How Shall We Live?
Part III: Ashes and Other Paths to Joy
The Rev. Joshua Mason Pawelek
Unitarian Universalist Society: East
Manchester, CT
October 14, 2007
I begin my trek through the Unitarian Universalist principles with #3, “Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.” I begin here because I experience this principle to be the least helpful of the seven in answering the question, “How shall we live?” I find it too general, too vague—perhaps even too touchy-feely—to guide us to real depth. I’m not against touchy-feely—I love a good hug. But, like ashes in the mouth of St. Francis, our principles ought to guide us in a far more compelling way toward the infinite, toward soul-joy, toward hallelujah, toward mystery, toward what the Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron calls the “soft spot.”
I also find the third principle confusing because it is comprised of two separate principles—“acceptance of one another” and “encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.” I trust there was a perfectly good reason why these two principles were joined into one when the principles were revised in the early 1980s, But today I see no viable reason to keep them together. Since there are two principles here, I’m not going to short-change you and sneak both into one sermon. I’m going to start with spiritual growth and come back to acceptance at a later date.
I’m starting with “spiritual growth” because I suspect we may need to sit with this principle the longest. I have a hunch that what we say about spiritual growth—and how we approach spiritual growth—has implications for our understanding of the other principles. I suspect the lack of a collective UU understanding of spiritual growth is one of our greatest weaknesses. I want to take sufficient time to define spiritual growth, and to begin seeking new language for this principle so that it becomes more central and provocative in our lives. I want spiritual growth to be not just something we “encourage”—that language is far too ineffectual to me—but something foundational to our personal health and well-being, foundational to the strength and cohesion of our communities. Spiritual growth as an ancient and still vital facet of human development; spiritual growth as an expectation within our congregations, as a way of orienting our days, as a powerful force that shapes and directs our lives. Spiritual growth so that we may experience the infinite and the eternal. How shall we live? We shall live as people striving for great spiritual depth.
I am fully aware that the words “spirit,” “spiritual” and “spirituality” mean different things to different people. Some Unitarian Universalists bristle and shudder at these words, see no place for them in their lives, regard them as ancient relics used to explain the unexplainable before modern science had figured out the nature of stars, cells, and atoms. Some are energized by these words, long for them in their lives, feel so many of the world’s problems emerge from a lack of authentic spirituality and a warping of the great spiritual traditions. And some are unsure of these words, unsure how they think and feel about them, remaining open but simultaneously harboring a healthy skepticism.
Because of these different and conflicting Unitarian Universalist appraisals of spirituality we have become, as a movement, somewhat ambivalent about matters of spirit. “Can we say that? Spirituality? What if someone doesn’t like that word?” I think this has to change. I never again want to find myself in a Unitarian Universalist pulpit where one has to tip-toe carefully around the subject of spirituality, or lecture about it as if it were something more serious religious people do. I won’t tip-toe, and I feel blessed to not have to in this pulpit. Spirituality is the primary resource available to any religion to enable its people to connect with the infinite and the eternal, to discern the meaning of their lives, to find the personal and collective power to work for peace and justice. To the extent we avoid conversations about spirituality, we are cutting off the hand that feeds.
In my current thinking about spirituality, and in my approach to my own spiritual life, I see two overarching stages of adult spiritual growth. Both stages require intentionality, although spontaneity and randomness play an important role. Both stages, far as I can tell, are relevant and accessible no matter what one’s theology happens to be. I also note these stages repeat. We’re not done when we get to the second stage. As we grow we cycle through these stages over and over again, increasing the depth of our insight and compassion each time through.
Remember the lyrics from our earlier hymn: “From all the fret and fever of the day, let there be moments when we turn away, and, deaf to all confusing outer din, intently listen for the voice within.” This is the first stage. Learn the voice within. Know yourself. Know who you are and what you value. Amidst the rush and crush of life, amidst the demands of work and family, amidst the constant barrage of messages from some sources other than you, amidst all the fret and fever of the day, listen for the voice within. Learn to recognize it. Learn to value it, respond to it, proclaim it, defend it, rely on it, follow it. Let it be your plumb-line, your guide. Examine it. Dialogue with it. Challenge it if you need to. Your life does harbor a deep and abiding truth and there is a voice within—a heart voice—a soul voice—a mind voice—a body voice—always speaking that truth.
This is not fluffy, liberal religious rhetoric. This is modernist spirituality. This is faith in the knowing self; faith in the authority of the self. This is learning to trust one’s intuition, one’s feelings, one’s body. This is Descartes announcing, “I think, therefore I am.” This is Emerson proclaiming, “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.” This is Whitman lying in the grass, singing, “I loafe and invite my soul.” This is Howard Thurman contemplating, “How good it is to center down! To sit quietly and see oneself pass by!” This is Mary Oliver musing, “You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” This is that nagging at the edges of your consciousness, telling you it’s time to make a change. This is the passion that wells up inside when struck by an idea of how your life could be. This is the path to self-realization and self-determination. This is often the point of decision: the decision of the gay man to come out of the closet and claim his wholeness; the decision of the infertile couple to adopt and claim their identity as parents; the decision of the worker to strike and claim her dignity; the decision of the pilgrim to crawl on his knees and proclaim his love for his god; the decision of the transgender person to undergo sexual reassignment surgery and proclaim her true self; the decision to pursue a vocation, to finish school, to break an addiction; the decision to create—to write, to paint, to sculpt, to dance, to sing; the decision to turn the soil, plant seeds, water, tend, and harvest; the decision to love what your heart loves; the decision to struggle for what you think is right.
This is the decision of Giovannio Bernardone, after spending a year as a prisoner of war and contemplating the emptiness of his life, to become Francis, to refuse to enter the family business, to vow poverty, to swear off property and money, to love his God and the world. There is an essential you—a voice within—a still, small voice—a hunch—an intuition—and the practice of listening to it is spiritual practice. As we learn to listen, we learn who we are; we see more clearly how to live our lives; and as the conduct of our lives aligns with the voice within, we find ourselves spending more joyful, satisfying, meaningful days. Hallelujah.
This first stage in adult spiritual growth is wonderful. Unitarian Universalism, at its best, enables people to engage in it. And it is not enough for a full spiritual life. In fact, if we stop here, claiming ourselves, proclaiming our truths—as essential as self-realization is—we risk becoming mired in a kind of spiritual selfishness, even narcissism. We risk isolation. We risk taking our privileges for granted. We risk forgetting the world. We risk failing to understand the true source of the voice within. I think this is why St. Francis poured ashes on his food. Using ashes was one of many ways he avoided the risks of too great a focus on the self, held himself accountable to a larger vision, dedicated his life to a greater reality over which he had no control—but which he loved deeply—and moved from the finite to life amidst the infinite. As David James Duncan surmises, Francis “was not a killjoy: he was joy’s greatest lover, choosing, each time he threw ashes on the wondrous flavors of food, a life of no joy but Infinite soul-joy.”
This is what I believe: the voice within is our voice, but only to a degree. It actually functions like a mirror reflecting to us the image of a greater, commanding reality beyond ourselves and over which we have no control, but which we are invited to love very deeply. The second stage of adult spiritual development is to take this self we have identified and claimed and dedicate it to this greater, commanding reality; take this self we have explored, tested and nurtured and empty it out for the sake of this greater, commanding reality; take this self we have sought and found and proclaimed to the world and lay it down on the altar of this greater, commanding reality; take this life we have filled with content, color, passion, creativity, vocation and activism and realize: everything we thought we knew may change; everything we thought was solid and reliable may shift beneath our feet; all our assumptions and goals and loves and joys may turn to ashes in an instant leaving us naked and vulnerable in the presence of this greater, commanding reality. And herein lies our path to joy.
When I say commanding I don’t mean dominating, controlling, wrathful or all-powerful—none of the traditional monotheistic conceptions of God. By commanding I mean a reality so compelling, so potent, so real, so genuine, so truthful, so sensible even in the absence of sense, so vast and awe-inspiring that we, of our own volition, desire and choose to dedicate our lives to it, choose to live within its embrace, choose to accept its grace. This is not the “command” of a general sending troops to battle. This is, again, an invitation to become fully awake to our place in a much larger order, to dance to its rythyms, to sing its melodies, to ride its current, and to love it deeply.
There are many greater, commanding realities. Perhaps the one reflected in you is Nature, and as you learn your self, you begin to recognize nature’s patterns residing at the core of your being, giving sound to your inner voice, and you choose to dedicate your self to the earth, to living in concert with the land, to knowing the ground upon which you stand, to planting and harvesting, to stewarding creation—and this brings you immense joy.
Perhaps your greater, commanding reality is some form of the biblical kingdom of God, and as you learn your self, you begin to recognize the power of loving God and loving neighbor as self, giving sound to your inner voice, and you choose to spend your life striving to make real the values of Jesus and his teachers, the Hebrew prophets—and this brings you immense joy.
Perhaps this greater, commanding reality is a mystery, and as your learn yourself you begin to recognize you are standing at the edge of a cliff, facing the wind, peering into the distance. There is no sure ground upon which to stand, you are shivering and dizzy, but also filled with awe at the possibility contained in such a vast space, giving sound to your inner voice, and you choose to spend your life in its awesome embrace, trusting its strange ebb and flow, trusting that much more is possible than our limited minds can imagine.
The Buddhist nun, Pema Chodron, offers another way of understanding this connection between our inner voice and a greater, commanding reality. She writes: “There is a teaching that says that behind all hardening and tightening and rigidity of the heart, there’s always fear. But if you touch fear, behind fear there is a soft spot. And if you touch that soft spot, you find the vast blue sky. You find that which is ineffable, ungraspable, and unbiased, that which can support and awaken us at any time.”
When we finally hear the inner voice in its fullnes, when we touch the soft spot, we find it is one and the same with our greater, commanding reality. Spiritual growth happens when we choose to enter its embrace, choose to respond to it, choose to move with it rather than resist it, choose to wake up. Then we have the opportunity to cycle back, to discern an even deeper self. The gay man is always more than a gay man. The adopting parent is always more than an adopting parent. The striking always worker is more than a striking worker. The pilgrim is always more than a pilgrim. The transsexual is always more than a transsexual. There are always further regions of the self to discover and explore, always a deeper voice to hear, and thus always a greater, commanding reality to encounter. We cycle around, finding ourselves, and then dedicating ourselves to something greater and in that dedication we open ourselves up to infinite soul-joy.
My friends, I suspect it is true of most religious people, but it is certainly true of Unitarian Universalists: we tend to stop at the first stage. We’re very good at cultivating the self. We get stuck at giving over the self, emptying out the self, dedicating the self. We get stuck at giving up control to a greater, commanding reality. We have little taste for ashes. Perhaps, at least in a metaphorical sense, we need to cultivate that taste. How shall we live? Let us live as people who strive for great spiritual depth; people who listen to the deeper voice within in search of themselves so that, having found themselves, they may offer themselves into the embrace of the infinite and the eternal.
Amen and blessed be.
Beardsley, Monroe, “From All the Fret and Fever of the Day” in Singing the Living Tradition (Boston: Beacon Press and the Unitarian Universalist Association, 1993) #90.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, “Self-Reliance” in Whicher, Stephen E., Selections From Ralph Waldo Emerson (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1960) p. 149.
Thurman, Howard, “How Good to Center Down,” Fluker, Walter E. and Tumber, Catherine, eds., A Strange Freedom (Boston: Beacon Press, 1998) p. 305.
