Invitation to Worship, Joan Bechtel
 

Good morning. I am especially looking forward to today’s worship in which Judy is going to help us find a way to, or the words to, explain briefly who we are and why we gather here each Sunday to worship together. Duane sometimes calls it worth-shaping, and indeed, I think that is what we are about this morning, giving worth, form and shape to our faith in a way that we can explain it to others (and surely in the process to ourselves).

In my own case and, frankly, to my surprise, I find that I look forward to this Sunday ritual with all of you who have made us feel so welcome. Many years ago, unable to continue attending church, I found other things to fill my Sunday mornings, things I cared about, reading, writing letters or in my journal, spinning, walking in the woods, for instance. Life was full, time was short, and Sundays were too precious to give up for church attendance. Now, in Unitarian Universalism, all that has changed. I find myself eager to discover the full extent of what it means to be a Unitarian Universalist.

There is one problem, however; occasionally someone asks or discovers that we are attending church and I find that when I say we have joined the Unitarian Universalists of the Cumberland Valley, the reaction is often a sort of silent gulp, a stiffening of the face, and nothing more. Sometimes the reaction is a polite, puzzled, "But they don’t believe anything?" Or a less polite, more shocked, "You mean that ‘Anything Goes Church’?" Depending upon who it is, I find myself either tongue tied or babbling something defensive and incoherent.

As it turns out I am not the only one who has trouble explaining Unitarian Universalism in casual conversation on social occasions. Forrester Church, a long experienced and prominent Unitarian thinker, minister of All Souls Unitarian Church in New York City, wrestles with the problem as well. In his book, Born Again Unitarian Universalism. he recounts a conversation at a dinner party. Seated between strangers, he is caught off guard.

 

"You are a what? "

"A Unitarian Universalist."

"Oh, I see, " he says, but obviously doesn‘t. He is rescued by the woman on the right.

"I’ve never really understood just what it is you Unitarians believe. You are Christians, aren’t you?"

"Not exactly. I mean, we were and some of us still are but most of us are not."

"You don’t believe in Jesus?"

"Not in an orthodox way, certainly. Many of us value his teachings but few, if any of us, believe that he was resurrected on the third day or that he was God."

"What about immortality? "

"Well, I guess you’d have to say that we’re pretty much divided on that one."

"But at least you all believe in God?" interrupts the man across the table.

"Not exactly. Many of us do, if each in his or her own way. Others of us do not find the concept of God a useful one."

"What then do you believe? " the bewildered hostess politely asks.

Let us join in worship as we meditate upon our common faith.
 

"Ours is a Church…"
Wallace W. Robbins

Ours is a church of reason — not because the mind is free of errors, but because the dialogue of mind with mind, and mind with itself, refines religious thought.

Ours is a church of moral work — not because we think morality is a sufficient religion, but because we know no better way of showing our gratitude to God, and our confidence in one another.

Ours is a church of conscience — not because we hold that conscience is infallible, but because it is the meeting place of God and the human spirit.

Ours is a non-creedal church — not because we have no beliefs, but because we will not be restrained in our beliefs.

"I Had Been Hungry, All the Years"
Emily Dickinson

I had been hungry, all the Years—
My Noon had Come—to dine—
I trembling drew the Table near—
And touched the Curious Wine.

'Twas this on Tables I had seen
When turning, hungry, Home
I looked in Windows, for the Wealth
I could not hope—for Mine

I did not know the ample Bread
'Twas so unlike the Crumb
The Birds and I, had often shared
In Nature's-Dining Room

The Plenty hurt me-'twas so new
Myself felt ill-and odd
As Berry of a Mountain Bush
Transplanted-to the Road

Nor was I hungry-so I found
That Hunger-was a way
Of Persons outside Windows
The Entering takes away.

Sermon "The Only U.U. at the Party"

Okay, so there you are at the party, all dressed up with your hair done just right and your chalice jewelry shining. Maybe it’s a necklace with matching earrings, maybe it’s a lapel pin or a tie tack, but it looks great against your fancy clothes. Someone politely asks you "What’s that jewelry you’re wearing?" and you say "I’m a Unitarian Universalist. The flaming chalice is the symbol of our faith."

Oh. Dead silence for a moment. You know what comes next… "What’s a Unitarian Universalist?"

Here’s a golden opportunity to do some educating — "a teachable moment," as they say. You may not be the first Unitarian Universalist this person has ever met, but you might be the first one they’ve talked to about it. You’re the only U.U. at the party. You are a committed U.U., you’re enthusiastic about your religion and you would love to share the good news. Here’s your chance. What are you going to say?

It’s no wonder that you feel in a bit of a dilemma. Even as seasoned a Unitarian Universalist as Forrester Church didn’t do a very good job of describing himself at that dinner party we heard about earlier. But you know what? You can do better than Forrester Church! You really can. It helps a lot if you prepare yourself ahead of time. After all, why did you wear that jewelry to the party if you didn’t want to talk about it? You knew this would happen! So think about it first, and have some ideas about how to keep the conversation going.

But first… let’s talk about context a little bit. I’m going to borrow an example from my colleague Daniel O’Connell, the U.U. minister at West Redding, Connecticut:

Let’s say that you’ve just met someone at the party and you tell them you’re an Orioles fan. They don't ask you, whether you mean the Baltimore or some other kind of Orioles. And most of the time, they know you're talking about baseball, not football. They know it's a sport, they know its on TV, they know there are season tickets & luxury boxes to be had at the right price.

You tell someone you are an Orioles fan, and it's high context communication‚ a whole wealth of information comes over with it: you're a regular guy or a regular gal. It means you're loyal to your team, and you know something about the team's history, its heroes — yeah, Cal Ripkin, right? You tell someone you are an Orioles fan, it carries a lot of other information with it.

But when you tell someone you are a Unitarian Universalist, it's low context communication. Let's see, it isn't a sport, is it? There aren't any teams? Oh, it's a religion? If it's a real religion, how come I haven't heard of it? You say you're a Unitarian Universalist? Well, you look normal enough.

Let me ask you this: Is it weird but normal, like being a vegetarian? Or is it way out there, like some kind of a cult?

You tell someone you are an Orioles fan, and you've given them an entire mental picture… If they describe you as an Orioles fan to someone, it means something even if they don't know much about baseball, because they know that there's a good chance the person they’re speaking to does know about baseball. They don’t dare describe you as a Unitarian Universalist, because they have no idea what it means and if they said it, they might get asked, and who wants to look dumb?

So if you have an uninformed listener, you’ll have to give them some context. Or in another likely scenario, they think they do know what a Unitarian Universalist is, and they’ve got it all wrong. Then you’re immediately on the defensive trying to correct their misconceptions, which they probably don’t want corrected, and you’re both in an uncomfortable conversation that you wish had never started. Please, let’s talk about baseball.

It’s tempting to skirt the subject of religion when yours is unfamiliar or misunderstood. But try to resist the impulse to change the subject, because at this moment, you represent the faith; you are Unitarian Universalism as far as the other person is concerned, and you have a golden opportunity to witness for your faith just as others do for theirs when they have a chance.

With the sermon this morning, I hope to offer you some guidelines for how to approach the inevitable conversation when you tell someone you’re a Unitarian Universalist and they say "What’s that?" It’s bound to happen, so why not do some planning ahead and be prepared with some things to say that will be, at least educational, and at best, persuasive. I also want to help you think about how to handle it when the questioning is obviously hostile and you find yourself in an argument, or you’re feeling ridiculed.

Sometimes Duane and I talk about "the elevator question." You’re on an elevator headed for the 30^th floor, a fellow passenger asks about your chalice lapel pin, and you have until the elevator reaches the top to explain Unitarian Universalism. You might think of this as the sound-bite approach.

What’s the most important thing to say? I think that if you have the opportunity to say just one thing about being a U.U., it’s good to talk about our understanding that only the individual can determine for herself or himself what to believe; we think that beliefs can’t be imposed by some outside authority, but can only be determined by the inner authority of the person’s own conscience and their personal experience. So we have a community of religious seekers who support one another in their personal search for spiritual meaning, even though the results of the search will be different for different people. We value the differences because we value diversity; we think it is enriching. In a very brief interchange, that’s probably all you’ll have a chance to say.

But let’s go back to the party. Here the scenario is quite different, because you have at least the possibility for a much longer and more in-depth conversation.

First, some thoughts on technique. My personal preference is to try to use only positive statements about what we are, and how we believe. I prefer not to try to explain Unitarian Universalism by saying what we aren’t, and what we don’t believe. It gives a whole different tone to the conversation if you can say "We believe that there are valuable religious truths to be found in many of the world’s religions, and other sources as well" rather than "We aren’t Bible-based." Or to say "We believe that only the individual can determine what she or he believes" rather than "We don’t have a creed." What we aren’t will come out in the conversation soon enough anyway, because people will want to compare Unitarian Universalism with their own religious orientation and will want to know how it’s different. But it’s better not to start there. Find a way to use positive statements about your faith.

Another technique is to try to talk about your own experience. (Isn’t that what’s at the core of our faith, after all — personal experience?) Remember what it was about your first visit to a U.U. church that made you decide to come back a second time. Remember how it felt to be among us. Talk about what excited you, what comforted you, what delighted you. A deeply meaningful religious life has to be a matter of personal choice, so talk about why you made that choice.

Another reason for talking about your own experience is that it’s difficult to generalize and make sweeping statements about Unitarian Universalism, for the reasons I’ve just given. There is a diversity of belief and practice among us, so that if you are going to be true to your faith, you can’t honestly say "Unitarian Universalists believe this or that…"

I usually say something along the lines of "UUs tend to believe…" as in "UUs tend to believe that human beings are not conceived and born in sin, fit only for eternal damnation." I think most UUs do believe this, and I believe that there are orthodox religious conceptions of humanity that promulgate that other view.

Or, I'll say that UUs tend to believe that people can participate in the ongoing creation of the world, that we can change who we are, and that we are called upon to make the world a better place than we found it. We tend not to believe everything is preordained by God.

We tend to believe in freedom, reason, tolerance, and love as overarching values. We tend to believe that love is stronger than death, that questions of humanity are more important than questions of divinity. We UUs, unlike the more orthodox, agree not to make definitive for every person what can only be known through faith and personal experience.

Those are religious belief statements and I think most UUs would agree with them even though we say that we don’t all believe the same things. Nevertheless, taken together, they point to the core beliefs of Unitarian Universalism. Already you’ve said a lot, and that conversation over the guacamole must be well underway by now.

Be sure to ask questions about the other person’s faith, so that it’s a real conversation. You can model the religious tolerance and respect for diversity that we are always talking about by being truly interested in their understanding of religion and their reasons for the choices they have made. They probably wouldn’t have stuck with the conversation this long if they weren’t really interested in talking about it, so give them a chance, too.

There are several basic points that I think should be made about Unitarian Universalism to the receptive but uninformed listener. I just touched on some of them. As I said with the "elevator question," the individual authority to determine belief is probably the most important if you have to pick only one. Here are a few others:

Our understanding that "revelation is not sealed." That is, there are always new truths being discovered, new ways of understanding the world and the human experience. We are open to new understandings, we are curious, we are willing to change our minds given new information.

Several months ago I wrote a newsletter column about what it means to be a liberal. Around here that is not necessarily a positive word, yet it’s one I’m proud to claim, because "liberal" means, among other things, "favoring proposals for reform, open to new ideas for progress, and tolerant of the ideas and behavior of others; broad-minded." Indeed, this is certainly a way of describing us as liberal religionists, for believing that revelation is not sealed means being open to new ideas and being broad-minded.

Another way to say this is that ours is a living tradition, as exemplified by the title of our hymnal, Singing the Living Tradition. Calling ours a living tradition suggests that we have both roots and wings — roots in the traditions that come from our long history, and wings in the qualities of liveliness and open-mindedness that are part of being a living, changing, evolving entity.

This is what Wallace Robbins alluded to when he wrote, "Ours is a non-creedal church—not because we have no beliefs, but because we will not be restrained in our beliefs." We will not be limited or tied down by a creed that was written many hundreds of years ago in a culture that was much different from today’s, for a church that was much different even from the Christian church of today. As our world changes, so will our ways of religious understanding and expression.

Another important point to make about Unitarian Universalists is that we are committed to living our beliefs out in the world. In fact, we try to make our actions as consistent as possible with our beliefs. (And, yes, we sometimes fail at that, because we are human and therefore fallible and inconsistent. But we try.) This marriage of faith and action is what gives us our well-deserved reputation as social activists.

I find it handy when talking about us as social activists, to refer emphatically to our respect for the inherent worth and dignity of every person. This can go a long way toward explaining our historic activism in the abolitionist movement and the attempt to win the vote for women or secure better care for the mentally ill, or a host of other human rights issues; and, more recently, our work for anti-racism, for the rights of women and children, for gay rights and so forth. There are plenty of religious movements in the world which really don’t believe that everyone has inherent worth and dignity. They believe that people are born sinful and wicked, they believe that only some will be saved, they believe that some are unworthy of a place at the table, perhaps because of their gender or their social class or because of who they love. So this is a place where the contrast between your religion and some of the more familiar religions will quickly become obvious, and it will give your listener some context within which to understand you.

Another high value that most Unitarian Universalists hold is the value of reason in religious life. How often have you heard someone say "I like coming to a Unitarian Universalist church because I don’t feel that I have to check my brain at the door." Things have to make sense to us. We value science and the scientific method; we are able, to paraphrase Robbins, to refine religious thought through the dialogue of mind with mind and mind with itself.

Yet — and here comes what sounds like a paradox — there is a growing willingness among many of us to accept Mystery and the inexplicable as a possible destination in the search for truth. Without abandoning our respect for reason, many of us are aware that sometimes acknowledging the mystery is the only way of explaining something. We find a way to hold both, each in its rightful place.

Another thing that is somewhat unique among us is the value we place on the gathered community, and the covenant we have with one another to remain in relationship through the hard times. What holds us in community is this covenant we have made together, rather than our espousal of a common creed. A few years ago, this congregation came up with a statement of covenant which says:

To enable the life of this community, I will:

• Be an active participant and generous supporter;

• Interact with others openly and respectfully;
• Remain responsible for my spiritual growth and search for meaning;
• Seek to resolve differences with a loving and understanding attitude;
• Learn about and welcome the gifts and resources of others;
• Acknowledge the existence of boundaries of acceptable behavior and recognize that violations will not be tolerated.

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