEDICTION:  As Veja extinguishes our chalice, let’s pause for our 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, remembering that we have commitments, as human beings and as members of a Fellowship which cares for its own and for the larger community.  May we live out our values in everyday life, watching for ways to serve.  And may we find peace and healing in ourselves and grace in our life together.  Amen, Shalom, Salaam, and Blessed Be.

 

CLOSING CIRCLE