In the midst of news reports, candle-light vigils, politicians and clergy speaking words of comfort, conversations with loved-ones and with strangers, advice from trauma specialists, lists of what to say to kids in the aftermath of unspeakable violence; in the midst of prayers, hugs, tears, utter shock, disgust, incomprehensibility, feelings of profound sadness, despair, anger, confusion, vulnerability; in the midst of stories of hiding for dear life in closets, stories of heroism, of self-sacrifice, of unfathomable grief, of outrage, of children close your eyes; in the midst of vows of never again and cries of gun control now; in the midst of the rush to transform this unbridled evil into—not a political opportunity, as some are calling it, but a sacred opportunity, a human opportunity —because it’s long past time to curb this American culture of violence; in the midst of all of this, let us pause, let us breathe, let us just be in each other’s presence and recognize how truly precious it is to be together.

We know this. We know it’s precious to join together in community in a world that seems to do everything it can to drive people apart—to alienate, to fragment, to disconnect, to separate. But this Sunday, after an act of such enormous evil just sixty miles from where we gather—this Sunday when we who weren’t even in the line of fire, we who are blessedly removed from the immediate experience of this evil, but we who still nevertheless long to make sense of what happened, long for comfort, solace and healing—this Sunday when congregations thousands of miles away, all across the nation, are remembering the victims of Friday’s massacre in Newtown—this Sunday we realize anew just how precious it is to be together.  I, for one, am reminded of how much I love each of you. How truly precious it is to be together.

The choir originally planned to sing a piece entitled “Tikkun Olam,” which is Hebrew for the practice of repairing the world. It’s a wonderful piece. You will get to hear it—we’ll be singing it next week. But after the Newtown shooting it didn’t feel right to sing this song this morning. In his remarks at the Friday afternoon press conference in Newtown, Governor Malloy said something akin to “it’s too early to speak of rebuilding.” He’s right. We can’t speak of rebuilding before the families of the victims—and we too—have had time to fully accept what has happened. It still feels so unreal, so impossible. There are presents already bought—maybe even wrapped—for some of these deceased children to open on Christmas morning. It’s not time yet to speak of rebuilding. Rebuilding will come. Repairing will come. Healing will come. Forgiveness will come. Peace will come. But it’s not time yet.

Instead the choir sang, “What Does the World Require of You?” This question seems essential to me. In the aftermath of tragedy, what does the world require of us?  That’s the question I want to ponder now. It’s the question I want you to take with you into this week, into the holidays, into the new year. What does the world require of us? There’s a part of me that answers this question with exasperation, exhaustion, despair, cynicism and helplessness. What can I possibly do? The December 14^th Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting was not only evil, it was absurd, beyond explanation. What is required of us in the face of such violent absurdity? And keep in mind: if it hadn’t happened on Friday, we might have lit candles of concern this morning for the families of the three people who lost their lives on Tuesday when a gunman opened fire in a mall in Happy Valley, OR. And two weeks before that it was two dead in a university classroom in Casper, Wyoming—the shooter happened to be from Vernon. And before that it was seven dead at a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin; July 20, twelve dead in an Aurora, Colorado movie theater; May 30, five dead in a Seattle, WA cafe; April 7, three dead in Tulsa, Oklahoma; April 2, seven dead in Oakland, CA; February 27, three dead in Chardon, OH. I’ve been studying the lists. They are long. And I’m not even touching on the gang violence that plagues urban neighborhoods across the nation and leaves a trail of asphalt chalk bodies and tattered yellow police tape, a trail of shattered lives, broken families, fractured communities. I’ve been working to address violence in Hartford for six years now in coalition with a number of North Hartford pastors. We’re talented, committed leaders who want deeply—even desperately—to make a difference, but the impact we’ve had is embarrassingly small—inconsequential by most measures. What does the world require of us? Who in the world knows? What can we possibly say to these families who’ve lost children to such absurd violence? How can we even remotely know what they feel? What can we possibly do for them that will make a difference? Who in the world knows?

That’s my exasperated, exhausted, despairing, cynical and helpless answer to the question, “What does the world require of us?” And let me be crystal clear: we all get to have our version of that answer. We all get to cry tears of confusion, vulnerability, hopelessness. We all get to throw up our hands and say I can’t handle this anymore! We all get to feel helpless in the face of evil. We all get to plead with the heavens: what is happening to us? We get to have that response because it is real—an honest, human response to evil.

But we don’t get to have it forever. And not even for long. The truth is we aren’t separate from one another. The truth is we aren’t disconnected from one another.  There may be brokenness; there may be fragmentation; there may be alienation; but in the end we depend on one another—and we never see it so clearly as we do in the wake of tragedy. We need one another, as we said in our opening words.[1] We don’t live alone. We don’t live alone. We live in families. We live in communities. We live in town and cities. We live in states. We live in a nation. We live in a world. And this means there are requirements!

What does living in this world in the aftermath of tragic violence require of us? I have three answers this morning.

Requirement #1. In the wake of tragic violence, after your time of despair, seek to ground yourself. Start breathing again. Be intentional about it. Breathe deeply, slowly, fully. Fill your lungs with oxygen and remind yourself it comes from green plants and algae. Remind yourself this air you breathe is evidence of your connection to the whole of life. Not separation, but connection.  Breathe in, and as you breathe, relax, rest, be still, be quiet, be calm. Breathe in, and as you breathe, reflect, concentrate, contemplate, focus, pray. Then, still breathing, when you feel ready, start to move. Slowy at first. Gently at first: bend, bow, stretch, lengthen, extend, reach. Keep breathing. And then, when you feel ready: walk, roll, run, dance. Then, still breathing, as you feel ready, begin to create. Creative acts are so essential to moving out of despair and finding our ground. Write, compose, sing, speak, play, act, sculpt, craft, paint, draw. Feel yourself slowly coming back to yourself.

If you can, go outside. Touch the ground, the soil, the earth—the beautiful, dark brown earth. Work in the dark, brown earth. Play in the dark, brown earth. Tend it, till it, turn it, plant seeds, nurture what comes forth. Let the dirt get on your hands, under your fingernails, between your toes. Feel yourself coming back to life. Listen for the still small voice. Hear your own truths, your convictions emerging once again. They are there. They’ve never actually left.

The mystic Howard Thurman wrote, “How good it is to center down!”—he’s talking about becoming grounded—“to sit quietly and see oneself pass by! / The streets of our minds seethe with endless traffic; / Our spirits resound with clashings, with noisy silences, / While something deep within hungers for the still moment and the resting lull. / With full intensity we seek, ere the quiet passes, a fresh sense of order in our living; / A direction, a strong sure purpose that will structure our confusion and bring  meaning in our chaos.”[2]  Maybe you can find your grounding quickly. Maybe you’re tying and you can’t quite get there yet. Maybe you need more time. It’s ok. Despair is not easy to overcome. Take your time. Don’t be afraid to ask for help. But have hope: your center is there—it’s real. You’ll find it. The world requires this of us. In the wake of tragedy, in the wake of violence, after our time of despair, seek grounding.

Requirement #2. In the wake of tragedy, with your despair now trailing behind you, from a place of groundedness emerging within you, attend—however you can—to suffering. It may not be clear for some time how we can be of service to the families of those who died in the Newtown shooting, especially at a distance. But we can be sure the suffering is extraordinary. We can be sure the suffering will last. We can be sure the suffering will ripple around the state and the nation for years to come. Already I see people on Facebook who know someone who lost a child in the shooting; or who know someone who knows someone who died; or who used to live in that part of the state; or who work in the Newtown schools; or who live in Newtown but whose children attend a different school; or who live one town over; or like Scott and Christine Hapgood, who used to attend here, who asked if we could hold up the name of a friend of theirs,  Laurie Veillette, an EMT who lives in Newtown and was one of the first responders; or like Pat Eaton-Robb—a member here—who’s been in Newtown covering the story for the Associated Press; or like Rev. Jeanne Lloyd—also a UUS:E member—who serves our congregation in Woodbury, two towns over from Newtown, and who will certainly need support as she conducts ministry just a few miles from the site of the shooting. It may not be feasible for us to provide any kind of direct care to the families of the victims, but this suffering, this pain, this trauma will ripple around and around. If and when you encounter it, attend to it. That is, stay present to it. We help alleviate suffering through our presence. Offer a helping hand, a kind word, a hug, a supportive conversation. If and when you encounter it, hold on. Don’t let go. Don’t look away. Don’t turn away. Take time. Make yourself available. Again, stay present.

The doctor-turned-spiritual-writer, Rachel Naomi Remen, says “There is in life a suffering so unspeakable, a vulnerability so extreme that it goes far beyond words, beyond explanations and even beyond healing. In the face of such suffering all we can do is bear witness so no one need suffer alone.”[3] The world requires this of us. In the wake of tragedy, with your despair finally fading behind you, from a place of groundedness, attend however you can to suffering.

Requirement #3. In the wake of tragic violence, having moved beyond despair, having grounded yourself, having attended to suffering, it’s time to engage in the work of repair. It’s time to rebuild what has been destroyed. It’s time to change what isn’t working, to address the sources of suffering—at least those that are within our power to address. And here I want to say a few words about gun control. I don’t believe there is any law or set of laws that can keep us totally safe from the kind of horrific violence we saw in Newtown on Friday. My sense is that if a person is as tormented, confused, angry and violent as this shooter was, and if they become—for whatever reason—driven to commit an act of violence, and they really want to procure a gun, and if they’re persistent, they’ll likely be able to get one regardless of the law. But friends, that is no argument for the United States of America to continue its reckless habits of lax gun control. As I hinted at the beginning of my remarks, working for stricter gun control now is not the politicization of a tragedy; it is a moral imperative whose time is long past due. Changing American guns laws to make ownership more restrictive, to make guns more traceable, to close gun show sale loopholes, to hold dealers accountable when guns they sell are used in crimes, to hold owners accountable when they fail to report when their guns have been stolen, and to limit the kinds of guns people can own (i.e., assault weapons are not necessary for hunting)—all of these changes will save thousands upon thousands of lives. In my view, this is the work of repair emerging from Friday’s tragedy.

 

I suspect the Newtown shooting will change the direction of the conversation about gun control in this country. It’s a tipping point. And it is my hope this morning that people on both sides of the gun control debate can come together and agree on a sensible, sane approach to gun ownership that continues to protect Second Amendment freedoms but makes change substantial enough to stop the madness of American gun violence.

I suppose that sounds naïve. At least there’s a part of me that fears it is. And perhaps in this moment, just 48 hours after the shooting began at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, it is too soon to talk about repairing what is broken. We aren’t there yet. We’re still trying to get beyond despair to groundedness. But the world requires this of us—after finding our grounding, after attending to suffering, we must work to repair the world.

Some final thoughts: I think it’s possible that on a morning like this morning it all feels like too much. How to find grounding in the midst of despair? It feels like too much. How to bear witness to the suffering inflicted on the people of Newtown, or any suffering we may encounter? It feels like too much? How to engage in the work of repair, especially when we know the immense power of the forces opposing changes in U.S. gun laws? It feels like too much. This brings to mind an excerpt from the Irish writer, Seamus Heanney’s play The Cure at Troy. He writes: “History says, Don’t hope / On this side of the grave.” That is, there are reasons to feel down, to feel demoralized, to feel despair. We’re witnessing one 60 miles down the road. And history is filled with them.  “History says, Don’t hope / On this side of the grave.”

But Heanney doesn’t succumb. He refuses to learn this lesson. And so should we. He continues: “Once in a lifetime / The longed-for tidal wave / Of justice can rise up, / And hope and history rhyme. / So hope for a great sea-change / on the far side of revenge. / Believe that a further shore / Is reachable from here. / Believe in miracles/ And cures and healing wells.”[4]

Friends, the truth is we are connected—to each other, to the people of Newtown, to all people, to all life. We are connected and therefore world requires certain things of us. In the wake of tragic violence, in the midst of despair, first seek grounding. Then attend to suffering. Then work to repair the world. Why try to meet these requirements? Because a further shore is reachable from here. May we reach it.

Amen. Blessed be.