Sunday, January 27, 2008

"Our Roots: Part Three

 Where Are We Going?"

A Talk by Barbara Fleming

Namaqua UU Congregation

     In the first two parts of this series, you learned about the Arians, fourth-century dissidents who first rejected the concept of the trinity; Michael Servetus, who burned at the stake for his heretical views, and the Socinians, who brought their radical ideas to England in the 17^th century. In England we met John Biddle, daring author of the book Twelve Arguments (against the trinity) and Theopholus Lindsey, Unitarian preacher. The scene then moved to America, where Theodore Parker, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Hosea Ballou and others began to spread Unitarianism and Universalism. In the latter half of the nineteenth century, we saw activism about social justice begin to emerge in the person of Clara Barton, Samuel Howe and many others. We saw the rigid doctrines of Christianity, which our forefathers had accepted unquestioningly for centuries, begin to fall away.

     As the 20^th century dawns, the fires of activism, the desire to eradicate social injustices,  flicker only faintly among both Unitarians and Universalists. Our two faiths have fallen into the doldrums, losing members and retreating into theological debates and struggles to keep their churches going. Foothills Unitarian in Fort Collins, then called Unity Church, nearly became extinct in the teens. Only the dedication and determination – and money – of a few individuals keep it alive. For a number of years, it is the Congregational-Unitarian Church, supported financially by the Congregationalists, intellectually and spiritually by the Unitarians.

     Not that there aren’t causes to get engaged in. Women still can’t vote (they didn’t gain the vote until 1920, after unbelievable anguish and effort). In most of the country, birth control is illegal; people are arrested in some states for distributing literature about preventing pregnancy. Abortion, if it happens at all, is done in secret, with great danger to the woman. Poverty is everywhere, the KKK is thriving, blacks are oppressed, immigrants mistreated, particularly Germans and Chinese. Child labor is rampant in cities and in some rural areas, and conditions for workers are appalling. Money barons rule civic life to an alarming extent.

     But few Us or Us rise to combat these evils. Surviving the Great War, which we now call World War I, the frenetic twenties with prohibition, speak-easies and the rise of the Mafia, then the Depression, absorbs much of the energy and attention of the faithful, along with everyone else.

     Still, a devoted few hang in there, recognizing that the world and their religious view of it are changing. After decades of polite internal discussion, in 1933 the Unitarians, a non-creedal religion for several decades, come up with a creed of sorts:

 We believe in “the supreme worth of every human personality, the authority of truth, known or to be known, and the power of men of goodwill and sacrificial spirit to overcome all evil and progressively establish the kingdom of God.”

     This statement results from abandoning belief in the literalness and infallibility of the Bible, heaven and hell, the divinity of Jesus as a gift from God, and the resurrection that atoned for sins and promised eternal life. Those precepts had been an integral part of both Unitarianism and Universalism for centuries, and it will be a few more decades before Universalists move entirely away from them. Unitarians retain a deep and abiding faith in a divine presence.

     But views are changing.

     For one, a cataclysmic event shakes the entire world, and both Unitarians and Universalists begin to awaken from relatively isolationist inactivity.

     When World War II breaks out in Europe in 1939, America’s years of complacency are over. Word trickles into this country about the persecution, imprisonment and even eradication of Jews under Nazi rule. Poland falls, then Czechoslovakia. In almost no time, nearly all of western Europe is under German control. Separately, Unitarian and Universalist congregations determine to do all that they can to help the beleaguered Jews.

     The brightest lights in this dark time are Martha and Waitstill Sharp. Waitstill, a Unitarian minister, leaves the comfort and safety of his home to travel to Europe to bring out as many Jews as he can. His wife leaves their children behind to accompany him. Both risk their lives time and time again. Recently the couple were honored posthumously by the state of Israel for their work, only the second Americans to receive such an accolade.

     The work of the Sharps and others to rescue Jews is the genesis for the Unitarian Service Committee, an organization dedicated to bringing about social justice and aiding the disadvantaged all over the world.

     The two faiths are separate at this time, and the work of Universalists is less well known than that of Unitarians, but they too are committing time and energy to relieving the plight of Jews in Europe.

     In 1939, amid this universal upheaval, Unitarians issue a statement that broadens their religious perspective, even though they still consider themselves Christians:

We honor individual freedom of belief, discipleship to advancing truth, the democratic method in human relations, universal brotherhood, undivided by nation, race or creed, and allegiance to the cause of a united world community.

      Growing up in the Unitarian church in Fort Collins, I recited every Sunday, unquestioningly, a statement of belief in the brotherhood of man, the fatherhood of God, the leadership of Jesus and the discipleship of all religious people -- a very male-oriented version of Christianity.

     Among the Unitarians more interested in good works than theology, the light of liberal religion burns strong and bright during this time of urgency – but after the crisis has passed, the country moves toward self-indulgence and material comforts and away from concern for the social ills in our society. It takes a small woman named Rosa Parks and some other brave souls standing up to the stain of segregation to touch the consciousness of the faithful again.

     However, in the decades between WWII and the rise of the civil rights movement, we can celebrate a few heroes of our faith:

• Adlai Stevenson, governor of Illinois and twice candidate for the presidency, a principled politician

• Paul and Emily Douglas, politician and humanitarian respectively, who left a large footprint and made a difference

• Abigail Adams Eliot, pioneer in progressive early-childhood education

• Sophia Lyon Fahs, creator of a progressive religious education curriculum

• Whitney Young, African American leader of the Urban League

• Irma Rombauer, who showed us the joy of cooking

• A. Powell Davies, minister of All Souls Unitarian Church in Washington, D.C., founder of nine Unitarian churches in the D.C. area

     Even before the civil rights movement gets well underway, Unitarians and Universalists begin talking to each other. Both have grown beyond their Judeo-Christian roots, moving away from belief in the Bible as literally true and divinely inspired and toward a more eclectic view of religious wisdom and truth. Both are small in number; Universalism has come closer than Unitarianism to fading away altogether, in part because most mainstream Protestant denominations have given up the idea of a punitive God who sends sinners to hell, taking for themselves the meat of the Universalist message. Both denominations realize how much they have in common, and how much they need each other to keep liberal religion alive in this country. In 1961, they join forces to become the Unitarian Universalist Association and the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee.

            How does that work out?

     To each denomination the other brings gifts. Universalists contribute their deeply imbedded belief in the essential goodness of human beings, the grace of God and the promise of redemption, many of them retaining their belief in an afterlife. They offer optimism and hope. Unitarians contribute their long, proud, heretical history rooted in Christianity, a solid faith tradition, long practice in the democratic process, a rational approach to theological inquiry, their extraordinary history of social justice work, and the humanist perspective of reaching for the best in each of us. Both come to the merger with a long history of putting faith into action to address social ills, and both have long practiced congregational polity, each congregation determining its own ministerial leadership and mission. The headquarters association becomes what it remains today, a central resource for congregations to draw on, a conduit for connection, a unified voice for our faith, and a periodic focal point for district and national meetings.

     In the mid-1960s, Martin Luther King, Jr. injects strength and courage into the drive for civil rights. Many Unitarian and Universalists, newly calling themselves UUs, join this articulate, charismatic Baptist in the gargantuan struggle to free black people from the oppressions of segregation.

     Perhaps most notable of the Unitarian activists is the Rev. James Reeb. We note and remember him because right after he joined the civil rights protest march in Selma, Mississippi, he was brutally murdered by a gang of white supremacists. Reeb made his choice to march for civil rights because he felt his religion mandated that action. His martyrdom helped pass the Civil Rights Act of 1965.

    Working for this critically important cause helps cement the bond between Unitarians and Universalists, but there’s still an elephant in the room. Who are we, and what, exactly, do we believe?

     Those engineering the merger resolve all kinds of logistical questions – but not theological ones.

     By 1985, the merged denominations adopt a statement of principles and purposes incorporating the essential beliefs of each arm of the merged faiths. These statements remain our guidelines twenty-plus years later. Now the UUA has asked congregations to review and consider these principles and sources and will use the feedback to assess possible changes in wording. But for the present, the principles and sources remain the bedrock of our denomination.

      A few years ago the president of the UUA assembled a group of people to assess the status of our faith. This group, the Commission on Appraisal, issued a report after surveying thousands of UUs around the country. Among other observations, they reported that we have many commonly held beliefs:

• We base our convictions upon our own experience of the depth and dimensions of life, which is richer and more complex than any words or concepts we use to describe it.

• We embrace a sense of possibility.

• We are committed to being people of character.

• We claim a vision of religious community that protects and respects individual freedom, fosters acceptance, and supports an active quest for greater understanding and deeper meaning and purpose.

• We are committed to religious community as a place where we work together for a more just and compassionate world.

• We affirm a vision of the natural world as an interdependent web, of which we are inextricably a part—not as dominators but as companions and at times protectors.

     The elephant is still in the room – many of us find it difficult to articulate who we are and what we believe. It’s gotten more challenging as we have become more eclectic. But perhaps it does not matter, for our movement is growing, liberal religion is alive and well, and more and more of us are finding ways to translate our faith into action. Today, we don’t have larger-than-life figures bringing about sweeping, historic social change in our country, but we do have less-noticed, everyday heroes putting their faith into action all over the country. You can find UUs helping to protect physicians who perform abortions, giving sanctuary to immigrants who fled their native land in fear for their lives, performing marriage ceremonies between homosexual couples, welcoming gays and lesbians into their congregations, helping hurricane victims rebuild their lives, creating “green” buildings and living in an environmentally responsible way, contributing time and money to those in need, protesting injustice, picketing for peace, and doing much, much more. 

     In our churches you will find chalices, symbols of light and hope, a visible manifestation first used by the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, rather than crosses, that ubiquitous symbol of traditional Trinitarian Christianity, bespeaking the belief that Jesus died and was resurrected for the mortals’ sins and promising eternal life to the saved. You may find symbols that represent several of the world’s religions. You will surely find inclusivity, diversity and openness. You may well find UUs engaged in animated disagreement – it might be noisy, but it will probably be respectful. You will find traditional hymns in our hymnal with other than traditional words in some of them, and, as the joke goes, you may see the singers reading cautiously ahead to see if they agree with the words. You will find concern about man’s inhumanity to man, unjust wars, and other issues that affect us all. You will find theists, humanists, agnostics, Buddhists, Christians, pagans, wiccans and searchers reluctant to label themselves. Whatever and whoever they are, though, you will find people who have chosen this faith tradition, people who, if asked, might tell you they aren’t entirely sure what they believe or how to articulate it -- they might not even be 100 percent sure why they’re here -- but they are sure they don’t want to be anywhere else.

     Thanks for listening.