Hard Hats and Life Preservers
Rev. Claudia M. Frost
1-10-2010
Like Zora, in the story, A Lamp in Every Corner, some of us carry the lamps handed down from our families and their families who established this church. Some of us saw the flame of love and truth and found our way to Unitarian Universalism a number of years ago. Others may be newer to discover this faith. We gather here to strengthen the bonds of this religious community that it may continue to light the way for those who have not yet found us or those who remain hesitant to come through the door.
Maybe you’ve heard stories about the feeling of “Being Home” when people discover Unitarian Universalism. My husband, Dave and I grew up in the United Methodist Church. As young adults we loved being a part of a Sunday school class in a large inner city church. With other young couples, we explored the roots of our religious beliefs and began a spiritual journey of questioning. Unknowingly, we had begun a path toward Unitarian Universalism, for try as we might, after experiencing other United Methodist and Presbyterian churches we were never comfortable again in the religion of our youth. We had grown differently and discovered that our way of asking religious questions and studying other sources of wisdom made people in those congregations uncomfortable.
Although we were active in a variety of congregations as we moved to different cities because of education and assignments with the US Air Force, we spent ten years wandering in the spiritual wilderness until Air Force friends told us about Unitarian Universalism. They loaned us George Marshall’s book, Challenge of a Liberal Faith. I’ll never forget our road trip to Washington DC from our home on the Mississippi gulf coast. As Dave drove, I read the book out loud. After one chapter were so enthused that we switched to the questions and answers at the back. With each mile we rode, we became more excited. Yes!, there really were people like us and they had a very long and exciting history. Our enthusiasm soon turned to disappointment. There weren’t any Unitarian Universalist congregations in our area along the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
We were fortunate though, to enter Unitarian Universalism through what I lovingly call the “Backdoor”. We quickly joined the Church of the Larger Fellowship. That was pre Internet days. We literally joined the “UU Church by mail. We received wonderful sermons by their newsletter called “The Quest” and packets of resource materials for religious education for our family. Unknown to us at the time, I later realized it was a terrific entry to Unitarian Univrsalism for we had a chance to learn so much about our faith through personal study even though we lacked live religious community. Today, the Church of the Larger Fellowship is growing and thriving; still sends information by mail; but mostly conducts congregational business by e-mail. They have a minister, Rev. Jane Rzepka, a strong covenant group program, and a vital prison ministry. Later when we moved to San Antonio, our home town, we didn’t return to the church of our childhood where our parents still belonged, we went right to the First Unitarian Universalist church and enjoyed that comfortable presence of “Being Home”. We had found our people!
The transition to being a Unitarian Universalist was an easy fit. I didn’t have any religious trauma or pain to overcome. I had grown beyond the constricting bonds of my religious origins. I took seriously the free and responsible search for truth and meaning as mentioned in our 4th Unitarian Universalist Principle. It was vitally important to reflect on how my original religious concepts intersected with Unitarian Universalist meanings. Concepts such as sin, prayer, even God had to be re-examined in dialogue and study with other committed Unitarian Universalist’s. I understand that for some of you the stories may not be so smooth……if you aren’t a life long Unitarian Universalist, even though you may have had the comfortable at home feeling when you came here, joining a congregation might not be easy. You may still be in a process of discernment even though you have been coming here for quite some time.
Have you received any guidance on becoming a member here? Even though we are a welcoming and friendly group, we may not have provided you with any guidance and education about Unitarian Universalism and the expectations of membership.
Possibly, you joined this congregation a number of years ago, but have not found the path to deepening your faith or understandings of Unitarian Universalist history any broader than what you have heard from the pulpit on Sunday morning. I invite you to come to Sunday school. Adult Religious education starts at 10:00 each Sunday. A new series is starting and we have an excellent calendar of topics planned through the fall of this year with a terrific variety of volunteer facilitators. I will also be hosting a UU101 class after worship and fellowship on Jan. 31st. Whether you are a prospective new member, a long time member, or just curious, you are welcome …….sign up.
In 2001, the UUA Commission on Appraisal that studied the meaning of membership said, “Often folks drift away when they don’t feel connected and challenged.”
They mentioned the need for ….high expectations, personal responsibility, challenge, growth and change…These are keys to the important work we do in this church ……Poet Annie Dillard said,
when people come to church they should not be handed an order of service with a smile, but should be given hard hats and life preservers; because church should be a dangerous place, a zone of risk, a place of new birth and new life, where we confront ourselves with who we truly are and who the church is calling us to be.
Coming to church should challenge us.
In his book, The Almost Church, church consultant, Michael Durall says UU churches should challenge their members and friends to lead lives of dedication, commitment, and even sacrifice. Living a life of faith isn’t always easy, and in fact it should not be. Earlier I shared the late Rev. A. Powell Davies thoughts on why a life of faith isn’t easy. Rev. Davies was the senior minister of All Souls Church in Washington DC after World War II and the founder of 13 Unitarian Universalist congregations in the DC area. He reminds us that we need to be in a community of faith to renew our courage, and sharpen our conscience. Regular church attendance can bring us to our best self, remind us of the highest possibilities of human nature and give us a vision of hope and a renewed dedication to service of our fellow human beings.
In the 1950’s, Rev. Davies often asked the members of his congregations, “What are you doing with your faith?” Michael Durall asks the same question today, “What are we doing with our faith?” In the past, life in many Unitarian Universalist congregations was considered an inward process of self enlightenment or self discovery rather than the formation of a community of faith and service. Church programs tended to be based on accumulating information rather than changing people’s lives. Today, people seek out a congregation because they want a place to belong; to work out questions of meaning and value; and to have a spiritual life that’s different from the secular culture.
Peter Wiles, religion editor for the New York Times, says “religion should be an adventure… not a leisure activity.” Churches should be called to do things they think they cannot do, and should stick their necks out and take chances. He says churches have souls. Rev. A Powell Davies said once that Life is just a chance to grow a soul.
Does Outlaw’s Bridge have a soul? How would you describe it? Do we hold a conviction in our hearts and minds that Unitarian Universalism can change people’s lives for the better in some fundamental way? Each Sunday we print our commitment in our statement of purpose on the back of the order of service. On a number of those intentions we are doing very well. In some areas we have more work to do. This is a church that can change people’s lives for the better in fundamental ways.
Making connections is said to be the essence of the religious experience. This is a place for making friends, for fellowship and community. This is a place to feel spiritually grounded, a place for meaning making and internal connections.
I believe this congregation does have a soul and it is alive and well. This is a place that can change people’s lives for the better in fundamental ways, but there’s a catch.
Membership in a Unitarian Universalist congregation is a process. Like any effective relationship, it takes commitment and work. You get out of it what you put in. Often it’s a gradual progression from lesser to greater commitment. Integrity of membership begins with regular attendance at Sunday worship. You need to show up. People need to worship regularly together. It is an integral part of what binds us together. It’s where we learn to create that space of openness in ourselves to hear and learn from others who may not think and believe just like we do, but whom we are in relationship with. Regular worship together, helps us grow in ways so we don’t all have to think alike to love alike. We can support one another on our varied religious journeys.
I have heard it said that small miracles occur at church every Sunday. I believe it. As liberal religious people, we don’t talk about miracles very often, yet they occur. We just have to learn to recognize them. Maybe it’s coming back through the door after you left; wounded by something someone said; vowing not to continue. Maybe it was participating in a creative compromise on a very contentious decision because everyone calmed down and listened deeply to one another. Universalist pioneer, John Murray had vowed never to preach Universalism again, but we have a real Universalist miracle story about how John Murray waded ashore on the very land where a faithful and persistent, Thomas Potter had been waiting for a preacher to come and preach in the chapel he had built on his land.
At times, being a member of a religious community tries our faith. It can be hard. A congregation is by nature a human institution. At times it can become all too human. Difficulties arise; disillusionment sets in as people fail to rise to our highest ideals. Some people walk away, some may need to step back for a while to reflect and recharge, and there are others who remain steadfast, loyal through the good times and bad. Returning to our Covenant can help…..holding one another to how we have promised we will be together…to stay at the table…..speak our truth with love. Freedom, reason, and individual autonomy are not enough. It requires patience, tolerance, openness to change, developing our ability to read social cues, sensitivity to others and the capacity to forgive…..these are spiritual gifts we learn in real community where the members are invested participants rather than observers or consumers. We learn, we sometimes fall short of our best selves, we grow and we return again.
This is not just a place to be renewed. Being a member of a religious community should place you, as Annie Dillard says, in a zone of risk. Maybe we should have our hard hats ready when we come here. This church is a work zone for “new birth and new life”, where we can confront ourselves with who we truly are and a vision of what we want to become. This church should be calling us to our highest selves, both as individuals, and to the best the church can be as we move outside these walls to work with our neighbors. This is a place to create a community of compassion. It is a place that calls people to serve…..to lead lives of dedication, service and sacrifice. The purpose of the church is not to keep the members satisfied. Religion is not a commodity to be consumed. It’s something in which we are called to invest and we all know that investing comes with different levels of risk.
Our Unitarian Universalist heritage is a covenantal church rather than a creedal faith. We are united by common purposes rather than common beliefs. We should take our covenants seriously and communicate this commitment to those seeking to belong. Membership here comes with a certain level of accountability. Such accountability is a willingness to take some responsibility for the equality of life in the congregation. Being a member is living with intention not being passive.
Last year I heard a story about a member in my previous congregation who had been participating for quite some time but had never actually joined. She finally took the plunge to become a member when invited to do so. The membership director asked her if she felt different and she revealed that it had changed her deeply in many ways because she now felt more a part of the congregation rather than someone sitting on the sidelines observing.
Being a part of the group gives us a larger sense of purpose and connection. Rev. Burton Carley of The Church of the River in Memphis Tennessee told a story about a knight in the Middle Ages returning from an exhausting day of skirmishes. The Lord of the Manor announced with conviction, “I haven’t any enemies to the west.” And the Knight replied: “You do now!”
An organized pathway to membership …a map to understanding Unitarian Universalism will prevent people ending up feeling like the knight in Burton Carly’s story……exhausted from doing things in the wrong direction. Enthusiasm is not enough for embarking on the membership journey. A sense of direction and an understanding is needed as well. You may recall your exuberance or quiet delight in finding this liberal congregation. People who are new to the congregation, those who didn’t grow up here need to have explicit ways to become an integrated part of the religious community.
We are a friendly group, but it’s not easy to remember everyone’s name. Most of you all know each other and often don’t wear name tags….a key thing if you are a visual learner or don’t hear well. Some folks are shy about staying for the food and fellowship following the service unless personally invited.
As for invitations, I’ve seen some congregations make the mistake of asking people to jump right into committee work as the way of becoming involved. Whoever heard of anyone seeking out a church in order to serve on a committee? That’s a sure way to burn people out. It’s important to give newcomers time and guidance to learn about the congregation, get to know people and a chance to nurture their souls before they are asked to be in leadership positions.
Unitarian Universalist polity holds us, the members, responsible for the quality of life in our congregations. We are in this together as a free church; bound together not by a professed creed, but by a covenant…….. which you can find in the front of your hymnal and by our congregational covenant which you voted on at your annual meeting last fall. We have some work to do with our covenant…..as many may not know what it says, it’s not yet become visible and alive…but it is a beginning for stating how we will be together. It should be a living document open to growth and change.
One of our Unitarian martyrs, Frances David, once said, We need not think alike to love alike. Relationships can be transformative. When people talk to each other about their lives, they learn to attach meaning to experience. When we enter into relationships we can be expected to be changed. This happens when we become members of a religious community. 20th century Unitarian Process Theologian, Henry Nelson Weiman, studied and wrote about how individuals can encounter a sense of the holy in intentional nurturing relationships.
That is surely true of my relationship with one of my very good friends from seminary. When we first met 8 years ago as we entered seminary, we couldn’t have been further apart on the Theological spectrum…..yet our shared but very different experiences as dedicated Unitarian Universalists, the trials and tribulations of seminary and some very rocky places in our personal lives have bonded us closely. We have both been changed a bit by our knowledge of one another’s theologies but we still don’t think alike in so many ways. No amount of debate or sharing of viewpoints could change that. We are just wired differently. But we care deeply for one another. We highly respect each other’s difference of opinion and the varied strengths we bring to ministry…..two very different people…..bonded by love through shared experiences.
Love is the power that allows for the unity in diversity…..that illusive goal we continue to reach for.
As Rev. Forest Church once said about his congregation, All Souls, New York City, we too are a “laboratory for the spiritual version of e pluribus unum” out of the many, one. Many different theological viewpoints exist in this congregation, often more than one per person…..yet we have a beautiful legacy here of creating space for one another. Even though you may not share the same theology with the person sitting next to us, we make space for their theology as we would want ours respected in return. A variety of languages of reverence are spoken here; both the language of the heart and of the mind.
An important part of being a member of this church is the expectation that we will be changed if we engage ourselves in the life of this church and in our Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations. My hope is that membership here will lead you to embody the spirit of generosity, open mindedness, and a desire to serve others.
The meaning of membership is one of transformation. If you are not yet a member here, I invite you to talk with me about membership. Whether you are a long standing member or new here, I invite you to attend our upcoming “Pathways to Membership Class. What are you doing with your faith? Can you turn your liberal idealism into a grounded reality by a commitment to what this church can be……a place where we can transcend our all too human realities, our pettiness, our failures to live up to our own ideals. I invite you to renew your loyalty. If not yet a member, I invite you to move from the sidelines to full commitment. It’s time to take chances. But all beware; get ready; grab your life preserver and put on your hard hat. You can’t help but be changed. May it be so. Amen.
Sources:
Michael Durall, The Almost Church:Redefining Unitarian Universalism for an New Era, Tulsa, Oklahoma: Jenkin Loyd Jones Press , 2004.
Michael Durall, The Almost Church: Revitalized, Envisioning the Future of Unitarian Universalism, Boulder, Colorado: Common Wealth Consulting Group, 2009.
Commission on Appraisal Unitarian Universalist Association, Belonging: The Meaning of Membership, Boston, Massachusetts: Unitarian Universalist Association, 2001.
Forest Church
1-10-2010 Claudia Frost