A Journey of Transformation

February 5, 2006

Rev. Paul Beckel

First Universalist Unitarian Church ~ www.uuwausau.org

READING “The Long Way Home” by Rachel Remen in Kitchen Table Wisdom

Synopsis: Helene is an attractive woman who spends an inordinate amount of time to ensure that she is seen that way. She’s about to marry a man who seems to have all of the qualities she would want – except: he lacks passion. He asks her permission every time he kisses her.

Caught in the dressing room of a department store during the 1989 San Francisco earthquake, Helene is thrown about, loses her clothes, purse, and keys, and finds herself walking home several miles, in 4 inch heels, through chaos and debris. Upon arriving after midnight, her fiancé grasps her, kicks shut the door, and makes love to her right there on the floor. She later asks him, “why have you never done that before?” He replies, “I was always afraid of smearing your makeup.”

Helene discovers in crisis that by dropping her façade of invulnerability, she opens the door to a new relationship with her fiancé and with herself.

MESSAGE

[Note: earlier in the service we held a child dedication for Maggie Schmidt, new love of Steve and Sally Schmidt. Because Steve is a member of St. Anne’s Catholic church, Maggie was baptized there earlier this morning. To tie the two services together, we used some of the same music in both services, and acknowledged some of the advantages and challenges of this dual affiliation.]

Steve and Sally, I’ve seen the look of love in your eyes when you hold Maggie, and I’ve even seen it in your eyes when other people hold Maggie. It has been marvelous to share these first stages of parenting with you. And I look forward to the day not too far off when Maggie will be running home from preschool with crumpled sheets of paper splashed with paint, beaming, “I made a turtle!” or “Look! It’s a pachycephalasorous.”

But even sooner will be those first steps. Steps as tentative, perilous, and ambitious as your own wide-eyed steps into parenthood. Through all of these experiences you’ll have the opportunity to witness firsthand that joy, astonishment, fear, and hope, that comes with discovery of one’s self and one’s world.

Maggie is still vulnerable, which is why she needs parents. Maggie is still vulnerable, which is why you – and all of us – need her.

Albert Schweitzer writes,

“I listened in my youth, to conversations between grown-up people through which breathed a tone of sorrowful regret which oppressed the heart. The speakers looked back at the idealism and... enthusiasm of their youth as something precious to which they ought to have held fast, and yet at the same time they regarded it as almost a law of nature that no one should be able to do so.

This woke in me a dread of having ever, even once, to look back on my own past with such a feeling; I resolved never to let myself become subject to this tragic domination of mere reason, and what I thus vowed in almost boyish defiance I have tried to carry out.”

How is it that we travel so far from this innocent faith in the magic and the possibility in life. And how is it that we sometimes look back upon that innocence as if we’d rather still be there?

Methodist theologian James Fowler suggests that we have the potential to progress through six stages of faith development. I wrote these out in the order of service because I’m going to move through them quickly, but I thought you might want to reconsider them later. [You can also borrow Fowler’s book from me.]

First, Innocence: Fowler suggests that we begin with the dependent innocence of the infant, simply accepting the worldview of our caregivers.

Then, Literalism: Perhaps we move on to a second stage of literal acceptance of the family stories, beliefs and rules. Taking everything at face value.

3^rd, Loyalty: Perhaps we move on to third stage, in which we integrate the contradictions of the family stories into the practicalities of real life. But we continue to support the given myth from the standpoint of loyalty.

4^th, Critical Religion: Perhaps we move on to a fourth stage, to critically reflect upon the given religious philosophy, and to assert our own experience as authoritative.

5^th, A Broader Perspective: Perhaps we move on to a fifth stage, to recognize that our own experience is part of the common experience of humanity. In some ways stage 5 is a tour back to the beginning – a state of willingness, vulnerability, a loss of conceit... (this is how babies can be spiritual guides).

And finally, perhaps, though this is very rare, we might move on to a place we could call sainthood or altruism or being a Bodhisattva – a way of being in which the self is transcended, and we begin to live a sacrificial life, offering ourselves for the benefit of the whole.

A glance at these stages would suggest that the ideals of historical Unitarianism focus upon stage 4. Unitarians are stereotypically defiant, and rationalistic, defining ourselves against the rest of the world.

The original theology of Universalism, on the other hand, might egg us on to stage five. Historic Universalism focuses upon a sense of belonging, and what we have in common with others despite our differences.

***

There is a danger, of course, in defining stages such as this. Our lives likely embody pieces from each of these stage every day.

And even if we are not operating at the level of Sainthood at every moment ... we cannot wish ourselves – and we certainly cannot wish anyone else – into another stage. We move on only when we have completed the necessary developmental tasks to do so.

My message today is this: do so.

Step out. Open Up. Continue to Unfold.

Continue on the journey...one tiny step at a time. And be thankful for the earthquakes and the major leaps forward; even as you’re thankful that they don’t happen too often.

***

If it’s true about Unitarianism representing Fowler’s fourth stage, and Universalism representing stage five, then what, exactly, is the earth-shattering difference between them?

It may be the difference between ego and spirit. Ego is the realization that I am different from “all those other things out there.” And spirit is the realization that I am the same as “all those other things out there.” Ego is about separation. And spirit is about relationship. Both are essential to make a whole human being. It is the task of religion (literally “re-linking”) to tie them together.

I see myself as a Unitarian in practice and a Universalist by ideal. And I wonder, I hope, I strive, I fantasize, and once in a while I leap and grasp at these higher levels.

It’s risky. It’s hard enough to tread in the waters of selflessness. It can be even harder because the people around us don’t usually appreciate it when we change. Even if we change “for the better.”

If you start thinking, saying, or doing things that sound suspiciously unlike the religious person you were yesterday, your relationships with those closest to you will change.

I think about my relationship with all of you. How would you take it if years from now I had to suddenly explain to you that my religious philosophy is quite different from what it was when you agreed to have me as your minister? Well, I suppose it had better be different.

But that transition needn’t be sudden. Our responsibility to one another here, I believe, is to grow. Along the way I’ll be up front with you about where I’m headed. Of course I’d like for you to do the same with me – and with your friends here.... AND I’d like us all to refrain from freezing our images of ourselves or each other in the frame of yesterday or even today.

***

When I begin to lose motivation to continue on the private path of personal transformation, I’m often jarred out onto the public freeway by its shrill and demanding cry for healing.

At a library-book-sale once, Jane and I picked up some old magazines for a project for her RE class. One happened to be a TIME magazine from 1967 with a cover story about an interracial marriage.

Pages and pages of scandalous discussion, fearful speculation, and tasteless jokes.... I didn’t know, I did not expect – that still in 1967 interracial marriage was seen as such a remarkable issue. And that in 16 states it was still illegal.

I take it for granted that interracial marriage will not be an issue for my children... and I am thankful to the work of history and to the work of human hands that this great social transformation has taken place.

But I can’t help but wonder: will my own children pick up a TIME magazine from 2006 and be amazed at the scandalous discussion, fearful speculation, and tasteless jokes about same-sex marriage? Will they say, “I can’t believe that was still an issue in 2006!”??

I can only hope that by taking the risk to grow personally, we will again and again find the courage to transform the system.

* * *

Most Unitarian Universalists come into this organization from another religious tradition or from none at all. A good number of us entered at Fowler’s stage four, as critics of religion and society, pleased that there was a place that we could find ourselves and set aside a certain amount of nonsense from our past.

I’ve taught an adult education class called The Haunting Church: Owning Your Religious Past. Let me tell you about it because I’d be glad to share it again if you’re interested. In that class we tend to discover that on our spiritual journeys, there are paths which we had nothing to do with choosing or defining; we were just put there.

By understanding the religious experiences of our early childhood, when we had no choice, and the later experiences for which we do have to take some responsibility, we find ourselves better able to navigate the forks in the road ahead.

Another important navigation tool, in addition to the map of the road behind us, is a detailed description of the spot on which we’re now standing. And so I would urge you to consider writing it down...in a page or two...or if you’re like me and you must devote a page or two to six or seven major topics, then do that. Just do it. Not as an unchanging map of paradise, just as a snapshot of where you lived in 2006.

I would then urge you to take some spiritual risks. If you don’t believe in god, try prayer anyway. If you don’t like to be around the poor go work in a soup kitchen...if you can’t stand teenagers, go volunteer with them...if you don’t consider yourself creative, write or sing something for us on a Sunday morning. It will not only help you grow, but as you grow, you’ll discover new areas of risk taking to pursue.

And finally, if you came in here at stage 4 many years ago, and you find yourself outgrowing that, perhaps we need a way of recognizing that growth. We don’t have any kind of formal recognition of “elders” here, but we’re in the process of developing a coming-of-age program for which we’ll need mentors... elders of sorts. Let’s talk more in the coming weeks about how both young and old who are making these transitions can be of assistance to one another.

In the meantime, consider the Mahayana Buddhist ideal of the bodhisattva: the one who, just on the brink of attaining enlightenment, voluntarily renounces their salvation and returns to the world to enable others to reach the goal.

If you can, imagine four travelers who have traveled across an immense desert and finally come to a high wall surrounding they-know-not-what. One of the travelers is determined to climb the wall to see what is inside. And when he reaches the top, gives a shout of joy and jumps inside. The next two do the same. But when the fourth traveler gets to the top of the wall...and sees below him an enchanted garden with sparkling streams, pleasant groves, and luscious fruit, he resists the temptation to jump over. Remembering other wayfarers who are trudging the burning deserts, he climbs back down and devotes himself to directing them to the oasis. The pledge of the bodhisattva is not to leave this world until the grass itself is enlightened.

***

The new Pope, Benedict, just published his first encyclical letter: “Deus Caritas Est,” God is Love. Within the framework of our life’s unfolding, or within the framework of Fowlers stages, which level is love? Even as one who tends to be suspicious of the anthropomorphizing of god, I can answer: He is in all of them. All of the stages of faith development; through our birth and death and everything in between. Deus Caritas Est.

For those of you who are finding all of this Catholic stuff to bring on some inner earthquakes, let me say: We have nothing to fear from such a God. Pope Benedict states clearly: The role of the church is to "bring about openness of mind and will to the demands of the common good," not to "impose on those who do not share the faith ways of thinking and modes of conduct...."

As Valentine’s Day approaches let us pledge to be this church. Regardless of which church we belong to. Let us at least imagine such a love, surpassing all others. And whether we name it Lord or Love, Source or Tao, mystery or God, may we each answer the summons to love.