-Call to Worship
Olympia Brown, Universalist minister in the 19th century, said:
Each nation must learn that the people of all nations are children of God,
And must share the wealth of the world. You may say this is impracticable, far away, can never be accomplished, but it is the work we are appointed to do!
Sometime, somehow, somewhere, we must ever teach this great lesson.
Sermon –
“How Many Seas Must the White Dove Sail?”All our lives we have questions, and all our lives we look for answers.
Have you ever noticed how many of the songs we sing are filled with questions and answers?
A true religious community helps us in our striving together growing our souls - to feel OK about asking questions – sometimes really hard questions.
And a liberal religious education community helps us to live without knowing all the answers, and helps us to find companionship as we seek the answers.
Shelly Jackson Denham is a wonderful UU musician who teaches peace and social justice to youth at the UU Conference Center called The Mountain in NC. She wrote the hymn we sang earlier, and she suggests that even to question is an answer. By asking questions in community, we find a sort of answer. … Bob Dylan suggests that the answers to all his aching questions are “Blowing in the Wind” – perhaps a reference to the spirit of life, the transcendent?
My new colleagues whom I join in ministering to this congregation – Michael and Joan – will spend a series of Sundays this coming church year asking some of the “Great Questions” that we all face in our lives, as we seek meaning and truth and justice.
This morning – in the songs we sang and the witness to Hiroshima – we have already pondered the bulk of what I would call today’s sermon.
1. We cry for peace, peace, when there is no peace. When will we learn? How long will it take?
2. Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.
In every religion in the world, peace is lifted up as a divine goal. The ultimate goal, the vision of the Beloved Community, the Kingdom of God, is one where the lamb and the lion shall lie down together. Heaven is often viewed as the peaceful rest, following a life filled with strife and struggle.
Peace is a vision, a goal, a value shared by so many people for so long.
And yet - when have we experienced it – either as individuals or as a human society?
We cry for peace, peace, when there is no peace - Even when we can be fortunate enough to avoid warfare among nations, we find violence in the streets, and in many of our homes.
We have the vision. We share the longing for peace. Many of us work for it in our careers, or in our daily lives. Many of us realize that peace must be actively worked on – in our hearts, in our families, in how we spend money, pass public policy, and on and on.
But it’s not here, and it hasn’t been here since Adam and Eve left the Garden.
So where is hope? Where is the good news for us, to keep us singing the song of freedom and hope and courage in the face of despair?
We Unitarian Universalists are very fortunate – we have something in our history, our principles, and our covenant – that can sustain us. And our liberal theology gives us reason to believe that we can become part of creation of a beloved community – we can be peace-makers.
Historically, it was our radical Reformation good king John Sigismund who back in the 1500s in feudal Europe became the first ruler to declare tolerance of religious belief. He said, “I am Unitarian, but that does not mean my citizens must share my belief. People are free to practice their own religion! In my kingdom, all faiths are tolerated.” That practice – toleration – is an active peace-building quality that has been extremely rare in the history of humankind. It has – from the beginning – been central to what Unitarianism, what liberal religion stands for!
Tolerance.
The second feature of our Unitarian faith – historically back hundreds of years, and still today, is insistence on reason. Human reason, the power of our inborn intelligence that can be nurtured and blossom – and with Emerson and the Transcendentalist, that quality was enlarged to include intuitive knowing – human reason and intuition are keystones of our liberal religion. We will not allow our actions to be guided by blindness or superstition or peer pressure or mob rule. We can be wiser than that; we can gain insight and truth by using our reason and intuition of the right. Using our brains can be a way to help build peace.
A third quality, which our faith has always stood for - is freedom. With freedom, with people being free to live out their lives without oppression, peace can be built on solid ground. In this nation, for over 200 years, Unitarians and Universalists have known that the peace of a kingdom of heaven here on earth can be achieved ONLY by working for freedom and justice for those still in chains – freedom and justice for slaves, for women, for the hungry, for immigrants, for people of minority religious beliefs, for gays and lesbians. Until all people are free, none of us truly is. Until we build peace for all, there can be peace for none.
And look at our seven principles. These are the guideposts that our UU congregations have agreed to use to keep us in relationship with one another – so that we can be real peace-builders in the world. We pledge to affirm and promote (and I think those are active verbs, affirm and promote)
¨ the inherent worth & dignity of every person
¨ justice, equity, & compassion in human relations
¨ acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth
¨ a free & responsible search for truth & meaning
¨ the right of conscience and the use of democratic process
¨ the goal of world community with peace, liberty & justice for all
¨ and respect for the interdependent web of all existence
If we affirm and promote these principles,
¨ if we talk about what they mean to us and how we practice them in our lives –
¨ if we vote in elections guided by them –
¨ if we help our children understand them –
¨ if our Mastercard and Visa statements reflect these principles –
then we are in fact peace-makers. BLESSED are the peacemakers – you shall be called children of God!!
In little ways – making this a loving community of caring friends, teaching our children
In bigger ways – reaching out to our neighborhoods; working with our Peace Camp each summer; and helping with mentoring and housing and living wage issues
In worldwide ways – clearing a field of landmines, helping bring human rights to all people
Then we can look at the problems, ask the hard questions, seek the answers, and not lose hope! Dorothy Day reminds us:
People say, what is the sense of our small effort.
A pebble cast into a pond causes ripples that spread in all directions. Each one of our thoughts, words and deeds is like that.
No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless, There’s too much work to do!
And I want you all to know that I think our UU principles can sustain us in this effort!
And so – let me encourage us all to support one another as we ask the hard questions and – yes – maybe feel hopeless at times – let us all support one another in this loving community – that there is more love, more hope, more peace possible for us all.
Let us teach it. Let us sing it!
¨ If you are not part of this community, join us.
¨ If you are a part of this community, but have not yet found a way to be a peace maker, join us in the exploration of the work.
¨ If you have found a way to make peace, then become one of our peace teachers!
We all need each other for this. Sing together # 95!
Benediction
Please remain standing, and join hands to feel the touch of human community which can sustain you in the week to come:
Go in peace. Live simply, gently, at home in yourselves.
Act justly. Speak justly.
Remember the depth of your own compassion.
Forget not your power in the days of your powerlessness.
Crave peace for all people of the world,
Beginning with yourselves,
And go as you go with the dream
Of that peace alive in your heart.
Postlude
This morning we are pleased to welcome John Steinbach and Japanese Hibakusha guests, two survivors of the August 6, 1945 bombing of Hiroshima. They will be bringing a gift of 1,000 paper cranes for the church. Ms. Fumiko Amano was with her parents and bother when the A-bomb was dropped on them. Her brother died Aug 19th, 1945. Ms. Keiko Hara was 5 years old when she was bombed in Hiroshima.
They invite you to remain after the church service for conversation with them. And they invite you to join them at the anniversary commemoration, being held this afternoon beginning at 5:30 at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
