Ed Searl's Journal: In My Estimation

Romney and Religion

2012-01-23T09:18:00.002-06:00

For me it was a bizarre moment in a presidential candidates' debate. A Charleston audience huzzahed Newt Gingrich for being "appalled" at John King's opening question regarding a former wife's allegations. She claimed that Gingrich asked her for an "open marriage" so he could could continue an adulterous affair with the woman who subsequently became his third wife. In essence, Gingrich took King to task, implicating him as part of a "media elite" that is pro-Obama.

So an audience, surely strong on traditional family values and leaning toward conservative Christianity, resoundingly cheered a thrice married, twice divorced, admitted adulterer. Gingrich won the primary a couple of days later, decisively defeating Mitt Romney, whom the pundits, for weeks, had projected the likely winner.

In vivid contrast, Romney represents family values lived: a faithful husband in a long marriage to a high school sweetheart, a dedicated father, and a man of faith long-dedicated as lay-clergy and local leader to his birth church to which he tithes. And there's the rub. Romney is a Mormon.

In the wake of the South Carolina primary, a negative response to Romney's Mormon identity is being questioned. The consensus concludes, it was less of an issue for South Carolina's Evangelicals than it was four years ago; but such a view doesn't dismiss it altogether as an issue.

The Protestant right and Catholics, too, don't find Mormonism to be Christian, despite Mormon contentions that they are.

There's an unspoken religious litmus test for political candidates that relates to belief in God--the God of the Jewish Christian tradition, preferably a conservative Christian take on that God. (It's been proven by reputable polls that the most reviled minority in America are atheists.) For most Americans, Mormonism stands outside the Christian pale.

The pundits are beginning to say that Romney must address his staunch Mormon identity, that it's the elephant in the room of his crumbling campaign. It's not easy to pin down why Mitt Romney doesn't excite popular enthusiasm. On appearance, except for his Mormonism, he should. He's what used to be called "four square."

So, a socially conservative audience, huzzahed a morally suspect Newt Gingrich when challenged on his character/behavior; and a conservative electorate made him the anti-Romney of the week.

Religion matters.

Imagine

2012-01-21T09:26:00.012-06:00

January 1995

I originally proposed a sermon on the theme “ How Would Our World Be Different, If Dr. King Had Lived?” I wanted to try my hand at counterfactual history, also known as alternate or “what if” history.

I did a little research and thought about a design. However, I was overwhelmed by a retrospective sadness for the course of America since 1968, seen through a lens of possibility—how Dr. King’s moral arc would have affected our national moral arc.

You surely know, I’m referencing Dr. King’s quotation “the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.” Perhaps you know that President Obama has a rug in the oval office with those words woven around the edge. You probably don’t know that Dr. King borrowed that now famous phrase from Unitarian minister Theodore Parker who said in 1853, “I do not pretend to understand the moral universe. The arc is a long one. My eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by experience of sight. I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.”

As I reflected on what might have been, I realized how monumental Martin Luther King Jr. had already become as he entered his full maturity at age 39. He’d inspired and contributed to the organization of the greatest political/cultural event of the 20th century: an astonishingly successful expansion of civil rights largely won by the moral effort of the people oppressed by 400 hundred years of entrenched racism. Dr. King had begun to campaign for economic justice (The Poor Peoples’ March and his reason for being in Memphis, a sanitation workers strike); and he had begun to oppose the Vietnam War. He was dramatically transforming the notion of Love from neutered Christian sentiment to transformative action—the swift sword of Mrs. Howe’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” but without violence and blood.

He threatened a smug, self-serving economic and political establishment that, in his absence over the last four decades, has grown into a Plutocracy that has cynically abused national interest (of, by, and for the people—another Theodore Parker phrase) for selfish gain.

In my imagination, I injected Dr. King into the events of tumbling decades: the 70s, 80, 90s, the 2000s. I was literally overwhelmed at the imagined gravitas of his presence, the difference he would have made. His baseline, the transformative power of Love, would have at the very least been a constant goad, a reminder always to keep in mind the notion of a moral arc bending ever closer to Justice not for some but for all. He would have pushed American Christianity away from Evangelicalism’s selfish prosperity theology, toward a generous social justice ethic of view true to Jesus’s own revolutionary ministry.

Seventeen years ago, I had the occasion to visit the Lorraine Motel where Dr. King was shot. Memphis was literally closed because of an ice storm that had passed through the area night before. The motel was worn and tired, much like the decaying industrial/transportation district surrounding it. A single wreath on a balcony marked the 2nd floor where Dr. King was shot. It was a bright, sunny mid-winter, Sunday afternoon. The sensations of the day mingling with my active imagination,--standing on holy ground,--made it one of the more memorable and poignant experiences of my life.

I imagined the report of a rifle, the slumping body, the ooze of blood, but I knew couldn’t fully comprehended the full import of the tragic event. Such a realization still exceeds my ability to order and hold it, relative to the course of events of the last 43 years.

Our world would have been a better place—a much better place—had Dr. King survived to walk with us at age 83.

I grieve for what might have been but never was.

Fruit of the Tree

2012-01-13T11:17:00.004-06:00

[My favorite religious myth comes from Genesis. The two trees, Of the Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life, haunt my religio-spiritual imagination. A mystery of the human condition is a moral consciousness joined to a sense of mortality. This is a consciousness that often comes to a relatively young child. I sometime am asked to talk to a child as young as nine who has realized that s/he won't live forever. Here's a vignette from my new book on Ecclesiastes, Wisdom for the Ages, that speaks to this fundamental human awareness, the proverbial loss of innocence.]

The Thisness of Being

’ve just listened to a Canadian Broadcast Corporation “Writers and Company” interview with philosopher and novelist Rebecca Goldstein, regarding her new book Thirty-six Arguments for the Existence of God.

You can’t judge a book by its cover‒at least by its title. Ms. Goldstein’s new book is a novel‒a philosophical novel. She is a professional philosopher, a professor at Brandeis University, who some years ago wearied of analytical philosophy’s restrictions and branched into the writing of fiction. Her new book has garnered interest, in part, for the appendix that lists said thirty-six arguments and offers a brief critique of each.

The interview began with Ms. Goldstein remembering her youth, when she would lie in bed and think about the strangeness of her being. In thinking of her existential self, she had an extraordinary, heightened awareness that was both terrifying and thrilling. She wondered, why am I me? Do others perceive this me? At a very early age, she was genuinely mystified by the thisness of her own existence.

A practicing Orthodox Jew by birth through the years of her first marriage, she now declares herself probably agnostic, though she admires the rich nuances of a religious outlook. In the interview, she mused on the existential problem of death from a very ordinary point of view: how can all the aspects of personality, the complex world that each person is, simply cease to be? This non-existence was easy for her to accept for herself, but she couldn’t so readily accept it for those she loved, such as her father.

As a child, she had pondered death. As a philosopher, she’s still mystified by what she called the thisness of being. This blows her away. In this regard, philosophizing seems an ordinary human activity to her, as she seeks to understand what she first experienced non-rationally as a child.

Her memories stirred mine. I remember lying in bed as a child, the night dark and the room still. I thought about the common stuff of childhood‒school, friends, sports and such. But I also remembered that now and again, seeping in from where I didn’t know, came strange images of death, the thisness of my being falling into an abyss of nothingness. If I remember the accompanying emotion accurately, it had a sense of awesome dread that was also compelling. Fascinating is the mystical term. I didn’t want to think about non-being, but when I did, I had to take it to the edge of an abyss. Much later, when I encountered Rudolph Otto’s concept of the mysterium tremendum, I had a phrase to describe these episodes of apprehension and fascination about death. Later, Emily Dickinson’s haunting, “when I have fears that I may cease to be,” assured me that I wasn‘t alone in confronting this disturbing conclusion to being, the end of the thisness of my life and every life.

By no means a morbid child, I didn’t dwell on death. Was I precocious? Perhaps. But probably more children spontaneously entertain such episodes than we imagine.

Dying and death are important aspects of ministry, involving pastoral care and the rite of passage of either a funeral or memorial service. When the compulsion to write and publish a book came upon me in my mid-thirties, I followed the advice to write what I knew about. I fashioned a guide on crafting modern funeral and memorial services called In Memoriam. It’s been in print since 1993, reissued in 2000 in a second edition, and has become a standard resource even beyond the confines of my liberal religious tradition.

Considering this, my affinity for Ecclesiastes pops into focus. Though Ecclesiastes offers a litany of observations and aphorism about death, I’ve never found it morbid. It’s Realistic and it’s philosophical in a commonsense, everyman’s way.

A number of verses might be cited to highlight Ecclesiastes sensibility regarding mortality and the human response to it. In light of my own scheme of Natural Religion, I cite this selection:

I said in my heart, with regards to the sons of men that God is testing them to show them that they are but beasts. For the fate of the sons of men and the fate of beasts is the same; as one dies, so dies the other. They will all have the breath, and man has no advantage over the beasts; for all is vanity. All go to one place; all are from dust, all turn to dust again. Who knows whether the spirit of man goes upward and the spirit of the beast goes down to the earth? So I saw that there is nothing better than a man should enjoy his work, for that is his lot; who can bring him to see what will be after him? [3:18-22]

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Reconciliation

2011-12-12T12:07:00.015-06:00

The Presidential primaries are upon us. Circumstances have whittled down the large field of Republican candidates a little. And yet another non-Romney hopeful, Newt Gingrich, has risen to the top of the most-popular-by-poll list. (The pushback on Romney, I maintain, is his staunch Mormon identity. But that’s a topic for another time.)

I started this blog in 2007 during the last Presidential campaign cycle with special focus on religious, politics and the American Experience. It’s time for me to once again pick up that thread.

It’s not that the campaigns and debates to date have been free of religious discourse. Indeed, several of the debates have focused on the candidate’s religious perspectives. Once again, the self-proclaimed socially conservative candidates are generally against same sex marriage and abortion. This was expected.

Something of a surprise is the impact on public opinion of sexual morality in the candidates’ lives. Herman Cain dropped out of the pack of candidates when accused of work place sexual harrasment, plus an accusation of a long standing adulterous relationship.

Gingrich, now on his third marriage, has confessed to committing adultery during his previous marriages, including an affair while he was leading the impeachment proceedings against Bill Clinton, who was being held up to scruntiny, in part, for his sexual indiscretions. Curiously, Gingrich first explained his own past behavior hinged on loving his country too much and working too hard.

He had an adulterous affair with current wife. But she also led him to convert to Catholicism, an identity that Gingrich is using in a very clever way.

In the most recent debate, fellow debaters challenged Gingrich directly or indirectly about his behavior relative to his marriages. He responded to one accusation, saying, “I said up-front, openly, I’ve made mistakes at times. I’ve had to go to God for forgiveness; I’ve had to seek reconciliation. I’m also a 68-year-old grandfather.” (The latter has faint echoes of Henry Hyde's excuse of "youthful indiscretion.")

In the Catholic tradition confession (before a priest) and reconciliation (through the Eucharist) converge in a sacrament of forgiveness. In two sentences Gingrich invoked the notion that God had forgiven him for his misdeeds. And I add, by implication, if God has forgiven, shouldn’t mere mortals forgive him and move on, too?

It’s perilous to take to task such a fundamental and long-standing doctrine of the Roman church, now known as the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

Many of us have a more visceral sense of moral justice, somewhere along the spectrum of penance and punishment.

My 95 year old mother, a lifelong Roman Catholic has come to question plastic grace. When I asked her what she thought about Gingrich’s pronouncement regarding reconciliation, she said, “So he can be a sinner all his life, become a Catholic late in life, confess, and be forgiven. He gets to start all over?”

In the Protestant, as well as the Catholic, tradition in America, the notion of forgiveness--either by being born again or by confession--is a religious center and has seeped out to marble the popular culture. It is often said that Americans quickly forgive public individuals who have been sinners, in one fashion for another, to a lesser or greater degree. (Sin is a theme for another day, too.)

As I noted earlier, Gingrich is very clever in his phrasing. Implicitly, he challenges us to argue, not against his character, but against a doctrine at the center of the Roman Catholic tradition that he has recently adopted. Remember, Gingrich implies that he has been forgiven according to Catholic doctrine.

He has deftly shifted the focus from himself to an institution and its theology. He is clever.

Selections for the Holidays

2011-11-29T13:29:00.002-06:00

Throughout December, I'll be posting selections from my recently published Holiday Anthology on a new blog "If Only for the Season." UUism's openness allows us to celebrate the many Mid-Winter Festivals with gusto. Here's my first selection.

Keep the “X” in Xmas

preview on Amazon

One of my earliest Christmas sermons (c. 1980) was titled “Keep the X in Xmas.” And that would have been more than twenty-five years ago in a far-away place called Youngstown, in a long-ago time called the 20th century.

I recall that I was playing off a then current campaign by certain Christian groups not to use this common shorthand of Xmas. They contended that this was just one more ploy–a conspiracy really–by a Godless and hostile culture to secularize the Christian spirit of Christmas.

If you Google the four letter word Xmas, you can navigate to the Wikipedia notation (it’s first in the list) that says, in part: “Some people believe that the term is part of an effort to 'take Christ out of Christmas' or to literally 'cross out Christ';[citation needed] it is also seen as evidence of the secularization of Christmas or a vehicle for pushing political correctness, or as a symptom of the commercialization of the holiday (as the abbreviation has long been used by retailers).”

There are time-honored justifications to use X to represent Christ, but I took the clever tack a quarter a century ago, that X stood for an x-factor: the mystery and wonder of the traditional Nativity tale.

I also strained to explain a deeper quality in X, something that is truly timeless at the Winter Solstice, as enacted by the ancients who built bonfires on hilltops and rolled flaming wheels down those hilltops to coax the waning sun to once again wax toward the spring equinox.

For me the X-factor is real and still beyond my ability to describe fully: it’s what converges within and beneath and beyond at this time of year, something that motivates our spirits to break out in Mid-Winter festivals.

Then and now, I liberally call myself a pagan drawn to the natural, cycling rhythms of our earth-home. [p. 45]

Thanksgiving Meditation: An Apple Accounting

2011-11-23T10:24:00.006-06:00

[This is a personal favorite, inspired by a year spent in the region of the great orchards of central New York State. It appeared in my 1998 book A Place of Your Own.]

I know of no better way to stimulate the Harvest Season's deep sense of gratitude then to make an Apple Accounting.

Indulge your senses, awaken memory, and stimulate gratitude with an ordinary, humble apple – fresh, waxy, plump, and red. Take one from the bowl. Polish it to a rich glow, in which you can see your reflection. Encounter its natural beauty.

Before that first wonderful bite, imagine: The March thawing of the earth and the first flow of sap rushing through winter stiff branches – aching from dormancy and itching for life. The cool showers of April seeping into roots and swelling buds. The May perfume of astonishingly white apple blossoms, blushed with pink– buzzed and kissed by bees. The steady green growth of youthful June. Swelling days and the embrace of heavy nights in July. August's ripening and deepening colors. September's coolness penetrating deep into the tangy flesh, sweetening as it chills. The yellow glow of October’s harvest moon waxing the red skin.

Winter melts to spring; spring matures to summer; summer ripens to autumn: the unity of life from blossom through fruit. In the intimations of the cold and heat, drought and rain, sunshine and darkness, fair weather and storm, envision the roundness of the days and the cycles of the earth. And hidden deep in the flesh, know that seeds wait to renew life through eternity.

As you pause, hold the fruit your hand, feeling its heft and hardness. Run your fingers over the smoothness of the skin. Smell the sweet, fruity perfume. Once again see your reflection, as though the apple holds you in its meaning even as you hold the apple's meaning in your imagination.

Now take a bite. Savor textures and tastes. In the crunch and juice, in the firmness and yielding of the flesh, in the tartness and sweetness, you know the proportion and goodness of things. Here is evidence of Nature's beauty, bounty, and order.

Remember your reflection in the Apple skin. Nature has blessed you, too.

Let your personal memory quicken and take an accounting of your life through your days and seasons – an accounting that brings you the realization of your good fortune to be a living, sensing, feeling, thinking creature.

In this apple accounting you experience firsthand a genuine Thanksgiving for the natural miracle of Life, in the scheme of things so improbable yet inevitable; so fragile, yet tenacious and abundant.

Respectfully Yours and Mine

2011-11-18T09:59:00.008-06:00

I have one daughter, now an adult living in Brea, CA with two young children of her own. One of my great pleasures is watching her being fully embedded in the timeless art of being a nurturing mother—providing physical care yes, but more, passing through the generations love and guidance, while taking joy and satisfaction in her 7 year old son Brett and her 2 year old daughter Bridget.

The year Katie was 9, I was intern minister in Syracuse NY. We lived in a government subsidized town house packed together with other town houses in a little complex. The complex was atumble with kids. I remember most of all the sound of plastic tires—Big Wheels—racing over the asphalt pavement at all hours of the day.

Katie had a lot of playmates in that confined and family-packed place, including several girls her age. Some were nice and some weren’t. One girl, her name was Becky I remember, lorded it over Katie throughout the year we lived there. Becky took every opportunity to tell Katie that whatever she had or did was better than what Katie had or did.

This irked Katie to no end. However, Katie, even at 9 was able to process Becky’s ways. Once Becky blurted out in the presence of Katie's Mom, “I like my Mommy, better than your Mommy.”

Now think of all the possible responses -- different ways of tearing down Becky’s Mom and lifting up Katie’s own Mom. But Katie gave a response that is among the wisest responses possible, which I’ve long considered to be among the best insight/advice I’ve ever heard.

Katie said simply, “Of course you like your Mommy better. She’s your Mommy.”

Think about that inborn wisdom – that whatever is ours we like the best, whether it’s our political party, or our sports team, or our school, or our whatever… (Notice that we claim so many things as ours.)

Just because something is ours and we like it the best, doesn’t mean it’s categorically the best, but from within our own experience we like it better than anything, anywhere else.

My daughter taught me to let others take pride in and express loyalty to what is theirs, while maintaining my pride in and loyalty to what is mine. I've found this outlook/strategy anxiety-reducing and respectful.

Exultation and Imitation

2011-11-10T13:47:00.004-06:00

Gingko Outside My Front Door

Being the oldest
of its kind –

It is the gingko's

Solemn duty

To speak

On behalf of all trees.

It does this

By waiting

And by holding

Until kindred trees

Have given their color

And dropped their leaves.

Then, having distilled

a season of sunlight,

And having bided its time, –

Almost overnight, –

The gingko's

Fan-shaped leaves

Take on the color

of the sun

So that

The waning days

of autumn color

Are a yellow exultation;

When

in a final act

of imitation

The ginkgo

Drops leaves

to the earth

in a rush –

Like sunlight

radiating across

the cosmos

To puddle

On a barren planet.

Philosophy of Life, Yes

2011-11-07T11:26:00.006-06:00

So, Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry believes that he has been called by God to politics generally and by implication specifically to be President. That sort of thinking characterizes a significant branch of evangelical Christianity – that there is intimacy and communication between the believer and God. At the very least, such thinking is prideful. At the worst, such thinking leads to unexamined righteousness. When God is on your side, whatever actions you take are justified. (I remember what Bob Dylan wrote long ago:" You don't count the dead, when God’s on your side.")

I'm thinking about this as I'm double tasking: watching a CNN news report on Perry’s religion and reading a New York Times interview with poet laureate Philip Levine, now a wise 83 years old. In the interview, Levine, a blue collar intellectual, muses, "There is a kind of Protestant ethic that believes that if you're really a good person, God will reward you with a full table and a garage full of automobiles and a beautiful husband or wife – that we should be judged by what the world has delivered to us."

When this outlook is magnified, it often leads to a theology of prosperity, that the Bible proposes Christians will reap financial and other material rewards by virtue of their faith. This is a distorted and malicious doctrine of how Jesus lived and what he taught. It is a slippery slope to unrestrained materialism and the perversion of greed.

Yesterday, in my Sunday sermon, I spoke to the ancient philosophy of Stoicism. In my preface, I described my own long progression as a student of religion and ethics. As a matter of personal choice, but also as a teacher with my own liberal assembly, I'm now most interested in advocating an effective philosophy of life free of the traps and trappings of traditional religion.

As I prepared yesterday's remarks on the philosophy of Stoicism, I was pleased to find that that much of my outlook and many of my disciplines resonate to the Stoic way. In particular, I admire and cultivate character based upon virtue: the macrocosm of Nature rflected in the microcosm of Self.

I envision the notion of a philosophy of life becoming increasingly my focus – a focus well-suited to an age seeking a center that will hold. Where is that center? Where it's always been: in the Self.

Respect

2011-10-12T08:44:00.008-05:00

[A few years ago I devised a sermon, "Seven Effective Attitudes of Unitarian Universalists" One of the seven attitudes I identified is respect.]

One of the important twentieth century historians of Unitarianism cited Individualism, Freedom of Belief and Conscience, and Toleration as the great markers of our tradition.

Toleration always struck me as condescending, a passive rather than active attitude. Acceptance is only a little better. (Remember Thomas Carlyle’s famous response to Margaret Fuller’s declaration, “I accept the Universe.” He said, “Egad, she better!”) I favor Respect, which contains Acceptance and Toleration and more.

We respect the many religions of the world, not as much for their beliefs as for their origins from the same human impulse to seek meaning and purpose, as well as for the role these religions play in family and community. Such diversity is a fact of human culture. And then the great world religions each bring a different, relatively unique emphasis to Universal Religion. For example among the Abrahamic religions, Judaism brings Justice, Christianity brings Love, and Islam brings Surrender to God’s will.

Our attitude of respect relates to what we call our first principle: “the inherent worth and dignity of every person.” Our reasoning begins with respect for self that logically extends to our fellowkind. Two hundred years ago, our forebears emphasized that human kind was indeed formed in the image of God and that we had a natural divinity, too. In a similar sense to the Buddhists bowing before one another to acknowledge the Buddha-spirit in one another, so we figuratively bow to the divinity of one another. Some of us might be more comfortable with an Enlightenment recognition of egalitarianism and rights, but we nevertheless agree that what each of us recognizes in self extends empathetically to all.

In recent years our respect has expanded to include not only other forms of life, but also to include the whole of the earth. This has been expressed in another principle that declares, “Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.”

In my mind, Respect has an element of Reverence. Indeed, Reverence is Respect written large.

Third Story: Death

2011-10-09T16:48:00.009-05:00

2005 Standford University

"My third story is about death," Steve Jobs said in his now famous “The Commencement Speech, delivered in the throes of pancreatic cancer. His third story was an intimate personal story--a story that resonates to a universal human story.

I've spent thirty years putting death into its proper context. Steve Jobs did so in this single speech. He spoke from personal experience with brevity, sensitivity, and just the right tone and authority for our age. That’s why it’s appearing everywhere, offering sobering inspiration. For example, CNN played the speech in its entirety during the morning broadcast following Mr. Jobs’ death.

“No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.”

The he told the newly minted graduates, “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

Such carpe diem counsel is nothing new.

I'm completing a book, Wisdom for the Ages: A Season with Ecclesiastes that highlights Ecclesiastes down-to-earth philosophy of life, dating from 2300 years ago. It draws from an even older vein of wisdom found on 4000-year-old Babylonian tablets, collected as the Epic of Gilgamesh.

Similar advice comes from a variety of ages and cultures: Experience and gain knowledge. Enjoy life with the one whom you love. Work hard and enjoy the fruits of your toil-- figuratively, wine and bread in moderation. Don't let the things you pursue and acquire overwhelm you. Never forget, even in your youth, that death is your fate.

Steve Jobs’ death is a "Big Chill" moment for Baby Boomers. We’ve paused and are reflecting.

He's given us incredible technologies. He's also given us something more valuable via that simple, remarkable speech, yet another expression of a timeless philosophy of life: know that you are mortal and that your death can come at any moment; nevertheless, live and enjoy the life you have to its fullness.

And by example, he recommended that when death comes, meet it with dignity, grace, and no regrets.

As Deep as Time, As Broad as the Earth

2011-09-30T10:28:00.018-05:00

Click to visit Monarch Watch

[This is the time of the year monarchs flock and begin a monumental trek to Mexico mountains to winter. Here's my dedication for UCH's Monarch Way Station: September 2007.]

This small parcel of land

set aside by intention and action,

Has already been blessed

by the natural graces

and ordinary miracles

Of Nature

Where all Life

Is embraced by myriad bonds

of mutuality.

Today we affirm Relationships

as deep as time

and as broad as the Earth —

An Interdependent Web Of Life

In which Butterfly and Human Being

alike has an ordained place.

Isn't this Web of Life

Amazing?

Isn't this Web of Life

Wonderful?

Isn't this Web of Life

Sacred?

Here we gather and care for

plants of the Prairie

to feed Caterpillars

And to provide a Way‒Station

for Monarchs

Wending their way in Autumn

to a Winter Sanctuary

a thousand miles distant

And returning like clockwork

In the Spring.

This is our pledge and our prayer:

May we be Agents of Life

Finding the ways and implementing the means

to sustain and enhance life

in all of its forms

On this Blessed Earth.

Here and now,

Everywhere,

Forevermore.

Animal Blessing Ceremony

2011-09-25T19:00:00.003-05:00

May the animals in our lives

– indeed, in our world –

reveal to us deeper relationships,

life answering to life;

causing us to revere Life's Spirit

in all manifestations:

in the intricate and beautiful

Web Of Existence, yes,

but even more

through myriad fellow creatures –

especially those companion animals –

whose presence bless us daily.

[The animals and their friends paraded down and around the aisles, then together stopped.]

With intention, compassion, and abiding affection,

we pause to hear the murmur of life

in this hallowed room

as we contemplate

the meaning and presence of our fellow creatures

in sacred silence.

[after the silence]

Say aloud the names
you have given your companion animals.

Now everyone say with me:

“We are all in this together.”

Simple Prayers Wherever You Go

2011-09-23T10:44:00.012-05:00

Kindle ebook

It has stayed with me for more than a quarter of a century, James Madison Barr's "I don't pray, but if I did, this is what I would say..." (Barr, now decased, was longtime humanist Unitarian minister in Memphis.)

Prayer isn't among my personal spiritual disciplines, at least formally. But when my adult daughter, a member of the Anaheim, CA UU society alluded to her prayer life, I put together a little book for her as a Holiday gift. I called it Simple Prayers.

In the brief introduction to my ten simple prayers, I spoke of prayer as a matter of self-transcendence. I explained I sought to strip prayer to its essence with the hope that those who use my offerings will be able to use a particular prayer throughout the day.

Here's one of the ten simple prayers:

Mercy and Forgiveness,

Scour my mind and rectify my heart.

I think the resulting book, published on Create Space and available on Amazon, is handsome. It includes blank pages for journaling--keeping a record of one's prayer life.. It's the sort of book one might keep on the home desk or on a bedside table.

Recently I turned it into a Kindle ebook. This is the sort of resource to keep with one during the day, easily accessible for immediate inspiration/succor. Hence, I gave this edition the subtitle Wherever You Go, fulfilling the longstanding UU admonition to make one's life a "prayer without ceasing."

The Kindle edition has the additional advantage of making my little book more private for public reading/reference.

Jesus's Portrait

2011-09-20T10:06:00.009-05:00

I've been to quite a few wedding receptions. I could compile a nonfiction book on the people I've met and the stories I've been told around and across banquet tables.

Occasionally, I feel trapped by the conversation, especially if the subject is about religion or politics, and I disagree with something said. I don't want to be contentious at such a celebratory event.

At a reception recently, the conversation turned to the book, #1 NY Times besteller, Heaven Is Real. You probably know about it: A four old boy, his father a Wesleyan minister in Nebraska, nearly dies from a burst appendix. Over subsequent weeks and months, the little boy reveals aspects of a brief but detailed visit to heaven, including an encounter with Jesus, wearing a crown, purple sash, and white robes.

The parents present the young boy with portrait after portrait of Jesus. None resemble the Jesus he met until he's presented with a painting by another child prodigy, Akiane Kramarik of Mt. Morris, Illinois, who paints largely from her imagination. For believers, including the boy's parents, this conjunction of child prodigies has special authority.

I've posted a photo of the charming prodigy and her Jesus-portrait. What strikes me about the painting is the styled hair of Jesus. It reminds me of what's called a tell in poker--a gesture that gives away the player's hand. This hairstyle screams of the early years of the twenty-first century when she painted it. (I'm reminded of movie epics that can be dated by the hairstyles, no matter how period-authentic the costumes are.)

The book Heaven Is Real appears to be full of its own sort of theological tell, doctrine that is concordant with unique Weslyean doctrine.

Some years ago, anthropoligsts devised an image of what Jesus might really have looked like, given his time, social status, and genetic background. It caused a bit of a stir. I always thought that this face would have fit nicely into a Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western (music of course by Ennio Morricone.)

Such renditions beg the questions of cultural-centrism, of idolatry, and even of the notion of cult--religion looking to one figure in particular.

Regarding the historical Jesus, I lean to the outlook of the relatively recent Jesus Seminar, particularly John Dominic Crossan. Jesus was a social radical who doesn't resemble the popular portrait that most folks carry in their imagination.

Whenever I get distressed about such things, I turn to Theodore Parker's "Transient and Permanent in Christianity (1841)," and find my distress much relieved.

Follow Up: Goshen College and the National Anthem

2011-09-17T08:57:00.009-05:00

Goshen students show their support of "The Star Spangled Banner"

Goshen College in Goshen, Indiana has Mennonite roots.

Through March of 2010, true to its peace-church heritage, it did not play the national anthem at its sporting events. I blogged about a change, the playing of the national anthem before a baseball game: In My Estimation, March 25, 2010.

An article in today's NY Times reports on a reversal of playing the national anthem, using instead, "America the Beautiful."

According to the article, the issue of anthem/no anthem has theological implications. Obviously, the overarching issue is peace/war. A second theological issue is hospitality.

In 2009 the college began a campaign emphasizing its pacifism called "Peace by Peace." Apparently there was some push back from non-Mennonites, particularly recruited athletes. Perhaps the anthem controversy reflected this push back. The playing of the anthem, theoretically, made the college more hospitable to non-Mennonites.

The NY Times article reported remarks by a college official: "There is a theological question, 'which was that if we talk so much about peace, that will make it hard to attract non-Mennonite students.'

"'And if we can’t attract non-Mennonite students, are we being hospitable?' Dr. Berry said.

"Hospitality is, like pacifism, a core Christian virtue, and some Mennonites believed that playing the anthem was justified to help students from other backgrounds feel welcome."

This controversy, in a tiny college ensconced in conservative Middle America, fascinates me.

I admire Goshen's faith tradition, particularly Mennonite practices, including pacifism. I suspect the implicit issue is the school's long term survival. It needs a steady supply of students beyond the Mennonite culture. The theological concern over hospitality seems to me to be a subterfuge that skirts the ultimate issue of mere survival. Yet I don't doubt that those engaging in talking about anthem/no anthem were sincere in wanting to be a hospitable place without violating Mennonite pacifism.

The compromise playing of "America the Beautiful," settles the issue for now. Each side saves some face. The college will survive.

I invite you to read my 2010 blog for background regarding the playing of the national anthem at sporting events, a curious custom now deeply embedded in the American culture of sports--a practice that has theological undertones.

In Tribute and Hope

2011-09-12T14:24:00.002-05:00

[I wrote this meditation for the observance of 9/11]

It is good,

right, andfitting,

For so many reasons,

That we remember,

especially remember,

Those who died

and the familieswho suffered

and suffer still;

To say aloud the names,

To tell the stories,

To speak our grief,

And then to be silent

in respect and inreflection;

Feeling varied emotions

And seeking meanings

alone andtogether.

And when we have remembered–

paid our respects–

Promising not to forget,

We return to embrace

All that is excellent

– true, beautifulgood –

That we might live,

Not just once again,

But more fully

– in wisdom, courage, and compassion –

Vowing that we shall make our world

a better place

In Tribute and in Hope.

We're Not Done Yet

2011-09-09T20:29:00.017-05:00

10 years ago, when Jeff Briere was intern minister at UCH, we collaborated on a description of Unitarian Universalistm: 101 Reasons I'm a Unitarian Universalist. (Jeff is now minister in Chattanooga.)

Jeff and I each wrote 50, one-paragraph reasons, interesting and informative tidbits of UU practice, history, and lore. Originally produced on a photocopy machine, a few years ago, I turned it into a paperback book and self-published it on Lulu. This summer Lulu formatted it as an e-book and submitted it to Apple’s ibookstore. (It had languished as a paperback book, but as an e-book‒an iTune‒it immediately sold a dozen iPad downloads.) It's now available on Kindle, Amazon's e-bookstore.

A decade after its creation, I find 101 Reasons to be a cunning and effective portrayal of Unitarian Universalism, as good a brief introduction as there is, relative to being consumable and entertaining.

At the time, Jeff and I compared our design to a pointillist painting. We wrote this introduction:

Dear Reader,

To explain how so many different people

could practice one religion

in so many different ways

is daunting.

Perhaps the difficulty lies

in attempting a verbal explanation,

when painting a picture

would better communicate

the nuances of Unitarian Universalism..

Think of this collection

as a pointillist canvas

upon which are 101 spots of color.

In turning the pages,

you can see each little dot.

Stand a few feet back

and the dots blend in monumental images.

Then you can begin to see

larger shapes and forms

that create the tableau

of the living tradition of

Unitarian Universalism.

Wishing you meaning and purpose.

Jeff wrote the conclusion, the one hundred, first reason and arguably the most compelling reason for being a UU:

101

We aren’t done yet. That’s a phrase you hear now and again. We aren’t done yet. But when have you heard that in reference to religion? Unitarian Universalism isn’t done yet. We talk about a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. A search. An on-going organized plan to find something true and meaningful. And when we find that true and meaningful something, there will be another search, because there isn’t only one true and meaningful thing out there to find. We aren’t done yet. [JB]

As I think of Unitarian Universalism at age 50, remembering the hopes voiced in 1961 for a new and improved liberal religion, Jeff's conclusion resonates for me, "We aren't done yet."

An Emergent Animal Ministry

2011-09-05T09:39:00.009-05:00

A few years ago I edited a collection of poetry and prose, In Praise of Animals under the Skinner House imprint. While the collection was proposed by my editor at SH, I'd long been interested in Animal Rights. For a couple of decades I'd been calling Animal Rights "an ethical frontier," the next step in a progressing ethic of respect and reverence.

Within Unitarian Universalism Animal Rights has become a more sophisticated movement as ethical treatment thinking has transformed to an animal ministry perspective. I think this represents, in part, a distancing from a secular animal rights activism. The emergent Animal Ministry movement looks more to moral suasion than to confrontational coercion.

I've prepared a Reader's Guide to my In Praise of Animals collection. I think it is an apt means for the uninitiated to begin to explore what is now being called "multi-species" relationships--our appropriate relationship with our animal kindred as well as the web of life that embraces us all. My guide is a resource for individual reflection. But it would also work well in a readers or book discussion group.

Animal Rights is no longer a frontier. It is a realm of ethical being that is rich and fulfilling. It is, in my estimation, a coming home for the human species.

If Only for the Season: A Holiday Anthology

2011-09-03T08:58:00.004-05:00

This summer, I've been working on a collection of my Holiday writings. I ended up with forty-six selections. I chose the title If Only for the Season after a popular meditation I wrote more than twenty years ago. I had several intentions: to capture the breadth of Mid-Winter observances and moods; to express universal, deep meanings; and to provide a resource for all who come to the season with a liberal spirit, especially fellow Unitarian Universalists.

I'd been aiming for the book's September 1 release. I made it, thanks to the layout and design skills of Ellie, my spouse. Ellie offers her considerable expertise to those who want to use the wonderful services of on-demand publishing. [Visit her Publishista site.] The finished product is a handsome book, 8.25 inches square.

This is a collection for personal use, as well as for fashioning services and celebrations during the Holiday Season. It makes a thoughtful and meaningful gift. (It makes an implicit statement regarding the Holidays versus Christmas annual controversy. And it is respectful and enlightening about Christmas.)

You can see the book's preview on Amazon. You can buy it at Amazon or CreateSpace's online store. I recommend the latter.

An Innate Sense of Life: Moral Grounding

2011-08-24T11:54:00.015-05:00

In late September UCH will host a first ever Multi-Species Workshop, sponsored by our Animal Ministry group, in conjunction with an animal blessing Sunday Service.

I’m awfully proud of our progressive religious ways. Our relationship to animals has a deep vein of identity and compassion that's now a burgeoning movement within our ranks.

The three towering figures of early American Unitarianism are Channing, Emerson, and Parker.

In particular, Channing and Parker are known for their highly developed consciences. They embody the Unitarian core notion of CHARACTER.

From the current perspective of animal rights/liberation joined to the emerging (scientific) understanding of an innate moral sense—particularly “do no harm,” the following two anecdotes are a propos. In addition, these anecdotes beg the value of moral development and age-appropriate religious/moral education that we UUs have long promoted.

First, William Ellery Channning from a letter:

I can remember an incident in my childhood, which has given a turn to my whole life and character. I found a nest of birds in my father's field, which held for young ones. They had no down when I first discovered them. They opened their little mouths as if they were hungry, and I gave them some crumbs which were in my pocket. Every day I returned to feed them. As soon as school was not, I would run home for some bread, and sit by the nest to see them eat, for an hour at a time. They were now feathered, and almost ready to fly. When I came one morning, I found them all cut up into quarters. The grass around the nest was red with blood. Their little limbs were raw and bloody. The mother was on a tree, and the father on the wall, mourning for their young. I cried, myself, for I was a child. I thought, too, that the parents looked on me as the author of their miseries, and this made me still more unhappy. I wanted to undeceive them. I wanted to sympathize with and comfort them. When I left the field, they followed me with their eyes and with mournful reproaches. I was too young and too sincere in my grief to make any apostrophes. But I can never forget my feelings. The impression will never be worn away, nor can I ever cease to abhor every species of inhumanity towards inferior animals.

Second, Theodore Parker from an “Autobiographical Fragment:”

When a little boy in petticoats in my fourth year, one fine day in spring, my father led me by the hand to a distant part of the farm, but soon sent me home alone. On the way I had to pass a little " pond-hole " then spreading its waters wide; a rhodora in full bloom — a rare flower in my neighborhood, and which grew only in that locality — attracted my attention and drew me to the spot. I saw a little spotted tortoise sunning himself in the shallow water at the root of the flaming shrub. I lifted the stick I had in my hand to strike the harmless reptile; for, though I had never killed any creature, yet I had seen other boys out of sport destroy birds, squirrels, and the like, and I felt a disposition to follow their wicked example. But all at once something checked my little arm, and a voice within me said, clear and loud, "It is wrong!" I held my uplifted stick in wonder at the new emotion — the consciousness of an involuntary but inward check upon my actions, till the tortoise and the rhodora both vanished from my sight. I hastened home and told the tale to my mother, and asked what was it that told me it was wrong? She wiped a tear from her eye with her apron, and taking me in her arms, said, “Some men call it conscience, but I prefer to call it the voice of God in the soul of man. If you listen and obey it, then it will speak clearer and clearer, and always guide you right; but if you turn a deaf ear or disobey, then it will fade out little by little, and leave you all in the dark and without a guide. Your life depends on heeding this little' voice." She went her way, careful and troubled about many things, but doubtless pondered them in her motherly heart; while I went off to wonder and think it over in my poor, childish way. But I am sure no event in my life has made so deep and lasting an impression on me.

In my estimation an innate awareness of the value of life—one’s own and then in compassion with fellow creatures—is both traditional Unitarian and cutting edge, 21^st century progressive UU religion. I’ll be searching Emerson to determine whether he had a similar childhood experience.

Simple Prayers: Wherever You Go

2011-08-17T13:26:00.009-05:00

My daughter Katie, who lives in Orange County, recently joined the UU fellowship in Anaheim. Katie’s in her early 40s and has two young children. Her midlife return to the liberal religion of her youth, though somewhat predictable, nevertheless, pleases me. My chosen faith is now her chosen faith.

She's become quite involved in her little congregation. She teaches religious education and is on the religious education committee. She's a worship assistant, too.

Now when we talk, the theme is frequently about religion. True to her upbringing, she's an explorer and has eclectic tastes. I'm proud to say, she's her father's daughter.

In one of our conversations she revealed that now and again she prays. So, last Christmas, I compiled a book for her titled Simple Prayers. Its brief introduction describes prayer as a means to self- transcendence. The actual prayers are 10 mantra like utterances – each featuring an attribute of the Divine. I also included blank lined pages for recording prayer experiences – prayer journal.

I used the on-demand resources of Create Space, an Amazon subsidiary. I chose a distinctive format, 8 1/4 inch square. The cover illustration was a gnarly old white church door, inviting entry to sacred space.

I liked the end product so much in content and attractiveness, I made it available for sale as a paperback book on Create Space and Amazon. Now, I'm making it available in the e-book marketplace. It's on (or soon will be on) Amazon.com as well as Lulu.com – another online publisher. The Lulu edition can be read on a variety of popular readers.

Here's my marketing copy:

Simple Prayers is a unique guide, reducing the practice of prayer to its very essence as a private act with powerful affect. In an extraordinary economy of words, the ten prayers touch varied aspects of human aspiration and need.

Created by a seasoned Unitarian minister known for his practical approach to the contemporary spirituality, these simple prayers address aspects of the Universal. It is a suitable resource for persons of all faiths and persuasions.

As a teaser, I present the first Simple Prayer:

Providence,

My gratitude is boundless.

Now available as an Amazon Kindle book or in a Lulu e-book edition: Simple Prayers: Wherever You Go. Only $1.99.

Education and Income by Faith Traditions

2011-05-18T09:59:00.007-05:00

The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, through ongoing polls, produces data that begs interpretation. For example, 2007 and 2010 polls charted education and income among a variety of faith traditions.

As might be expected, there are strong correlations between income and education. Hindus, Reform Jews, and Conservative Jews head the list. Among the faith traditions, they have the highest percentage of college graduates and the greatest number of households with income above $75K. Most persuasively, this poll shows how education and income correlate and surely suggests that each half of the equation is self-reinforcing.

Of course, I’m interested where Unitarians fall in these polls. One commentator designated Unitarians as an outlier (with Buddhists and Orthodox Christians), who are less affluent than their education might predict. According to this commentator, “One possible explanation is that some religions are likely to produce, or to attract, people who voluntarily choose lower paying jobs, like teaching.”

It appears, Unitarians, as a group, value education over wealth. This comes with a certain attitude about money, both scrupulous and laissez faire. While this may cause our congregations to struggle in financing their operations, there’s something noble about “choosing lower paying jobs,” particularly when those jobs benefit society and/or lead to a satisfying personal life. This may involve values and integrity that designate a strong set of Unitarian values.

In this regard, in the midst of the boom that preceded the Great Recession, in my Hinsdale Unitarian congregation, there was considerable interest in “your money or your life” and the notion of “voluntary simplicity.” Now I can say with confidence, “How Unitarian!”

The Soul Is Dead, But the Spirit Lives On

2011-05-17T12:14:00.006-05:00

I always read David Brooks’s op-ed pieces in the New York Times. His politics are too right of center for my own point of view; however, he’s always well-reasoned and even more importantly, draws upon much of the scientific research that I find authoritative regarding the human condition. Brooks has an interest in morality, as do I. He often cites evolutionary biologists and psychologists, as well as neuroscientists, who explore the landscape of the mind.

I’ve long been convinced that these areas of science have successfully challenged traditional philosophy, ethics, and theology. The popular writer Tom Wolfe, relatively early on, recognized the impact the new sciences, neuroscience, in particular, would have in a 1996 article “Sorry Your Soul Just Died.” In it he wrote, “Thereupon, in the year 2006 or 2026, some new Nietzsche will step forward to announce: ‘The self is dead’—except that being prone to the poetic, like Nietzsche I, he will probably say: ‘The soul is dead.’ He will say that he is merely bringing the news, the news of the greatest event of the millennium: ‘The soul, that last refuge of values, is dead, because educated people no longer believe it exists.’”

Today, Brooks has an article “Nice Guys Finish Last” in which he makes a case, based on recent scientific thought that human beings are intrinsically moral, though programmed by evolution to be selfish. Is this an oxymoron? No. Because evolution also involves complex equations to be cooperative and part of a community.If the group benefits, so the individual benefits, reasons Brooks.

He writes, “In his book, ‘The Righteous Mind,’ to be published early next year, Jonathan Haidt joins Edward O. Wilson, David Sloan Wilson, and others who argue that natural selection takes place not only when individuals compete with other individuals, but also when groups compete with other groups. Both competitions are examples of the survival of the fittest, but when groups compete, it’s the cohesive, cooperative, internally altruistic groups that win and pass on their genes. The idea of ‘group selection’ was heresy a few years ago, but there is momentum behind it now.

In the end, Brooks makes a conservative pitch for religion and ethics, saying, “[T]he big upshot is this: For decades, people tried to devise a rigorous ‘scientific’ system to analyze behavior that would be divorced from morality. But if cooperation permeates our nature, then so does morality, and there is no escaping ethics, emotion and religion in our quest to understand who we are and how we got this way.

If I could question David Brooks, I’d ask him to name the “people” who sought a scientific system divorced from morality. Sounds a bit like a straw man to me. I’ve never seen science (scientists) wanting to diminish morality—or religion or God. Such a judgment comes from the religionists or traditionalists who become defensive.

My bottom line maintains that we human beings, by virtue of millions of years of creaturely evolution are hardwired to be moral. A few years ago Jonathan Haidt, a leading evolutionary psychologist, described five moral colors, which he describes on his web site’s home page as

1) Harm/care, related to our long evolution as mammals with attachment systems and an ability to feel (and dislike) the pain of others. This foundation underlies virtues of kindness, gentleness, and nurturance.

2) Fairness/reciprocity, related to the evolutionary process of reciprocal altruism. This foundation generates ideas of justice, rights, and autonomy. [Note: In our original conception, Fairness included concerns about equality, which are more strongly endorsed by political liberals. However, as we reformulate the theory in 2010 based on new data, we are likely to include several forms of fairness, and to emphasize proportionality, which is more strongly endorsed by conservatives]

3) Ingroup/loyalty, related to our long history as tribal creatures able to form shifting coalitions. This foundation underlies virtues of patriotism and self-sacrifice for the group. It is active anytime people feel that it's "one for all, and all for one."

4) Authority/respect, shaped by our long primate history of hierarchical social interactions. This foundation underlies virtues of leadership and followership, including deference to legitimate authority and respect for traditions.

5) Purity/sanctity, shaped by the psychology of disgust and contamination. This foundation underlies religious notions of striving to live in an elevated, less carnal, more noble way. It underlies the widespread idea that the body is a temple which can be desecrated by immoral activities and contaminants (an idea not unique to religious traditions).

Remarks in the previous blog regarding First Nature and Second Nature have relevance here. I’m thinking Second Nature is the rationalization and application of First Nature instincts, including the five moral colors. To these five instincts, I certainly add the mammalian bonding instinct which has resulted in a cornucopia of the various fruits of love.

To return to Wolfe and the soul, the soul may be dead, but the human spirit is more vibrant than ever—a source of awe and wonder.

First and Second Nature

2011-05-16T11:48:00.010-05:00

When I woke up this morning, I didn’t expect to be thinking about the notion of free will, one of the great philosophical/theological questions. But a NY Times article about the so-called housewives reality shows that plague the contemporary television landscape nudged me in that direction.

Critic Neil Genzlinger wrote, “’One of the annoying things about believing in free will and individual responsibility is the difficulty of finding somebody to blame your problems on,’ the great religious scholar P. J. O’Rourke wrote in Rolling Stone in November 1989. ‘And when you do find somebody, it’s remarkable how often his picture turns up on your driver’s license.’

“We are faced with two possibilities. One is that there is no free will, which means that God actually planned for there to be a 'Real Housewives of New Jersey ' and for people to watch it. Contemplating a universe built on that premise can lead only to collective insanity, and therefore the notion must be rejected.

“Thus we must embrace the other possibility: that there is free will, and that the enablers who make “The Real Housewives of New Jersey” possible could transform the show from the lame caricature it is, if only they — in Mr. O’Rourke’s formulation — looked at their driver’s licenses. That they have not done so suggests a need for some forcible action.”

Though tongue-in-cheek, this article led me down the Unitarian Universalist path of freedom and responsibility.

Personally, I don’t put God into the free-will equation. I am a Religious Naturalist and frame my musings by the insights of evolutionary biology and neuroscience. From these perspectives, I see both determinism and free will. For some years, I’ve mused about a First Nature and a Second Nature.

Our First Nature is our creatureliness—what has evolved over billions of years to become the Human Species that bends us toward generally shared behaviors that seem determined. (Anyone sexually attracted to another knows how powerful First Nature influences are.)

Our Second Nature emerges from the workings of our incredible, highly evolved mind—its consciousness and self-consciousness. Through reason, we make choices that counter our First Nature instincts, and can be called a result of free will. (Though sexually attracted to another person, we might choose not to act on the urge for a variety of reasons, including a vow of exclusivity to another.)

Metaphorically, human nature describes a realm somewhere between angels and animals. The phrase “angels of our better nature,” speaks to what I understand as our Second Nature possibilities.

In the end, I maintain that each of us is responsible for her or his actions. O’Rourke has it right. When we begin to assess the source of our problems, the place to begin is one’s self. Look at the face on your driver’s license. Or remember Michael Jackson’s reflections on “Man in the Mirror.”

I'm starting with the man in the mirror
(Ooh!)
I'm asking him to change his ways
(Change his ways-Ooh!)
And no message could've been any clearer
If you wanna make the world a better place
(If you wanna make the world a better place)
Take a look at yourself and then make that...
(Take a look at yourself and then make that...)
Change!

Bin Laden in Hell?

2011-05-06T12:44:00.007-05:00

One of those manufactured for the news cycle polls, conducted a few days ago by CNN asked whether Osama bin Laden was going to Hell. Sixty-one percent of those surveyed said they thought he was in hell with 24 percent saying they didn't know and 10 percent saying no, they didn't think so. Five percent of respondents did not believe in hell.

To be fair, the poll responded to an incendiary Daily News front page that screamed "Rot in Hell" alongside Bin Laden's photo, the day after his killing by Navy Seals.

Hell's getting a lot of interest these days, as a new universalism seeps into the Evangelical community. Ross Douthat, a NY Times opiner, wrote an April 24 piece about "A Case for Hell." I responded in an unpublished letter to the editor:

Full disclosure: I’ve been a Unitarian Universalist minister since 1977, and I interned at an historic Universalist church in 1976-77 in Syracuse New York, so I have a bona fide Universalist identity.

I’m amused by the contemporary brouhaha over the doctrine of universal salvation that my thoroughly liberal faith tradition resolved in the first few decades of the 19^th century. And I’m also amused by Ross Douthat’s recent op-ed piece “A Case for Hell,” in which he seems to argue that moral choice and its consequence of heaven or hell makes us more fully human.

His reasoning is thin from the perspective of traditional theology, which for the old Universalists turned on a doctrine of the Atonement along with the notion of a loving Father. For them, free will mattered and their choices responded to God’s overarching Love. Therefore, it can be argued, in contrast to Mr. Douthat’s reasoning, that choice can operate in a system of universal salvation through the agency of love.

Such nuances of theology seem so antique and irrelevant, relative to a progressing understanding of the human condition increasingly grounded in the sciences, especially neuroscience, evolutionary biology, and moral psychology. Mr. Douthat dismisses this sort of scientific materialism along with universal salvation as forms of determinism that steal our free will. He appears to be defending a higher notion of the human condition by declaring, “The doctrine of hell… assumes that our choices are real, and, indeed, that we are the choices that we make.”

Rather than resorting to time-worn theologies of universal salvation and hell to get his point across , I’d love for Mr. Douthat to deal directly with the deep issues, the notion of free will and doctrine of the human condition, from a contemporary point of view.

Actually, the question of the CNN poll offers an opportunity for serious religious conversation. Poll a group of Muslims, say in Saudi Arabia, if bin Laden is in Heaven and you'd probably have an overwhelming majority giving a resounding "yes!"

Which point of view is true in an absolute sense? Neither. Heaven and Hell are irrelevant, and such partisan doctrines only cause grief in the world, because it leads to belief that God is partisan, too.

Back in the day Bob Dylan sang, "And you don't count the dead when God's on your side."

Governor Quinn, Cardinal Bernadin, and the Death Penalty

2011-03-26T19:31:00.012-05:00

Of all recent Catholic leaders, Cardinal Joseph Bernadin of Chicago has impressed me the most. Though dead for fifteen years, his argument for a "seamless garment" or "consistent ethic of life" continues to challenge my own ethical thinking.

At a 1983 speech at Fordham University, he proposed that a consistent ethic of life, joining abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, war, and poverty as action areas that Roman Catholics should work to abolish. He continued to speak out on these controversial areas until his death, but was unable to gather a critical mass of popular support. At the time of his death, he was writing a book drawing on this notion of a seamless garment,The Gift of Peace, but questioned the value of his thoughts. He asked his assistant, as well as his publisher, "Do you think this is worth doing?" The book became a best seller and was translated into 14 languages.

One of those who read it and took its message to heart is Illinois Governor Pat Quinn. After signing a document on March 9 (interestingly Ash Wednesday), that repealed Illinois' death penalty, Governor Quinn held up his copy of Bernadin's book, citing it as an influence in his decision. In fact, on that fateful morning, before making his decision final, Governor Quinn prayed and read a passage in II Corinthians that spoke to human imperfection.

In my estimation, Governor Quinn, who heretofore had supported capital punishment, illuminates the role religion/faith can have on public policy. Religions across the spectrum seek to influence public policy according to the values each holds.

Governor Quinn cherry picked one element (the death penalty) from Bernadin's ethic. Will he apply the seamless garment ethic to other areas? (He has long had a pro-choice stance.) We'll see.

There is a mutuality operating in the repeal of the death penalty in Illinois: Cardinal Bernadin's ethic inspired Governor Quinn. Governor Quinn will help renew and expand the influence of Cardinal Bernadin's ethic.

[See NY Times article]

Traditional and Cutting Edge: Obama's Religion

2011-02-07T11:57:00.009-06:00

Barack Obama spoke at Thursday's National Prayer Breakfast. He surveyed his personal faith and highlighted the place of prayer in his daily practices.

Mr. Obama is accused by many of being a stealth Muslim, an absurd, factless accusation. For twenty years, before becoming President, he attended Trinity United Church of Christ congregation on Chicago's South Side. The church and minister, Jeremiah Wright, preached and practiced a Black Liberation Theology. Both came under scrutiny during the 2008 campaign. Wright retired. The Obama's resigned their membership.

In Washington the Obama's have infrequently attended Sunday services, favoring no one church. He has essentially privatized his spiritual life with personal prayer being at the center. His remarks seemed to allude to the criticisms that some have made: "My Christian faith then has been a sustaining force for me over these last few years. All the more so, when Michelle and I hear our faith questioned from time to time, we are reminded that ultimately what matters is not what other people say about us but whether we're being true to our conscience and true to our God. 'Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness and all these things will be given to you as well.'"

He belongs to the ever growing group of Americans categorized as "non affiliated."

But he prays every day, in the morning and in the night. "When I wake in the morning, I wait on the Lord, and I ask Him to give me the strength to do right by our country and its people. And when I go to bed at night I wait on the Lord, and I ask Him to forgive me my sins, and look after my family and the American people, and make me an instrument of His will."

His prayers generally embrace one of three themes:

"I pray for my ability to help those who are struggling."
"[A] second recurring theme in my prayers is a prayer for humility."
"And the last recurring theme, one that binds all prayers together, is that I might walk closer with God and make that walk my first and most important task."

He cogently summarized his prayer life: "I say these prayers hoping they will be answered, and I say these prayers knowing that I must work and must sacrifice and must serve to see them answered. But I also say these prayers knowing that the act of prayer itself is a source of strength. It’s a reminder that our time on Earth is not just about us; that when we open ourselves to the possibility that God might have a larger purpose for our lives, there’s a chance that somehow, in ways that we may never fully know, God will use us well."

In my estimation, relative to traditional Christian piety, Mr. Obama's witness of his private devotional life is intimate and inspiring. Any Christian could model their prayer life after his.

What I find worthy of deeper cultural consideration is his privatization of spirituality, that he belongs to the "non-affiliated." This places him on a religious/cultural cutting edge.

Keep the X in Xmas

2010-12-13T13:29:00.003-06:00

I once gave a Christmas sermon: "Keep the X in Xmas!" I thought then and still do now that my line of argument was clever.

I meant X as a symbol of the unknown--the mystery always beyond the progressing edge of knowledge. Mystery invokes wonder and joy, without which Christmas for us postmoderns is an empty commercial shell. My most popular Christmas meditation softly recommends: "If only for the season, the brief season of light and life and love, let us be a little foolish about candlelight and children and matters of the heart, if only for the season!"

To be a little foolish is to keep the mystery, the X factor in Xmas.

Religion Didn't Create Morality

2010-12-09T11:43:00.013-06:00

I've decided to speak out more often, more aggressively about religious nonsense, particularly as such nonsense relates to political posturing.

What tipped the balance was a Sarah Palin utterance, quoted in a Washington Post article by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend titled, "Sarah Palin is wrong about John F. Kennedy, religion and politics."

Since Ms. Palin obviously wants to influence religion in American life, it's appropriate to push back, pointing out how misinformed she is.

Ms. Palin contends: "morality itself cannot be sustained without the support of religious beliefs."

There's convincing evidence today, thanks to evolutionary psychologists such as Steven Pinker, that we're hardwired by evolution to bend toward an instinctive morality. (A New York Times Magazine article by Pinker gives a handy overview of moral instincts.)

Contrary to Ms. Palin's pronouncement, religion didn't create morality. In fact, our human moral instincts significantly contributed to the creation of religion--not just one religion but many religions. And, yes, it's possible to be moral without religion.

Resist Not Fools

2010-09-12T09:56:00.008-05:00

As the September 11 anniversary of the terrorist attack on Manhattan’s World Trade Towers approaches, a fringe Florida minister with a miniscule congregation, proposes the public burning of the Muslim holy book, the Koran. He’s gotten far too much attention, including requests from the Secretary of State and the President not to proceed with such a demonstration. The mediasphere loves the story, because it panders to a growing intolerance of Muslims, appealing to base attitudes.

There have been plenty of worthy programs across America since 9/11 to promote tolerance generally and Muslim-awareness specifically. Now and again these efforts get notice, but are soon forgotten. But one fringe Christian minister, with a cockamamie call to burn the Koran, gets days of exposure not just in the United States, but around the world. This isn’t fair, is it?

Ecclesiastes recognizes this unfairness: “Wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good.” [9:18]

I’ve chosen not to contend with the Florida minister, simply saying “The call to burn the Koran is utter foolishness with self-evident, dangerous consequences; yet I support First Amendment rights, especially freedom of religion and of speech.”

To those upset with the proposed Koran burning I recommend they take a positive posture by learning a little about this Holy Book about which most persons are largely ignorant, perhaps by a reading a good encyclopedia article. This familiarization can extend to reading a few surahs from any one of a number online translations.

For me, Wisdom is proactive. Contend with fools and their foolishness as little as possible. There are f ew rewards to come from arguing with the foolish, who through such arguments gain a certain credibility.

The Earth Lasts Forever

2010-07-12T11:19:00.009-05:00

"A generation goes and a generation comes," [Ecclesiastes 1:4] has special meaning for me regarding the Monarch butterfly. As summer edges into autumn, across North America, Monarchs swarm and begin an epic migration thousands of miles south to a great wintering area in Mexican mountain forests. Then, in spring, the survivors of that great winter flock flutter north to repopulate landscapes from which their ancestors came, some reaching the prairies of southern Canada.

From March through October, the butterflies drink the nectar and the caterpillars munch on the leaves of milkweed plants—tall, broad leafed plants with a bitter, milky sap. The butterflies, drawn to the perfume of clustered, pinkish blooms, linger to lay tiny white eggs on the leaves. The eggs hatch into minute green and black caterpillars that feast endlessly to become big fat specimens; when they attain full size the caterpillars transform into delicate, beautiful chrysalises, to emerge as orange and black monarchs.

This cycle repeats three or four times throughout a hospitable summer. The final generation “knows” its destiny. Rather than laying eggs, these last Monarchs of summer flock and begin a trek that can be as long as twenty-five hundred miles.

For three summers I’ve allowed a volunteer milkweed to grown in the corner of a border of variegated dogwood alongside my driveway. The single plant, this year, has exploded into a score and more, with a few trying to establish in my lawn, fifteen feet from the original plant. A gardener friend said that milkweed spread by sending out roots, so I now have a well-established colony.

A few weeks ago the perfume of milkweed flowers wafted a gentle, sweet perfume that caused me to bury my nose in a blossom. To my eye the little blooms look like pastel bursts of fireworks, the variety that radiate from the center out to form a ball.

Milkweed perfumes must be an olfactory siren call to Monarchs. For a few days three, four, and even more Monarchs at a time have fluttered among the beguiling blossoms. They seem besotted to my eye. Now and again a pair spins skyward in a mating ritual.

In Nature everything has a season. The season cycles through the generations, usually resting in the larger cycle of a year. For the Monarchs the yearly cycle has discrete cycles throughout the spring and summer. The result is a constancy of life, but the constancy rests on generation going and coming.

Ecclesiastes in beguiling poeticized prose conveys this intuited truth.

Though generations cease to be, the succession of generations seem right and fitting, and even offers consolation, if not comfort regarding mortality.

"A generation goes, and a generation comes; but the earth remains forever." [1:4]

Election and Exceptionalism

2010-06-16T07:38:00.013-05:00

The conclusion to last night's Presidential Address from the Oval Office regarding the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Crisis:

"Each year, at the beginning of shrimping season, the region's fishermen take part in a tradition that was brought to America long ago by fishing immigrants from Europe. It's called 'The Blessing of the Fleet,' and today it's a celebration where clergy from different religions gather to say a prayer for the safety and success of the men and women who will soon head out to sea - some for weeks at a time.

"The ceremony goes on in good times and in bad. It took place after Katrina, and it took place a few weeks ago - at the beginning of the most difficult season these fishermen have ever faced. And still, they came and they prayed. For as a priest and former fisherman once said of the tradition, 'The blessing is not that God has promised to remove all obstacles and dangers. The blessing is that He is with us always, 'a blessing that's granted '...even in the midst of the storm.'

"The oil spill is not the last crisis America will face. This nation has known hard times before and we will surely know them again. What sees us through - what has always seen us through - is our strength, our resilience, and our unyielding faith that something better awaits us if we summon the courage to reach for it. Tonight, we pray for that courage. We pray for the people of the Gulf. And we pray that a hand may guide us through the storm towards a brighter day. Thank you, God Bless You, and may God Bless the United States of America."

In my estimation Barack Obama once again gives insight into his personal religion, while also giving a religious gloss to the general situation--at least its solution. He offers a complex traditional equation: generic faith, national courage, and trust in a guiding and steadfast Providence.

I suspect that faith, courage and trust are principles significant to Mr. Obama's sense of Self. Perhaps his seeming equanimity, which some criticize as a lack of passion, relates to a core belief of being elected (in a religious sense) and in communion with his God.

And I further suspect that those who disparage him by mockingly calling him "The Messiah" somehow share a similar outlook and ironically project notions of Divine election and exceptionalism on him. This is to say that of recent political personalities, Mr. Obama is the one who, in popular connsciousness, seems "chosen" to fill his office and shape a national destiny--for better or worse depending on your political outlook.

Where's the Love?

2010-05-20T14:38:00.016-05:00

Then: Joe

It is one of the most poignant experiences of my ministry.

The setting: a bleak and decrepit little town in Western Pennsylvania not far from New Castle, circa 1980. The town had been an enclave for East European immigrants who worked the steel mills of the region when the steel industry was booming. It had become a place of closed storefronts and old folks left behind.

Joe, the deceased was a more recent immigrant, part of the jetsam of World War II from the region of contentious ethnic groups that became Yugoslavia. He had an old house and a dumpling shaped girlfriend who’d lived with him, a scandal in this insular community.

His only relative, a niece who lived in California with Unitarian ties, had called me in Youngstown. Niece, the girl friend, and I sat in the living area of Joe’s modest home, in the gray twilight of a bleak winter’s afternoon, drinking his homemade wine from cream cheese glasses. The strong wine warmed the belly and lessened the gloom. The niece told Joe’s story.

As the war progressed, Joe’s village was taken over by an unfriendly group of guerillas who threatened to raze and kill. Joe made an impassioned plea for mercy, declaring “Aren’t we all brothers?” His plaintive appeal saved the village.

After the war, in his new American town, Joe and a few other locals had a dispute with the town’s Catholic Church and were excommunicated. As a result they couldn’t be buried in the church’s consecrated graveyard (not to mention buried by a Unitarian minister!). But they’d made plans. The excommunicants had bought a parcel adjacent to the graveyard and as they died, one after another, the little graveyard filled up. The Church had retaliated, erecting an ugly barbed wire fence where the unconsecrated land began. The message was unmistakable, the symbolism as obvious as a crown of thorns.

As I pronounced the words by the graveside, before a handful of dispassionate people, I looked past the granite tombstones embedded with medallion portraits of the deceased, to the barbed wire fence, and beyond to the so-called consecrated land and stolid church. Clots of snow fell from a leaden sky and wind cut my cheeks.

Were the tears in my eyes from weather. Or were they from an aching grief for the inhumanity of a religion too proud of itself to simply love as its prophet had so clearly commanded?

Now: Janine

I remembered Joe’s burial and the enduring image of the barbed wire fence when I recently learned of an Edgewater woman, Janine Denomme, a lifelong Catholic of prodigious involvement with her Church who was denied, in no uncertain terms, the final rites of her beloved faith, because she had audaciously been ordained as a priest by a dissident Catholic group, Roman Catholic Womenpriests. (She was weeks away from death by advancing cancer.) The hierarchy declared she had self-excommunicated.

Once again I look across a barbed wire fence, musing on the spiritual irony of the actions of a Church founded on the principle of transcendent love.

Paul once declared that love trumps faith: “Faith, hope, and love abide, these three…but the greatest of these is love.”

Where’s the love?

A Fierce Unrest

2010-04-19T10:46:00.008-05:00

In a well-reviewed (by NY Times) book, The Art of Choosing by Sheena Iyengar, the author cites her own research: “Members of more fundamentalist faiths experienced greater hope, were more optimistic when faced with adversity and were less likely to be depressed than their counterparts. Indeed, the people most susceptible to pessimism and depression were the Unitarians, especially those who were atheists. The presence of so many rules didn’t debilitate people; instead, it seemed to empower them. Many of their choices were taken away, and yet they experienced a sense of control over their lives.”

In my estimation choice linked to the spiritual notion of freedom is a cardinal value and virtue, too. My immediate response to the author's judgment regarding happiness and Unitarians was amusement mixed with a desire to argue. I had plenty of justifications why Unitarian are so, as well as why such a "realistic" outlook is not only fitting but good.

I remembered decades ago discourse about inner locus of control vs. external locus of control of one's own behavior, and that the former was evidence of a human being rising to the apex of self-actualization.

In the end I recalled a Unitarian hymn, "A Fierce Unrest" from a Don Marquis poem: "A fierce unrest seethes at the core of all existing things...."

If choice there were, though I believe it to be already a fact of the human condition, I wouldn't hesitate to choose a fierce unrest at the core of my own life.

The Passion of Barack Obama

2010-04-07T08:40:00.005-05:00

On Monday Barack Obama hosted an Easter Prayer Breakfast that included a number of Christian leaders, some of whom serve as his administration’s advisors on faith based initiatives. His remarks clearly identify his personal faith as a Christian. He testified:

“I can … tell you what draws me to this holy day and what lesson I take from Christ's sacrifice and what inspires me about the story of the resurrection.

“For even after the passage of 2,000 years, we can still picture the moment in our mind's eye. The young man from Nazareth marched through Jerusalem; object of scorn and derision and abuse and torture by an empire. The agony of crucifixion amid the cries of thieves. The discovery, just three days later, that would forever alter our world -- that the Son of Man was not to be found in His tomb and that Jesus Christ had risen.

“We are awed by the grace He showed even to those who would have killed Him. We are thankful for the sacrifice He gave for the sins of humanity. And we glory in the promise of redemption in the resurrection.

“And such a promise is one of life's great blessings, because, as I am continually learning, we are, each of us, imperfect. Each of us errs -- by accident or by design. Each of us falls short of how we ought to live. And selfishness and pride are vices that afflict us all.

“It's not easy to purge these afflictions, to achieve redemption. But as Christians, we believe that redemption can be delivered -- by faith in Jesus Christ. And the possibility of redemption can make straight the crookedness of a character; make whole the incompleteness of a soul. Redemption makes life, however fleeting here on Earth, resound with eternal hope.

“Of all the stories passed down through the gospels, this one in particular speaks to me during this season. And I think of hanging -- watching Christ hang from the cross, enduring the final seconds of His passion. He summoned what remained of His strength to utter a few last words before He breathed His last breath.

“'Father,' He said, ‘into your hands I commit my spirit’ Father, into your hands I commit my spirit. These words were spoken by our Lord and Savior, but they can just as truly be spoken by every one of us here today. Their meaning can just as truly be lived out by all of God's children.

“So, on this day, let us commit our spirit to the pursuit of a life that is true, to act justly and to love mercy and walk humbly with the Lord. And when we falter, as we will, let redemption -- through commitment and through perseverance and through faith -- be our abiding hope and fervent prayer.”

In my estimation we each have a narrative by which we comprehend our individual lives. Try to imagine how Mr. Obama’s looks at his astonishing life, in light of his personal testimony.

Perhaps he sees himself as the classic Christian “suffering servant,” bearing scorn and derision for a greater good: “to act justly and to love mercy and walk humbly with the Lord.” And how does he endure? By committing his spirit to his God, as he offers up the sacrifice of Self.

Further imagine that most immediately Mr. Obama is understanding the travails and eventual success of health care reform, one of the most significant transformations of American society, through this classic narrative. (I think this is reasonable. And it was my immediate response upon reading his words.)

Let’s call this narrative “The Passion of Barack Obama.”

Immortality: Mind and Memory

2010-04-02T11:33:00.012-05:00

Last week I officiated at a funeral and two memorial services.

In the Unitarian tradition the eulogy and remembrances are at the heart of end of life observances. This affirms that the deceased was this person and not that person, that she or he lived the life that circumstance shaped; but in the final analysis the deceased chose his or her path. We honestly remember and lovingly honor each life in its excellence and in its tragedy. And so I eulogized three unique personalities. Every human life matters is, indeed, sacred.

The great Russian poet Yevtushenko in his poem “People” intoned:

No people are uninteresting.

Their fate is like the chronicle of planets.

Nothing in them in not particular,

and planet is dissimilar from planet.

And if a man lived in obscurity

making his friends in that obscurity

obscurity is not uninteresting.

To each his world is private

and in that world one excellent minute.

And in that world one tragic minute

These are private.

In honesty and in love, taking my cues from those who loved and/or were closest to the deceased, I craft eulogies in my end of life ceremonies. Each occasion, though grief marbled, affrms the first UU principle--the inherent worth and dignity of each person.

And I talk about other things in the service that relate to the gestalt of grief and remembrance, including human mortality.

I also speak to the sort of immortality I believe in, linking immortality to love and to memory, saying “We must believe that whatever we have known and loved is ours, blended with mind and memory, joined to our souls. The dead are not dead if we have loved them truly. In our lives we give them immortality.”

I believe that this is so, the only sort of conscious immortality we hope for. We, the living, are the bridge to immortality. This is, when you think about it, an awe-inspiring power to possess and a sacred responsibility to wield—to keep alive, resurrect, if you will, the personality that has otherwise dissolved in time. (It was Jesus who at the Last Supper/Passover Seder told his disciples, "Do this in remembrance of me." He wanted to be remembered, one of the most plaintive appeals of the human condition.)

We have traditional yearly days of memory and affirmation: Memorial Day in Spring, All Souls/Veteran Day in Autumn, and today, Easter Sunday. I like the Jewish custom of a year of mourning that releases the mourner to a yearly remembrance, usually on the deceased’s birthday. That’s a good tradition. It grants freedom with responsibility.

I’m of the mind that ceaseless remembrance is the best, the sort recommended in a familiar reading that suggests that the spirit of the deceased is found through all that is beautiful, good, true in the world. You’ll surely recognize the words:

Do not stand at my grave and weep,

I am not there, I do not sleep.

I am in a thousand winds that blow,

I am the softly falling snow.

I am the gentle showers of rain,

I am the fields of ripening grain.

This morning I want you to realize that relative to the life of a person you have loved and who has died, you are a link to their immortality. In this regard, to practice resurrection is to remember,-- perhaps without ceasing,—to remember honestly and lovingly. What an awesome power, what a sacred responsibility this is.

Hold it in your heart. Cherish it with your mind.

Practice resurrection.

A Mythopoetic Tale of Human Diversity

2010-03-27T08:01:00.008-05:00

[from a sermon Around the World Religions]

When Nature’s God, using the slow but sure means of evolution, shaped and then sent our ancestors across the face of the earth to inhabit it, She did so with great expectations:

First, that through the millennia women and men would have many and diverse experiences, thereby teasing out and embodying the vast possibilities of the human condition in varying climates and cultures.

And second, that someday, when the world would seem to grow much smaller, as it has in our times, we might gather together the many people of the earth along with the deposit of their respective cultures. Then, now, we might learn of multitudinous experiences and discover how the various cultures not only evolved but also found and lived the meaning of their lives.

Why did She do so? She did so because she is a bountiful and generous God. She made the human condition virtually boundless that we might discover the many meanings that may be lived and discovered, not just in a particular life but through many, many lives.

No one life, no one culture is large enough to encompass the human condition. For She is a wise and Loving God, who delights and unconditionally loves all Her progeny in all its diversity.

An Anthem, by Goshen

2010-03-25T09:37:00.011-05:00

Goshen College, a tiny (1000 student) liberal arts school has deep Mennonite traditions. It's ensconced in lush Amish and Mennonite country of north central Indiana. The Mennonites are a "peace church," with well-established pacifist ways.

One of Goshen College's enduring customs was not to play the national anthem, which they perceived as a war anthem, before college sporting events. As a NY Times article reports, they broke with that custom at a baseball game this week, though they followed an instrumental recording of the anthem with a prayer attributed to St. Francis.

Apparently the administration felt pressure to conform to cultural standards and bow toward a student body that, while still Christian, is decreasingly Mennonite. Perhaps the change was seen as preserving a fragile institution by making its ways less controversial.

In my estimation though prudent, playing the anthem without words still seems a kind of capitulation by Goshen College to public pressure at the sacrifice of values.

The playing of the "Star Spangled Banner" originated in 1918 in Chicago at a World Series Game. The country was at war and President Wilson had declared the SSB the "unofficial" anthem of the United States of America. When the series moved to Boston, the team's showman/owner ratcheted up the ante: at each game a large and enthusiastic band played the anthem before each game.

The SSB didn't become the official anthem until 1931. The events around WWII, then of the Cold War led to a larger practice of playing the national anthem before all sports events.

Richard C. Crepeau, a scholar who has studied the relationship of the national anthem and sports, concludes, "In recent years, the national anthem has lost its patriotic air in most sports venues. It has become an occasion for entertainers to display their talents or lack thereof, fans to create new cheers, and the networks to run commercials. Its symbolic significance has been overshadowed by commercial purposes and public indifference, but it can still rattle the cages when someone uses it as an occasion for protest."

I've often wondered about the incongruous custom of the anthem opening sports events. And I've long suspected that the gestalt of spectator sports has religious significance with ritual, pageantry, patriotism, hero-worship and more to lift the spectator to a higher level of consciousness/being. In this regard the anthem reflects the amalgam of what is called Americanism, the melding of patriotism and religion.

Social Justice and the Hierarchy of Needs

2010-03-15T12:20:00.010-05:00

Yesterday I spoke on the theme of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs relative to self actualization. An interesting after-service conversation considered how social justice issues might be predicated on this famous hierarchy, that poverty and its injustices preclude an individual from ever participating in a value-rich life. That is, a person always concerned with securing food, shelter, and safety can hardly begin to consider healthy self-esteem let alone rise to self-actualization.

This morning an article The Obesity-Hunger Paradox in the NY Times sketched circumstances of hunger and obesity in the South Bronx: " A 2008 study by the city government showed that 9 of the Bronx’s 12 community districts had too few supermarkets, forcing huge swaths of the borough to rely largely on unhealthful, but cheap, food.

'“When you’re just trying to get your calorie intake, you’re going to get what fills your belly,” said Joel Berg, the author of “All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America?” “And that may make you heavier even as you’re really struggling to secure enough food.'”

In my estimation there's insight here regarding the timeless debate regarding the influences of nurture versus nature. Circumstances matter, not a little but a lot in the formation of character. In this regard social justice, at its best, seeks to change circumstances for the better, so that a person might become all that he or she can be.

The Millennials and Religion

2010-02-20T16:24:00.016-06:00

The Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life released the findings of its recent survey regarding the religious practices of the so-called Millennials, the generational cohort 18-29 who came of age after 2000.

The report's summary declares, "Compared with their elders today, young people are much less likely to affiliate with any religious tradition or to identify themselves as part of a Christian denomination. Fully one-in-four adults under age 30 (25%) are unaffiliated, describing their religion as 'atheist,' 'agnostic' or 'nothing in particular.' This compares with less than one-fifth of people in their 30s (19%), 15% of those in their 40s, 14% of those in their 50s and 10% or less among those 60 and older."

They are less religiously affiliated. "Yet in other ways, Millennials remain fairly traditional in their religious beliefs and practices. Pew Research Center surveys show, for instance, that young adults' beliefs about life after death and the existence of heaven, hell and miracles closely resemble the beliefs of older people."

Generally, religion is just a little less important for the Millennials than for the Generation Xers who preceded them. The more significant shift relates to formal affiliations. Hence the report's title and subtitle: "Religion Among the Millennials: Less Religiously Active Than Older Americans, But Fairly Traditional In Other Ways."

In my estimation this report further fills in the emerging outline of religion in the American Experience. The shift away from affiliations while keeping much of what is called "spirituality" differentiates Americans from the rest of Western Civilization, but in an increasingly transformed fashion.

Spirituality matters still matter, while institutional religion further ebbs.

Emotional Communion

2010-02-09T08:07:00.015-06:00

The NY Times, Science Section reports today on a study regarding its own "most frequently emailed article" list conducted by researchers at the University of Pennsylvania.

The researchers concluded that "awe-inspiring" stories were at the top of the most-emailed list.

"But in general, people who share this kind of article seem to have loftier motives than trying to impress their friends. They’re seeking emotional communion, Dr. [Jonah] Berger said.

“'Emotion in general leads to transmission, and awe is quite a strong emotion,” he said. 'If I’ve just read this story that changes the way I understand the world and myself, I want to talk to others about what it means. I want to proselytize and share the feeling of awe. If you read the article and feel the same emotion, it will bring us closer together.'”

In my estimation this study offers insight into Natural Religion rooted in exerience and emotion, a subset of a broad category of Religious Experience. Awe is one of the strongest manifestations of Religious Experience. Tellingly, when experienced, awe makes us want to reach out to others, "to proseltyze and share." I love the term "emotional communion."

Emotional communion, a unique gestalt of affirmation and connection, is at the center of Religion. Religious Experience compels us to reach out, to be understood and to understand: a deep kindredness.

I'm Taking a Sabbatical from Garrison Keillor

2010-02-05T13:30:00.010-06:00

In a mid-December column in Salon.com (and syndicated in several major papers), Garrison Keillor claimed Christmas for Christians in no uncertain words. "Christmas is a Christian holiday -- if you're not in the club, then buzz off."

He had curmudgeonly words for Unitarians and Jews. "Unitarians listen to the Inner Voice and so they have no creed that they all stand up and recite in unison, and that's their perfect right, but it is wrong, wrong, wrong to rewrite 'Silent Night.' If you don't believe Jesus was God, OK, go write your own damn 'Silent Night' and leave ours alone. This is spiritual piracy and cultural elitism and we Christians have stood for it long enough. And all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year, Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write 'Grab your loafers, come along if you wanna, and we'll blow that shofar for Rosh Hashanah'? No, we didn't.'"

In my estimation this poorly constructed, rambling diatribe of Mr. Keillor isn't satire. (I've reread it to discern the proverbial tongue in cheek.)

It contributes to a prevalent vein of ugly discourse of us against them. And it lacks a simple sense of history regarding the evolution of Christmas. Talk about cultural appropriation! Mr. Keillor knows better.

I honestly can't fathom his intentions in writing this mean spirited piece. It hardly reflects his big-cuddly-bear, aw-shucks persona as portrayed in the image, posted above, from his Salon.com page.

I've decided to take a sabbatical from Garrison Keillor, in the same way I've taken a sabbatical from the "nattering nabobs of negativism" that inhabit talk radio. I began yesterday, when I declined a special simulcast screening of Mr. Keillor's radio show. Before this article, I would have gone.

Avatar: Sometimes a Movie Is More Than a Movie

2010-01-27T10:57:00.009-06:00

The movie Avatar has just become the greatest grossing movie ever, passing James Cameron's previous blockbuster Titanic. The movie has caused considerable controversy among certain groups, according to a recent NY Times article, "You Saw What in 'Avatar?'"

"Over the last month, Avatar has been criticized by social and political conservatives who bristle at its depictions of religion and the use of military force; feminists who feel that the male avatar bodies are stronger and more muscular than their female counterparts; antismoking advocates who object to a character who lights up cigarettes; not to mention fans of Soviet-era Russian science fiction; the Chinese; and the Vatican. This week the authorities in China announced that the 2-D version of the film would be pulled from most theaters there to make way for a biography of Confucius."

In my estimation such a ganglion of protest indicates the power of contemporary cinema. Is there any more powerful means to reflect and inform a global collective consciousness?

James Cameron has once again successfully engaged in the creative process of mythopoeis--of telling, in an artful way, a story of contemporary meaning. He's taken compelling themes of the day and spun them together. And don't forget what Joseph Campbell called the monomyth of the Hero. (The formula of the classic hero infected Hollywood script writing and movie making at the end of the 20th century, following the success of Star Wars.)

Sometimes a movie is more than a movie.

Standing on the Side of Love: UUs Are Lovers

2010-01-25T14:34:00.022-06:00

I am a big supporter of my denomination's (The Unitarian Universalist Association’s) current campaign Standing on the Side of Love. Although it began with two hot button social issues, same sex marriage and immigration reform, and was instigated by a hate crime shooting spree at a Tennessee UU congregation, it is a boundless campaign.

We UUs own a big chunk of the "love franchise." Our Universalist tradition bends us toward Love. “God is Love” was the Universalist motto—an essential theological doctrine that compels loving God in return, as well as loving God’s creation, especially our sisters and brothers.

In my estimation Unitarian Universalists are lovers. We love the human condition in all its manifestations: female and male, young and old, straight and gay, every race and culture. We love the Earth and its Nature in its many aspects. We love the many world religions. We love the senses. We love the times and tides of our bodies. We love the free mind and will to meaning we can bring to bear in every circumstance of life. We love the richness of poetry and myth. We love the preciseness and clarity of science. We love tradition and we love innovation. We love contemplation and we love discussion. We love the arts: music, the spoken and written word, photographic image and painting, theater and cinema—all the creative forms through which human imagination seeks expression. We love our own life and we love our larger Life, despite the reality that living means dying.

I often cite Rupert Brooke’s poem “The Great Lover” that begins:

"I have been so great a lover: filled my days

So proudly with the splendour of Love's praise."

And continues:

"Love is a flame;—we have beaconed the world's night.

A city:—and we have built it, these and I.

An emperor:—we have taught the world to die".

Mary Daly: In Memoriam

2010-01-07T08:21:00.004-06:00

Mary Daly, a major voice in 20th century theology has died, age 81. She was a provocative and controversial personality, advocating a radical feminism at Boston College, where she began her career as a pioneering female Roman Catholic theologian in the 1960s. She challenged the traditional church's patriarchal and misogynist ways and eventually declared herself to be "post-christian." She also self-described as a "radical lesbian feminist." An obituary is in today's New York Times.

In my estimation Mary Daly's work will endure because it is perched at the beginning of what will inevitably become a post-christian worldview, an outlook that has cut loose from outworn forms of institutional Christianity and seeks to recover the revolutionary nature of Jesus's teachings, such as radical egalitarianism. She was a courageous and creative spirit.

Imagine, If Christ Were in Christmas

2009-12-09T09:16:00.011-06:00

A few years ago I gave a Christmas sermon lifting up the historical Jesus of sound modern scholarship--the ethical Jesus. Though I'm not a Christian in a cultural sense, I admire this credible Jesus who was a radical egalitarian. His ethics are a challenge now as they were two millennia ago.

I find the annual contention over crèches, crosses and Christmas versus holiday trees to be shallow concerns from the Christian side—an idolatry of forms over substance. And I muse, What would Christmas be if the historical Christ were truly at the center of the midwinter festival? It would be something radically different from what in our time and place is essentially a commercial holiday.

One of the most controversial aspects of Jesus’s brief ministry was the healing and comforting of the sick. Surviving sources leave no doubt that Jesus gave special attention to the afflicted of body and spirit. Translated to modern times, his example should move a believer to attend to the infirm, the ill, and the emotionally distressed in every circumstance. Certainly it would lead to direct acts of service, including charity for specific groups, which has become a seasonal custom.

But for those of fullest vision, Jesus’ example would also include universal health care. It would be unacceptable for any individual to be excluded from quality medical care because of economic or social circumstance. Followers of Jesus wouldn’t judge who is and who isn’t entitled to full medical care. They would be adamant that all are entitled, and they would seek reform.

Charity would abound in a Christ centered Christmas, but instead of an emphasis on giving downward, from those who have to those who don’t, there would be an emphasis on egalitarianism. The biblical scholar John Dominic Crossan has pointed out that Jesus ate at the same table with the dispossessed of his day, including women. It is one thing to work at a soup kitchen or hand out vouchers for food and meals. It is something else to share a meal, accepting those with whom you eat as fellow human beings through love rather than pity.

Such a radical outlook would awaken a strong sense of those “isms” that keep us apart—racism, classism, sexism, agism—and would ultimately look to correcting injustices and oppressions through what we’ve come to call social justice. Deep Christians would examine and seek to rectify a social and economic system that results in us-versus-them distinctions between the poor, the homeless, the unemployed, the undereducated, the hungry and the rest of us. Like Jesus, Christians would be social revolutionaries, working for systemic change, always from a universal love that knows no distinctions.

Women in particular would have special focus at Christmas. That Jesus consorted with and lifted up women, relative to the practices of his place and time, would translate in our own place and time into a recognition of women’s full humanity. This wouldn’t be “woman on a pedestal”—mythologized and imbued with virtues that the traditional culture does not or cannot practice. There would be equal participation by women in the family, in the community, in government, in the workplace.

A Christ-centered Christmas would surely confront the endemic violence that marbles our culture. “Peace on earth” wouldn’t be a once-a-year slogan; it would be a motivating principle centered in the teachings of Jesus, internalized with such passion that all acts of individual, community, and state would be inspired by the ideal of nonresistance. Instead of a temporary state, as when warring armies put down their arms on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, peace would be the permanent, expected, normal state motivating all activities.

In a Christ-centered Christmas, the ultimate criterion for judging the motivation of any act would be whether it is done in the expansive spirit of love, which Jesus once declared was the great law. Each Christian would be compelled to look within and rectify her or his heart with the expansive love that Jesus not only taught but lived. Christmas would be a time of reflection and perhaps of corrective change—a time of humility and confidence in the power of love to transform the individual and society and make peace real.

Kingdom Come

In short, Christmas would be radically different from the commercial Christmas we now know. Jesus was an itinerant minister, so he acquired scant possessions. There would be no Black Friday the day after Thanksgiving, with frenzied shoppers lined up for deep discounts and hard-to-come-by products. There would be few if any presents under the Christmas tree (if there were a Christmas tree)—certainly no extravagances. A materialist Christmas would be more than vulgar; it would be sinful.

What there would be, I suspect, would be the fellowship and the natural levelings of the common table: good food and drink, including wine. But the purpose would be not so much to feast and drink as to gather together in gladness and joy—to be true companions. No one would be lonely or hungry on Christmas Day. And, most important, Christmas Day wouldn’t be one day—a brief interlude in a materialist and market culture—it would be every day. The Kingdom would then truly come, as Jesus once prayed it might.

Charter for Compassion: 21st Century World Morality

2009-11-14T11:54:00.006-06:00

“The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the centre of our world and put another there, and to honour the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect.”

So begins a just launched campaign to “bring the world together,” known as the Charter for Compassion. Karen Armstrong, former nun who has become a popular writer on big issues of religion such as God and Christian/Muslim relations, is a leading voice urging this initiative. Her studies on religion have led her to conclude that compassion is common ground across various religions. She advocates compassion as a means toward a greater campaign promoting the Golden Rule as a worldwide ethic.

The Charter for Compassion’s carefully drafted statement (November 12) was guided by Council of Sages, a multi-faith, multi-national group of religious thinkers and leaders.

In my estimation this campaign reflects a recently revivified interest in promoting the Golden Rule as a means to unify a fragmented world, a world that grows smaller and smaller through communication and travel. In this way Globalization meets Universalism.

This emphasis helps organized religion across the spectrum to transcend isolating and contentious sectarianism.

In earlier postings on this blog I’ve identified the Golden Rule as a significant aspect of Barack Obama’s personal religion and worldview. I recommend this as 21st century moral, world leadership.

All efforts seeking common ground and human mutuality are on target and sorely needed.

Good Without God

2009-11-04T18:48:00.028-06:00

The Chicago Coalition for Reason has erected a billboard above the corner of LaSalle Drive and Grand Avenue asking: "Are you good without God? Millions are." The Chicago Tribune gave it a couple of paragraphs.

Atheists, agnostics, and humanists have banded together in several cities to post similar billboard and bus placard messages. A Wisconsin based organization, Freedom From Religion Foundation, has taken an organizational lead.

There appears to be a variety of opinions among the anti-religion community regarding such campaigns. More strident voices seem to be prevailing. The messages grow more aggressive. For example a new campaign quotes Thomas Jefferson: "Religions are all alike founded upon fables and mythologies."

In my estimation such campaigns are ironic. They engage traditional religions, while using "evangelizing" tactics that religions use and that the non-religious usually loathe. Yet, in this regard, the tactics fit into an ongoing God/no-God controversy that is a signature of these times.

Though strictly speaking I belong to the atheist, agnostic, humanist spectrum, I’m not anti-religious. Religion is inherent to the human condition. I simply want my religion to be a religion of realities—naturalistic, true to reason and experience, and compelling.

Character in Our Postmodern Era

2009-10-22T12:40:00.013-05:00

My favorite op-ed columnist has become David Brooks. I look forward to his columns in the NY Times, which often draw from the best of contemporary science and social science. To my sensibilities he offers well-reasoned commentary that is also cutting edge. Curiously his musings often coincide with sermons I’m working on.

This week, in "Where the Wild Things Are," Mr. Brooks wrote about the general notion of “character,” contrasting the philosophers’ and psychologists’ point of view, the latter being the most up-to-date. As an illustration he used the character Max of the book that’s become the blockbuster movie du jour: “Where the Wild Things Are.”

The Wild Things are outward expressions of Max’s own inner conflicts. For Mr. Brooks this illustrates the psychologists’ analysis of character. He wrote, “People have only vague intuitions about the instincts and impulses that have been implanted in them by evolution, culture and upbringing. There is no easy way to command all the wild things jostling inside.” Max is every man/every woman.

Earlier in the article Mr. Brooks wrote, “According to the psychologist’s view, individuals don’t have one thing called character."

“The psychologists say this because a century’s worth of experiments suggests that people’s actual behavior is not driven by permanent traits that apply from one context to another. Students who are routinely dishonest at home are not routinely dishonest at school. People who are courageous at work can be cowardly at church. People who behave kindly on a sunny day may behave callously the next day when it is cloudy and they are feeling glum. Behavior does not exhibit what the psychologists call ‘cross-situational stability.’

“The psychologists thus tend to gravitate toward a different view of conduct. In this view, people don’t have one permanent thing called character. We each have a multiplicity of tendencies inside, which are activated by this or that context. As Paul Bloom of Yale put it in an essay for The Atlantic last year, we are a community of competing selves. These different selves 'are continually popping in and out of existence. They have different desires, and they fight for control — bargaining with, deceiving, and plotting against one another.'

“The philosopher’s view is shaped like a funnel. At the bottom, there is a narrow thing called character. And at the top, the wide ways it expresses itself. The psychologist’s view is shaped like an upside-down funnel. At the bottom, there is a wide variety of unconscious tendencies that get aroused by different situations. At the top, there is the narrow story we tell about ourselves to give coherence to life.

“The difference is easy to recognize on the movie screen. Most movies embrace the character version. The hero is good and conquers evil. Spike Jonze’s new movie adaptation of ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ illuminates the psychological version.”

In my estimation this is an aspect, and therefore an illustration, of the postmodern context in which we live. For most of my ministerial career I’ve lifted up the notion of character—that character, the coherence of right beliefs and right actions—matters essentially and ultimately. And of course the Unitarian way has been, from its origin two centuries ago, justification by character. This means we “save” ourselves by the good person we freely will to be.

I do see that 20^th and 21^st century Americans live fragmented lives in a fragmented world, where “the [old] center does not hold.” That is the definition of postmodernism in a nutshell, a context where sureties and coherence have deconstructed and the “wild things” threaten to run berserk.

What’s left? There are a number of compelling new ethics from excellent minds of the 20^th/21^st centuries. I’ve been writing about this in a relatively new blog: ethics for postmoderns. These ethics were arrived at independently and therefore appear unrelated. However, I have an intuition that these ethics have what, in another context, the great biologist E.O. Wilson called consilience.

I think that the postmodern dilemma relative to character involves the many ethics that compel our better behavior, in spite of “instincts and impulses … implanted in us by evolution, culture and upbringing.” As Mr. Brooks wrote "there is no easy way."

Each of us has to do the work and act/live with ambiguity that is a function of change and complexity.

Visit my site ethicsforpostmoderns.blogspot.com for glimpses into some of these compelling and challenging "new" ethics.

Day of the Dead

2009-10-06T15:06:00.019-05:00

The current Day of the Dead exhibit at the National Museum of Mexican Art (1852 West 19^th Street in Chicago) is “Camino a casa: Coming Home on the Day of the Dead.” Held annually for 23 years, this has become the largest Day of the Dead exhibition in the

United States

. This year there will be 12 altars or ofrendas, by 20 artists, including a special ofrenda created for Arturo Velasquez Sr. (1915-2009) and an ofrenda created by the acclaimed author Sandra Cisneros as a tribute to her parents.

In my estimation the NMMA’s annual collection of altars to the dead offers one of Chicago’s great meditations with multiple layers of meaning, the least not being a contemplation on mortality in the season best suited for it. The exhibit runs through December 13. Try to visit it around All Hallow’s Eve, when it is said that veil between realities grows thin, that the living and the dead might commune.

Before leaving the Pilsen neighborhood have a meal at Neuvo Leon, the classic neighborhood restaurant at 1515 West 18^th Street.There's nothing like a savory meal after confronting motality to affirm Life and living.

Disrespecting Elders

2009-09-23T10:19:00.008-05:00

I woke up this morning to a short commentary by Rush Limbaugh in which he railed against Jimmy Carter, calling him a "national hemorrhoid.” In addition to being patently vulgar, Limbaugh once again ventured into one of his favorite realms: the ad hominem argument against the person and not the person’s policies, which is a classic fallacy in logic.

Mr. Carter, since his remarks about racism and the populist uprisings of the so-called “tea-baggers,” has taken considerable verbal abuse. His conservative critics label him the worst president of the last century, usually contrasting him with Ronald Reagan who followed.

Yet Mr. Carter has been a successful activist ex-President, perhaps the most activist of the entire American experience. He has transformed his deep personal religious beliefs (Southern Baptist based) into activism such as Habitat for Humanity. And he has progressed into an ever broader world view. (For example, he recently spoke out against world-wide oppression of women, citing his own break with his church’s traditional views of women as subservient.) In 2002 he was awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.

Moreover, Mr. Carter has noteworthy personal achievements. He served as a naval officer. He is a bona fide entrepreneur/capitalist—a successful peanut farmer. He’s personally written more than 20 books on a variety of subjects. He’s continued to reside in his rural home town of Plains, Georgia. His long marriage is a partnership with wife Rosalyn.

In my estimation Jimmy Carter is principled and moral, thoughtful and progressive. He has become a wise elder. (One of his recent books ponders the possibilities of a life’s later years.) Indeed, he is one of the international Elders gathered by Nelson Mandela.

Then, why is Mr. Carter so denigrated by hectoring conservative talk radio personalities and their minions in and out of government?

It’s a national disgrace that Mr. Carter is disrespected as a person, considering his formidable personal achievements as well as status as ex-President.

But for me there’s something even more disrespectful in all of this: a lack of respect for elder wisdom. This strikes me as yet another example of an increasing ugliness in American society that is unacceptable.

As one venturing into the elder years, I say shame on Rush Limbaugh for his vulgarity relative to Jimmy Carter, one of our society’s and one of the world’s wise elders.

Enchanted Stardust

2009-09-12T09:00:00.009-05:00

This image provided by NASA, released Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2009, taken by the refurbished Hubble Space Telescope, shows stars bursting to life in the chaotic Carina Nebula. (NASA photo / September 9, 2009)

In my estimation there is nothing more awe-inspiring, wonder-invoking than the images provided by the Hubble Space Telescope: "Out of the stars in their flight, out of the dust of eternity have we come...sunlight and stardust mingled in time and space..." (Robert Terry Weston, c. 1960.)

Long ago, Unitarian minister Theodore Parker (c. 1840) intuited that we are "enchanted stardust."

The origin and evolution of our 13.5 billion year old universe is a great ponderable, a wellspring of Natural Religion and infinite source of religious experience. The images of the Hubble Space Telescope are primary resources of a Religion of Realities.

Making Peace 40 Years Later

2009-09-02T09:17:00.012-05:00

Noodling around my local Dollar Store, I found a book that haunts me, Last Night I Dreamed of Peace: The Diary of Dang Thuy Tram. In April 1968, when this diary began, Thuy was a 25 year old doctor in a North Vietnamese battle field hospital. In June 1970 the diary ends. Dr. Thuy was killed by a bullet to the forehead by South Vietnamese troops. (See the 2006 New York Times article for the remarkable story of The Diary and Dr. Thuy.)

Thuy's diary was surreptitiously saved (against general orders) by an American soldier who held on to it through 2005. Within a few months of resurfacing it was published in Vietnam and became an extraordinary best seller. It was subsequently translated and published in a 2007 American edition. Obviously its American press run exceeded demand, since I bought a remaindered first edition for a buck only 2 years after publication.

I hadn't heard Thuy Tram's poignant diary, which has been inevitably compared to Anne Frank's rescued words.

In my estimation there's no surprise that the Diary of Dang Thuy Tram languished in the American literary marketplace. It relates the Vietnam War from the perspective of the once-enemy. Perhaps, 40 years later, we don't want to remember. Or more likely we don't want to engage in the humbling process of truth and reconciliation, when we listen without argument and seek to empathize with those who'd been victimized.; and we do so for the sake of justice and peace.

I remember, once again, Santayana's counsel: "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it."

Redemption and Character

2009-08-27T09:11:00.009-05:00

Ted Kennedy’s death results inevitably in a review of his life—origins and influences, early behavior, and a long public run that rendered him the Lion of the Senate. I reflect on two significant aspects of Mr. Kennedy's life: redemption and character.

There is no denying Mr. Kennedy’s failures and shortcomings that seem rooted in his family’s privilege and ambition. (The family fortune had dubious sources and the patriarch father’s legendary immorality set a bad example.)

Mr. Kennedy bounced from boarding school to boarding school. Harvard expelled him for cheating. As a young senator, he walked away from a tragic accident that resulted in the death of an attractive young woman. By credible anecdotal accounts he long remained an alcoholic and womanizer.

Yet after his unsuccessful insurgent run for president against Jimmy Carter in 1980, Mr. Kennedy was a diligent senator who mastered procedure and reached across the aisle to work/compromise with the opposition party. He was an effective legislator and a leader of the political progressives. Jessie Jackson has judged him “the tallest tree” in the forest of civil rights.

After a much publicized divorce, he settled into a later life marriage that appeared harmonious. (The straight-laced Orrin Hatch was compelled to write a song, "Souls Along the Way," about Teddy and wife Vicky.) For the family he became beloved and revered "Uncle Teddy." Publicly he was considerate, congenial, and charming.

I struggle with my estimation of Ted Kennedy—the balance of his 77 years. My struggle relates to redemption—the cheap grace that so many seek after committing egregious acts. But I also recognize that an examined life can have a positive moral arc, an arc that bends toward better and better character. (Maybe Chappaquiddick and equivalent behavior in Mr. Kennedy’s midlife caused him to reflect and as a result he changed his moral trajectory. Here you might review his 1969 speech regarding Chappaquddick, judged by some to be among the hundred best.)

In the end I affirm that every human life is best understood as a work in progress—a continuing process of examination and adjustment. The moral arc of a life ought to bend toward goodness. Let this be the standard of redemption and character.

Science and Religion, A Rapproachement?

2009-08-26T07:37:00.011-05:00

[On Sunday, The New York Times published an article by Robert Wright,“A Grand Bargain Over Evolution." Today, Wednesday, the letters to the editor have half a dozen responses, indicating a lively interest in the contemporary debate. I was late in sending in my letter/response. Here it is.]

Robert Wright’s appeal for a mutual appreciation by Science and Religion has two thick threads: 1) natural selection (evolution or Darwinism) is compatible with a traditional religious outlook that posits God; and 2) a “higher purpose” may be discerned, even by Scientists, as working through nature. For the sake of a greater good, including “world peace,” Mr. Wright calls for rapproachement between the two sides, because there is a significant area of agreement.

I’m pleased that the NY Times publishes such quality discourse. But I find myself arguing with Mr. Wright’s contentions in two significant dimensions.

As a minister who’s sought to heed the revolutionary insight of contemporary science, particularly evolutionary biology and neuroscience, I’ve concluded that in every instance Science trumps Religion. At the very least, Science explains better than ever, if not for the first time, the roots and branches of Religious thinking. Second, there’s a self-serving tendency of Religion to impose an anthropic principle, that human kind is somehow the goal of Nature, an expression of a “higher purpose.”

Mr. Wright’s “grand bargain” strikes me as something of a “half-way covenant.” He finds the story of natural selection compelling but wants to keep the valuable social constructs of religion viable. His “grand bargain” strikes me as no bargain for either side.

I say, let the empirical insights of Science prevail, and let Religion adapt to progressing truths.

In my estimation this is the “more evolved religion” drawing on “an awe inspiring story” Mr. Wright anticipates.

WWJD: Health Care Reform and the Golden Rule

2009-08-20T08:24:00.004-05:00

At the Michael Vick/Philadelphia Eagles press conference on August 14, Tony Dungy related that when he first visited MV at Leavenworth, he asked him, “Where was the Lord in all this?”

This set me thinking. Relative to the health care reform debate, “Where is the Lord in all this?”

There has been scant reference to the culture’s dominant Christian ethic from either side of the debate. More to the point, relative to health care reform, WHAT WOULD JESUS DO?

As one who monitors religion and American culture, the absence of Christian ethics in the health care reform debate is resounding, especially in light of a relatively recent rave to wear bracelets inscribed with WWJD—WHAT WOULD JESUS DO?

President Obama, by posing this question, would significantly challenge the anti-reform protestors. Mr. Obama could once again reference the Golden Rule, his favorite ethical rubric.

Christians have long associated the Golden Rule with Jesus’ teachings as well as with Jewish scripture. Luke summarizes Jesus’ proclamation also referenced in Matthew: “And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.” (Seniors who enjoy Medicare might find insight here.)

There are other relevant Christian reference points, too: feeding the multitudes at the Mount; the declaration that “whatever you neglect to do unto one of these, you neglect to do to me;” healing the sick; and even raising the dead, begin an easy list of Jesus’ acts of charity.

In my estimation, at heart, Mr. Obama has time and again revealed himself as a Christian moralist who preaches egalitarianism rather than as a power-craving socialist. He has frequently cited the Golden Rule as a standard for personal behavior and for achieving social justice.

When confronted with responding to the question WHAT WOULD JESUS DO, could the opposition to health care reform persuade a Christian majority that Jesus would have sided with the big insurance or pharmaceutical companies, or have denied coverage to those with pre-existing conditions, or excluded undocumented aliens from coverage, or favored seniors at the expense of the larger population or favored the larger population over seniors, or favored men over women or vice versa…? That would be a hard, if not impossible, sell.

Dominic Crossan, a leading scholar of the Jesus Seminar, has argued persuasively that the historic Jesus was essentially an egalitarian who favored no one group over any other group. Logically, universal health care would be the moral result of applied Christian egalitarianism, where all are treated equally and each respected individually.

This is my modest proposal: Mr. Obama, recast your health care reform initiative. Call it henceforth “Golden Rule Health Care—An Egalitarian Solution.” The Christian majority could claim the Golden Rule as expressing Jesus’ ethic, while a larger community could cite the Golden Rule as a universal principle found throughout world religions and philosophies. And no one would dare speak against social egalitarianism, at least in the sense that "all men are created equal" with natural rights of life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness

Such a recasting of health care reform would fit Mr.Obama’s criterion that faith or belief inform public policy only by appealing to universal principles. In Mr. Obama’s own estimation there is no more universal principle than the Golden Rule.

God and Evolution at the National Institutes of Health

2009-07-30T08:36:00.008-05:00

Sam Harris, a prominent "strong" atheist, recently questioned the appointment of Francis Collins to head the National Institutes of Health.

Mr. Harris wrote, ironically: "It would seem a brilliant choice. Dr. Collins’s credentials are impeccable: he is a physical chemist, a medical geneticist and the former head of the Human Genome Project. He is also, by his own account, living proof that there is no conflict between science and religion. In 2006, he published 'The Language of God,' in which he claimed to demonstrate 'a consistent and profoundly satisfying harmony' between 21st-century science and evangelical Christianity."

However, Mr. Harris used Dr. Collins's own words to demonstrate disturbing inconsistencies. For example, Dr. Collins flip-flopped in asserting when God stands inside Nature and when God stands outside Nature. Mr. Harris also insinuated that Dr. Collins helps foster an epidemic of scientific ignorance by inserting God's intervention in the midst of evolution.

In my estimation Mr.Harris's article raises a variety of issues, including the contentious relationship between Science and Religion and first ammendment rights regarding freedom of religion (as it relates to public policy and an implicit religious test for office).

Was Barack Obama'a July, 2009 appoinment of Dr. Collins a stroke of brilliance--a bridge across the abyss of the culture war?