Coordinator: Lynn Dove
The service today is presented by the UUS:East delegates to the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly in St. Louis, Missouri, in June of this year. We intend to share our experience and how it changed us, and to give you some of the flavor of General Assembly.
Pastoral Prayer JEANNE Lloyd
People suffering from heat waves across the country.
People suffering from missiles that fall from the sky.
And, people are still trying to come to grips
With the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina
One year later.
Our lives turn in ways we least expect
And don’t want.
Still, to live in this world
you must be able
to do three things:
love that which is mortal;
hold that love and those mortal
against your bones knowing
your own life depends on it;
and, let them go
love and those loved
when the time comes to let go,
let them go.
We seek peace for each other
And with each other.
We seek justice and compassion
For everyone,
Ourselves as well.
May grace enter our hearts.
May what we do
Be the answer.
May it be so.
Amen.
REFLECTION: Nancy Parker
Transformation Because of GA?
During this year’s GA, it didn’t seem to me that I was being transformed at all. The whole experience seemed much less dramatic than 2005’s GA. The workshop leaders were mostly regular UUA leaders. Not that they’re anything to sneeze at, but I had no sense that I was being nudged to change my life dramatically.
That was until I tried to summarize my notes in preparation for planning this service. Listen to a few quotes from a variety of workshops and plenaries and see if you detect a pattern.
In the John Murray Lecture, Robert Hardies, minister of All Souls Church in Washington, D.C., told about feeling downhearted recently. He then spoke about John Murray, who arrived in the United States in 1771 equally downhearted. He was welcomed by Thomas Potter, with “arms wide open and a smile on his face.” "Come, my friend," said Potter, "I have been expecting you for a long time." Hardies said, “Murray 's despair was met by Potter's faith, a faith and love that is stronger than despair.” Thus they both experienced the healing properties of radical hospitality.
In the second plenary, Meg Riley said we get one quarter million visitors a year. We need to repel fewer visitors. We do this by being religious, passionate, and spiritual. New people stand out – TALK TO THEM. [To do this effectively] We need the ability to tolerate pain. Conflict avoidance equals the suppression of pain.
David Korten, author of The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community, said that corporations convert the life energy of people into money, making money while the earth is dying. How do they continue to do this? They tell stories about imperial prosperity and force. We must change the stories. We must, through our stories, develop a growing sense of community – cultural, economic, political – a global civil society.
In the Starr King Lecture, we heard again from Robert Hardies, this time discussing Rebecca Parker’s book, Blessing the World, which he had edited. She said, “Very often, despair leads to a breakthrough. To move from despair to healing, we must move out of our stuckness and numbing and listen to those most impacted by violence, listen to their wisdom. We must find mercy, grace, hope in deep places. We must make a commitment to being here and ask ourselves, ‘Am I willing to live?’”
And in her final report, the moderator, Gini Coulter, departed from her planned remarks to tell us about a couple of racial incidents that had taken place at GA once again this year.
She said that we need to take home the desire to learn more about anti-racism and other oppressions. We need to get in touch with the part of ourselves annoyed by anti-racism work. We change by being tolerant of pain. Good systems keep pain in the right place.
Over and over throughout GA came the message: Reach out to others, to those who are like us and to those who are different from us. Tell our stories. Be prepared to share out own pain and to listen to the pain of others. Meet others at a deeper level. This will help both with healing and with attracting others to our liberal religion. It will allow us to relate to those whose thinking is very different from ours.
While none of this was startlingly new, the repetition through many venues did get me thinking about how it all might apply to me. The one fact that jumps out at me when I think about my own life is its busyness. Each day is a battle to do at least some of the jobs that are backed up in my various areas of activity. What did I say I’d do at the ICEJ meeting? Did I make the phone calls I said I’d make for the Anti-Racism Committee? On and on. How much of this is really useful and how much keeps me from deeper connections with those I meet every day? I don’t have an answer but, since GA, I do find myself paying greater attention to the question. Watch this space!
“Hardies closed with John Murray's benediction. ‘Go out into the highways and byways of America. Give the people something of your vision. You may possess only a small light but uncover it, let it shine, use it in order to bring more light and understanding to the hearts and minds of men and women. Give them, not hell, but hope and courage.’
What Are We Doing Here?
Jeanne Lloyd
August 06, 2006
What are we doing here?
What are we doing here?
What are we doing here?
You will hear, today, the term “right relations” several times.
It was spoken of many times at GA.
But it has deep meanings that are important to understand,
if you are to make sense of this service,
if you are to make sense of our place here,
if you are to make sense of your life.
“Right relations” is both an ethical term and a theological term.
Ethics is the consideration of how people ought to behave
given what they believe and value. Religious values and meaning suggest some behaviors and not others,
some decisions and not others.
Ethics asks us to choose intentionally
and to act with integrity on what we believe and value.
It asks us what are we doing here?
Janet Heller
GA 2006 Right Relationship with the Earth
For me GA was about making connections with people who are working for a better world in many different ways. My hopes and anticipation of connecting with others involved in Green Sanctuary work were not disappointed. I was thrilled to see that the hard work done by the many volunteers and few staff at the UU Ministry For Earth was finally beginning to get the long overdue recognition it so deserves. While for years the UUA and GA have been outstanding in speaking out for social justice issues, those of us concerned with environmental justice issues have often felt sidelined. This year the UU General Assembly truly began to place environmental justice front and center. This happened in several ways, but especially through the brief ceremony honoring the 19 new Green Sanctuaries, one of course being UUSE, in the full plenary session before 4000 people, and with UUA President Bill Sinkford there to greet and congratulate each new Green Sanctuary congregation.
You probably know that on the last day of GA the assembly voted on an unprecedented Statement of Conscience concerning the Threat of Global Warming. I was heartened by the commitment of many people from various committees and UUA Affiliates who had all come together prior to GA, named themselves the Community of Earth, and worked hard to improve the Statement of Conscience. This group hammered out what became the basis for many of the amendments that allowed the final statement of Conscience on Global Warming to be a much stronger document than the original draft.
It now calls on us as UUs personally, in our congregations and as a denomination to take very serious action about the huge crisis that global warming and climate change is bringing to the entire world. The Statement of Conscience we all passed is both a powerful statement and a plan of action which is strong and clear scientifically, morally, spiritually and politically. I was thrilled to see over 4000 delegates staying the extra hour of the last long plenary session to debate and vote on all the amendments. It was a joy to see the sea of yellow voting cards all over the hall expressing the will of the assembly to pass this Statement of Conscience and then to have the Youth Caucus come up in mass to the pro microphone and to make a statement about why they so strongly supported it.
I felt grateful to be a part of this UU organization and feel its commitment to environmental as well as social justice, to right relationship with the earth community, including the human community, to living in these very interesting times with eyes wide open to the huge challenges that face us, without despair, but rather in hope for working together in community, for forming ever deeper relationships with one another, and for making greater connections with all who seek to bring about what David Korten calls... “the Great Turning.” Hearing David Korten speak on the Great Turning - from Empire and authoritarianism to Earth Community and cooperation - was a highlight of the week for me. ....I am still reading his book and the YES magazine he edits. His ideas make me feel that the work of transforming human culture is possible, doable and essential.
Another highlight was watching the Bridging Ceremony where many young people including our Chamae walked across the stage, named themselves and their home congregations and went from being a youth to a young adult. During the ceremony it was made clear to us what a challenge we have to help UU youth bridge successfully into active spiritually nourished UUs in our congregations. The world we are trying to save and transform is the world they are just now entering. The need to form right relationships with our young adults, to work together, listen to them and help them have a spiritual home in UU congregations is essential for all of us as we go forward.
It was a special joy for me to be Chamae’s sponsor this year. Seeing her transformation from being somewhat overwhelmed and exhausted in the first few days to being deeply inspired and joyful in the last few days was a very special experience, and I am grateful that she let me share that with her.
Chamae Munroe
What are you doing here?
After attending Josh’s moving sermon, these words resounded within me and I began formulating some thoughts in response to it even before we began planning for this service. When I wasn’t attending 5 hr long plenary sessions or running all over st. louis in desperate search of any food to be found, I could usually be found in the dismantling chaos workshop that met every day to promote anti-oppression and anti-racism work. One workshop in particular had a profound impact on me.
All of the attendees were divided into groups and were supposed to represent different schools. Each school was given a bag of supplies and were given the instruction to make a poster that represented what beautiful to meant to them. Some schools received a surplus of supplies, more than they could possibly know what to do with. Other schools received some supplies but were missing crucial elements, such as glue or tape necessary to attach the other materials they were given to the poster. I was in one of the groups given a rather meager assortment of materials. We had to think creatively to somehow represent beauty with a large white piece of paper, a piece of notebook paper, a crayon, a pencil, some sequins and a feather.
Such engineering required a little bit of ingenuity to complete the task set before us and we used the first couple of the 20 minutes to brainstorm. As we were generating ideas, some of the facilitators posing as teachers and administration walking around to the schools came over to our table and started berating us. “I don’t think you’re using your time wisely, you’re not making satisfactory progress on your work here. I think you need to stop talking and fooling around and get to work.”
This sort of negative commentary continued throughout the entire time we were working on the poster. As the members of my group became increasingly frustrated, one of the members voiced their feelings of dislike of how we were being treated and tried to come up with effective ways of how we could deal with the oppressive atmosphere. Our solution was to remain quiet and work diligently on our poster, effectively depriving them of any reason to criticize us. We executed this behavior, yet the next time they approached us we were accused of being loud and obnoxious. The fact that we were silently working had no relevance whatsoever to their allegations that we were disrupting the other groups that were desperately trying to make their posters.
To be placed in such a blatant contrary situation was terribly frustrating for me. I felt as though our group was a school of salmon, desperately trying to swim upstream. No matter what we did, it simply was not going to be good enough and the automatic response was vigilant opposition.
Experiencing this particular anti-racism workshop for me was like putting on the glasses of a colored person. All of the groups that were given lavish amounts of resources contained all the people of color within them, while the groups who were lacking necessary tools were all white groups. This workshop really opened up my eyes to having to attend an underprivileged school and yet be charged with competing with standards met by schools with greater supplies to help them meet goals set. I really felt the frustration that no matter what we did and how hard we tried, that it simply was not going to be met with encouragement or praise. It wasn’t our work that was being judged, but rather how we were perceived as people, and that verdict had been declared long before our time. The constant condemnation provoked a deep sense of hopelessness and despair and if I were made to endure it for any longer than 20 minutes, I doubt I would have had the resolution to continue on. To try to succeed in such an inhospitable environment seemed like insanity.
Later on in GA I was approached by a young lady in a wheelchair who asked if I would join her on the dance floor. Since I had been rather introverted throughout GA, I really appreciated her efforts at reaching out to me. After a little while, we went back over to the convention center and since it was late in the day and I’m sure her arms were tired, she asked me if I would push her. Having to carefully maneuver around the curb and to come at the ramp in the sidewalk at just the right angle, having to push the button to open the door, really made me more aware of how life is a little more difficult if you aren’t able-bodied. This was in an area that had made accessibility accommodations too; I can’t even imagine trying to get into a building that only had stairs.
So why am I telling you all this? It is the beginning of my own reply to “why are we here?” and I want to share one last personal experience that helped shed some light in answering this question. I was at the coffeehouse because sharing one another’s talents and expressions of self are one of the most spiritual practices to me. Since my birthday at the end of May it seemed as though my life had been on fast forward between entering adulthood, graduating, celebrating, and then going to GA. There was a lot of changes going on in my life, new adjustments to be made and realizations to be had but one thing was followed by the other so rapidly that I didn’t have time after any of them to just sit and be still, to process what was going on. At the coffeehouse though, I finally entered a more relaxed atmosphere and listening to a girl tap dance and fire out poetry, everything just sort of hit me like an anvil and I started bawling. For anyone that knows me, I really have problems with anyone seeing me at anything less than my best and crying certainly is NOT my best. As soon as the tears started rolling, my first reaction was that I should go back to my room where I could sob in solitude rather than a room full of people. But then I asked myself why? Why should I go and be by myself when what I need most was to feel connected to the rest of humanity? I feel as though our faith is one where we should be able to be our entire selves, for good or for worse and to support one another through it all. To me, that is what solidarity is all about and is why religions exist at all. And so I stayed and my convictions were confirmed. As I sat with my head buried in my arms, a fellow worshiper came and sat next to me and took the truth straight from my heart. “I’ve been where you are right now before and if my experiences speak at all to where you are now, you are crying in a room full of people because you don’t want to be alone.” He sat there beside me and his presence gave me the support I was in need at the moment. He saw my suffering and he reached out, striking at a chord deep within my soul with the statement, “If we’re not here for each other, then why are we here?”
JEANNE
“If we’re not here for each other, then why are we here?”
You’ve heard me say before:
A good religion,
like a good lover,
will draw out the best in you.
Will call you forth into a new light
where who you are and what you do,
is congruent with what you believe.
Ethical decision making is based on rules
modeled on the Ten Commandments.
The basis for the Ten Commandments was a covenant
that God made with Israel.
Covenant is a religious term
describing a relationship of commitment and responsibility.
The covenant between Israel and God goes like this:
“I will be your God and you will be my people.”
It is relational.
A covenant is not a contract.
It is not a creed.
It does not dictate correct doctrine or belief.
A covenant outlines a relationship and it is voluntary.
An unconditional agreement between one or more people.
In their covenant with God,
people promised to act in ways
that express, value, and serve . . . the relationship.
Rules were then developed to guide these promises.
And, in right relations,
the test of any rule’s ethical capacity
is how well it expresses, values, serves, and protects the relationship that generated the rule.
Respecting others and resolving conflicts means,
in this case,
relating, despite the conflict;
committing to stay connected,
to learn together,
and to discover mutually satisfying resolutions
that cannot be discovered or imagined alone.
“Evil” is the violation of relation in human life.
Relation is how justice is made and re-made.
Redressing wronged relations and confronting
those powers that violate relations
and harm human well-being makes for justice.
An ethic of right relating calls us to be responsible
not only to past events demanding justice and fairness,
but also in the present.
We may not be responsible for what happened in the past
(or we may)
but we are responsible for how we respond
and for what happens now.
Under the ethic of right relations,
we hold others accountable when people’s rights are violated;
and we support them in healing.
TED PAPPAS:
right relations of our congregation with other congregations
Transformation, Change and the Process of Becoming on a Congregational Level
I traveled to St. Louis a day before general Assembly to attend the inaugural sessions of a new leadership training, called UU University. The Boston staff of the Association put together a number of strands that we could choose from. I attended workshops involving membership and generosity, and was struck by a common language and a unifying theme to both of those topics.
Our speakers described what I realized is beginning to take place right here in our own church. The vision, mission and ministry of a congregation were stressed, much as the vision of our society has been described in our strategic plan. Our plan talks about growth but it also gives voice to our vision. A vision that describes what we should do, what we are called to do, and what our faith requires of us.
I’m sure that earlier in my spiritual journey I would never have used the phrase “What our faith requires us to do.” That phrase suggests a dogma, a prescription for living. But as I said earlier, transformation is a process of becoming, a process of growth and change. And as I am personally growing, changing, maturing, I am gaining a greater understanding of the fact that there are, indeed, requirements placed upon me by my lifelong involvement with unitarian universalism.
My faith requires of me a sharing and a commitment to the future. It requires an openness and a commitment to the democratic process and the democratic spirit. It requires of me a commitment to enhance the spiritual development of this group of people, worshipping together, and a commitment to those seekers who have not yet found us. It requires a commitment to the belief in the power of dreams. To believe in what is plentiful in our congregation, rather than to dwell on what is scarce.
When we come to this church, we come because we are seeking a [cure] to the inertia of the spirit. We come to a place which replenishes our spirits and our souls. A place where our community, coming together, magnifies and enriches the spirit and the soul within each of us.
In short, we are looking for a place that transforms us, and lets us realize [who we are becoming].
Just as I have these commitments to you, G.A. and UU University reinforced those commitments and requirements I have to the larger community. By larger community, I not only mean those who are still seeking a religious home, but other Unitarian Universalists in Connecticut. Many of you are aware of our combined efforts with the churches and societies in Norwich, Storrs, New London and Brooklyn. Our hopes to call two new ministers to Eastern Connecticut to help Josh and the other ministers of those congregations have been met with enthusiasm by the UUA in Boston.
I have also had preliminary meetings with church leaders in Hartford and West Hartford. The three of us hope to find ways to raise the profile of Unitarian- Universalism in the greater Hartford area, and to have fun doing it.
Just as we are looking for a place that transforms us, I hope that these efforts in the larger community with like minded UU’s, will bring closer cooperation regionally, and make it easier for others who need us to find us, adding to their vitality and our own vitality as well.
JEANNE:
An ethic of right relations
is the moral implication of interdependence.
It asks that relationships be considered prominently
in ethical decision making.
A test then of any action under an ethic of right relations
is whether it shows evidence of having
considered and valued relationships and connections.
What are we doing here?
What is the evidence?
An ethic of right relations encourages us to do what we can,
here and now.
It asks what are the values and beliefs
we affirm and want expressed in our relating now?
It acknowledges that disconnection and estrangement,
conflict and breakdown,
disappointment and hurt,
happen in relating.
But, relating is how we change,
forgive,
learn,
heal,
and grow.
Relating is not only how everything happens.
Relating is how anything ever will happen.
It asks, “What can we do now?”
Or
“What are we doing here?”
Amen.
