Blessings ~

Practice gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude, gratitude ~

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Sadness, Outrage, Action


Sadness, Outrage, Action

I’m having a difficult time focusing this evening.  I intended to leave the office hours ago.  I move from sadness to outrage and back to sadness again.  It began today with the realization that I knew the young man arrested in Massachusetts for plotting a terrorist attack.  ‘Knew him’ as in met him once as a young man studying at Northeastern.  I don’t remember him at all but was reminded by someone we have in common.  As the story unfolded it became clear that rather than a young man bent on damage this may well be a young man who was courted to see if he could be led down a path to damage.  And we did the courting. Surely he followed and must be accountable for his decisions.  And, perhaps this young man had already lost his way.  We can’t know.   But there are things I know to be true.  I wish I didn’t.  His family will suffer terribly.  His brother will be bullied, his parents harassed.  At best, travel will become difficult and relocation or isolation necessary.  At worst, some other misguided young men will puff their chests up full of what they have been taught is patriotism and strike out at this family’s home or heads.  Sadness, outrage, sadness. 
There is this other truth.  I don’t believe for a minute that any of my children, or that I in my youth, would ever have been tested in this way.  Surely many a young person, struggling with any number of challenges, loses their way and we hope they do not encounter forces of authority that will lead them astray.  I recall with worry learning of a friend who had been courted by a cult many years ago.  I was worried and sad.  To learn that ‘we’ are doing that sort of courting takes me to a deeper place of sadness and outrage.  The story may reveal things we have yet to know and perhaps we’ll learn that the process was full of integrity, that the young man was determined to do damage for reasons other than our authoring --- perhaps.
To have encountered this line of thought on the same day an Alabama court ruled on the SB1070-like bill allowing racial and cultural targeting in that state increased the sadness.  And to see Massachusetts republican leaders lining up in support of the so-called Secure Communities Program allowing for the continued targeting of Latino/a and other people of color here in my home State made it worse.  I fear the wave of ‘othering’ that is trying to batter our people like a Tsunami.  This wave of scapegoating and criminalizing entire communities is loathsome.  That it is being led by a people who arrived here and stole land is not lost on the indigenous of this land, many of whom are now asked for identification in their once-and-always native lands.   Sadness, outrage, more sadness ~
There is so much more that I begin to write, and erase because it brings on too much to manage in my head.  Too much sadness, outrage and more sadness.   I turn on NPR and hear the ‘good’ news is that the bill in Alabama won’t require all school children to have their immigration status checked but the bad news is that it’s now legal to target people who ‘might’ be undocumented and if I understood properly, illegal to give them water.  That what we have to ‘celebrate’ is that only some children will be hurt reveals much about who we have become. To believe that our compassion in the presence of someone needing water can be legislated is hideous.  Sadness, outrage, more sadness.
What worries me most is how easily we as a people are manipulated by fear.  People are quick  to hold up examples of people who have harmed others and who would indeed be deported by the Secure Communities Program.  And we are quick to look at this misguided and perhaps harmful young man.  But at what cost that solution?  In terms of $$ surely all the effort we’ve put into entrapment and chasing the Secure Communities is $$$ we are not putting into anti-bullying programs in our schools, community strengthening programs and classes in non-violent communication and multicultural collaborations. (things btw that perhaps would make us stronger, more secure, knowledgeable and appreciative of each ‘other’). But the question, ‘At what cost’ is directed at our souls.  And we know the answer.  While ultimate costs paid during any genocide or war are counted in the lost lives of victims and loved ones who remain, those who lead the effort pay a price too.  The price of one’s own soul is paid in order to so dehumanize another human being that you can do harm or deliver them to harm’s way.  But there is an even greater price that is paid.  For a soul so damaged no longer feels the pain.  Those paying the largest price are those who watched.  Those who watched and failed to act. 

Sadness
Outrage
Action

Truth leads me to sadness
Morality yanks me to outrage
Faith calls me to action

Wednesday, September 28, 2011

Will it Matter That You Were Here? Does it Matter Now?

An excerpt from a sermon (For What Shall We Be Known?) preached on Sept 25, 2011 at UU Marblehead


Any one of us might be known as friendly, articulate, possibly athletic or energetic, and probably liberal. But what are we known for?  Or we might be known as prickly, clumsy and a tad sluggish. But what are we known for?  And please don’t be distracted by thinking it’s narcissistic or self indulgent or crass to be ‘all about you.’ it’s a worthy and important question.  And it’s a necessary question.  Lacking the question may well translate into lacking focus and commitment.  It may well translate into a lack of accountability to the rest of us, should you pass on doing something worth being known for. And it need not be something grand like ending a war, or like Clara Barton, starting the Red Cross.  It can be as simple and powerful as sitting and listening to some young people trying their best to make it through high school academics, relationships and family.  It can be as simple as being ‘that person, over there, she’s the one that will listen.’  It can be that simple as being the one who helped some folks learn to read and speak English as a second language.  Or the one that fought to make life easier for some single parents. Or the one that always stops by the nursing homes and shares fresh flowers. Or the one that means the world to some folks struggling with addiction.  Like Joe Coleman, a former member of this congregation who was known as a guy who could talk your ear off, in the nicest way.  He would eventually get to stories about the Russian Mob and leave you wondering what was real and what was a great story.  He was a such a sweet guy.  But as it turns out he was known FOR, helping more than one young person stick with battling alcoholism and stick with AA.   It mattered that he was there.
One of the truly sacred things about my vocation is the access I am given into people’s lives when they are nearing death.  In that process I come to know that person in manners not possible before.  To spend time with a person nearing the last living days is to see a person intimately engaged in reality, what’s important to them and what is not.  It’s as real as life gets when there isn’t much of it left. 
I had that sacred pleasure with Rheua Stakely who died earlier this summer.  Our time together was actually pretty unique.  Although I’ve spoken with many people about their memorial services in the months, weeks and days leading up to their deaths, no one has ever insisted on being so involved in the planning.  Every detail!  Each week we would meet and her focus would be on hymns, music and speakers and mine would be on talking about living and dying.  We would move between her agenda and mine, back and forth, back and forth.  I would ask her to tell me about her spirit and she would do so, and then follow it with ‘now, about singing spirit of life, I would like it if everyone would hum it a second time!’  And then we would move on to her time in the mountains, which caterer she would secure, the fear of dying,
It was remarkable time that I treasure.  About two weeks before she died, I was asking her to tell me about her work with the Speakers Bureau again.  She was really something you know.  She put together what would later become Speak Out, the group that provides panels of 4 or 6 speakers who themselves are Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual or Transgender.  The belief is that through meeting them and hearing their own stories and being able to ask questions, people are changed in their understandings and their phobias.  We spoke of that work, we spoke of her relationships, her mountaineering and then we talked about goodbyes.  How very difficult it was to say goodbye.  And then we spoke about death.  At one point I held her hand, looked at her and said, ‘You know, you have saved lives.’  Emotion coursed through her face and body and through tears, she replied in her weakened voice ‘you know, I really think I did. ’ This was one of three times I saw that level of emotion move over and through her whole body, bubbling up from her heart and soul.  The second time was when she and I spoke of our goodbyes to each other.  The third time I’ll share in a few minutes.  So, there she was, barely able to speak.  Because of the tears and because everything had become such a great effort.  And she managed to repeat’ I really think I did.’  I told her what I tell you today, ‘I have no doubt it’s true.’ 
Rheua was known ‘as’ energetic, fun, adventurous, outrageous at times, very particular about her food, and many other things.  But she will always be known in my heart ‘for’ saving lives. 
Just as was the case for Charlie eight years ago, people stood and spoke during Rheau’s service and we learned how she was also known for her enormous impact within the Jewish School community and so much more.  The world shifted toward greater equality while Rheua was living.  It mattered she was here.
 In The Summer Day, Mary Oliver asks the question
 Does everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
With your one wild and precious life?
It is easy to hear those words and think of life like a desert.  Oooooohhhhhhh, what will I do with this special thing? This wild and precious life? It’s tasty, isn’t it?   With no disrespect to Mary Oliver, I ask you to consider it as a sacred and powerful gift as well.  Wild and precious indeed but also sacred and powerful.   And it need not be terribly large and here’s this one other very important thing - not everybody even needs to know.  It needn’t be loud. 
And so, dear ones, And in this special place of ours, I ask what will you do with this sacred and powerful life.  For what will you be known?  Will it matter that you were here?
In the intimate space of your immediate family and friends, I know the answer is ‘of course’ but I ask that we look further away in the larger scheme of who we are in this world.  In this complicated world, for what will you be known?
Earlier I mentioned three times that our friend Rheua Stakely was overcome with emotion.  When we spoke about her saving lives. When we spoke of our goodbyes to one another. And then this third thing. which was all about you.  Rheua told me that she had to die this way.  She couldn’t have been hit by a car because she needed this experience to learn something important.  She had to learn what it was like to have people who didn’t even know her, care.  She was stunned and transformed – by you.  By and through your care and love.  That, that is what you were known for, by Rheua Stakely.  And it was no small thing.  No small thing indeed ~

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Diet Divine Continued ~ Planning for Spiritual Fitness

Excerpt from a sermon preached today in Marblehead ~

None of us can craft the Diet Divine for another.  I can only know mine.  When I am at my most spiritually fit self, I have plunged into the water recently, preferably ocean or lake, I have lost myself in figure drawing for three hours in the week, I have read somewhere I could hear the wind or better yet feel it, my feet have touched sand, I have used lavender soap and lit a candle while I bathed or showered, I have had real conversations each day, I have given things away to strangers, I have served others, I have listened to music, I have helped a special child swim, delivered myself to beauty over and over again.  I have spent time stretching my body, helping it be strong and healthy so my soul is more free to experience our world, I have touched people and been touched, I have sat quietly listening, I have sat quietly watching, I have say quietly thinking.
When are you most spiritually fit? 
And how will you feed your spirit today?   In the coming week?  What will be in your Diet Divine?  And what might it be like if we viewed this nourishment as every bit as important as what we put into our body or how we work it out?  And this one piece, connection – what would it be like if we saw that as essential as air or water?  As essential and as powerful ~

Diet Divine ~ The Plan

Excerpted from a sermon given on Sept 18 at the UU Church of Marblehead

9 spirit points a day.  Overachieving is encouraged!
Three rooted in connection.
Three rooted in growth.
Three rooted in service.
Walk on the beach – 1 connection spirit point.  Sat and meditated while you were there – 2.  Read poetry– 1 growth spirit point, read it aloud - 2.  Held a door for someone even though they were quite aways behind you – 1 service spirit point, served a meal to the hungry-2, sat and talked with them before the meal, let’s make it 3.
Came to worship – 2 connection spirit points, participated in Sunday seminar – 2 growth spirit point, served as greeter this morning – 2 service spirit points --- did all three? You’re two-thirds of the way there and it’s not even noon.
Called a friend – 1 connection spirit point, cooked together and shared a meal with friends or family – 2 connection spirit points, cried or laughed until you could barely stop with a loved one – 3, signed up for a class that makes you smile – 1 growth point, went to the class – 2,  if it was something new for you, 3 growth spirit points.  Wrote a check for a charitable institution – 1 service spirit point, attended an event for a charitable institution – 2, went to a meeting of a local community organized group to listen – just listen – 3.
Meditated for ten minutes – 1 connection spirit point, 30 minutes, 2, an hour – 3. Painted or drew or wrote or sang for ten minutes – 1 growth spirit point, 30 minutes, 2, an hour – 3.  Volunteered for and with people who are in need – 10 minutes – 1 service spirit point, 30 minutes, 2, an hour-3.   It really isn’t hard to track is it?  Each day, connect, grow and serve.  Connect, grow and serve.
 Connect with where we came from --- creation.  Connect with who we know we are ---family, friends & community.  Connect with who we need to see – people who seem ‘other’ than ourselves.
Grow in ways that make our spirits soar and grow in ways that make us cry because we see truths we need to see.  Grow inward and outward.  Stretch.  Use well honed muscles and develop new ones too. 
And serve – in the little ways that await in every setting and in the ways that challenge us too.
Connect, grow and serve, each day in some way.  Diet Divine. 

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

Why Church? A piece of the answer ~

An excerpt from a sermon based on The Everything Seed'by Carol Martignacco with beautiful illustrations by Joy Troyer.

"But when we come here, it’s different.  Here we get to dream something quite special.  We get to dream about how to become a better person.  This sanctuary is our place for appreciating that sacred seed deep within, acknowledging how each of us is special and then ---------Reaching for a better self. It is here we seek and find the path that lets our seed emerge and reach for the sun and grow to become everything it is yet to be.  Everything yet to be known.  Everything meant to be.  Each of us able to ponder ‘best use’ of our souls In this world.  
On a pathway to discover what was imprinted on our seed.
Just as a real seed needs good soil, water, sunlight and nutrients, we need things too.  We need to hone our ability to be still and listen for the voice within.  We need to listen to the voices of truth in our world knowing that some of those truths are difficult.  We need to appreciate our beginnings or perhaps overcome them.  We need love.  We need music and art and dance.  We need study and we need play.  We need to drink in the air and bathe in the ocean.  But most of all we need each other to remind us always that because of our shared beginnings, we belong. We belong to this world and to each other. 
And that ahead of us each day, possibilities ………

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

I See the Moon & the Moon Sees Me ~

When I was young, those words were part of a little song we would sing:

I see the moon and the moon sees me
The moon sees somebody I want to see
So God bless the moon
And God bless me
And God bless the somebody I want to see


Last night, following the CNN Tea Party debate for the Republican candidates I went out and sat in the moonlight, seeking some sort of solace.  It finally came with those words and a new appreciation of the theology present in that little ditty from my childhood.  While the God of my childhood is not the God of my theology today, the God of my religious humanism fits just as well.  As I sat there seeking some sort of cleansing from the telling of falsehoods, the cheer from the audience affirming that society should let those without healthcare die, the unkindness shared between human beings present and absent, the othering of entire communities and my own less-than-best-self feelings about the people on the stage and in the audience ..... the words of the ditty came to me and I smiled.  I smiled and hid.  I hid there in my mind's eye.  In a warm bedroom with large windows, amidst tall trees and clean air, surrounded by a loving family and the many assets life delivers a white child of white collar workers in a Boston suburb.  And found my salve.  My faith delivered that salve just as surely as it invited me back out to the present.  No longer 4, but 54, still privileged & still living in a warm bedroom with large windows, amidst tall trees and clean air.  Still surrounded by a loving family and the many assets life delivers a white professional woman living in surburbian Massachusetts and still singing "I see the moon...."   But the same faith that called 'come and let the light of the moon carress you and soothe you" calls me to hear the words to this little song with all the truth creation holds.  To see our moon is to recognize we are all children of creation and to accept that by sheer accident of birth many of our siblings are viewing it in settings far from the warm bedroom of my childhood and far from the warm bedroom of my present and far from the warm bedroom of my future, if able to view it at all.  "The moon sees somebody I want to see..."  My faith calls me to see those children and those youth and those adults.  "God bless the somebody I want to see..." My religious humanism calls me to action. 
And so, in the light of the moon, carressing my soul, my faith tells me it's okay to be soothed but don't you dare stop there, child.  Don't you dare stop there ~

Friday, September 2, 2011

Living Gratitude ~

When my father died three years ago I lived what I have counseled so often – ‘grief will have its way with you.’ So often I have sat or walked with people in loss and offered those words. At times, I use water imagery, saying “It will hit you like a wave and you may not see it coming. Anything can set it off and it will not honor any agenda you have. It also doesn’t come with an expiration date.” Intellectually I knew it to be true and had tasted it at different times in my life. But with my father’s death, I came to know it more thoroughly. Just as losing a child comes with its own particular grief, so too, does losing a parent (and I imagine, a mate). And so, grief has had its way with me and will do so again and again. But today I awakened knowing something else just as thoroughly and it left me smiling. It turns out that gratitude, if you let it, will have its way with you too. I shared some time ago that I began a new spiritual practice at meal time. I join hands (if I am with others) and then bow my head and silently name three things for which I am grateful. I began it as a means of taking those three moments each day to be still and thankful. What I couldn’t have known was how it would alter my relationship with gratitude in life. Somehow, that intentional practice brought gratitude into my very being – the same space grief knows so well. And now, waves of gratitude hit at any time, honor no agenda, have no expiration date and when I’m lucky, I don’t even see them coming. And I am grateful ~