The Rev. Josh Pawelek
Video at: The Place We Require of Humans
“Who will journey to the place we require of humans?”[1] asks the poet, Sonia Sanchez. This question from her poem “Aaaayeee Babo (Praise God),” has become scripture to me in recent months. I have read it and re-read it, reflecting on its implications for my life and longing to answer “I will. I will journey to the place we require of humans.” In the midst of this longing I also recognize in myself a struggle, a not knowing, a not being sure anymore what, exactly, the journey looks like, what the place is and what is required. But I do know in some instinctual, intuitive, spiritual, ‘beyond words’ way of knowing that I need this question in my life. So I commend it to you this morning: “Who will journey to the place we require of humans?”
Though I confess to not knowing, I am sure of one thing: we human beings, collectively, globally, are not in the right place now. Sonia Sanchez says it with her characteristic grace and edge: “This earth is hard symmetry / This earth of feverish war / This earth inflamed with hate / This patch of tongues corroding the earth’s air.”[2]
Reflecting on “Aaaayeee Babo (Praise God)” led me back to an essay by the Rev. Rebecca Parker, president of the Unitarian Universalist Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley, CA, entitled “After the Apocalypse.” In this essay, which she wrote in the 1990s, she critiques the popular religious notion of a coming apocalypse—a divinely wrought moment of great violence and destruction after which a new heaven and a new earth will emerge out of the ruins of the old.[3] She says humanity needs to let go of this myth in all its forms. She suspects—and I agree—that this kind of spiritual looking forward (even in its liberal form) prevents us from engaging in an honest spiritual looking backward, an honest, collective accounting of where we’ve been. This kind of spiritual looking forward—and these are my words more than hers—prevents us from beginning a deeply-felt, collective process of atonement for and healing of the deep wounds of the past—an atonement and healing that must take place if humanity is to have a future worthy of our looking forward.
Countering specifically those who look forward to a final, violent apocalypse, Parker says, essentially, Come on! Haven’t we had enough already? She says, “We are living in a post-slavery, post-Holocaust, post-Vietnam, Post-Hiroshima world.” Were she to write this essay today, I assume she would add “Post-9/11” and “War on Terror” world. For so many people on this planet, hasn’t the apocalypse already come? She says, “We are living in the aftermath of collective violence that has been severe, massive and traumatic. The scars from slavery, genocide, and meaningless war mark our bodies.” For so many communities on this planet, hasn’t the apocalypse already come? She says, “We are living in the midst of rain forest burning, the rapid death of species, the growing pollution of the air and water, and new mutations of racism and violence”[4] For so many of the earth’s creatures, hasn’t the apocalypse already come? She says, “We must relinquish our innocence and see the world as it is…. We must notice the breakdown, sorrow, and legacies of injustice that characterize our current world order. From this place of honesty, we must discover how we can live among the ruins.”[5]
From this place of honesty. Perhaps that is the place we require of humans. Perhaps that is where we must journey.
I feel compelled to remind us that tomorrow most of the fifty United States observe Columbus Day in honor of the explorer Christopher Columbus’ arrival in the Americas on October 12, 1492. I have mixed emotions about this observance. One can certainly argue that what Columbus achieved was remarkable, and that his arrival on the island he called San Salvador, but which was known to its inhabitants as Guanahani, opened the doors to an era of European exploration and colonization led eventually to the creation of a truly great nation, the United States of America, a beacon of freedom to the world, a bulwark of democracy, equality and human rights. And one can also argue that this great nation was founded on the near genocide of its indigenous people, founded on a centuries-long struggle to wrest the land from the first nations, founded and made strong on the bloody backs of African slaves, founded through the stealing of land, forced migration, the creation of reservation, the exploitation of workers of all races, and an assault on indigenous cultures such that even today their survival, in many cases, remains quite tenuous. Both arguments can be true—a great nation; a profoundly tragic history.
This history is what Rebecca Parker is asking all of us—Unitarian Universalists, Americans, human beings—to face honestly. This is, I believe, what Sonia Sanchez means by “This earth of feverish war / this earth inflamed with hate.”
Our theological theme for October is atonement. Last Sunday I spoke about atonement in very personal terms, as an individual process in which I first recognize that I’ve missed my mark, that I’ve let others down and, most significantly, that I’ve hurt someone. Second, I seek out the one I’ve hurt and pronounce some version of the words, “I’m sorry. Will you forgive me?” I spoke of the blessings a spiritual practice of atonement yields in our lives, the invitation it extends to us to repair broken relationships, to restore trust, to return to our best selves, to forgive and be forgiven, to know and be known, to love and be loved. I spoke of atonement as an essential practice in managing the conflicts that seem to arise, as if they are inevitable, in human communities. This morning I’m wondering what it would mean for human beings to atone for this earth of feverish war, for this earth inflamed with hate. I’m wondering what it would mean for human beings to really finally atone for slavery and genocide and meaningless war. I’m wondering how that might happen, what that might look like, how one might organize it. I’m wondering how it might change us. I’m coming to believe such atonement is the place we require of humans.
I want to disclose my fear to you. That is, I want to tell you about a feeling of fear I’ve been experiencing in recent months. I think it will help you grasp why I would make the claim that the place we require of humans is a place of atonement. Suffice it to say, I’ve been assigned to write a paper for my clergy study group, the Greenfield Group, to present at its convocation in November. For this convocation we are speculating about the church of the future. What does it look like? What challenges does it face? What ministries does it carry out? One of the books we are reading is former head of Greenpeace International, Paul Gilding’s The Great Disruption: Why the Climate Crisis Will Bring on the End of Shopping and the Birth of a New World. Gilding is convinced that we (meaning we the inhabitants of earth) have “physically entered a period of great change, a synchronized, related crash of the economy and the ecosystem, with food shortages, climate catastrophes, massive economic change, and global geopolitical instability.” [6] What does the church of the future look like is like of a synchronized, related crash of the economy and the ecosystem?
Most of us have heard such dire scenarios foretold before. Some of us take them seriously. Some of us can’t imagine they could possibly come to pass. I’m often in the latter camp, but Gilding has gotten under my skin. I know there are many who will hear or read this and say, “there’s no cause for fear. This is overstated. It’s overly dramatic, left-wing environmentalist manipulation. It’s anti-corporation, anti-jobs, etc.” On the far political and religious right there will be those who say, “There is no climate crisis, no related economic crisis; it’s all a hoax; don’t listen to Gilding; burn that book.”
I read the book. I find him more convincing than anyone else I’ve read on the subject. Gilding is not drawing from biased sources which, admittedly, some environmentalists do. He cites decades of studies from a wide range of sources that warn about the coming of this great disruption. He cites the Pentagon’s 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review that discusses how climate change will act as “an accelerant of instability or conflict, placing a burden to respond on civilian institutions and militaries around the world.”[7] He cites a letter from 33 retired generals and admirals to the Senate majority and minority leaders in April, 2010, stating that “climate change is threatening American security … it exacerbates existing problems by decreasing stability, increasing conflict, and incubating the socioeconomic conditions that foster terrorist recruitment.”[8] This is hardly biased, left-wing fear-mongering.
Gilding also talks about the limits of his previous tactics of direct confrontation with corporations and his recent work in the corporate world trying to build sustainable companies producing sustainable goods, and consulting to multi-national corporations on how to become more responsible global citizens. He appreciates the way profit motives are in constant dialogue with moral and ethical considerations in many corporate boardrooms. He recognizes how so many corporate leaders, in the end, are decent people who want to do the right thing, yet must navigate complex financial and legal structures in order to change corporate cultures.[9] Many of you will disagree with Gilding here and argue that we have to maintain immense pressure on corporations to cease practices that destroy the environment. That’s true. My point is that an honest reading of this book doesn’t lead one to appraise it as a biased, left-wing rant. It is not, which for me, makes his conclusions all the more convincing: we (meaning we the inhabitants of earth) are facing immense loss, suffering and struggle in the coming decades, and there is nothing we can do to prevent it. The damage is already done. This is the source of my feeling of fear.
For the record, Gilding is quite hopeful about humanity’s capacity to adapt to the great disruption. In fact he’s so positive that his tone throughout the book is, well, sunny, and often feels at odds with the future he foresees.
What seems very clear to me is that the reason we’re in this predicament is because we (meaning we the inhabitants of earth) have allowed “This earth of feverish war / This earth inflamed with hate / This patch of tongues corroding the earth’s air.” We’ve allowed it. No single person, no single group of people, no single race, culture or nation it to blame. Many have tried to warn us, but in the end, we (meaning we the inhabitants of earth) have allowed it. It has all happened on our watch. It strikes me that some form of atonement is necessary.
What would that look like? I’m not looking for a global high holy day like Yom Kippur. I’m not looking for some global ritual that will atone for all the atrocities of modern human history. I’m not sure that’s possible. But I am looking for what is within our sphere of influence—our power—here in this congregation. I am fearful of what may be coming, but I also feel very strongly we can be the kind of people who speak honestly about our history and about how it has led us to where we are now. Speaking with such honesty is a form of atonement.
I feel very strongly that we can be the kind of people who feel and express deep remorse for the violence human beings have visited upon each other and upon the earth—not only in the founding and fashioning of this nation, but throughout the world—which has led us to where we are now. Feeling and expressing such remorse is a form of atonement.
I feel very strongly that we can be the kind of people who lament and critique racism, sexism, homophobia, heterosexism and environmental injustice—and work to end them. Such work is a form of atonement.
Yes! We can be the kind of people who lament and critique and work for an end to economic injustice, an end to this vast divide between the wealthy and the poor across the globe. Such work is a form of atonement.
We cannot atone for all the violence and oppression of the modern age—we don’t have that kind of power—but we do have power. We can be the kind of people who use our lives to proclaim “It is time for a new way of being on this earth.” Such proclaiming is a form of atonement.
We can be the kind of people who do everything in our power to build beloved community, among ourselves, and in the wider world. Such building is a form of atonement.
We can be the kind of people who, in the words of Howard Thurman, keep open the doors of our hearts, recognizing that love “is the very essence of the vitality of being,” recognizing the “great disclosure” that “love is stronger than hate and goes beyond death.”[10] Such recognition and such open-heartedness are a form of atonement. Bringing such love to bear in the world is a form of atonement.
We can be the kind of people who do everything in our power to heal this earth of feverish war, this earth inflamed with hate. Such healing is a form of atonement.
We have it within ourselves to be this kind of people. If we want to do what is within our power to help humanity and the earth meet the challenges that lay ahead, to adapt to the radical changes that lay on the horizon, then we must journey to the place required of humans. We must journey to that honest, remorseful, lamenting, critiquing, proclaiming, beloved community-building, open-hearted, healing, loving place. I’m still not entirely sure about what the journey looks like, but I want to go there. I want us to go there. May we go. May we be and may we become that kind of people.
Amen and Blessed be.
[1] Sanchez, Sonia “Aaaayeee Babo (Praise God)” Shake Loose My Skin(Boston: Beacon Press, 1999) p. 151.
[2] Sanchez, Sonia “Aaaayeee Babo (Praise God)” Shake Loose My Skin (Boston: Beacon Press, 1999) p. 151.
[3] Revelations 21:1.
[4] Parker, Rebecca, “After the Apocalypse,” Blessing the World: What Can Save Us Now (Boston: Skinner House Books, 2006) p. 20.
[5] Parker, Rebecca, “After the Apocalypse,” Blessing the World: What Can Save Us Now (Boston: Skinner House Books, 2006) p. 21.
[6] Gilding, Paul, The Great Disruption: Why Climate Crisis Will Bring On the End of Shopping and the Birth of a New World (New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2011) p. 5.
[7] Gilding, The Great Disruption, p. 109.
[8] Gilding, The Great Disruption, p. 109.
[9] Gilding, The Great Disruption, Chapter 2.
[10] Thurman, Howard, “Keep Open the Door of Thy Heart” in Fluker, Walter earl and Tumber, Catherine A Strange Freedom: The Best of Haward Thurman on Religious Experience and Public Life (Boston: Beacon Press, 1998) p. 301.
