A Hate Crime in Knoxville

On Sunday a shotgun bearing gunman invaded a Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, TN, and killed two and injured six. I sent the following message to my Hinsdale Unitarian congregation today:

The congregation of the Unitarian Church of Hinsdale has been affected by Sunday’s shooting spree that killed two and injured six others in a Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville.

Our hearts are heavy for the murdered and injured of the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church.

Our hearts are heavy for the congregation that must now try to understand and then respond to the single gunmen's hate for liberals and gays directed at them.

Our hearts are heavy for violence that marbles American society.

Our hearts are heavy for what drives a man, such as this gunman, to resort to such an act as the consummation of his 58 years.

The shooting spree on Sunday could have been even more devastating, for the gunman had 73 rounds of unspent ammunition. It's likely that the courage of an usher and others, who subdued the gunman, saved many children, youth, and adults. For this we are thankful.

The Unitarian Universalist liberal religious community throughout America now knows a larger measure of the violence spawned by hate. Yes, this is being categorized as a hate crime by the Tennessee authorities.

Speaking on behalf the Unitarian Church of Hinsdale, I know this senseless act of violence will only increase our resolve to promote progressive values in peaceful and democratic ways, that justice and love will one day prevail over such senseless acts of violence and hate.

The Chicago Sun Times website has a thorough July 29 AP article on the shooting.

A letter to the editor, the text similar to the above, appeared in the July 30, edition of the Chicago Sun Times.

Barack Obama's Prayer

Last week, while visiting the Western Wall in Jerusalem, Barack Obama followed the custom of placing a note between the stones. Someone pilfered the note, handwritten on hotel stationery, and made available to the press the following prayer:

Lord,

Protect my family and me. Forgive my sins, and help me guard against pride and despair. Give me the wisdom to do what is right and just. And make me an instrument of your will.

The publication of the prayer raises issues of sacrilege: violating an act of private prayer as well as the sacred space that is the Western Wall. Some have questioned whether or not this was a ploy by the Obama camp in the first place. Bloggers and media commentators have scrutinized every word, including the non-capitalization of the word your, for theological and personal implications, regarding Mr. Obama.

In my estimation this brief utterance will be imprinted on our collective consciousness, if Mr. Obama is elected president. Because of its brevity and manifest implications, it is memorable. I continue to emphasize that Mr. Obama is integrally more religious than any presidential candidate since Woodrow Wilson. I welcome this additional glimpse into his religious character.

A Conversation on Race

This year's presidential campaign continues to bring race to the forefront of our national consciousness. Several months there was a general call by media and political leaders to have a culture-wide "conversation on race." President Clinton made a similar call in the early 1990s, but that call went nowhere.

Leading the way, CNN, with correspondent Soledad O'Brien anchoring, is offering valuable programs on various aspects of race: Black in America.

In my estimation race, long the shame and scourge of American culture, has reached a new threshold because of Barack Obama's presidential possibilities.

Within my own congregation, I' m leading a year-long "conversation on race." On Sunday, August 10, at 10 a.m. in the UCH auditorium, I'll present, as a slide show, Jacob Lawrence's monumental (1940) 60 panel series on the "Great Migration," in which southern blacks came north to work the factories during WWI. This show will be backed by music composed by the African American composer William Grant Still.

I'm also urging all members and friends of UCH to read Frederick Douglass's classic Slave Narrative. Without a sense of the many evils of slavery, it's impossible to understand the course and outcome of racism in America. Visit my web page to learn about the program and how to download a free copy of Douglass's 1845 book, an outstanding first person account of the slave experience: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave.

Animal Rights Gains Support

On June 25 the Spanish Parliament took a giant step toward granting the so-called great apes certain rights (life and freedom) heretofore exclusively human. The environmental committee passed resolutions that echoed scientists and philosophers of the Great Ape Project, who advocate for humane treatment of our species closest animal kin.

The Great Ape Project's website declares: "The idea is founded upon undeniable scientific proof that non-human great apes share more than genetically similar DNA with their human counterparts. They enjoy a rich emotional and cultural existence in which they experience emotions such as fear, anxiety and happiness. They share the intellectual capacity to create and use tools, learn and teach other languages. They remember their past and plan for their future. It is in recognition of these and other morally significant qualities that the Great Ape Project was founded. The Great Ape Project seeks to end the unconscionable treatment of our nearest living relatives by obtaining for non-human great apes the fundamental moral and legal protections of the right to life, the freedom from arbitrary deprivation of liberty, and protection from torture."

In my estimation animal rights is an ethical frontier that illuminates our human relationship with Nature--the great web of life. Compiling my quote collection In Praise of Animals (Skinner House, 2007), convinced me that we are just beginning to appreciate animals as kindred and that a once assumed dominion over animals is a fallacy.

Bravo to Spain for taking this first legal leap granting animals their intrinsic rights.

Church, State, and Barack Obama

In July 2007 Barack Obama said, "For my friends on the right, I think it would be helpful to remember the critical role that the separation of church and state has played in preserving not only our democracy but also our religious practice."

In more recent prepared remarks delivered on July 1 at Zanesville, Ohio, Mr. Obama vowed not only to continue George Bush's Faith Based Initiative Program, but to expand it. He added one disclaimer, that faith based agencies could not discriminate on the grounds of religion in hiring employees. (Many questioned this disclaimer as undermining the very nature of faith in faith based initiatives.)

The greater hue and cry focused on the issue of the separation of church and state generally and Mr. Obama's politically expedient flip-flop about it.

In my estimation Mr. Obama's affirmation of faith based initiatives is further evidence of his own strong religious values, rooted in his experience as a community organizer on Chicago's Southside. I found one of the final paragraphs of his July 1 remarks particularly telling (note my highights):

"And my Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships will also have a broader role – it will help set our national agenda. ... If we’re going to end genocide and stop the scourge of HIV/AIDS, we need people of faith on Capitol Hill talking about how these challenges don’t just represent a security crisis or a humanitarian crisis, but a moral crisis as well."

For my Unitarian Universalist readers, take a look at Forrest Church's take on the church/ state issue on the UUA website: http://www.uua.org/visitors/uuperspectives/55665.shtml

Magic Mushrooms and Religious Experience

Since the 1960s they've been called magic mushrooms for their hallucinogenic visions. A recent, reputable study provides evidence of their means to provide immediate and long term, mood altering experiences.

Roland Griffiths, a John Hopkins' researcher, has been experimenting with a group of 36 volunteers who've ingested psilocybin, the active ingredient in hallucinogenic mushrooms. In the July 1 edition of the Journal of Pharmacology Mr. Griffiths reports, "We have people saying these eight hours in the lab are among the most meaningful in their lives. Some rank it alongside births and deaths of loved ones."

One of the research subjects, John Hayes, a professor of pastoral counseling said, "It gave me this sense that space and time are human constructions that can collapse. The ultimate reality is something beyond those constructions, and more importantly, everything in the world is connected."

Many of the subjects not only had such profound mystical experiences, the residual effect (measured by life satisfaction) of those experiences lasted throughout the study's first year.

In my estimation this study points to the neurological basis of religious experience, especially those categorized as mystical experiences. Compare this to the experiences of Jill Bolte Taylor as chronicled in a recent book “My Stroke of Insight.” (See my May 27 posting.) Ms. Bolte had a stroke that immobilized the left lobe of her brain that resulted in a "nirvana-like" awareness of the oneness of the universe.

I've long maintained that the center of Religion is personal religious experience. I'm now persuaded that religious experience is a discrete phenomenon within the brain. Our knowledge of this phenomenon grows daily.

Expanding Faith Based Initiatives

This afternoon Barack Obama will propose significant government support for faith-based community service organizations, an expansion of George W. Bush's controversial initiative. The speech's site, a Zanesville, Ohio church that serves its impoverished community with a food and a clothes bank, as well as a youth center, is in a crucial swing state.

In today's speech Mr. Obama will describe the evolution of his own Christian faith during his years as an organizer in Chicago, highlighting the significance of that faith now: ``In time, I came to see faith as being both a personal commitment to Christ and a commitment to my community; that while I could sit in church and pray all I want, I wouldn't be fulfilling God's will unless I went out and did the Lord's work,."

Mr. Obama promises to elevate this commitment to faith-based organizations to a ``moral center'' of his administration, by renaming it the Office of Community and Faith-Based Partnerships. He wants the larger organizations to train many smaller organizations at work in their local communities, similar to the Zanesville church where he will speak.

True to his community organizer's roots, he will seek a "bottom ups" approach in providing grass roots support for the needy.

In my estimation what Mr. Obama will say today has two sides to ponder. First, there's political posturing to curry the favor of the Evangelical and the poor voters--a very clever two-for-one. Second, there's reiteration of Mr. Obama's Christian identity.

Once again Mr. Obama is speaking like a preacher/theologian. In this instance he parallels his commitment to Christ to a commitment to community. My June 16 blog proposed that Mr. Obama is the most integrally religious candidate since Woodrow Wilson. This bumps that analysis up a notch.

Rather than less religion in this year's presidential campaign, thanks to Mr. Obama, we have more in a way that can significantly affect religion's role in politics and culture. I'm wary.