Opening Words

No. 428: “Come out of the dark earth,”
From Singing the Living Tradition

Hymn

No. 190 Light of Ages and of Nations
from Singing the Living Tradition

Children’s Story

“God Comes to Us in Our Dreams”
by Mary Ann Moore

There once was a girl who lived with her family in a small village. It was a very small village, so everyone there knew each other. The girl’s family loved her and the people of the village loved her. When she woke up crying one night because she had had a frightening dream, everyone in the village knew about it and everyone cared.

In the morning, the people of the village asked the girl about her scary dream. “In my dream, I was walking down the path to get some wood,” she recalled. “All of a sudden a tiger jumped down from a tree and got in front of me on the path so I couldn’t go by.” The girl almost started to cry again as she remembered how scary it was. “Then the tiger started coming toward me and it was snarling and growling and showing its teeth, and I was sure it wanted to eat me. I turned around and started to run as fast as I could, but the tiger ran right behind me. Just as it was going to catch me, I turned around and started to run as fast as I could, but the tiger ran right behind me. Just as it was going to catch me with one of its huge paws, I woke up!” The girl went to her mother and hid her head under her mother’s arm. She was still very frightened when she thought of the dream, and she was afraid for night to come when she would have to sleep again.

The elders in the village gathered together and talked for a while about the girl’s dream. Then they went back to the girl, who was still with her mother, and said, “If you want to learn not to be afraid in your dreams, we can help you.

The girl thought for a minute and then said, very quietly, “I do want to learn not to be afraid in my dreams.”

One of the elders said to her, “All right then, try this: Tonight if you dream the same dream and the tiger starts to come toward you, don’t run, but stay where you are and say ‘Hello, tiger. “

“But the tiger will eat me,” said the girl. “I’m too scared.”

“Yes, you may be scared,” replied the elders, “but we believe you will be brave enough to do it. And we don’t think the tiger will eat you.”

That night the girl dreamed of the tiger again. But when the tiger started toward her, she remembered and stood bravely, facing the tiger, and said, “Hello, tiger.” When the tiger got right in front of her, it stopped.

And then a wonderful thing happened. As the girl looked at the tiger’s face, she saw it smile, and as she looked some more, the tiger’s face began to change and she saw there the faces of lots of animals. They smiled at her, too. As she looked some more, the animals’ faces changed into faces of people, and the people’s faces smiled at her. The girl felt a wonderful happy feeling coming over her when she realized that she wasn’t afraid anymore. And then, as she looked again, she saw not only the animals and the people, but trees and earth and sky and water and beautiful colors and beautiful darkness all swirling around and mixing together, and all smiling at her. And she felt a great joy.

The next morning the girl couldn’t wait to tell everyone in the village about her dream. Everyone gathered around, and as she told it, everyone sighed and smiled and shared her joy. Once again the elders went off by themselves for a while to talk about the girl’s dream. When they returned one of the elders said to her, “You were blessed, my daughter. Because you were brave, God has come to you in your dream and blessed you.”

Later that day, as the girl was walking down the path to get some wood, she was still thinking about her wonderful dream. She was eager for night to come so that she could dream again.

Meditation

No. 487: “The bell is full of wind”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Reading

from the Boston Globe

[In wheatfields in south central England, mysterious huge flattened circles have appeared for years. Large numbers of people had come to believe they were put there by paranormal forces or by aliens.]

London. Every summer, the mysterious crop circles, large and intricate patterns of flattened wheat, appear in the fields. And every summer they are greeted by expressions of reverence and wisecracks about little green men.

Now two British artists have offered a new and elegantly simple explanation of the phenomenon: They done it.

Doug Bower and David Chorley, both in their 60s, claim to have created the circles all by themselves.

They said they worked at night, using a ball of string (to keep the circles round), a wire sight attached to a baseball cap (to keep the lines straight) and two long sticks with rope handles (to flatten the crops).

The con men said they came forward because they were tired of people making money off their joke.

In fact, two circle “experts,” Patrick Delgado and Cohn Andrews have made a nice income off the mystery in recent years.

Delgado and Andrews wrote two best-selling books about the subject. They also gave speeches and organized conferences. And they ran a $1.8 million dollar research project for Japanese television, aimed at capturing the formation of a crop circle on film.

The latest news on the crop circle front, that the whole thing apparently was a joke, came to Delgado last week in the cruelest possible way.

With a newspaper reporter and a photographer watching, Bower and Chorley made one of their circles in a wheat field. Then the circle was shown to Delgado, who solemnly pronounced it genuine and explained that no mere mortals could have made such a thing.

Then he was informed that two mere mortals had made it. The man was shaken.

“I was taken for a ride like many other people,” Delgado told reporters. But by yesterday, he tried to mount a recovery. When Bower and Chorley made yet another circle, this one for British television, Delgado gave it a firm thumbs down.

“This is not a genuine crop circle. It’s totally different from the real thing,” he said firmly.

Bower and Chorley claimed they started making their circles in 1978. At first, no one noticed. There was no media coverage. But then Delgado saw his first circle. And the mystery took off.

The hoaxsters said they did not get truly committed until they heard Delgado talking on the radio about the involvement of a “superior intelligence.”

“We laughed so much that time we had to stop the car,” Chorley said.

Sermon

“Making Meaning of a Random Universe”
by the Rev. Jane Rzepka

There was once a man who lived in England and preached Universalism. The year was 1770, his life was working out badly, he landed in debtor’s prison, his wife and baby died, he was called to task for his theology in London. He decided to sail for the New World, much relieved that he would never have to preach again. His name was John Murray.

At the same time, an elderly man, Thomas Potter, sat in his farmhouse in Good Luck, New Jersey, and thought up a Universalist theology on his own. He was so enthused about this new religion of his that he built a little church building there on the farm. He figured, “If God wants my church to succeed, he’ll send me a preacher.”

Meanwhile, John Murray’s ship encounters some peculiar winds, and lo and behold, it goes aground at Good Luck, New Jersey, right there at Thomas Potter’s farm. Murray finds Potter just waiting for him to show up. Murray prays for the winds to shift, and fast, but they don’t. Obviously, God has sent Murray to Potter’s meetinghouse; Potter and Murray decide that Providence was clearly at work, and Murray winds up preaching Universalism for the next 35 years, thus starting the Universalist Church in America.

This story is nonsense. At least that’s my opinion. Sure, John Murray did wash ashore at Good Luck, New Jersey at Thomas Potter’s farm and all that, and what a great coincidence that was, but we really have no reason to believe that God meddles much in nitty-gritty day-to-day affairs down in New Jersey.

But we’re human beings. It would be so nice if the events in our lives made sense. But for us, meaning is not pre-figured by somebody else; we create it. If Potter and Murray want to start a new American religion, good for them. They have given their lives meaning. Just as if in our own lives a car goes out of control on 128 and nearly hits you but doesn’t, you can decide that yes, this is the day to finally tell your sister you really love her in spite of everything, and you will have made meaning of your near miss. Or say your teaching job gets axed, you decide you will find a way to get your MBA, which you had wanted to do in the first place. You have created meaning. Or you win the Mega-Bucks, you get yourself a new car, but you also donate a room to an AIDS hospice, and you have taken a random event and made meaning. We make the ‘promises we keep.’ We choose our own stars.

Our minister in San Francisco, Victor Carpenter, has a daughter, Gracia, age thirteen who operates at the level of a one-year-old. He finds that people frequently try to tell him the “purpose” for this tragedy; they want to explain why it makes sense that Gracia is the way she is; why this had to happen. Victor says, “We all want a world that is orderly and predictable and will conform, at least in the main, to our standards and expectations…. [Well,] Baloney! It is our ability and our willingness to deal with reality on its own terms that makes reality meaningful, us wise, and life endurable. I am continually amazed by the prevalence of [people] who always stand ready to offer “purposes” for Gracia (complete with silver linings). Cathe and I have been told that Gracia was sent to us in order that we might be better prepared to give comfort and solace to other people who were ‘afflicted’ with similar children. Or that she was sent because we were strong enough to learn from her and provide for her without breaking. Or for reasons God chooses not to vouchsafe but, nonetheless, we’ll discover one day. Such attempts to discover some kind of purpose are inappropriate because they always start at the wrong end of the situation. They start with some pre-established ideal of ‘purpose,’ then attempt to fit reality to that purpose rather than start with the reality.” (Stations of the Spirit, p.84)

You probably remember the book When Bad Things Happen to Good People, where Kushner says, “Let me suggest that the bad things that happen to us in our lives do not have a meaning when they happen to us. They do not happen for any good reason which would cause us to accept them willingly. But we can give them a meaning. We can redeem these tragedies from senselessness by imposing meaning on them. The question we should be asking is not, ‘Why did this happen to me? What did I do to deserve this?’ That is really an unanswerable, pointless question. A better question would be ‘Now that this has happened to me, what am I going to do about it?’ (p. 136)

We have to be careful. Because ambiguity is hard for most of us to tolerate, because an unpredictable universe is difficult to live with, because we find inherent meaninglessness unsatisfying, most human beings are prone to spot meaning where there simply is none, and we see patterns in randomness. Where there are stars, we see constellations.

When we see meaning in the meaningless we can be in some danger. For example, a fraudulent stockbroker gets some fancy letterhead and sends out 32,000 letters to potential investors. In 16,000 of these letters he predicts the index will rise, and in the other 16,000 he predicts a decline. No matter whether the index rises or falls, a follow-up letter is sent, but only to the 16,000 people who initially received a correct “prediction.” To 8,000 of them, a rise is predicted for the next week; to the other 8,000, a decline. Whatever happens now, 8,000 people will have received two correct predictions. Again, to these 8,000 people only, letters are sent concerning the index’s performance the following week: 4,000 predicting a rise; 4,000, a decline. Whatever the outcome, 4,000 people have now received three straight correct predictions. This goes on a few more times, until 500 people have received six straight correct “predictions.” These 500 people are now reminded of this and told that in order to continue to receive this valuable information for the seventh week they must each contribute $500. This fraudulent broker knows that a number of us are willing to ascribe meaning and predictive powers to what has in fact been random success. (Paulos, p. 32)

Most of us believe a number of things that aren’t true: We may not necessarily believe that a stockbroker has a corner on the future of the market, or that God sent John Murray to New Jersey, or that crop circles were made by aliens. But a large majority of the general public thinks itself more intelligent, more fair-minded, less prejudiced, and more skilled behind the wheel of an automobile than the average person. This phenomenon is called the “Lake Wobegon effect,” after Garrison Keillor’s fictional community where “the women are strong, the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.” (Gilovich, p. 77)

If you think you are above these kinds of pitfalls, if you think you are rational, you might have fun with a couple of books that are out. One is Innumeracy (John Allen Paulos, 1988), and the other is How We Know What Isn’t So, by Thomas Gilovich (1991).

We all know, for example, that men and women who cannot have biological children and subsequently adopt, are more likely to then conceive a baby than couples who can’t conceive and don’t adopt. On-lookers figure that after having adopted, there’s less stress associated with the child-bearing issue, and the woman gets pregnant after all. I can think of a half dozen couples in this church who began filling out adoption papers and at some point went on to have biological children.

The thing is, the phenomenon is simply not true: If you are a couple who cannot conceive, it makes no statistical difference at all whether or not you adopt. Some of you will go on to have a biological child, and some of you won’t. It’s just that we tend to notice the pregnancies more in families who have adopted children. (Gilovich, p. 31) There’s no connection here, no causality, no meaning. Sometimes what we’re observing is simply probability theory at work, our high school math books come alive.

Just now there’s a lot of interest out there in randomness, in chaos theory, and in probability, partly because these mathematical theories demonstrate that our intuition often leads us astray. Part of this renewed interest was caused by a little teaser in Parade Magazine in September of 1990, the magazine that comes with the Sunday paper. You mathematicians know it as the “Monty Hall Problem.”

For 27 years, Monty Hall hosted the TV game show “Let’s Make a Deal.” Contestants are faced with three doors. Behind one, say, is a sports car. Behind the other two are goats. Monty Hall knows what’s behind each door. So you, the contestant, choose a door-let’s say Door Number 1. Before he opens the door you chose, Monty Hall opens a different door and shows you that one of the goats is behind it. Then he says, “Do you want to stick with the door you picked, or do you want to switch to the other closed door?” The question is, should you switch?

Most people’s instincts tell them that it doesn’t make any difference, that either way they have a fifty-fifty chance of winning the car. But they are wrong. If you switch, you will double your chances of winning.

Here we go. When you chose Door Number 1, your chances of winning the car were one in three. Monty Hall reveals a goat behind Door Number 3. He’s not back there moving goats and cars around, so the chances of the car being behind Door Number 1 haven’t changed any-you still have a 1 in 3 chance that the car is behind Door Number 1. But Monty has eliminated Door 3 altogether. Therefore, if Door 1 only gives you a one third chance of winning, Door 2, the only one left must give you a two thirds chance. If you switch to Door 2, you will double your chances of winning. What we want to believe, what we think we know, just isn’t true. (If you want to try it yourself, get three playing cards and try it twenty times or so.)

In American culture today, it is popular to want to nurture and cultivate “the intuitive” part of one’s personality. Intuition is seen to be somehow warmer, or more spiritual, than “cold rationality.” But what I’m working toward this morning is a reminder that fact and scientific truths have their place in our religion. Scientific fact helps us guard against outright fraudulence, to be sure. But perhaps more important, mathematical science can be its own miracle, and when we recognize that miracle, we have available to use a kind of “warm rationality” that also deserves a place inside us.

Let’s look at basketball. The books I mentioned both talk about basketball. You know the feeling: You dribble, you shoot, you sink the ball. You dribble, you shoot again. Swish. Another shot, another two points. You’re on a roll. You’re confident. You’re hot. The players, the coaches, and the fans all know that the player has a “hot hand.” Almost everybody believes that players tend to shoot in streaks. In fact, 91% of the people asked believe that a player has “a better chance of making a shot after having just made the last two or three shots.” (Gilovich, p. 14, Paulos, 46)

Not true. If you actually study the games, if you record the numbers and do the math, you find that players are not any more likely to make a shot after making their last one, two, or three shots than after missing their last one, two, or three shots. There’s no such thing as a hot streak. If you have a hypothetical player who sinks a shot 50% of the time, pure chance would predict runs of 4, 5, or 6 baskets in a row, just as flipping a coin results in predictable long streaks of heads or tails.

Certainly, hot streaks, if they actually existed, would be amazing, exciting, miraculous. But to me, the hard, so-called “cold reality,” is even more amazing, exciting, and miraculous. What I like about it is this: A great deal in life seems random. Will the basketball sink into the net? There’s no telling for any given shot. None. But over time, what seems utterly unpredictable falls into a dependable pattern. That’s what “chaos theory” is all about. (see Chaos, James Gleick, 1988) Who knows whether any given coin flip will turn out to be heads or tails? But over a long enough period, you can count on the fact that it’ll be heads about half the time, and tails about half the time. So do we live in a random universe or is it predictable?

We human beings are funny. We seem to like feeling amazed, even when the chances of the event Occurring weren’t all that unlikely. Take birthdays. There are 366 possible birthdays. So if you have 367 people in a room, you know for sure that at least two people in the group have the same birthday. What if we wanted to be just 50% sure that two people in the room would share a birthday? How many people would have to be in the room? The answer is 23. Half the time that twenty-three people are gathered, two or more of them will share a birthday. To be truthful, if I were with 22 other people and two of them had the same birthday, I would think that was some special coincidence. But the truth is, the miracle is not in coincidence, but rather in the marvelous, dependable, predictability of the universe, that in a small room of people, one would reasonably expect that two people may have the same birthday.

I was once a high school exchange student for a year in Australia. While I was there, I knew another American exchange student. Years later, I ran into this fellow in a youth hostel in Denmark. I’ve always thought this to be an impressive coincidence; “What were the chances of my running into him?” But after reading these books, I’ve come to realize that the chances were much greater than I would have thought, that what’s impressive is that almost everyone can expect to have some kind of “it’s a small world” story. To my way of thinking, the logical response to what seems to be an amazing coincidence is not a belief in Providence, or synchronicity, or fate, or that something was “meant to be,” but simply to recognize the world as a pretty neat place, just on the face of it, just as it ordinarily operates. Myself, I was never very big on math. But I have learned some things this week. I have learned that one can expect a whole constellation of things to happen-to just happen. That one can expect some of us to get cancer, some of us to get a phone call from a kid selling magazines, some of us will win a trip to Disney World, some of us will get a grocery cart with a wheel that doesn’t turn right, some of us will die too young, some of us will inherit money from an unknown relative. I have learned that if the universe is operating in its usual random way, I can depend on all that.

And I have learned that we can decide to make meaning of the cancer, or the trip to Florida, or anything at all. Will I make something of my life, of this week, of the rest of the day? I decide.

And finally, I have learned that living in the midst of all that happens, the good things are abundant. John Murray lands in New Jersey. Or in that championship basketball game, you make a whole string of baskets in a row. Or you do get pregnant after all. Or you run into an old friend in a youth hostel in Denmark. We can expect all that.

May our eyes be open, and our hearts, and may we glory in the wonders that most certainly are ours.

Amen

Hymn

No. 345 With Joy We Claim the Growing Light
from Singing the Living Tradition

Closing Words

No. 694: “May the Love which overcomes all differences”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Questions for Discussion

by Joy D. Gasta

1. This sermon is on the same general theme as Jane Rzepka’s sermon, “Is Anything Meant to Be?” How would you express her ideas about God? In what ways are her ideas like and unlike your ideas about God?
2. Some people say they have trouble knowing how to exist in a world which is as random as Jane Rzepka’s. Do you? Why or why not? What helps you find moral order? What helps Jane Rzepka?
3. In general, most UUs can tolerate more randomness and ambiguity than members of more fundamentalist denominations. How do you explain your views to them and to children, including your own?

Opening Words

No. 418, “Come into the circle of love and justice”
From Singing the Living Tradition

Hymn

No. 93 To Mercy, Pity, Peace and Love
from Singing the Living Tradition

Children’s Story

“The Healing Power of God”
by Mary Ann Moore

Once a boy went to visit his grandparents. At his grandparents’ place there was a tree, and this boy climbed up into the tree just as he had done many times before. But this time, for some reason – maybe it was his smooth-bottomed church shoes – the boy suddenly slipped and fell out of the tree. He fell onto his right elbow, and by the time he was through falling, his arm hurt terribly. It hurt so much he cried.

His family all came running. When they saw his arm they knew something was really wrong, so they quickly took him to the hospital. There the doctor took an x-ray of his arm and found that the elbow joint was twisted out of place. The doctor said, “Don’t worry. I can fix it.” Soon the joint was back in place and the boy’s arm was in a cast.

The doctor said to him, “Your arm is going to be as good as new, but healing takes time. The cast will have to stay on for four weeks.” They gave him a sling to help hold up his arm, and the boy went home with his family. When he got home he ate a little bit, but he was so tired and soon went to sleep.

The next day he had to lie still and rest a lot, and his arm still hurt. His family brought him food, and his uncle cut up one of his shirts so it would fit over the cast. Other relatives and friends came by to see him. They told him how sorry they were that he had injured himself, and they tried to amuse him. They brought a balloon that said, “Get well!” And they made cards that said, “We’re sorry you fell out of the tree. Get well soon. We love you!” And they brought him some video movies to watch. By the end of the day the boy was feeling better.

As the days went by the boy felt a lot better. His arm didn’t hurt any more, and he got pretty good at doing things with his left hand. He even learned to write and draw with his left hand, although he usually used his right one. But he was tired of not having both hands and arms to do things with. He said to his parents, “I’m tired of not being well. I want my arm to get well right away. I want to take off this old cast! When can I take it off?”

His parents said to him, “We know you’re getting tired of having the cast on, but healing takes time.” They showed him on the calendar how many more days it would be before his arm would be thoroughly healed and the cast could come off.

“That’s too long,” the boy said. “I want to get well right now! Maybe God can make me well right now, or at least by tomorrow.”

So the boy talked to God. He said, “God, you probably noticed that I fell out of the tree and twisted my elbow out of joint and that the doctor put it back right and that now I have it in a cast. They tell me it’ll be lots more days before it’s healed, but I’m tired of having a cast. Couldn’t you make it heal faster? Couldn’t you make it well right now or at least by tomorrow?” And the boy waited to hear what God would say.

Finally the boy heard God say, ‘Yes, I know you’ve hurt your arm and I’m sorry. I know it must be hard to wait for it to thoroughly heal, but taking time is one of the ways that my healing power works.”

‘What are some of the other ways?” the boy asked, hoping there was a quicker way to get well.

‘Well, you’ve already been using my other ways. You went to the doctor and he used his knowledge of how elbow joints work to get your joint back in place. One of the ways that my healing energy works is with medicines and with doctors’ skills.”

‘What other ways of healing do you have?” the boy wondered.

‘Well, tender loving care is another,” God said. “And you’ve been getting that, too. Your family and your friends have been giving you lots of love and care, bringing you good wishes with balloons and cards and videos. My healing energy is in the tender loving care of family and friends. I know it’s hard to wait, but you will be well soon.”

So the boy said to God, “Okay, I guess I should be glad that you have all those different healing powers. I’m glad to know that my arm will be all well again.” And the boy decided to go and draw another of his left-handed pictures.

Meditation

No. 481, “It is our quiet time”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Reading

by Frederick Beekner

Exactly a year ago tomorrow, a very good friend of mine died. He was an English man, a witty, elegant, many faceted man. One morning in his sixty-eighth year he simply didn’t wake up. Which was about as easy a way as he could possibly have done it. But it wasn’t easy for the people he left behind because it gave us no chance to say good-bye.

A couple of months later my wife and I were staying with his widow overnight in Charleston, South Carolina, when I had a short dream about him.

I dreamed that he was standing there in the dark guest room looking very much the way he always did, and I told him how much we missed him and how glad I was to see him again. Then I said, “Are you really there, Dudley?” I meant, was he there in fact-and-truth, or was I merely dreaming he was? His answer was that he was really there, and then I said, “Can you prove it?”

“Of course,” he said, and he plucked a strand of blue wool out of his sweater and tossed it to me, and I caught it between my index finger and my thumb, and the feel of it was so palpable and real that it woke me up. That’s all there was to the dream.

When I told that dream at breakfast the next morning. I had hardly finished when my wife said she had noticed the strand of wool on the carpet when she was getting dressed. I rushed upstairs to see, and there it was, a little tangle of navy blue wool.

The dream may very well have been just another dream. And you certainly don’t have to invoke the supernatural to account for the thread on the carpet. Maybe my friend really did come—in my dream, or maybe all that’s extraordinary-about-it, is the fuss I’m making.

Dreams like that happen every day to somebody. They’re a dime a dozen, they may mean absolutely nothing. Or, dreams like that are momentary glimpses into a mystery of such depth, power and beauty that if we were to see it head on, in any way other than in glimpses, I suspect we would be annihilated. If I had to bet my life, and my children’s lives, my wife’s life on one possibility or the other, which would I bet on? Which would you bet on?

On ‘Yes there is God in the highest?” or if that language is no longer viable, “There is mystery and meaning in the deepest?” Or [would I bet] on “No, there is whatever happens and it means whatever you choose it to mean, and that’s all there is?”

Of course, we can bet yes today and no tomorrow. We may bet one way with our lips, our minds and even our hearts and another way with our feet. But all of us bet and it’s our lives themselves we’re betting with, in the sense that the betting is what shapes our lives.

And of course we can never be sure we bet right because the evidence both ways is fragmentary, fragile, ambiguous. A coincidence, as somebody said, can be God’s way of remaining anonymous or it can be just a coincidence. Is the dream that brings healing and hope just a product of wishful thinking or is it a message maybe from another realm? Whether we bet yes or no is equally an act of faith.

Reading

By Jane Rzepka

Katie [the ministerial intern] and I are each going to tell you a story that we made up together. We’re each going to tell this same story. Katie is going to tell it from the point of view of one theological position, and I’ll tell it from another theological position. The theological stances we take are fiction, pure fiction—any resemblance to our own theological tendencies are purely unintentional… Here’s Katie’s.

I. The Ice Storm: It Was “Meant to Be” – Katie Lee Crane

I can’t believe this day! The roads are covered with ice, it’s treacherous under foot and they’re forecasting more freezing rain and sleet. Wouldn’t you know it? This is the day I have to be at the office for a meeting by 9:00. I’ve got to get going!

I’d better leave now. Skip the dishes. Get going. I’ll bet the highway is backed up for miles. Think I’ll take the back roads today. Probably safer and less congested.

The roads are even worse than I’d imagined. What a mess! I can barely crawl…

Ohhhhhhh!!!!!!!!
What was that? That branch just missed the windshield. It’s a miracle I wasn’t hurt! Someone was definitely looking out for me that time! Guess I’m not supposed to go this way. I have a feeling I should take Rte. 128. I know myself well enough to follow my instincts. I’ll just turn around here and get on at the next exit.

I’m late for sure, but with roads like these, everyone else is going to be late, too. Besides….

Uh Oh … here we go again. This car’s going to spin off the road!!!

Thank God I’m alive. And, as far as I can tell, the car’s OK too. Whew! Another close call. What’s going on here? I wonder what this is supposed to mean?

I’ll figure that out later. What am I going to do now? There’s no getting out of here without help. If someone stops, what should I do? You hear all sorts of horror stories. No, I’ll know. I’ll just know. I’ll have to trust that the person who stops was sent to help me. In fact, I’m confident someone will be sent to help.

This is one of those times when I wish I had someone. I enjoy being single but right now I’d trade my independence for a person who could come and help me out. What am I talking about? Think of it. Two near misses. And I’m fine. The car’s fine. What’s the message? I’m sure there’s a lesson here somewhere.

Is it about this car? Should I sell this car? No, something tells me it’s more than that. It’s about….

Someone’s stopping. A guy. He looks kind of familiar. Oh, I can’t believe this! It’s Butch.

“Butch, is that you?”
“Kathie? Kathie Stevens? I don’t believe this! Can it possibly be you?”
“It is and, you know, I’m not at all surprised to see you.”
“What do you mean you’re not surprised to see me? I haven’t seen you in… when was it… it had to be our tenth high school reunion and that was…
“Fifteen years ago!”
“Fifteen, is it really that long? This is just amazing. Just amazing! It’s the middle of an ice storm, I just moved to Woburn last month, I wasn’t planning to take this route—only came this way because traffic was backed up on Rte. 93—and, when I stopped, I had no idea it was you who was stranded! And you’re not surprised to see me?”

“No, clearly you were led to find me. And I’m not surprised because I had a dream about you the other night. Now I realize it was some kind of premonition or sign. Butch, there are no coincidences. Something or someone is bringing us together again after all these years. This is something more than chance. This is some kind of message from the universe. I guess we have some unfinished business, eh?”
“Yup. Hop in. Where to?”
“Next exit, take a right.”
“This is amazing, isn’t it? Absolutely amazing!”
“Not really, Butch, I truly believe it was meant to be.”

II. The Ice Storm: “What a Coincidence” – Jane Rzepka

I can’t believe this day! The roads are covered with ice, it’s slippery and they’re forecasting more freezing rain and sleet. Wouldn’t you know it? This is the day I have to be at the office for a meeting by 9:00. I’ve got to get going!

I’d better leave now. Skip the dishes. Get going. I’ll bet the highway is backed up for miles. Think I’ll take the back roads today. Probably safer, less congested.

The roads are even worse than I’d imagined. What a mess! I can barely crawl….

Ohhhhhhh!!!!!!!!
What was that? That branch just missed the windshield. Dumb luck that I wasn’t hurt. Given the high wind velocity, it would make more sense to take a highly traveled road. I’ll take 128. That’s good thinking.

I’m late for sure, but with roads like these, everyone else is going to be late, too. Besides….

Uh oh… here we go again. This car’s spinning off the road!!! But I’m alive. And, as far as I can tell, the car’s OK too. Whew!

Another close call. But with driving conditions like this, I should expect as much.

What am I going to do now? There’s no getting out of here without help. If someone stops, what should I do? You hear all sorts of horror stories. I’d have to assess the person quickly – chances are quite promising that somebody will stop, given the volume of traffic. This whole thing is such an utter waste of time.

Someone’s stopping. A guy. Looks kind of familiar. Oh, I can’t believe this! It’s Butch.
“Butch, is that you?”
“Kathie? Kathie Stevens? I don’t believe this! Can it possibly be you?”
“It is – I love these small world things—they happen so often.”
“Wow. I haven’t seen you in… when was it… it had to be our tenth high school reunion and that was…”
“Fifteen years ago!”
“Fifteen, is it really that long? This is just amazing. Just amazing! It’s the middle of an ice storm, I just moved to Woburn last month, I wasn’t planning to take this route-I only came this way because traffic was backed up on Rte. 93-and, when I stopped, I had no idea it was you who was stranded!”

“Well, an awful lot of people from our old town in New Jersey wind up in the Boston area. And you always liked skiing, and sea food, and the Celtics, same as me. It’s not so surprising that we both ended up around here. And you know, because our next reunion’s coming up next week, I had a dream about you and the old gang. It’s great to see you in the flesh – maybe we’ll decide to ride down to the reunion together.”
“Could be. But for now, hop in. Where to?”
“Next exit, take a right.”
“This is amazing, isn’t it? Absolutely amazing!”
‘Yes, this is one delightful coincidence.”

[Quick dialogue, Katie and Jane].

Katie: “It was meant to be!”
Jane: “What a coincidence!”
Katie: “I feel led to my actions; drawn to them.”
Jane: “I evaluate the situation, make a decision, and I do it.”
Katie: “Sometimes I need to learn a lesson, and I am given the opportunity.”
Jane: “Sometimes I need that like a hole in the head.”
Katie: “Everything is part of a larger plan.”
Jane: “Luck. Chance. They’re an important part of life.”
Katie: “Something, someone, is looking out for me.”
Jane: “We’re on our own.”
Katie: “It was meant to be.”
Jane: “What a coincidence.”

Sermon
“Is Anything Meant To Be?”
by the Rev. Jane Rzepka

Here at the church, our “Is Anything ‘Meant to Be?”‘ theology discussion was scheduled for last Monday evening. I had ulterior motives, of course: I had imagined that the conversation would include, broadly speaking, two groups of people-those who do believe that cosmic intention is likely – those who believe that what happens was indeed “meant to be,” – and those who think the very notion is preposterous poppycock, who believe that to the extent that anyone decides, we decide what happens.

On Monday, if you remember, we had a storm. Of the seven meetings here at the church that night, four were cancelled. But I was here in hopes of having the discussion (after all I needed the input for this sermon). People did arrive, and to a person, they fit into the group that is of the opinion that we direct our own fates. The other group, the group that believes in cosmic messages, presumably looked out the window, noted the sleet, ice, wind, cold, slush, and treacherous footing, and knew without a doubt that this meeting, just wasn’t meant to be.

In the story that Katie read, the character, a fictitious composite, to be sure, was a person who felt comfortable attributing meaning and intent to a wide variety of aspects of life. She might have seen significance, for example, in the fact that the ice storm occurred on the anniversary of her best friend’s divorce, or she might believe that tea leaves, or the position of the planets and stars, hold messages.

Or maybe not. Maybe she believes not in those particular avenues of meaning, but she does believe that there’s one special someone out there destined for her to love; or that dreams hold powerful clues to future courses of action; or that there’s significance in the fact that when the phone rang, it was just the person she’d been thinking about; or that if her throat hurts, she would do well to examine what it is she’s reluctant to “voice.”

Or maybe she doesn’t look at life in those particular ways, but she does believe that when she hits all the green lights, the universe has found a way to smile on her; and when she needs a hysterectomy, she knows she wasn’t “supposed” to have had children in the first place; and that when her shutters blew off her house, or her mother-in-law came to live with her, or she won the coin-flip, that those things happened for a reason—indeed, everything happens for a reason. Our first character believes there are no coincidences, that events are predestined.

The character whose story I told, on the other hand, lives in quite a different world. Sore throats occur because of viruses or strep, and because you’re worn out. Ice storms always occur on the anniversary of something; it’s the luck of the draw. True love? You have to work at it, cultivate it, make it happen. Tea leaves are, well, tea leaves. Dreams can prompt interesting flights of fancy—amazing what neurons and synapses can do. You can time the green lights if you want, but usually you might as well leave it to chance. There are no hidden meanings. If you do the math, you find that the probability is quite high that someone you’ve been thinking about will call you on the phone – it’s happened to just about everybody. “Small world” theory tells us that though the incidents may be counter-intuitive, “normally occurring abnormal occurrences” are a predictable part of the natural world. The “Argument from Personal Incredulity” [Richard Dawkins], i.e., “if it seems impossible to me, it must be impossible,” holds no weight.

The hysterectomy? A certain percentage of women have them; it might as well be you. The coin-flip. We know from chaos theory that over time, you can count on the fact that coin tosses will result in heads about half the time, and tails about half the time – a dependable pattern. But any one flip of the coin? Who knows?

When the shutters blow off, or when you toss a coin, for that matter, you know that in a perfect world, with the perfect computer, and an infinite amount of input, you could have set up the equations, the weather patterns and wind velocities and shutter strength. You could have done the math and the physics and calculated the moment of flight. But short of all that, the loss of the shutter is experienced as random, and meaningless, too. That’s how it is, living in a neutral universe.

This is the character who identifies with Don Marquis’s typing cockroach, Archy, who reports, “i once heard the survivors/ of a colony of ants/ that had been partially/ obliterated by a cow s foot/ seriously debating/ the intention of the gods/ towards their civilization.”

Obviously, neither of our characters is real, and the portraits don’t describe any one of us. Most of us here either take less extreme positions, or more extreme positions, or we occupy some middle ground. Moreover, we understand that neither point of view is free of danger.

For example, taken to the extreme, our “it was meant to be” character has an over-riding sense that the way things are is the way things are supposed to be. She could believe that if she is being abused, she is supposed to be abused; if some people are poor, they are supposed to be poor; and – most horrifying – the Holocaust was supposed to happen.

If she gets sick, it’s because she needs to learn some lesson, and the universe needs to provide her with a “teaching”—it’s her fault that she’s sick. This person, on the far end of the continuum, believes that suffering is inherently of value.

Furthermore, again in an extreme case, because she believes something outside herself is calling the shots, she may feel “led” to destructive courses of action—who knows what she’ll feel called to do. It was meant to be.

The way I see it, the “it was meant to be” character needs to fight against a tendency to relinquish personal control, she needs to guard against abdicating her individual responsibility, and she needs to watch her inclination to throw careful, reasonable judgment to the winds. She needs to seek out “reality checks,” for when she goes with the natural human inclination to discover meaning in events, she could always be dead wrong. She is a person who sees constellations, not stars.

Of course the “it’s all a coincidence” character takes a dangerous position too, for she sees the stars, but not the constellations. She sees no meaning anywhere unless she creates it herself. For her, the universe is not warm and caring; it just “is.” She would say, with the biologist Richard Dawkins, [River Out of Eden], that “The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference.”

This, our second character is in danger of living in a world of profound cosmic loneliness, emptiness, and despair, where experiences, both good and bad, can come out of the blue with no redeeming value. She has to make life worth living, all on her own, and she may neglect to create that meaning. She will have to remember to celebrate the ups and downs of emotion, she will have to put extra stock in the depth of human interaction, and fun, and natural mystery and awe. And, like the first character, having viewed life through this particular lens, she could always turn out to have been wrong.

Now. We all know that as Unitarian Universalists, it’s perfectly OK to take either character’s position. But as a Unitarian Universalist minister, a person whose job it is in part to put forward our particular religious history and tradition, I want to point something out: As a religious movement, we are the people who defined ourselves in the late 18th and 19th Centuries as the religion that does not believe in predestination. We broke away from Calvinism precisely because we did not believe that anything was “meant to be.” Our sermon titles in 1759 read, “Natural Religion, as Distinguish’d from Revealed,” [Ebenezer Gay], and they were about the “Power of Self-determination, and Freedom of Choice.” We were the people who defined ourselves as those who “responded to the monitions of conscience and the dictates of reason.” [The Beginnings of Unitarianism in America, Conrad Wright, p. 114]. That’s what Unitarianism was.

If we were to become a movement primarily of people who do believe that events are “meant to be,” that would be a landmark change in Unitarian Universalist theology as we have practiced it up to now. We have changed before and we will change again—we are, after all, also the people who have always believed that “revelation is not sealed,” but I need to tell you that a theological change like that would be major.

The other rabbinical point I would underscore (rabbinical in the sense of carrying the tradition forward), is the message of our second reading, and the message being taught to our Fifth Graders as they study the Biblical story of the battle of Jericho and try to decide what really made the walls fall: In Unitarian Universalism, the method matters. Regardless of our theological conclusions, our way as Unitarian Universalists is to put reason to full use. From the beginning, as a religious movement on this continent, we have cared about judgment, and intellectual integrity, and conscience. This imperative doesn’t dwarf the full fruits of experience, and emotion, and sensitivity, but it does compel us to include all powers of reason in our theological decision-making.

Oh, as usual, I know we have only scratched the surface today, I know we could talk about Robert Frost stopping on a Snowy Evening, and why, and the piece of blue wool on the rug in the reading, and the ice storm. We could make a thousand cases for living in a predetermined world, and a thousand more for a random universe. And if we got started on “isn’t it a small world” stories we’d be here for the rest of our natural lives. After the service, if you have time, do come back up here to the sanctuary once you’ve grabbed your coffee, and we’ll talk more in an informal discussion. And meanwhile,

If there is a god,

If there is any power larger than us, larger than elephants or whales, larger than

clouds that burn with sunset color, larger than hurricanes that crush and fade,

If there is any cosmic thought or ideal

that brooding, watches over us,
guiding or wishing us toward goodness and health, If there is a will or presence
that grieves at our destructiveness
and glories in all our acts of love and of mercy, May that presence possess our hearts
and inspire our steps toward kindness.

And if there is not,

if no life or consciousness or purpose exists
except amid the yellow-leafed dying
and the merciful greening of this obscure, blessed earth,

May that same hopeful spirit still possess our hearts, and with a power more

needed than ever, inspire our steps toward mercy
yes, and again, toward every act of kindness.

[Ken Sawyer]

So may it be with us. Amen.

Hymn

No. 128 For All That Is Our Life
from Singing the Living Tradition

Closing Words

No. 700, “For all who see God”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Questions for Discussion

by Joy D. Gasta

1. How do you respond to Jane Rzepka’s assertion, “If we were to become a movement primarily of people who do believe that events are “meant to be,” that would be a landmark change in Unitarian Universalist theology as we have practiced it up to now?”
2. Emotionally, how do you tend to view life-as “meant-to-be” or coincidence? Does this tendency match your theological view of life, or is it at odds with it?
3. Is Rev. Rzepka correct that when we as a religious movement “care about judgment, and intellectual integrity, and conscience,” that does not “dwarf the full fruits of experience, and emotion, and sensitivity?”

Opening Words

There is no human being who does not carry
a treasure in the soul,
a moment of insight,
a memory of life,
a dream of excellence,
a call to worship.

Hymn

No. 360 “Here We Have Gathered”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Children’s Story

“Hosea Ballou: What Are You Thinking?”
By Denise D. Tracy, from “Living in the Wind”

Hosea’s father was a Baptist who believed that everyone was born with a stain of sin upon them. Even the tiniest babies had evil in their hearts and minds. Hosea was not sure what he believed. He wanted to believe as father did, but how could he be sure?

One day Hosea was leaning against a tree, thinking. His forehead was creased in thought. “What are you thinking?” asked his father. Hosea replied, “Suppose I could create a being which I knew would suffer forever. Should I create such a creature, and would it be good if I did?” Hosea waited for a reply. His father shook his head and did not respond. (Sometimes children surprise their parents with questions that they cannot answer.)

But Hosea thought a lot. He and his father talked about beliefs and ideas, and sometimes they argued, because their love was strong enough to allow for differences. Hosea had heard about Universal ism and it appealed to him. His father disagreed.

One day Hosea was sitting on a woodpile reading a book. His father asked him, ‘What book are you reading?”

“A Universalist book,” answered Hosea.

Later the father saw that Hosea had gone on to other things, leaving his Universalist book on the woodpile. Curious to see what this book was and wondering what his son was thinking, the father raised the volume and smiled. The book was none other than the Bible.

Hosea became a Universalist minister, and he and his father never agreed on theology. But their love was stronger than their differences. And they always tried to find out “What are you thinking?”

Reading

from All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten
by Robert Fulghum, Villand Books, 1988

This is kind of personal. It may get a little syrupy, so watch out. It started as a note to my wife. And then I thought that since some of you might have husbands or wives and might feel the same way, I’d pass it along. I don’t own this story, anyway. Charles Boyer does. Remember Charles Boyer? Suave, dapper, handsome, graceful. Lover of the most famous and beautiful ladies of the silver screen. That was on camera and in the fan magazines. In real life it was different.

There was only one woman. For forty-four years. His wife, Patricia. Friends said it was a lifelong love affair. They were no less lovers and friends and companions after forty-four years than after the first year.

Then Patricia developed cancer of the liver. And though the doctors told Charles, he could not bear to tell her. And so he sat by her bedside to provide hope and cheer. Day and night for six months. He could not change the inevitable. Nobody could. And Patricia died in his arms. Two days later Charles Boyer was also dead. By his own hand. He said he did not want to live without her. He said, “Her love was life to me.”

This was no movie. As I said, it’s the real story – Charles Boyer’s story .

It’s not for me to pass judgment on how he handled his grief. But it is for me to say that I am touched and comforted in a strange way. Touched by the depth of love behind the apparent sham of Hollywood love life. Comforted to know that [two people] can love each other that much that long.

I don’t know how I would handle my grief in similar circumstances. I pray I shall never have to stand in his shoes. (Here comes the personal part – no apologies.) But there are moments when I look across the room – amid the daily ordinariness of life – and see the person I call my wife and friend and companion. And I understand why Charles Boyer did what he did. It really is possible to love someone that much. I know. I’m certain of it.

Sermon

by the Rev. Jane Rzepka

“Love is the spirit of this church, and service its law.
This is our great covenant:
To dwell together in peace,
To seek the truth in love,
And to help one another.”

Some of you who grew up in our religious tradition may have recited these words as children. The words sound wonderful – how comforting it is to know that a group of people, somewhere, believe in love and care and peace.

The affirmation so many churches have repeated is a comfort because we would so much like people to be loving and caring and peaceful. And we are not. We can covenant together to live in peace and love ’till we’re blue in the face, and no matter how much we try (and, indeed, we must try), – no matter how much we try, we will get furious on occasion, or we will feel terribly hurt, we will misunderstand or offend or forget or misjudge or disappoint, we will feel cranky or resentful, we’ll be too silent or talk too much, or stomp around and yell or sulk, and we will be acutely aware of the fact that our great covenant to dwell together in peace and love and help is more dream than reality.

I feel sure that ever since people became people, we’ve had difficulty getting along with one another. A lot of very smart folks have lived and died, and no one yet has figured out how to ensure that human relationships will run smoothly. Nonetheless, every few years, somebody develops a theory that is supposed to answer once and for all the questions, “Why can’t we get along?” I am always cynical about these pop psychological theories, as you probably know, mostly because they are so often presented with zeal as the “one true path,” and anyone who has a question or two is labeled as a defensive “denier,” I do have questions about every theory I’m going to mention this morning – it’s frustrating that there isn’t time in a sermon to critique these theories – I hope you will come to see me after the service when we can talk in more depth. But all my reservations notwithstanding, I still think that these artificial psychological overlays are useful for shaking up our molecules – for helping us view our everyday relationships with new eyes.

We are easing, or shall I say we’re being propelled into, the holiday season, Many of us will be interacting with our families and extended families and friends at a level of intensity reserved only for November and December, So I’ve chosen four psychological dynamics, all of which are newly recognized and popular – you’re probably familiar with them – and I’m going to blatantly over-simplify and present them to you, in hopes that they will remind us that we can think about our relationships in new ways.

The first is “triangulation.” Triangulation. Let’s say, for instance, that the holidays are coming up, Joan gets the annual phone call from her mother that asks, “What time will Steve be bringing you over for Christmas this year? You know, all year I look forward to having you for Christmas dinner – just count the days.” Joan says, “Gee, I don’t know, let me talk to Steve.” Joan feels tense, already. She says to Steve, “So Steve, are we going to my mother’s for Christmas again or what?” “I can’t stand it over there, you know that. They do Christmas wrong – they string gaudy colored lights all over, they invite every relative over – even little kids – they kid around, they sing loud songs, they say what they think, they hug, they have pasta with their turkey and later all those little Italian cookies. I can’t take it another year. I mean, whatever happened to Christmas morning in church, a quiet glass of egg nog, and Handel? Call your mother back and tell her we won’t be coming.” Joan’s. feeling a lot of stress by now!

This is triangulation. The relationships between Joan, Steve, and her mother form a triangle. In family systems theory, the family is the unit to be looked at, not the individual. So we are not to view the situation as “Joan with a problem,” but rather as three people who have difficulty relating to each other as a group. Nor are we to view the situation as a problem about Christmas. In family therapy, one looks at the dynamic, not the content. The problem is not a person or an event, but the emotional patterns and processes of interacting.

In this Joan-mother-and-Steve mess, Joan is the one feeling stressed, anxious, and upset, even though actually, she couldn’t care less what they do about Christmas. Mom’s doing fine, Steve’s doing fine. Of course they are, because instead of dealing directly with one another, they have turned to Joan, made a triangle, and they both talk to her! That’s what happens in these triangles, a third party comes in and takes on all the stress. You know what has to happen – Steve and Joan’s mother have to resolve this conflict directly. They have to “detriangle.”

I think family systems theory, the idea of triangulation in particular, alerts us to two common pitfalls in human relationships: first, when we are feeling upset, we must always ask ourselves whose problem the problem really is. Your co-worker is upset with your boss and tells you every detail, your daughter has a problem with a teacher, your housemate had a run-in with your neighbor, your golf buddies each complain to you about the other, your sister tells you about your brother – they all try to draw you in, or worse, you insert yourself into their problem. That’s triangulation, and each of us will want to excuse ourselves from that dynamic as quickly and as firmly as we can.

The other thing this triangle concept makes us ask ourselves is, “Am I treating my own problems directly, or am I inviting a friend, a spouse, a relative, or a co-worker into my problem? Am I creating a triangle?”

So. Joan steps out of the triangle, Steve calls her mother, her mother would be just as happy to have them over on New Year’s Day, and they all live happily ever after. That’s how detriangulation works.

Another conception, this time out of the psychoanalytic model, but strongly identified with feminist psychology and theology , is “connection.” Traditionally, therapists are trained to gauge a person’s ability to separate and individuate. A person has been thought to be healthy and mature when he or she is independent and autonomous. Twelve years ago, our denomination’s press, the Beacon Press, published Jean Baker Miller’s book, Toward a New Psychology of Women, which argued that many women were not especially interested in modeling themselves after the lone ranger. Healthy women, according to this theory, thrive not on autonomy, but on connection. Women experience strong relationships as empowering.

My husband plays the trumpet in Thursday night jam sessions. He was telling me how much fun it is for each of them to perform and try to improve. They don’t really know each other very well, but they each have a strong interest in musical excellence, and Chuck says the emphasis on improving motivates them each to strive for new heights. The conversation put me in mind of my grandmothers, who used to play the violin and piano with a group of women. I remember vividly stories of them glorying in the company of one another and their harmony. It was the playing together, and the tea and conversation after the music, that my grandmothers loved.

What has happened of late in the fields of psychology and theology is that the value of interconnectedness is being recognized. No longer would the psychotherapuetic community say that only the members of those jazz sessions are healthy and mature, whereas my grandmothers were just frittering away their time. Now we would view the attention paid to human connection as being just as important as individual achievement. Close, deep human relationship is now seen as essential to our well-being, and interdependence is no longer a sign of weakness. Any person who can empathize, listen well, express feelings fluently, and maintain a closeness is to be admired in this new world of psychology. A balance of independence and connection is the new model. A balance of independence and connection.

The third concept I’d like to mention this morning is the genogram. The genogram is the notion that patterns and problems and mythologies get passed down from one generation of a group or a family to the next. We inherit our notions of what’s normal, of “how we ought to do things.” I heard our minister in Wellesley Hills, John Nichols, use the Red Sox as an example: As soon as this last season officially opened, the Red Sox experienced a team slump. “Think for a minute about what a team slump means. It means that every one of the teams’ hitters stops hitting. Boggs doesn’t hit, Evans doesn’t hit. Greenwell doesn’t hit. Barrett doesn’t hit. Players who were doing quite well suddenly stop doing well.” “A. Bartlett Giamatti, former president of Yale and now commissioner of the National League put it this way, ‘The Sox have always had that kind of elegant melancholy… There’s an almost Calvinistic sense of guilt at success, that we must reenact the Garden of Eden again and again. There’s a sense that things will turn out poorly no matter how hard we work. Somehow the Sox fulfill the notion that we live in an imperfect world. It’s as though they’re here to provide us with more pain.”

The Red Sox had a team mythology of hopelessness that they passed on down the line. Families do this kind of thing too – for generations the pattern in the home might be stern, reserved, and achievement-oriented, or boisterous, emotional and hopeful. If you have ever lived with someone who grew up with a very different set of family expectations, you know the power it holds. Maybe a family develops a pattern of alcohol abuse and passes that on down. Or maybe it’s a “silent strong husband/hysterical wife” routine that gets passed along, or an equal partnership model, or a tradition of single parenting. We inherit a “family culture,” for better or for worse, that moves from generation to generation – we live amidst a web of historical family systems.

The Red Sox’s club owners fired the manager, promoted one of the coaches to manager, and the team won 19 out of the next 20 games. What happened? Family therapists would say that the dysfunctional system got disturbed. By getting a new manager, the whole structure changed, and the group pattern and mythology of hopelessness was broken.

In my family, the women have their first baby at about age 26. This is unspoken, and probably unconscious, but a reliable family pattern. In my family, when you get old, you get rid of your belongings and move yourself into a nursing home. In my family, even when you don’t have any money, you find a way to travel to unusual places. (I fully expect that my grandchildren will one day find themselves in Iceland or Tasmania and will wonder what drove them there.)

Family patterns can be easily broken, but only if they’re recognized. A nursing home may not be the best choice for me when I get older, but unless I work at it, I can’t imagine anything else. It may be that I really don’t enjoy crossing the Baltic, but I don’t even ask myself the question unless I stop and try to understand why I’m there in the first place. We must each ask ourselves what parts of our family system we would like to perpetuate, and which patterns we should end. That’s what the concept of genograms is for.

The last dynamic I might mention is co-dependence. This one is sweeping the nation. The concept of co-dependence arises out of the field of alcoholism – it was used to describe the spouse (or even a child) of an alcoholic who had coped by trying to take care of everything, to control everything, so that life wouldn’t fall apart, and of course as a side-effect, the alcoholic could continue to drink. The idea of co-dependence has expanded now to include anybody who, above all, tries to (1) please people to win approval, (2) take care of others in what turns out to be an attempt to control them, and (3) expect perfection from themselves.

Barbara Merritt, one of our ministers in Worcester, tells a story. “This summer,” she says, “my husband taught a friend how to skip rocks on the Bay of Fundy. After this co-dependent had, for the first time, successfully skipped a rock 7 times, she looked around, and in anguish discovered that no one had been watching. What she then said could be understood as the co-dependent’s creed. She cried, ‘No one saw my rock skipping (my success) so it doesn’t count!’

“Not only does it not count, co-dependents believe that nothing we do has any reality unless there is an audience, a reaction, and approval. In order to get that approval, we will do just about anything. We become ‘people-pleasers,’ we feel we don’t have it all together, so we put up a good front. We will say yes (when what we want to say is no). We will say we are fine (when in fact we are in enormous pain). We will sacrifice our own legitimate wants, needs and desires …”

There is a story in the Christian Scriptures (Luke 9:59-62) that I have never understood. “And Jesus said to a man, ‘Follow me.’ But the man said, ‘Lord, let me first go and bury my father.’

“But Jesus said to him, ‘Leave the dead to bury their own dead; but as for you, go and proclaim the kingdom of God.’

“Another said, ‘I will follow you, Lord; but let me first say farewell to those at my home.’

“Jesus said to him, ‘No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”

If we look at this episode from the point of view of best-selling pop psychology , Jesus is talking to a couple of co-dependents. He’s saying, “Don’t do what everybody else wants and expects you to do, do what you know in your own heart is most important! Follow your heart, not society’s expectations.”

It seems to me that the key to getting out of co-dependency (if you buy the concept in the first place), is recognizing that each of us, just by being living breathing human beings, is worthy. Almost all of us are competent, basically good, and deserving of love. We don’t have to please everybody. We don’t have to control anybody else’s life. We don’t have to be perfect. That’s what co-dependency is all about.

So that’s the 1988 answer to “why people don’t get along”: triangulation, a need for connection, dysfunctional genograms, and co- dependence. All four of these paradigms are well worth pondering. But if we, in the end, go back to more traditional models for trying to live gently with one another, our hearts and spirits will still be changed. If we believe, as Chris wrote in her meditation, that “each day is a new beginning,” and we try to “remember the peace of the morning,” our hearts and spirits will still be changed. If we only look across the room on an ordinary day and are startled by our love, our hearts and spirits will still be changed. If we covenant to “dwell together in peace, to seek the truth in love, and to help one another,” if we want simply to believe that “love is the spirit of this church,” our hearts and spirits will still be changed. So may it be with us. Amen.

Just a few references:

Triangles:
“Chronic Anxiety and Defining a Self,” The Atlantic, September
1988, p. 35.
Family Therapy Techniques, Salvador Minuchin, H. Charles
Fishman.

Connections:
Toward a New Psychology of Women, Jean Baker Miller
In A Different Voice, Carol Gilligan

Genograms:
Generation to Generation, Edwin Friedman
Intimate Partners, Maggie Scarf

Co- Dependence:
Co- Dependence, Anne Wilson Schaef
Co-Dependent No More, Melody Beattie

Meditation

by the Rev. Bruce Southworth, adapted from Hymns of the Spirit

We turn aside from an unquiet world, seeking rest for our spirits
and light for our thoughts.

We bring our wounds to be healed,
our hopes to be renewed, and
our better selves to be quickened.

From the world of many things and many doings,
We come to seek the unity of a constantly loving spirit.

We are divided within ourselves by many cares, by many pleasures,
by diverse and selfish aims.

The majesty of the world bewilders our minds;
Temptations and perplexities break us asunder;
Tragedies small and great tempt our faith.

Yet in all the universe, there is no wholly severed thing,
For all things are part and substance of the other .
Nor can anyone of us find alone a separate good, bound as we are
one to another .

We gather this hour, here, together, to restore the soul’s freshness
and vision.

We seek to leave behind the broken parts, the hurts, the pains, to find new strength that leads to a trusting spirit and a grateful heart.

With faith in one another,
With faith in the infinite possibilities for love,
With gratitude for all blessings known and unknown, remembered
and forgotten,
We give thanks for this amazing thing;
We live, we laugh, we cry , we love.

Amen

Hymn

No. 354 “We Laugh, We Cry”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Benediction

In the days ahead,
May you have:
Enough happiness to keep you sweet,
Enough trials to keep you strong,
Enough sorrow to keep you human
Enough hope to keep you happy,
Enough failure to keep you eager,
Enough friends to give you comfort,
Enough wealth to meet your needs,
Enough enthusiasm to look forward,
Enough faith to banish depression,
Enough determination to make each day
Better than yesterday.

Questions for Discussion

1. The first psychological theory discussed in the sermon is triangulation. The example given is happily resolved. However, what
   do you think would have happened to Joan if both her mother and
   her husband had insisted on having their own way and resisted any
   compromise? If you were in Joan’s position, what would you do?
2. In what aspect of your life is independence especially important
   to you? In what aspect of your life is connection especially important to you? Does it seem as if the need for independence and the need for connection are well balanced in your life?
3. Jane Rzepka mentions several examples of family patterns that
   persist across the generations. Are you aware of any such patterns
   in your family? If so, which of these patterns would you like to
   change? What would it take to change them?
4. Do you see co-dependence as being a destructive characteristic, or
   does it seem to you that living up to the expectations of others is to
   be valued? If you had been one of the people to whom Jesus spoke,
   how would you have reacted to his telling you not to tend to your
   father’s burial, or not to take leave of your family? Does your
   response indicate your valuing of independence or connection?
5. As you reflect on the four psychological theories presented in this
   sermon, which of them seems most useful to you in terms of
   helping people get along? Is there an entirely different approach
   that you would advocate?

Opening Words

Religion is beauty which rises above all ugliness, it’s a protest and a dream.
Religion is the candle of life lit from the rays of the sun of love.
Religion is a broken heart with an unquenched spirit.
Religion is laughter coming through tears.
Religion is the cherishing of values felt to be most vital to life and blessedness.
Religion is a perfect dream trying to get itself built in an imperfect planet.
Religion is an unanswered prayer answering itself.
Religion is someone without money going out to purchase the universe.
Religion is the quest for the largest and fullest satisfaction of felt need.
Religion is a mother’s kiss and a father’s benediction.
Religion is someone on the summit of a mountain wondering why they are there.
Religion is giving the best that we have to the best that we know.

Hymn

No. 213 “There’s a Wideness In Your Mercy”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Children’s Story

“Alonzo Ames Miner: Use Common Sense”
by Denise D. Tracy, from Living In The Wind

Alonzo’s father was a farmer. On their farm they raised crops, cows, and Morgan horses. Alonzo knew how to hoe weeds between the corn, and pick mustard which helped fertilize the corn; he knew how to pick corn and how to turn it into fodder for cattle feed.

He knew how to take the cows out to pasture, calling “cowbush, cowbush” and how to bring them in again in the evening. He also knew how to milk the cows. He was so good at milking that the barn cats would line up at the end of the stall and he would direct a stream of milk into each cat’s mouth. Afterwards they would lick their lips and walk slowly away, waving their tails with pleasure.

But Alonzo loved the Morgan horses more than anything. They were chestnut brown, large and handsome. He considered the horses his personal friends. He was a good rider, light in the saddle with gentle hands. The horses responded well to his touch.

His father had told him if he was ever thrown to always stay with his horse, never to let his horse get away.

One day Alonzo was riding and the horse did throw him. Remembering his father’s words, he held onto the bridle and was dragged on the ground for a long distance. He was badly hurt and bruised and had broken bones. It took many months for him to be able to walk again, and all his life he was to have pain from these injuries.

The fall from the horse changed Alonzo’s life. He could no longer hope to be a farmer which required that he be physically healthy. So instead he studied hard and became a Universalist minister. He became a minister at the Universalist Church in Methuen and Lowell, Massachusetts, and in Boston. He was an excellent pastor and preacher.

Often he preached on common sense. He told the story of the horse whose bridle he held onto because he had been told not to let his horse out of his sight.

“That rule was good for me to know, but if I had used my common sense, I wouldn’t have been hurt so badly.” But then he would think to himself, “If l had used my common sense, I’d have been a farmer, and not a Universalist minister.” Alonzo realized that rules ought to be adaptable, and that using common sense was the means to adapt a rule to fit the situation.

And no matter where Alonzo preached or who he pastored to, at the end of the day he always loved to go into the stable and feed the horses a carrot or brush their coats to shine! Horses were still his friend.

Often he preached on common sense. He told the story of the horse whose bridle he held onto because he had been told not to let his horse out of his sight.

Reading

from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
by Samuel Coleridge

“God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!
Why look’st thou so?” – With my cross-bow
I shot the Albatross.

And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would work ’em woe;
For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow!
Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay,
That made the breeze to blow!

Ah, well a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.

I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.

Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes;
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

O happy living thing! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware;
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

Sermon

“Shooting the Albatross”
by the Rev. Jane Rzepka

The way I hear the poem, this guy shoots a bird. He feels awful about it – I mean really awful, then later he feels better. And that’s the end of it. But there must be more to it, or why on earth would English teachers keep assigning Coleridge and poems like The Rime of the Ancient Mariner?

The poem presents us with a problem: when we do something bad and feel terrible about it, how can we, in the end, accept ourselves once again? It’s not my job to understand Coleridge – that’s the job of those English teachers. But it is my job, and everybody’s job, to understand the universal religious problem of feeling bad about something you’ve done and then coming to terms with it.

“With my cross-bow I shot the Albatross. And I had done a hellish thing.” The sailor shoots the bird, the albatross. We don’t know why; maybe he himself doesn’t quite know why, either. But he soon recognizes his mistake, his “hellish thing,” just as any of us might privately acknowledge a slip-up, a lapse, an injustice, a serious wrong-doing.

When the Cosby Show first appeared on television, one of my children claimed he was to watch it for homework as an example of “realistic fiction.” At the dinner table, during a rare moment when the kids weren’t trying to bounce grapes off each others’ noses, we talked about whether or not the show actually was realistic. I said, “no.”

“They throw us a few realistic bones, Theo’s room’s a mess, the children insult each other, but I still don’t think the program shows family life as it is. Rudy doesn’t ever leave her toys in the living room, fighting has a witty, loving, tongue-in-cheek quality, and – the thing that strikes me most – the parents are never busy doing anything.” The kids fought me on this one. They said, “The Cosby Show is realistic Mom; it’s just that we don’t measure up.

“Why don’t you just accept the fact that, as a family, sometimes we do it wrong? There will always be elbows on the table, an unbrushed dog, experimental string pulleys or something crisscrossing the dining room at neck-level. There will always be days when we’re out of milk, when one of us is furious, when one of us is too busy for anybody’s good. The Cosbys are, realistically, the right kind of family. Accept it, Mom, we’re not.”

I want my family to feel happy and loved and cared for. And when they don’t seem happy or loved or well cared for or perfect (and of course they don’t always), I feel I’ve shot the albatross.

People shoot the albatross in different ways. Sometimes it’s the smallest things: forgetting an anniversary, over-reacting to a demanding co-worker, or letting the finance charges pile up. Or we are horrified about our drinking, our marriage, our self-indulgence, our children, our house, or a serious misjudgment or injustice or unkindness or betrayal. Somebody seems to say, “I needed you and you weren’t there,” or “You hurt me,” or “You let me down.” There are periods in a lifetime when we must say, along with the ancient mariner, “I have done a hellish thing.”

The mariner faced his failure all too thoroughly. By the third stanza the dead albatross literally hung around his neck, and he is

Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
I looked to heaven, and tried to pray;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.

“The soul in agony.” The Universalist, Hosea Ballou, said, “It is as much the nature of sin to torment the mind as it is the nature of fire to burn our flesh.” Universal salvation is okay; it’s okay if there’s no Hell, because we will sufficiently torment ourselves over our sins as they occur in this life. Indeed, we are quite capable of subjecting our own souls to agony. Guilt can do that, and probably should. But not forever.

We expect more of ourselves, I think, than we should, and that makes our albatrosses heavier, the agonies of the soul greater, the heart drier and dustier, the wicked whispers louder. Right off the bat I can think of three expectations for life that nearly all of us have and almost none of us can attain.

First, for example, we expect our inner conflicts to resolve themselves eventually. We make a final decision or take some action – the ambiguous business deal, the gossip session, the child’s punishment – then we vow to put the whole thing behind us now that it’s “resolved.” Lo and behold, little bits of an internal vocal minority keep bubbling back up.

I believe that it is more realistic to strive simply for relative peace amidst the various aspects of ourselves than it is to expect a static, complete, mental and emotional solution to a complex human dilemma. Reconciliation is an on-going process; there is not perfect tranquility. Don’t expect it.

The second thing I believe might occasionally reduce the weight of the albatross – and I know it’s obvious – is to remove the expectation that we should be able to make “right” decisions. Many of us go on believing, despite repeated evidence to the contrary, that all problems have a right solution; it’s just a question of figuring it out.

We go over it and over it, the pros and cons of finally putting Dad in a nursing home, or of arranging to work more closely with the very attractive person in the office down the hall, or of giving our tax refund to the family Disney World fund instead of to the Friends of the UUA. The fact is, as you will remember, in most cases there are many ways to do things, and no choice is altogether right or wrong. Don’t expect to always make the right decisions.

A third way of lightening that albatross load – again, obvious – is to jettison the notion that we ought to be able to cope with it all. Some problems will never be resolved. Some will never go away. A mother may always wonder about the baby she relinquished to adoptive parents. A retired man may always wonder if he handled that difficult Saturday night back in high school in the best way. That pest of a nephew may hang around for the rest of your natural life. That’s all there is to it; problems are part of being human as are the ancient mariner’s agonies.

We left the mariner in despair. How does he snap out of it? It may seem odd, but he begins to watch the water-snakes. He begins to watch them, “blue, glossy green, and velvet black, They coiled and swam; and every track was a flash of golden fire. O happy living things! No tongue their beauty might declare.” The ancient mariner embraces the world – beginning humbly with sea-snakes – but he embraces the world, nonetheless. “A spring of love gushed from my heart, And I blessed them unaware.”

The mariner was smart to embrace the world around him. Albert Einstein says that’s exactly what a person should do. “We experience ourselves,” says Einstein, “our thoughts and feelings, as something separated from the rest – a kind of optical illusion of our consciousness. . . .Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty. Nobody is able to achieve this completely, but the striving for such achievement is in itself a part of the liberation and a foundation for inner security.” Even the Principles of our own Unitarian Universalist Association recommend that we give attention to the “interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. “

I think the mariner, Einstein, and the UUA are on to something. Within the universe we do have bonds; life to life, creature to creature, person to person. We are never so broken that we need feel “alone on the sea.” There is a gentleness to creation, when only we bother to notice nature, or the night sky, or the people around us in a room. When we’ve shot the albatross, there is a way out of the agony that follows. To finally accept ourselves as a part of life on this planet, none of it perfect; to feel a common sympathy for ourselves as part of the human condition; and to accept it all, finally, and be free.

You may have seen the Yom Kippur liturgical chant that the Rev. Mark Belletini adapted:

All vows, all promises we have made to ourselves, all commitments to unswerving thought, opinion and behavior are now cancelled, nullified and made as naught.

Now are we free to reexamine all our desires and all the roads

we have chosen to walk; for all vows, all promises we have made to ourselves, all commitments to unswerving behavior,

thought, or opinion are now cancelled, nullified, made as naught.

Now we are free to cling no more to convictions based on inner vows or laziness or apathy; for now all vows, all promises we have made to ourselves, all commitments to unswerving opinion, behavior or thought are now cancelled, nullified and made as naught.

Blessed are Thou, eternal, center of the world, and light within our hearts!

We are free to start again, in peace.

The message I share with you today is a gentle, reassuring one. That is not to say that any one of us isn’t due for one that prods, or kicks hard, or wrestles with us, or makes us uneasy. But for today, if we’ve done our best to be loving and decent, I believe we may loosen the albatross and appreciate the divinity that is ever within.

Spirit of Life
When all is quiet and we are small
And the night is dark,
May we hear the tender breathing of all who lie awake with us.
That together we may gather strength to live with love, and
kindness and confidence.

“The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.”

Amen

Meditation

A Litany of Atonement
by the Rev. Robert Eller-Isaacs

For remaining silent, when a single voice would have made a
difference,
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

For each time that our fears have made us rigid and inaccessible,
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

For each time our greed has blinded us to the needs of others
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

For the selfishness that sets us apart and alone,
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

For falling short of the admonitions of the spirit,
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

For these and for so many acts, both evident and subtle, which have
fueled the illusion of separateness,
We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love.

Hymn

No. 323 “Break Not the Circle”
from Singing the Living Tradition

Benediction

Here and Now
by Emily Curie

The place to begin is here.
The time to begin is now.
I unwrap the layers of my public self
And settle in the calm.

Awake, my song
and sing to me
of treasured times
in memory
of healthy hopes:
the world made one
a restful sleep when day is done
of broken hearts mended
of long grudges ended
the lonely befriended
And let it begin with me.
The place to begin is here.
The time to begin is now.

Questions for Discussion

1. Think of one or two recent instances when you have been
   troubled by self-recrimination, when you have shot the albatross.
   Did your guilt and regret eventually serve you positively?
2. Is it psychologically and spiritually helpful to realize that some
   problems will never be completely resolved and that reconciliation
   often is an ongoing process – resulting in a “relative peace”?
3. Rev. Jane Rzepka says that when she is facing personal regrets
   and problems, it helps to “embrace the world” around her, and thus
   feel more bound up with the rest of life. Is this thought helpful to
   you? What are some simple, everyday ways you might enhance your
   “connectedness” with creation and with persons around you? Is there one thing you can do now to strengthen your relationship
   with life around you?