Bridging Ceremony – Learn to love

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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First UU Youth Group
May 18, 2014

The Senior High Youth Group invites you to share in the exploration of the topic of love. The service includes poems, stories, and mini-sermons about love, from the unique perspective of our teens.

 

Welcome: Audrey Lewis

Reading: Nikola Locar

Homily: “Strange Places” Kate Windsor

Sonnett 18: Maya Runnels

Homily:

“Falling” Mary Emma Gary

The first christmas gift my boyfriend ever gave me was a copy of Alice in Wonderland. I remember reading it during standardized testing, and due to the nature of that sort of testing was left with plenty of time to admire how versatile the rabbit hole metaphor is. Today, I use it to make a narrative of falling in love.

I sit in a garden filled with tulips, bits of grass poke between the red and violet bundles as a reminder that it takes a collection of things to make a picture beautiful. The tree I rest against has bark that is smooth from years of clambering up it with dripping popsicles and wings of laughter. A rabbit passes by, curiously I follow, admiring how his pocket watch doesn’t affect the speed at which he runs in front of me, and how he waits for me as I stop to watch the sudden ambush of butterflies, whose collective wings sound like the laughter of a baby, and how their patterns of innocent eyes flicker with delight at the wind chimes. He waits for me as I bend to pick up a kitten, then a puppy, then we all take off running, joined by more and more bodies until we approach the hole in the ground, dark and shining with promise. One after another the creatures I love jump down, until the rabbit and I are at the top of the hole looking down as everyone one else falls freely. He jumps, then I, into the hole in what I assume is sanity because according to the experts who write love songs the only way to fall in love is to give up the sturdy fabric of sanctity and sanity.

Jump with us.

We fall. We pass cabinets of snow globes, stuffed animals, and candy wrappers. little bottles that say “Horchata” from the time my dad drove to have breakfast with me after a rally, and little cakes that say “for biology, don’t eat” for all the times I’ve made cookies and he’s tried to steal a few. We pass hamster balls, VCR’s, books so worn their pages look like leaves, we pass them and we fall into a tunnel reminiscent of the scene from Willy Wonka that my kindergarden best friend was terrified of. As we fall some of the creatures stop on shelves, for while they are loved the bulk of their affection was spent at a time closer to the top of the tunnel.

Occasionally a door opens from nowhere and another person is cast into my tunnel with me, though sometimes it seems that I have joined theirs or that we have created a new one altogether. Each time a door opens, a few bottles may break, papers may fly, but what would an adventure be without broken glass? Eventually I land with the white rabbit on a floor with a spiral staircase at the center, leading down. There is a velvet rope with a note reading, “enjoy here until further notice.” So we sit. A door, previously unseen, opens. We are joined by a mouse, a cat, and seemingly the entire cast of Winnie The Pooh in the room that now holds a table. As a collective, we are in love, seperate we love each other, and in memories we love the glass table and orange tea cups that adorned our dizzying, spirited, fait.

This is how I see falling in love. We are led on a beautiful chase until the ground opens up under us. Possibly scared and maybe a little grimy we fall until we are actually floating. Floating on kind words, snippets of songs that you can’t remember the rest of the lyrics to, and collections of gorgeous arrays of light. Sunsets, sunrises, nights on the town to nights under stars, we float down until it feels like there isn’t possibly farther to fall. And then, because love is an exhaustive journey, we may choose to find a floor to rest on with the people who rejuvenate us the most, until we are ready to once again descend into a world of beautiful madness.

Our journey is never ending, and perhaps I am too young and naive or already too old and jaded to portray the drug that you cannot OD on, but I invite you to forget the pain of the past, the promise of the future, and take it upon yourselves to feel gravity pulling you down, and the cloud numbered nine lifting you back up. I invite you to listen to what the experts say, then to take it upon yourselves to discredit everything ever said about love, and make your own conclusions. I invite you to find the hole in the ground, the fireworks on display, or the flames that warm your cheeks and join me on the journey to find a home where the heart is a puzzle that requires more than one set of hands.

Sonnett 130: Anna Reynolds

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.
I have seen roses damask’d, red and white,
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go;
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she belied with false compare.

Poem: “Scattered Leaves” Andy Tittle

 

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

Most sermons delivered at the First UU Church of Austin during the past 14 years are available online through this website. You will find links to them in the right sidebar menu labeled Sermons. The Indexes link leads to tables of all sermons for each year listed by date (newest to oldest) with topic and speaker. Click on the topic to go to a sermon.

 

The serious business of play

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Marisol Caballero, Sermons

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Rev. Marisol Caballero
September 1, 2013

So often we dismiss saccharine statements made by those who teach children as trite, “I learn just as much from them as they learn from me!” But, there is a sacred science behind it. The insights and discoveries of children and teens lend us a glimpse into ways of engaging with our universe and each other that the average adult brain no longer accesses on our own! Join us in exploring the spiritual practice of learning with, from and teaching children.

 

Call to Worship 
By Carol Meyer

We are people of all ages who enter this space bringing our joys and our concerns.

We come together in hope.

We greet each other warmly with our voices and our smiles.

We come together in peace.

We light the chalice to symbolize our interdependence and our unity.

We come together in harmony.

We share our growth and our aspirations.

We come together in wonder.

We share our losses and our disappointments.

We come together in sorrow.

We share our concern and our compassion.

We come together in love.

We come to this place bringing our doubts and our faith.

We come together as seekers.

We sing and pray and listen. We speak and read and dream. We think and ponder and reflect We cry and laugh and center. We mourn and celebrate and meditate. We strive for justice and for mercy.

We come together in worship.

Reading 
excerpt from “The Courage to Teach” by Parker Palmer

Erik Erikson, reflecting on adult development, says that in midlife, we face a choice between “stagnation” and “generativity.” … On one hand (generativity] suggests creativity, the ongoing possibility that no matter our age, we can help co-create the world. On the other hand, it suggests the endless emergence ofthe generations, with its implied imperative that the elders look back toward the young and help them find a future that the elders will not see. Put these two images together, and generativity becomes “creativity in the service of the young” – in a way in which the elders serve not only the young but also their own well-being.

In the face of apparent judgment of the young, teachers must turn toward students, not away from them, saying, in effect, “There are great gaps between us. But no matter how wide and perilous they may be, I am committed to bridging them- not only because you need me to help you on your way but also because I need your insight and energy to help renew my own life.”

… Good teaching is an act of hospitality toward the young, and hospitality is always an act that benefits the host even more than the guest. The concept of hospitality arose in ancient times when this reciprocity was easier to see: in nomadic cultures, the food and shelter one gave to a stranger yesterday is the food and shelter one hopes to receive from a stranger tomorrow. By offering hospitality, one participates in the endless reweaving of a social fabric on which all can depend- thus the gift of sustenance for the guest becomes a gift of hope for the host. It is that way in teaching as well: the teacher’s hospitality to the student results in a world more hospitable to the teacher.

Prayer/Meditation 
Marta M. Flanagan

God of all generations, in all the power, mystery and design of this world, draw us near, inspire us to see anew the life before us. Make us like the child who sees so clearly and touches so deeply.

From the source of our being, we yearn for new vision, new eyes to see the world, new ears to hear the cries of sorrow and of joy. Uplift us to the glories beheld in ourselves and in those around us. And yes, open our hearts to the pain we guard within ourselves and to the pain known by the hungry in body and in spirit.

In this moment of life, sustain us in the silence of our own thoughts and prayers …

Peace be to this congregation. Amen.

Sermon 
“The Serious Business of Play”
Rev. Marisol Caballero

I always tell people that I have the best gig. I spent so many years working with kids in various settings and, as much as I knew, with my whole heart, that ministry was the vocation to which my soul called me, I knew that, once ordained and gainfully employed, I would surely miss getting to spend time with kids. After all, kids are some ofthe coolest people I know. Annie, one of our resident preschool theologians, is known to ask questions such as, “Why does everyone have a body?” and “Do I have to be a person?” But, in this gig here at First UU, I have been handed a living in which I get the opportunity to do ministry in the traditional sense- to meet interesting people and walk with them a ways through life, to prepare and give sermons from time-to-time, to plan programming, to facilitate adult spiritual learning experiences- and I’m also given the privilege of doing the sort of ministry that I have been spending most of my life engaging in- I am given the opportunity to learn from and with children.

Last spring, I stepped in as lead Sunday school teacher when one of our volunteers couldn’t make it at the last minute. I was working with a group of seven and eight year olds and the lesson was about varying ideas about God. We read a beautifully illustrated storybook that talked about how people view God differently and fmd God in many places. Afterward, we took out some crayons, markers, and blank construction paper. We emphasized how there is no right or wrong way in understanding God and it’s ok if everyone has a different picture or if everyone drew the same thing. The only instruction was to draw God. In the next few minutes, I saw a picture of a big tree, a picture of a forest trail, a big, bright yellow sun, an old man with a beard, a rainbow, and a kitty cat. Without having studied the complexities of quantum physics, these kids had explained it to me with crayons. We are all made up of the same stuff as everything else in the universe. Without spelling it out, they had linked their playful curiosities and uninhibited wonder to our lofty Unitarian Universalist principles. Divinity exists in all.

Still discovering the world around them, everything is still awesome, in the true sense of the word. Does the world become less awesome as we learn about it all, or do we lose sight of our sense of wonder as we age? Is it a bit of both?

Alison Gopnik, a professor of psychology and philosophy at UC Berkeley, says that the brains of babies and young children operate similarly to the “brains of the most brilliant scientists,” the “most powerful learning computers on the planet” by design. She says that instead of looking at babies and children as defective, adults-in-training, we should think of them as at “a different developmental stage of our same species.” That statement is blowing your minds, right? Well, of course, we all know that babies and children are human and that they are not at the same developmental stage as a master carpenter or neurosurgeon, but Gopnik goes on to using the analogy of a caterpillar and butterfly. But, guess who she says is the caterpillar and which is the butterfly? Children, whose evolutionary job is to learn, are flitting all around the garden, exploring and tasting each plant and flying seemingly without purpose, while us adults are more concerned with keeping our heads down and completing the task at hand so that we can eat it and then check that enormous leaf off of our to-do list. Now, on to the next one.

My favorite memory of the past week (which I’m sure will, over time, tum into one of my favorite memories of this past life, if I can take it with me wherever I am bound) was when my lady and I were shopping in HEB and she suddenly started to slyly shove me sideways until I was pinned to the shelves.

I had no explanation for why, aside from the possibility that she’d lost her mind. I struggled & couldn’t get away & so, giggling until I couldn’t breathe and red in the face with embarrassment as passers-by grinned at me in solidarity, she let me go as if nothing had happened. She did this several more times. In-between pinnings, we ran into a member of this church and our downstairs neighbor! Play, the most inexpensive fun there is, deeply connects us to one another.

For those who will better value concepts like “play” if a learned scholar has attached research to it (myself included, if I’m honest), Dr. Stuart Brown, founder of the National Institute for Play the guy whose initial research with convicted murderers demonstrated that a common theme in their lives had been a sad deficiency in play during childhood. Brown tells us that, “the opposite of play isn’t work, its depression,” that play is not simply rehearsal for adult activity, but has merit for its own sake. It is “its own biological entity.” Play is a huge source of our fulfilling one of our basic spiritual needs- yes, we all have basic spiritual needs, just as we have basic physical ones, such as food, water shelter- play actually strengthens our feelings of connectedness to each other. Brown says that, “the basis of human trust is established through play.” He says that we understand the “play signals” that others give us, verbally and physically” as children and “we begin to lose those signals, culturally and otherwise, as adults and that’s a shame.”

Children learn by “getting into everything,” otherwise known as playing. Gopnik had another great metaphor for the difference in the way that children and adults learn to explain how play is never “just” about having fun for children. I adore this metaphor. She explains how the typical adult brain functions like a spotlight. We pay focus our attention on one thing or task at a time, or try to anyhow, and value the ability to do so. We count ourselves as “on a roll” or “in the zone” and spend hours attempting to meditate on a singular object or thought, or try to clear our minds, completely.

Children’s minds, however, are more like lanterns, as they are not very skilled at focusing on one thing at a time but great at noticing everything around them at once. It isn’t that they are not paying attention to you, it’s that kids are paying attention to you and everything else, as well.

In order to reconnect ours minds once more with the ability to experience awe and wonder, to be open to innovation, creativity, and to allow our imaginations to view concepts in completely new ways, we may engage in playful learning with kids.

We talk about playas ifit’s a waste of time. We say things like, ‘Just having fun,” as if fun can’t be an important soul-nourishing goal on its own, as if enjoying life and taking a few moments to be silly wastes time and prevents us from doing important things- like working and making money, so that we can better enjoy life … We need not have either/or. Work and play are important. And, I am not speaking ofthe way I typically think of “work hard, play hard.” I don’t mean work, work, work, take a vacation to Africa that you’ve been planning and scrimping for over a year. I’m referring to the little silly games we play to make others smile, the digging in the sand simply for the sake of re-exploring how it feels running between fingers, spontaneously chasing your pet until they are sure you’ve lost your mind… I’m advocating for real play!

Lucky for us, we have a growing number of resident experts on the seriously crucial spiritual practice of play right here in this congregation! Most of them are rapidly growing taller than me, right before our eyes! First UU of Austin operates a loving and thriving cooperative Children and Youth Religious Education program, which means that parents of enrolled children are required to give at least eight hours of their time to the program per year. One of the many ways to do this is by interacting (also known as “playing”) with our kids during Sunday School and Youth Group meetings; learning alongside them, through their wisdom and insight and their illuminating lantern-minds, as they encounter fun ways of exploring their world, their thoughts, their relationships, and their understanding of Unitarian Universalism.

This opportunity is not reserved only for parents, and not all parents are the sort that do well in the classroom. If you are interested in engaging in teaching and being taught by our children and teens, in being transformed, in connecting with other members of this fascinating species of ours across the generations, in understanding Unitarian Universalism and science and mysticism and yourself and the ways that all of that is the same thing- in ways that you never imagined, consider becoming a volunteer teacher. It isn’t as scary as it may sound. It isn’t like I’m saying, “consider becoming a yogi or a guru if you’ve never practiced yoga or meditation.” And, not all Sundays with children and teens are magical. Some are tough. But, like any other sacred spiritual practice, religious education and exploration with our youngest UU elders requires a humble yet courageous spirit and an open heart.

It’s holy work. It’s ministry, in the truest sense of the word. It’s a hospitality, as Parker says, “that benefits the host even more than the guest.” One of my favorite lines in Maria Harris’ Fashion Me a People: Curriculum in the Church, one of those classics that we all have to read in seminary is, ”whether in church or beyond, teaching itself is a fundamentally religious activity in the sense that it is always, at root, in the direction of deepest meaning, ultimate origin, and fmal destiny … if teachers would take off their shoes on each teaching occasion in the conviction that they are on holy ground, they could envision this truth more easily.”

While it would be awesome if all this whole congregation, upon hearing this sermon, leapt up from the pews and ran to the lifespan RE table in the gallery to sign up for classroom time, that is an unrealistic expectation on my part. What I do hope, though, is that a critical mass of you does just that, but that all of us remember to daily remember to play, to (whether figuratively or literally) take off our shoes, realizing that, in doing so, we are on holy ground. My prayer is that we remember that, through the very serious business of silly, seemingly meaningless play, we are engaging in the very essence of what it means to be living members of this vast universe.

 

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

 

UU Minister – Some dis-assembly required

by Posted in Guest Speakers, Nell Newton, Sermons

Nell Newton
July 28, 2013

The process of building a minister includes a certain amount of disassembling the person who wanted to become a minister. There are many ways this is done -countless personal essays, stacks of reading, somber committees that decide one’s fitness -but one of the most discombobulating assignments is Chaplaincy work. The experience is expected to upend a student’s certainty. And afterwards, they usually write at least one sermon about the experience. This is be one of those sermons! My CPE Sermon

Reading
Untitled Poem
by Theresa Ines Soto
posted on Facebook – used with permission

Jesus. Never had to go to seminary.
He was wunderkind.
He never had cerebral palsy; He died
Once though. Jesus never had a broken
scooter, but over and over, he had a
broken heart. Me too, once or twice.
Sometimes I think I won’t
Make it, can’t do it. About that, Jesus said:
It takes more than bread
to stay alive. It takes a steady stream
of words from God’s mouth.”
God’s words for me are:
the sunset, the boats on the lake,
the perfection of all the ways God
is reflected in Beloved Community.
Jesus. Did the work that fell to Him
Until It Was Finished. I don’t even
Have to die to complete my work,
But maybe I can hold on for one
More day. Maybe that would be good.

Theresa Ines Soto is 41, a Latina, a 3rd-wave feminist, a lawyer, a seminarian, and a woman who has cerebral palsy. She walks with a cane and uses a scooter to get around. The scooter she uses now is a cheap one that goes slowly and is prone to tipping. She had a really great, really expensive scooter, but it was stolen last year.

She was born prematurely and her parents were told she wouldn’t live. Then they were told that she would live, but she’d never walk or talk. Then they were told that she might talk or walk, but that she’d never have the mental capacity to be independent. Each time they heard this information, her parents said “Okay”. She appreciates their willingness to love their daughter no matter what.

For me, spending time with Theresa means slowing myself down a bit. I slow my pace to match her scooter as its battery drains during the day. It means that I slow my ears down to the cadence of her voice which is quite clear and articulate, but slower. It means that I have to slow down my brain to make it work more carefully to notice how it would automatically presume that because her body is different, that her mind must be different too. I am better for having slowed down with Theresa. She’s going to make a difference in our denomination.

When she prays, it is with a relaxed forthrightness that is startling to my ears.

 

Sermon

UU Minister – Some Dis-Assembly Required

In the few years that I’ve been paying attention, I’ve noticed that seminary students who are entrusted with a pulpit will inevitably trot out some predictable sermons. There will be a ponderous sermon on Unitarian history – complete with footnotes – it’s really just a summary of a recent research paper. There will also be a sermon or two on The Seven Principles, or The Five Smooth Stones. There will usually be a chirpy sermon along the lines of “Let’s not forget the Universalists!” And, there will be, should be, a sermon where the student talks about their chaplaincy internship. It’s in these internships where we get our heads out of the books and throw our bodies into the front lines of pastoral work, generally in a hospital setting. And this, dear kind people, this is my chaplaincy sermon….

I was warned by others who had already completed their chaplaincy programs: “You’ll get what you need to learn about from chaplaincy.” One friend told about a student who had been uncomfortable with death and dying and, naturally, while on call, he got lots of experience with death and dying patients. He had waaay more than any of the other students. And, by the end of their program he was much better equipped to deal with death and dying.

During chaplaincy, non-theists start feeling connected to something larger and theists start arguing with a god who allows so much suffering… Yep. Whatever you need to work on, it will find you during chaplaincy training. I knew this when I was assigned to work at Brackenridge hospital last fall.

What did I need to learn about? The chill of dread rose up as I contemplated where I might be harboring unspoken resistance or denial. Would I be faced with blood, trauma, sick kids, sick parents, or something so un-doing that I couldn’t imagine being able to handle it??? Each time I started an overnight or weekend shift, I was gripped with a quiet worry that THIS time I would be forced to confront my deepest fears. And, each time, I simply found myself going about the work that was asked of me – listening, crying, hugging, joking, praying, and filling out the paperwork afterwards. I never came home completely undone or unable to speak my own name.

Here’s the work we were doing – most of the time it was just visiting with patients who were otherwise bored, or lonesome, but often we were called to show up during times where people needed spiritual or emotional support. It seemed like the other students in my program had it much harder – their shifts were filled with fighting families, multiple trauma victims, and worse. My shifts weren’t exactly picnics – no sooner than I’d lie down to rest then my pager would go off. But I seemed to get easier nights, simpler problems, less complicated paperwork… What awful undoing was waiting for me?

Among the hospital workers you were never supposed to wish them a “quiet” night – that would jinx it for sure. So, instead I would wish folks a “boring” night. And, then, I found myself saying a small and private prayer. A friend of mine sends his prayers to the Great To Whom It May Concern, but I found myself asking a Great Mother to hold the entirety of the hospital with compassion and to support the caregivers as well as those needing care. I’ve never thought of myself as a Goddess worshipping sort, and I wasn’t trying to make a theological point, but it seemed like the right thing to do. The Great Mother just seemed to be closer at hand in the hospital.

You see, despite all of the training we went through to prepare for the work, once we were let loose onto the hospital floors and into patient’s rooms, we all reverted to instinct and improvisation. And each of us found that the only way we could serve was to be exactly who we already were. The title “chaplain” just gave us a bit more authority to do it well! We simply lived into what was expected and asked of us.

A nurse called late one evening. A patient needed surgery, but was nervous. Could I come? Sure. Outside his room the nurse pulled me aside – the patient was a young man whose leg was mangled in a wreck. He was all alone and scared. In the nurse’s opinion, he needed some Mama energy. Well… as luck should have it… He was only a couple years older than my own son — handsome, pale, and frightened. He had never had surgery before and was afraid that he wouldn’t wake up from the anesthesia. I held his hand, smoothed his hair, listened, and placed a blessing upon him. The tears that he had been fighting back spilled out easily and he finally relaxed enough to agree to go ahead. I walked alongside his bed as he was wheeled down to surgery. I gave his hand a little squeeze and promised him that I’d be up to see him later. Then as they rolled him into the surgery area, I placed another silent blessing upon him, the surgeons, the nurses, and the man who was cleaning the hall floor at 11:00 at night. Later on I stopped by his room. He was bleary from the anesthesia, but he recognized me and grinned when I congratulated him on surviving.

And that was the Great Mother at work. I obeyed her imperative to soothe the children no matter what their age.

On another occasion I was called to visit a mother who was unraveling. She was almost vibrating with worry over her toddler whose head was wrapped with yards of tape to hold monitor wires in place. I helped him start a Thomas the Tank Engine video and then sat down to visit. The mom was exhausted not just with the worry over her son’s seizures, but with the dread of dealing with other family members who were emotionally more reserved. She felt like wailing and weeping, and felt judged and self-conscious. As we chatted I praised her beautiful child’s curiosity and appetite and listened to her fears and bravery. Finally I offered her the blessing that every parent needs to hear: “You are a wonderful mother and you are doing a good job raising this child.” She took a deep breath, nodded gratefully, and went back to patting her son to sleep.

And that was the Great Mother at work. I gave voice to her deep compassion for the terrifying work of parenting.

Caring for humans is messy, stinky, and funny. These bodies are the stuff of dirt and humor. Indeed, the word “humor” is rooted in the Latin for bodily fluids… And, often, what I brought with me into patient rooms was not just a readiness to witness the divine, but to also witness the absurdity and silliness of our selves.

One day I found myself offering a completely improvised prayer – actually all of my better prayers were spontaneous, jazz riffs created with whatever we had handy – and this prayer was with a woman who was stuck in bed, unable to walk because of pain in her hips, or, as she put it more delicately, her “backside”. The prayer included a desire to see her become unstuck and able to move easily into her future days. Our prayer was light and hopeful and not very serious. Two days later I visited and she had been up and done a lap around the nurses’ station! “It was that prayer!” She laughed, “I told my kids that you prayed for my BUTT and anyone who would do that is someone I can get along with!” I demurred, “Well… I figured that your butt is part of you, and you are part of all that is holy, so it made sense to me….” We laughed and the healing continued.

And that was the Great Mother at work. She is delighted by our laughter, as it bubbles up and lifts us into our creative moments!

So what was it that finally came undone during my chaplaincy work? What was that dark place that I had to look at and accept? Well… I had to accept that that elegant theologies only get you so far. After a point it’s your bodily presence and being that counts. And, more humbling, I realized that my mother was right all along.

And how was my mother right all along? My mother is a classic UU Church Lady. She wears sensible shoes, brings bean salads and an angel food cake to potlucks, and, yes she drives a Prius. My mother was the one who first tried to teach me about The Goddess. But, back then I smiled and nodded. Like so many daughters when their mother tries to pass along good advice, I dismissed it as simply a romantic personification. Perhaps that worked for her theology, but it wasn’t part of mine. Meanwhile, as I read the 18th Century German Liberal Theologians, and Lives of the Great Humanists, I bogged down. My eyeballs wearied and I felt as if there was really no place for me in this work of ministry. I should just go back into the kitchen and give up. How will I ever sound like someone who knows their stuff? As it turns out, I never will with any certainty. And, that’s okay. As a chaplain, I learned that it’s more important to show up than to be certain. The Great Mother showed this to me over and over. Does this make me a full-on Goddess Worshipper? I’m not sure.

“I hate this!” a man moaned. “I feel so bad that everyone has to work so hard to take care of me. I don’t want to be a burden to my family. They have better things to do!” How many times did I hear this from people who were ashamed of their vulnerability, pinned down by the weight of their infirmities, and feeling guilty of taking more than they feel that they deserve. In this world, in this culture, we are supposed to be upright individuals who create our own destinies as full agents. And when we wind up in a hospital bed, all of that is thrown upside down. We become needful and our agency is narrowed by the margins of pain. And, yes, we must depend upon others to care, and clean up, and help us to survive. We must turn to one another for support in walking and guiding the spoonful of food. And, often, those other people are complete strangers wearing drab uniforms.

When I heard that moan, I would assure a patient that this was their time to rest and receive. When it seemed appropriate, I would remind a patient that she is a child of god, and that god’s love guided all of the hands caring for her and to open herself to this love. And, for people who chafed at the indignity of the situation, or felt unworthy, or wondered why they should even bother to survive, I suggested that, truly, our highest purpose is to be with one another. That spilled out of my mouth one day, when tears were running down my own cheeks. It was completely unplanned, spun out of the thin air of that room. The work we are here to do is to simply be with one another. That’s all.

Now, if you also find time to fully and truly love your god and love your neighbor as yourself, then you might even have struck upon a religion worthy of attention! But in the meantime, take this simple observation, based upon experience: The work we are here to do is to simply be with one another. We are given instinct and intellect, and we will make use of whatever resources are at hand. We will find silliness and tears make it all easier, but how well we do that work – how well we be with one another — is how our lives will be measured. How do I know this? My mother, and the Great Mother, told me so!

© 2013 Nell Newton

 

Podcasts of sermons are available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

That little four-letter word called Hope

by Posted in Audio available, Chris Jimmerson, Guest Speakers, Sermons

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Chris Jimmerson
July 21, 2013

Chris Jimmerson just completed his second year of seminary at Meadville Lombard School of Theology, one of only two Unitarian Universalist seminaries in the United States. He is currently the minister intern at Wildflower Church. Before entering seminary, Chris served in a variety of lay leadership positions at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin where he helped to coordinate the church’s process of discerning its mission and reorganizing its governance structure.

 

What is hope? One of the theologians we studied in seminary last year says that basically there is no such thing as hope, and we should abandon hope and embrace struggle because the struggle is all we have. I am thinking that would not make a very inspiring sermon. How do we have hope without it becoming just wishful thinking?

Reading
-Vaclav Havel, Disturbing the Peace, 1986

Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Either we have hope or we don’t; it is a dimension of the soul, and it’s not essentially dependent on some particular observation of the world or estimate of the situation. Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced, and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons…. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good, not just because it stands a chance to succeed. The more propitious the situation in which we demonstrate hope, the deeper the hope is. Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the faith that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

Prayer

Spirit of Love and Life, breathe into us the compassion and courage that will sustain us.

Fill us with gratitude for the faith, grounding and hope to be found through living life filled with boundless and endless love.

When the news from our world is filled with injustice and struggle, as it often has been in these past weeks – when our work to end oppression and bring about the beloved community seems challenging and the road ahead seems long – when we face struggles sometimes just in our daily lives, let us breathe in the spirit of life and dwell in the essence of love.

For in doing so, we find renewal and the knowledge that love shall indeed, in the end, overcome.

For in doing so, we create greater faith and more hope. In doing so, we create our world anew.

So may it be. Amen

Sermon

Not long ago, one of my instructors at seminary was trying to explain to us a theology he called “non-theistic, liberative, naturalistic humanism.” I’m still not sure I completely understand it, but it does make for a great vocal warm up. Before giving any talk or sermon, I just say “non-theistic, liberative, naturalistic humanism” three or four times very quickly and then anything else comes trippingly off the tongue.

Now, I think he was engaging in a bit of seminary professor witticism when he bound all those words and concepts together; however, he was quite serious when he explained that this theology expresses the idea that oppression and human suffering — natural disasters and disease – imperialism and war — just the vagaries of the human condition are so random and so dire that we cannot realistically think that there is a God, much less a kind and loving God. On top of that, according to this theology, our struggles to end oppression occur within a sort of “zero sum game,” where advances attained by one group can only be made at the expense of greater oppression of another. Justice for all cannot be realized.

Thus, a central tenant of this theology is that we should abandon hope and embrace struggle, because the struggle is all we really have. And have a nice day. I ended the class discussion feeling something less than uplifted.

Later, I talked with my partner, Wayne, about it.

He said, “I don’t think you should try preaching that when you get out of seminary and start the search process for a church. None of them will hire you.”

Now, I think Wayne was absolutely right about that, so don’t worry — I’m not testing out an “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here” sermon on you today.

However, it did get me thinking about that little four-letter word called “hope”. What exactly is hope, really? Should we have hope?

What is its source and how do we sustain it, especially during the more difficult times of struggle that we do encounter in life? How do we keep it from becoming just wishful thinking?

So, I went on a theological search – a metaphysical quest, if you will, to find the meaning and source of hope. Like any good, modern day spiritual seeker, I did a Google search.

The first link I followed was to the Emily Dickinson poem titled, “Hope is the Thing with Feathers”.

The next thing I saw was a link to a book by Woody Allen called, “Without Feathers”.

It seemed I was right back where I had started. Thanks a lot, Woody. At least the book is really funny.

So, “Google as a pathway into spiritual enlightenment” having failed, I turned to looking at what some of our leading thinkers among Unitarian Universalists have had to say about hope. I know those of you who have been UU s for a while may not be overly surprised to hear that Unitarian Universalists have had quite a lot to say about it, rather often not agreeing with each other on the subject.

However, I did find much that moved me in reflections on faith and hope from Rebecca Ann Parker, President of our Unitarian Universalist seminary in Berkley, California, as well as those of Sharon Welch, Provost at the seminary I attend in Chicago.

The two have very different philosophical and theological perspectives and yet out of both of them I drew that indeed we must start by embracing the struggle – that hope may be found by realistically acknowledging that suffering and oppression are a part of life, but then seeking to transcend them in several ways:

By steadfastly continuing to act in ways that are loving and life- giving;

By persistently seeking justice; and

By purposefully finding the wisdom we need to sustain ourselves in the voices of those who have suffered oppression people who so often have found ways to restore hope out of hopelessness by creating joy, grace and beauty in day-to-day life. We must also guard against a kind of false hope that can lead to disillusionment and making harmful choices — a hope that seeks certainty, wherein we only have faith if we believe that we can control the outcomes of our actions.

For example, we are faced with the fact that the effects of global climate change are likely to get much worse before they get better, even if the world begins truly acting to try to mitigate them now. Given that, how do we hold onto a hope that can sustain environmental activism? Where do we find the resilience to continue to act, even knowing that we may not be able to prevent great loss?

The answer may lie in embracing this paradox:

Faith can exist only when there is uncertainty.

Hope arises out of what we cannot know – our choosing to act out of love for each other and the web of existence even in the midst of our not knowing, even when we encounter great challenges.

I saw this element of hope — this faith even in the face of an uncertain future – a future clouded by unexpected loss and grief, when I was a chaplain intern at a local Hospital last summer.

I’m changing the details a little to protect the privacy of the people involved, but here is in essence what happened.

I was with the husband and the father of a woman in her early forties who had collapsed near the end of the workday. Despite valiant efforts to revive her, she had died in one of the trauma rooms in the emergency center of the hospital. We learned later that a blood clot had loosened and traveled through her blood system to her heart, likely the result of a long flight she had recently taken to visit her sisters in South America. Her husband and her father were at her bedside, mourning over her now lifeless body.

The family was Catholic and spoke both Spanish and English.

They asked me to contact their Priest to come and say prayers and perform the sacraments in Spanish. They wanted me to stay with them as the rest of the family gathered and they waited on the priest.

Soon after, her daughter and son arrived, both of whom looked like they might be in their late teens or early twenties, followed by other family members. All that I could really do was to be with them, to put a comforting hand on a shoulder sometimes, a provide a soothing voice at others _ at times just stand at the doorway, trying to provide them sanctuary from the noise and commotion of the rest of the emergency center.

After the Priest came and performed the sacraments and a final prayer, I turned to walk him out, when suddenly the husband looked up at me from where he was sitting by her bedside and said, “would you stay with us while we tell her ‘goodbye’?”

I hadn’t even known that he knew I was still in the room. I stayed, of course.

They gathered around her – this mother, this wife, this daughter of theirs. They began to tell stories of her, blending laughter with tears, as they joined together in their love for one another and their love for her, as they one by one said goodbye to her.

The amazing love, the astounding human resilience, the astonishing courage they showed in being able to tell her goodbye, leave that hospital and move forward into an uncertain future bound tightly in their love for one another and their shared memories of her – sometimes, that is faith. Sometimes, that is hope.

Sometimes, hope is finding a way to continue our stories, even up against a struggle that turns toward the tragic at times. Hope is to be found in the fact that we carry forward the stories of even those we have lost _ just as the story of that mother, wife and daughter goes on through her loved ones continuing the telling of it.

Hope is that a grand narrative is still unfolding, and we get to participate in the telling of it, even if in only small ways,

And I think hope involves even a bit more. I think it also compels us to move toward a vision ofthe future, even though we cannot control and may not ever even know what happens in that future,

I think about something my Grandfather did when I reflect on this aspect of hope. My parents divorced when I was young, so my mother’s parents helped raise me and my younger brother and sister while mom was at work. My grandfather, Leo, became very much a father figure for me.

I still carry great love for him. He was a person who loved largely, embracing with true warmth and compassion everyone he met. I love that he would go from hyperkinetic in one moment to having an amazing stillness in the next. I love that he also had a strong vision for living and doing rightly in the world. In fact, the family always joked about how he could sometimes be a little irritating because he wouldn’t hesitate to tell you when he thought you could do something better in life,

That wasn’t really the irritating part though. The really annoying thing was that he was almost always right.

My family still pokes fun at me because they say I am so much like him, though I suspect not nearly as often right! Whether through nature or nurture or both, lowe much of who I have become to him. Another way of saying that is to say that many of his values and much of what mattered to him most live on in me, and I think there is a lot of hope to be found just in that.

To give you some idea of how much of who I am comes from my Grandfather, I want to tell you what happened the first time I brought my partner Wayne to meet my grandparents. I must have been in my thirties at the time. We drove to their house and sat in their living room for several hours, talking and being treated to delicious baked items from my grandmother’s kitchen.

My grandmother had to take us around their yard and show us all of her beautiful flowering plants, and my grandfather had to get out his maps and show us all the places they were going on their next trip (something I find myself subjecting others to even today).

After the visit, we said our goodbyes and got in the car to leave. I noticed that Wayne had this perplexed, maybe even bewildered look on his face.

I asked him, “What is it?”

There was a slight pause, and then he replied, “I feel like I just met an 80 year old YOU.”

To this day, he still tells me that I am “pulling a Leo” from time to time.

After my grandfather died, our family opened his safe where he kept his important papers. In it, we found letters he had written to my grandmother and to their children — my mother and her brother and sister.

In the letters, he spoke of his love for them, the joy they had brought to his life – his delight in who they had become and how they were living their lives. He wrote of his love for his grandchildren and his faith in the lives we would live. He thanked my grandmother for their life together.

Even all these years later, I am still overwhelmed by the fact that he even thought to do that. How much love can one heart possibly hold? How can we call this anything else but hope grounded in boundless and endless love?

Hope is writing letters to the future, even though it is a future that will not include us, at least not in our current form. Hope is writing letters to the future knowing that we may never know whether or how they will be received – never know what difference they may make.

I have to pause here and say, “Thanks, Leo, your letters made a huge difference to me.” It turns out he was right again – because he taught me something else:

The lives we live are our letters to the future. They are our hope for how the story will continue.

Isn’t it remarkable that hope turns out to be contained within how we live our lives in the here and now?

And so, as we leave today and go back out into our daily lives, may we continually be asking ourselves, “What story are we helping to write? What are we putting into our letters to the future?”

Even in the midst of life’s struggles and hardships, we can choose to live grounded in love for all that is, all that came before and all that will follow.

The poet, Adrienne Rich put it like this:

“My heart is moved by all I cannot save: so much has been destroyed. I have to cast my lot with those who age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world. A passion to make, and make again where such un-making reigns.”

And so may we create hope where hope has been lost.

And so, may we dwell in a faith courageous enough to embrace uncertainty.

As we go out into our world today, may we co-create the ever- unfolding story in ways we hope will bend the narrative toward justice, transformation and love.

May an enduring faith sustain us. May love continue to overcome.

May hope abound. Amen.

Offering words

People say, what is the sense of our small effort.

They cannot see that we must lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time.

A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions. Each one of our thoughts, words and deeds is like that.

No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless.

There is too much work to do.

Benediction

May your days to come be filled with peace and your spirit overflow with boundless and endless love.

Grounded in such love, may your courage rise up and embrace uncertainty as an opportunity and possibility for hope that glimmers eternally and a faith that sustains.

May you know Grace and may you bring Grace into the lives of others. Go in peace. Go in love. Go knowing that part of this place and of this beloved community travel with you until next you return.

Blessed be. Amen.

 

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

Who or what is God?

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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Rev. Nathan Ryan
July 7, 2013

How do we understand the most holy in a church where there is no creedal test and not everyone is a theist? Guest minister Rev. Nathan Ryan leads us through this three letter journey. He is assistant minister at the Unitarian Church of Baton Rouge. He has also served as director of lay ministry for the First Unitarian Church of Dallas and director of lifespan religious education at Live Oak UU Church in Cedar Park.

 

I remember feeling very angry and I didn’t know why. It was the first year I was in high school. It was red ribbon week. This is the week when the school decks out in red ribbons in an attempt to dissuade students from using drugs. Each student group was responsible for putting up signs with an anti-drug message. Most groups didn’t do it, but the one that really got to me put up signs all over the school saying things like “Jesus loves you” and “Your body is a temple, don’t poison it with drugs.”

I remember feeling very angry, almost violated when I saw these signs. I turned to my friend in exasperation about it. I lashed out at the signs and said something like “They can’t do this. What if I put up a sign that said “don’t do drugs because there is no god.” ” My friend didn’t really understand my anger and just continued on with what he was doing.

If I wanted to find the easy explanation of my emotion, the intellectual part of me could say that I was offended because these groups violated the separation of church and state or that I was upset because these messages were exclusive to atheists, Jews, Muslims, agnostics and anyone else who wasn’t a believer in this specific brand of Christianity. And those thoughts and justifications aren’t wrong.

But didn’t explain why I had such an emotional reaction, a reaction out of anger and sadness, and it doesn’t explain why I still hold this story in my consciousness to this day.

I think deep down I was upset because I didn’t have the cultural or spiritual understanding I needed to fully comprehend God as a concept or as an experience. I didn’t grow up with an understanding of God, not one that was real and meaningful to me. I knew about the God described in popular culture, a god that had no resonance with me. But I never in a religious context had the opportunity to explore my own understandings of God.

I knew of “their God” – the old white man with the beard who orchestrates and judges. Because I didn’t believe in him, I knew that I must not believe in God. As I got older my understanding of and relationship with God has grown and adapted and shifted.

The experiences of God came first and it was only later did I come to identify those experiences as God. Let me say that another way. I had experiences and feelings but I didn’t have the words to describe them. It was only later, as an adult, when I started learning about an expansive description of God, not the constricted God of my childhood, did I start identifying these feelings and experiences as divine in nature.

Some of those experiences: My time as a Unitarian Universalist youth – a time when I felt fully embraced by a community of caring and loving peers who encouraged me to discover and embrace my true self. This was at a time that it didn’t feel safe in my day to day life to figure out who I truly was. There were there friends and family who grew up in awful circumstances, friends who were surrounded by neglect and mental illness and addiction, and yet they were able to explore and know themselves and thrive.

There was the incredible dedication of a chaplain and nurse when I worked in the hospital who gave up hours to sit with a patient whose family had already left him in his last hours declaring to me that no one deserves to die alone. There are those tectonic shifts, towards a more just world, like the one we are experiencing now with LGBT rights. There are people who work for greater dialogue, who work for justice, who love those who seem unworthy of love. All of these experiences I would have described as divine, but it took a shift in my understanding to ever see them as the work of God.

I wanted to explore this topic with you today for two reasons. First, God and our interpretations of God permeate our culture so much that we, as a religious institution are called to explore it. Second, I think a lot of religious insight can be opened up by further exploration.

The aha moment for me about understanding God came when I switched the agency. That is to say, I stopped looking at God as the initiator of events, the person who pulls the switch to make it rain, or make us love, or who allows people to live and to die. I flipped it and saw god as the descriptor of these larger things.

The words of poet Annie Dillard describe this what God looks like after this shift. I don’t like her dismissive attitude or one gendered description of god, but the imagery is so useful that I wanted to share it with you.

“God does not demand that we give up our personal dignity, that we throw in our lot with random people, that we lose ourselves and turn from all that is not him. God needs nothing, asks nothing, and demands nothing, like the stars. It is a life with God which demands these things.

Experience has taught the race that if knowledge of God is the end, then these habits of life are not the means but the condition in which the means operates. You do not have to do these things; not at all. God does not, I regret to report, give a hoot. You do not have to do these things- unless you want to know God. They work on you, not on him.

You do not have to sit outside in the dark. If, however, you want to look at the stars, you will find that darkness is necessary. But the stars neither require nor demand it.”

This helped me greatly. Instead of seeing God as the cause of love, when I see love, I call it god. Just as when I see water fall from the sky I call it rain instead of saying that rain caused water to fall from the sky. Because God is such a powerfully deep and complicated metaphor, I think its ok to see God in many different ways (or not at all) and that strengthens the concept for me. Here are a few and I’ll ask you to try some on.

The early 20th century Unitarian theologian James Luther Adams says God is “that which ultimately concerns humanity” or god is “that in which we should place our confidence.” Unitarian Universalist minister Forrest Church from the reading earlier says that god is “that which is greater than all and yet present in each.” I see god I as the culmination of all of our understandings of something larger.

Take the lesson from earlier. How many of you found the words of people inadequate to describe art? Our best means of communication can pale in comparison to the fullness of experiencing art. And art is just an abstraction of something larger. Art is an attempt to communicate a feeling, an experience, a way of being that is indescribable. That is why often the artistic depiction of real life fail to fully embrace life’s the majesty and mystery. So here is the trajectory: Words are inadequate to describe art. Art is inadequate to describe life. Life is inadequate to describe our own musings and worries and ways of making meaning. If you carry this continuum all the way through to its conclusion, to the infinite most point, that is where I would call God.

Another way I see God, came out of our earlier reading by Emerson. What was so revolutionary about Emerson’s sermon to the Divinity School students at Harvard was that it took God out of the scriptures, out of the past and the books, and it located God squarely within each person. He put the obligation of knowing the divine and understanding revelation into our very existence.

I see God as the culmination of all of our understandings of the world, our understandings of good and evil and fun and suffering. But it is larger than that. It is all of the understandings of everyone and everything that has ever existed – including those who can’t make meaning.

So one conception of God, lets put on the horizontal axis, is the grandness and majesty of life. The culminated God concepts of everyone who has ever existed could go on the vertical axis, and you could continue adding dimensions to this. It is easy to poke holes in someone else’s conception of God and their beliefs. Beliefs are just our attempts to make sense of our experiences. To argue with someone’s beliefs is to argue with someone’s experiences.

We are all making two-dimensional representations of a concept that is three dimensional. When you do that, like when making a map, you aren’t going to get all the proportions right. If you are mapping on a piece of paper a round world either South America or Greenland is going to be the wrong size.

If we were to view God as the culmination of all of our experiences and beliefs, what is implied by that? First it implies that God is not out there. God is not some foreign substance or entity. We are a part of the great makeup of all existence. It also implies that revelation and the ability to change the world is no farther than right inside of us. It implies to borrow the concept from Howard Thurman in our invocation that each of us has an altar deep in our souls, guarded by an angel with a flaming sword and that is our link to the eternal. Second it implies that what we say and do matters. This is where I depart from Forrest Church in our first reading. I don’t know how many of you know Reverend Church’s story. He did some great things, he grew a Unitarian Universalist Church in New York from a small church into one of the largest congregations in the country. He spoke words, and wrote many books that gave hope to countless people. His book Love and Death may have helped me understand death better than anything else I’ve read.

In his reading, though, he dismissed his critics by saying “To think that I, who will never be guilty of committing a best-seller, could strike anyone as being sufficiently powerful to set back liberal religion even a decade.” Well, the shadow side of Rev. Church’s ministry was that because of his alcoholism and an affair, he hurt a lot of people. He hurt a lot of people partially because he didn’t understand the power of his own words and actions. If we are part of a larger conception of God, then our thoughts are significant. Our experiences, our insights are holy plasma.

I make paper cranes. This practice for me lies somewhere in between a deep spiritual and meditative practice and a way to manage my fidgety hands. I take a sheet of paper, a two dimensional sheet of paper. I fold it over and over until it turns into a crane, into something with depth.

This is a great practice for me, but with one unforeseen side effect. I have hundreds of these cranes all over my house. Because I am so used to them I forget that other people can treasure these.

The spiritual challenge of a god that is the culmination of everyone’s meaning and present in each is similar to the challenge of folding cranes. Your life is a life worthy of study a life worthy of hanging in a museum. Your years of experiences and insights and attempts to make meaning is each a fold in the paper. All of your work trying to learn to walk, and talk, and love, and experience life give this life depth and dimension and complexity.

Eventually you might reach a point where your gifts, your insights, your way of being in the world are so plentiful that they might stop feeling like gifts that other appreciate, and they just seem to you like hundreds of cranes all over your house.

If I had a better understanding of God when I was in high school, I may not have been so angry when I saw those signs at red ribbon week. I’m still not sure I’d be happy they were up, but I could process them with a better understanding. That sign that said “Your body is a temple, don’t poison it,” I wonder how that idea would have changed my life if I could receive it. I mean that idea is basically what I’m espousing, that our bodies hold great and meaningful pieces of God, that we are made up of star dust, particles that have existed since the beginning of time.

If I was more at peace with God, I might have opened me up to more people I knew in high school. And then they might have found the life changing and healing message of our faith – I know of at least three who are now Unitarian Universalist.

I wonder how many people who walked past those signs wished they could hear that their doubts and their questions made their faith stronger not weaker? I wonder how many would have been eased to know that they were worthy of love and kindness and that they were a blessing to the world. In the most concrete of senses, I wonder how many of my peers in high school could have had their lives transformed if I were able to share this church with them.

I’ll close this sermon with maybe one of my favorite definitions of God. It comes straight out of the Christian scriptures. It’s from 1 John Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God….No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and love is made complete. Let us go out and live a more loving more caring life. Amen.

 

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Joseph Priestley: The most hated man in Britain

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Luther Elmore, Sermons

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Luther Elmore
June 23, 2012

Joseph Priestley was a scientist, philosopher, educator, and Unitarian minister. His positions forced him to flee his homeland for America. We will look at his life and contributions to our Unitarian history.

 

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Youth Service

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The Youth of First UU Austin
Audrey Lewis, Max Wethington
May 19, 2013

The Sr. High Youth Group holds its annual youth service and holds a bridging ceremony. Bridging is a rite of passage celebrating the movement of our high school seniors into adulthood.

 

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Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

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We’ve come this far by faith

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Marisol Caballero
March 10, 2013

We are living in an extraordinary time and many of us will see significant social progress within our own lifetime… struggles for justice have not been easily won. Join us as we look back in order to move forward.

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Large is beautiful, too

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Rev. Stefan Jonasson
February 24, 2013

Rev. Jonasson is a Unitarian Universalist minister, historian, and the Unitarian Universalist Association’s Director for Large Congregations.

 

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This new thing called Universalism

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Marisol Caballero, Sermons, Video available

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Marisol Caballero
January 20, 2013

Evangelical minister Rob Bell, in his book, “Love Wins,” articulates the concept of God’s unconditional love, and he has been widely condemned for it by the evangelical community. Join us as we explore Universalism’s history and delve into why this idea still causes such an uproar.

 

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Is there a place for God in Unitarian Universalism?

by Posted in Andrew Young, Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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Andrew Young
December 30, 2012

Welcome to First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin. Whether this is your first time or you’ve been coming all your life, we welcome you.

My name is Andrew Young. I have been a member of this church for five and a half years and for two and a half of those years I have been the Youth Programming Coordinator, which means that I am in charge of our middle school and high school youth programs. Although I am still in this role, I am entering into a new role as well. This Sunday marks the end of my first semester at Starr King School for the Ministry where I am pursuing a Master of Divinity degree in preparation for ordination as Unitarian Universalist minister.

Today’s service is a part of my final project for a class aptly named “History of UU Religious Practices” in which we’ve studied how our liturgy has evolved since the Puritans arrived in North America. The word liturgy refers to the rituals of the church, especially the structure and format of the Sunday service since that is the primary ritual of our church. As such, this service diverges somewhat from our normal Sunday service in both format and content and I apologize in advance for any confusion this might cause.

The elements of today’s service and the selection of its hymns are rooted in our Unitarian and Universalist traditions. The hymns are from a hymnal published in 1955 that was used by both the Unitarians and the Universalists before the two denominations merged. Our responsive reading is taken from a Unitarian hymnal published in 1907.

It is sometimes said that the work of religion is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. Today’s service is sure to do both. We will deal with topics that may be uncomfortable for some of you due to your past experiences, and my intent is not to make light of or invalidate your feelings on these topics. We each bring our own experiences to the conversation and all I ask is that you keep an open mind and reflect on how each element of the service today affects you. Pay special attention to the words and phrases which trigger strong emotions for you, either positive or negative.

Now, as we begin our sacred time together, please join me in reading the words for lighting our chalice which are printed in your order of service.

Love is the doctrine of this church,
The quest of truth is its sacrament,
And service is its prayer
To dwell together in peace,
To seek knowledge in freedom,
To serve human need,
To the end that all souls shall grow into harmony with the Divine —
Thus do we covenant with each other and with God.

Invocation / Prayer

Please join me in an attitude of prayer.

La Eternulo estas mia paŝtisto; mi mankon ne havos.
Sur verdaj herbejoj Li ripozigas min, Apud trankvilaj akvoj Li kondukas min.
Li kvietigas mian animon; Li kondukas min laŭ vojo de la vero, pro Sia nomo.
Eĉ kiam mi iros tra valo de densa mallumo, Mi ne timos malbonon, ĉar Vi estas kun mi; Via bastono kaj apogiĝilo trankviligos min.
Vi kovras por mi tablon antaŭ miaj malamikoj; Vi ŝmiris per oleo mian kapon, mia pokalo estas plenigita.
Nur bono kaj favoro sekvos min en la daŭro de mia tuta vivo; Kaj mi restos en la domo de la Eternulo eterne.

Language is powerful. And yet, language is arbitrary. The words we use have no inherent meaning, only the meaning that we give to them. And yet, the words we use are still powerful because of that meaning. Dr. Zamenhof knew this well. In the 1880s he invented a language now called Esperanto, which you have just heard a sample of. Dr. Zamenhof grew up in a community that spoke four different languages, each with its own cultural heritage, and he saw how the differences in language created walls between members of the community. This was why he invented a language that didn’t belong to any single country or culture. He hoped that this language, with its lack of cultural and linguistic baggage, could help bring people together by lifting up their commonalities and rejoicing in their differences.

How does language affect the way you see the world? This is what I would like you to meditate on for the next few minutes whether you sit quietly or come to the window to light a candle. Take a moment to reflect on how you react differently to the Esperanto verse and its English equivalent.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.
Amen

Sermon

Like many members of our faith, I am a relatively recent convert to Unitarian Universalism. I was raised in a non-religious home, the son of freethinking parents who were the product of the cultural revolution of the 1960s. As a child I attended Catholic, Lutheran, Episcopal, Methodist, Baptist, Mormon, Pagan, and Jewish services with friends and extended family, but I was always only an observer and never a believer because I couldn’t subscribe to the central ideas of these groups. I didn’t believe in magic or in a God that would condemn so many of my friends to eternal damnation despite how much good they did in the world. After high school I discovered Buddhism and I embraced its teachings because they didn’t require me to believe in a deity or in superstition. By the time I found the UU church I considered myself a staunch atheist and skeptic. When I say that I was an atheist, I mean literally an a-theist, that is one who does not believe in God. This is subtly but importantly different from one who believes there is not a God. I had no proof one way or the other, and I knew for sure that I didn’t believe in the God of the Christian fundamentalists.

When I began attending here I didn’t realize was how much negative baggage I had attached over the years to many of the words associated with the church. Words like God, divinity, ministry, faith, spirituality, salvation, and grace made me bristle, and in the UU church I found a place where I could be in ethical and moral community with others without the need to use such terms. I remember that soon after joining the church a friend of mine was explaining his Pagan religious beliefs to me. He told me that he used to be an atheist, but he had realized that there was more to life than that. He felt that there was something that connected all of us together, and he had found an expression of this belief in Paganism. I remember that at the time I thought his beliefs were silly and superstitious and I was glad that I had found a church that was more enlightened. His use of divine language, such as god, goddess, and even ritual, had built up a wall between us. If you asked me then if I believed in God, my immediate answer without hesitation would have been “no”. Not only that, I thought that discussing the idea of a god or goddess was silly superstition. What I didn’t know was that my own journey of faith was only just beginning and I was yet to learn the underlying theology and history of Unitarian Universalism.

You see, Unitarian Universalism is a faith with deep theological roots. We can trace our direct lineage to the colonial era when English dissenters journeyed to America in search of religious freedom. The church of England considered them heretics because they believed in ideas such as universal salvation – the belief that all people will be saved – and unitarianism – the idea that Jesus was not God, only a man. And even though the dissenters were a product of the enlightenment, the ideas they supported were much older, almost as old as the Christian church itself. For the majority of our history the members of our denomination have considered themselves Christians and have been at home with the language of divinity. However, for the last hundred years our vocabulary has shifted to the language of philosophy and morality. This shift began, to some degree, in the early 19th century with the transcendentalists and their focus on the inherent goodness of both people and nature. It continued in the late 19th century with the translation of the great religious texts of the world into English. But it didn’t really pick up speed until the late 1940s with the introduction of the Unitarian fellowship movement.

At the time the American Unitarian Association was trying to find ways to increase growth. They found that there were some people who were interested in Unitarianism who weren’t comfortable in a traditional church, so they began to sponsor Unitarian fellowships as alternatives to churches. Fellowships could be started with as few as 10 members and without any ordained clergy. They could also meet in people’s homes or in rented space. To increase the likelihood of their success, the American Unitarian Association targeted largely white communities which also had universities in them. Add to this the popularity of humanism among this particular demographic sparked in part by the release of the Humanist Manifesto in the 1930s and the result was a boom in small groups which were lay led, often highly educated, and largely humanist in nature. Hymnals written at the time began to include readings and hymns which lacked the traditional language of divinity. Over time these fellowships became larger and either merged with existing churches or became churches themselves. This led to a large increase in humanism in the Unitarian church as a whole as well as a steady decline in the use of religious language. So complete was the removal of religious language from the denomination that our statement of principles and purposes, often pointed to when someone asks what we believe in as Unitarian Universalists, contains no divine language at all, except for the word “covenant”.

This is why, when I joined the church, I felt so at home, so comfortable with the language used here. However, things changed as I began to apply what I was learning in church to the rest of my life. As I attempted to truly live my UU principles each day I noticed two interesting side effects. The first one was that I was less and less defensive when other people used divine language in my presence. My understanding of words such as “God”, “ministry”, and “faith” began to change and take on new meanings, thanks in part to a large number of younger UUs who were adopting this language as their own. I came to think of God as the best hopes and dreams in all of us and when others would speak about God, I realized they were speaking about the same basic ideas. This led directly to the second side effect: Other people began to comment on what a good Christian I was. The first time this happened it took me completely by surprise. For a split second I was insulted, but very quickly I recognized the comment for what it was: not a slur, but a compliment on how I lived my life. I came to realize that there was an entire group of Christians, really the silent majority, who cared more about doing good in the world and following the teachings of Jesus than about commandments, sin, and hell. I also realized that many devoutly religious people were speaking of God not as a literal man in the sky – like the one on the order of service today – but as a metaphor for that something greater that connects us all. My ability to tolerate the use of God language had changed my entire outlook not only on Christianity, but also on religion as a whole. The walls which I had built up began to be broken down.

What I came to realize is that I had been doing the same thing that the religious fundamentalists had been doing. I had been taking words such as “God” and “faith” and putting them into little boxes of meaning instead of letting their meanings expand to meet me where I was in my personal journey. I thought that “God” had to mean a physical being, and that “prayer” meant talking directly to that physical being. I thought that “faith” meant blind trust of what you’ve been taught and that “salvation” meant that you would go to heaven after you die. I’m sure that if I asked a group of UUs about these words, many of them would have similar reactions. Many of us have attached the baggage of our previous religious experiences to these words. We hear the word “sin” and we think of angry signs at a protest. We hear the word “ministry” and we think of groups giving bibles to villagers in other countries. But to many these words mean much more.

As a religious educator and a parent I have seen another side of this issue as well. Many UUs want to spare our children from the negative effects that words such as “sin” had on us when we were their age. We want to shield our children from closed minded zealots who spew hate and intolerance in the name of religion. But in doing so, we often rob our children of the power that comes from having a language to describe that which is so difficult to describe in our lives. If we taught our children that “God” refers to the great mystery of life or if we taught them that “grace” refers to those gifts that we receive simply by being alive, then they would be equipped with those words when events in their lives moved them to use language which embodied the awe and wonder of life more directly than our everyday speech does. Instead we have given that power to the fundamentalists by making sure that their definitions of these words are the only ones that our children will ever learn.

I’m not trying to influence you one way or the other about your personal belief in God. Instead, my goal is to make you think about why the word itself is so problematic for Unitarian Universalists. I think that one of the reasons is that many times when we are asked “Do you believe in God?” we are expected to give a yes-or-no answer to a very complicated question. I think another reason is that many of the popular concepts of God are so simplistic and confined that we resist forcing the indescribable spiritual intuitions of our minds and hearts into such a simple and narrow description. The real question is not “what do you believe?” but “In what do you have faith?” When all seems lost and darkness is everywhere, to what do you pray for salvation from the darkness? If you put your hopes out to the universe, then perhaps the universe is God. If you rely on the inherent goodness of all people, then perhaps that is God.

I knew that my understanding of God, and especially of the word God, had changed significantly when I was asked by a high school youth if I believed in God and I was able to honestly answer “yes”. Although I don’t believe in a personal God whom I am able to interact with, I do believe in a wonderfully complex universe and in the spark of the divine in every living thing. To me, this is God. My belief in God hasn’t really changed since I became a UU, but my participation in this church has helped me define it as something more than “I don’t believe in the God they believe in.” I still consider myself a rational skeptic who doesn’t believe in superstition, but what has changed is my relationship with the word God. Instead of shrinking away from it I embrace it as my own. And I am beginning to see the fruits of my labor.

This year my 9 year old daughter began attending Redeemer Lutheran School, a local private school that is a part of Redeemer Lutheran Church. When we first started looking at private schools for my daughter I was concerned because many of them are very conservative. We chose Redeemer because of its rigorous academic program, but it came with some possible drawbacks. Two of these are the weekly chapels and bible verse memorizations, but the more serious one is that the church which runs the school is a member of the Missouri Synod. For those of you who have never heard of them, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod is the fundamentalist branch of Lutheranism in the US. It is balanced out by the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America. Whereas the ELCA ordains gay clergy, the Missouri Synod doesn’t even ordain women. They hold to the fundamentalist stance of strict biblical inerrancy. I’m sure you can imagine why this concerned me.

When we interviewed the principal we were assured that they taught evolution and that they were tolerant of other faiths at the school. The principal told us that a Muslim girl had even been student body president a few years ago. When we spoke to my daughter’s teacher he told us that they had an atheist student the year before and enjoyed having conversations with him about religion, so we signed my daughter up and hoped for the best. All of my fears were swept away on the very first day of school. The kids all put together bags with objects in them which represented who they were. The idea was for the kids to try and guess which bag belonged to which child based solely on the things in the bag. Among the things my daughter placed in her bag was a chalice. When they made posters that told other students about their interests and hobbies, my daughter wrote “I’m a Unitarian Universalist” as the very first thing on the poster.

So far our experiences have been very positive. Even though I’ve attended every chapel service to make sure I can explain to my daughter any theological bits that I disagree with, so far I haven’t needed to. She is so completely grounded in her faith and so at home with words like God and prayer and salvation that she has instead often come to me to tell me how she disagreed with the sermon topic before I even had a chance to bring it up on my own. We often discuss how we as Unitarian Universalists can apply the teachings of Jesus to our daily lives while maintaining our own beliefs about God and the spark of the divine within all people. She even asked her prayer leader at school to pray for me when I was traveling on a business trip, not because she believes in a personal God who answers our prayers, but because she wanted to express her desire that I come home safely.

So what is the point of all of this? My sermon is titled “Is There a Place for God in Unitarian Universalism?” I believe that the answer to this question is yes, there is a place for God. There is at least a place for the word “God” regardless of what your personal beliefs are regarding the existence or non-existence of one or more particular deities. We need to bring the religious language of our predecessors back into our daily experiences and embrace that language. It isn’t the words themselves that we have a problem with, it is the meaning that others have assigned to them. If we take back these words we will regain a descriptive vocabulary which we desperately need in these trying times. My challenge to you today is to reevaluate your relationship with the language of divinity. I realize that many of you have been hurt by religious zealots using these words to spew hate, but I ask that you try your best to embrace these words and to make them meaningful in your daily lives. Doing so will rob those same zealots of the power that these words have given them.

Benediction

I will leave you today with a quote from the book, Fluent in Faith: A Unitarian Universalist Embrace of Religious Language.

“God is the voice or impulse calling us toward goodness, beauty, creativity, love, justice, growth. God is a mysterious impulse available to us, a too-often unheeded voice within me and you and all of life. This god calls and invites, prompts and lures, but it is up to us whether to respond. We are a part of an interconnected web of life in which each affects all. There is a sacred spark, a spiritual energy and power, in each of us. It matters what we do with our lives. The great, ultimately unnameable mystery of life is a call to goodness and love. As we choose love, decide for love, stand on the side of love, we are part of the growing god in the universe.”

I implore you to find ways to embrace religious language in your daily lives and to teach your families and others about your faith by using the language of divinity. Words only have meaning because we give them meaning. If we don’t give these words a deeper and broader meaning, if we aren’t comfortable using them to describe our faith, then they will always be used to rail against us and the walls between us and those of other faiths will continue to stand.

Go now in peace until we meet again. Amen.

 

Podcasts of sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

 

The lovers, the dreamers, and me

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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Marisol Caballero

November 25, 2012

Kermit T. Frog’s famous ballad, “The Rainbow Connection,” has had a profound impact on my life, my theology, and my call to ministry. As I age, I have begun to recognize that Jim Henson’s words and characters have helped form so many of us in similar ways. This sermon will celebrate the wisdom of this unexpectedly prophetic man, who together with his puppets, continues to help change the world more than 20 years after his death.

 

Text of this sermon is not yet available. Click the play button to listen.

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

Our Religious Imagination

by Posted in Audio available, Brian Ferguson, Former Ministers, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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Rev. Brian Ferguson

November 4, 2012

Albert Einstein was one of the great thinkers of the 20th century and knew a lot but said “Imagination is more important than knowledge.” Our Unitarian Universalist religious tradition places great emphasis on the use of reason to interpret our experience to derive meaning in life. But the solutions to some of the most difficult intractable problems in our lives seem to lie beyond our experience and reason. This worship service will explore what possibilities could be open to us if we make imagination a bigger part of our religious life.

Rev. Brian Ferguson is currently serving in his third year as the Consulting Minister to the San Marcos Unitarian Universalist Fellowship. Prior to serving at San Marcos, Brian completed a year of chaplaincy training at Seton Family of Hospitals in Austin, specializing in the areas of Intensive Care, Trauma, and Mental Health. He was honored to serve as the ministerial intern here, at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin, in 2008 and also the Live Oak Unitarian Universalist Church in Cedar Park. Brian earned a Masters of Divinity degree from Starr King School for the Ministry, the Unitarian Universalist seminary in Berkeley, California. His ministry is driven by the desire to explore and improve the human condition in an interdisciplinary and holistic way.

He is a native of Scotland but has lived in California since 1986 prior to moving to Austin in August, 2008. In his previous life, before attending seminary, he earned an applied physics degree from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland, and worked for 24 years as an electronic design engineer and project manager. Brian is joined on life’s journey by his partner and our office manager, Natalie Freeburg, and nine year old daughter, Isla Ferguson.

 

Text of this sermon is not yet available. Click the play button to listen.

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

 

Day of the Dead

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons

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Marisol Caballero

October 28, 2012

The Day of the Dead (El Dia de los Muertos) is a Mexican holiday that celebrates the lives and personalities of our loved ones who have died. In this inter-generational worship service we celebrate and remember loved ones (pets included) who have died. A congregational ofrenda (altar) honors their memory. We briefly share the name of the deceased and our relationship to them. We bring items to place on our ofrenda, such as a favorite food, drink, photograph or another item that represents who they were and what they loved in life.

 

Text of this sermon is not yet available. Click the play button to listen.

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776

 

Coming Home

by Posted in Audio available, Guest Speakers, Sermons, Video available

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Marisol Caballero

September 30, 2012

We pride ourselves in being open and affirming toward all, yet it seems many people still do not know of our existence. Why are UUs so shy about talking about where we attend church? This sermon challenges us to be more willing to share our faith.

Text of this sermon is not yet available. Click the play button to listen.

Podcasts of this and other sermons are also available for free on iTunes. You can find them here.

http://itunes.apple.com/podcast/first-unitarian-universalist/id372427776