Prelude Melodia Africana I by Ludovico Einaudi
Opening Words by Sunshine Jeremiah Wolfe
This is a congregation that gathers in faith.
Not faith in one religion or one god or any one way.
We gather in faith of the power of diversity, the power of love, and the hope of a world transformed by our care.
We gather in faith in ourselves and those around us.
Not a faith that requires perfection or rightness in one another.
Rather, a faith that in our shared imperfection we may learn to stumble and fall together.
Faith that we will help one another to rise and to try again and again.
We are Unitarians.
Chalice Lighting (you may wish to light a candle in your own home at this point). (words by Jane Blackall)
May the light of this chalice be a reminder of the
shared values and principles around which we gather:
upholding the inherent worth and dignity of every person;
cherishing all those diverse creatures and habitats
with whom we share this Earth, our home;
seeking human liberation and flourishing;
serving the common good of all.
May this little light, and all it represents, make a home in our hearts;
where it will ever guide us back to our highest aspirations,
and help us be responsive, creative, just, and loving,
in this complex and ever-changing world.
Opening Prayer
Spirit of Life and Love,
be with us as we gather for worship,
each in our own place.
Help us to feel a sense of community,
even though we are physically apart.
Help us to care for each other,
in this world in which the clouds
of war, poverty, and climate change hover.
And help us to make a difference,
starting where we are, with what we have.
May we keep in touch however we can,
and help each other, however we may.
Help us to be grateful for the freedoms we have
and to respect the wishes of others.
May we hold in our hearts all those
who are grieving, lost, alone,
victims of violence and war,
suffering in any way,
Amen
Reading Reflection on the First Principle by Rebecca Ann Parker
Reverence and respect for human nature is at the core of Unitarian Universalist (UU) faith. We believe that all the dimensions of our being carry the potential to do good. We celebrate the gifts of being human: our intelligence and capacity for observation and reason, our senses and ability to appreciate beauty, our creativity, our feelings and emotions. We cherish our bodies as well as our souls. We can use our gifts to offer love, to work for justice, to heal injury, to create pleasure for ourselves and others.
‘Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy,’ the great twentieth-century Rabbi Abraham Heschel wrote. Unitarian Universalists affirm the inherent worth and dignity of each person as a given of faith—an unshakeable conviction calling us to self-respect and respect for others.
Alternative Lord’s Prayer
Spirit of Life and Love, here and everywhere,
may we be aware of your presence in our lives.
May our world be blessed.
May our daily needs be met,
and may our shortcomings be forgiven,
as we forgive those of others.
Give us the strength to resist wrong-doing,
the inspiration and guidance to do right,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
We are your hands in the world; help us to grow.
May we have compassion for all living beings,
and receive whatever life brings,
with courage and trust.
Amen
Reading from We affirm and promote The Inherent Worth and Dignity of Every Person by Marilyn Sewell, from With Purpose and Principle: Essays about the Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism. (adapted)
The first principle is our foundation. It speaks of respecting others enough to never objectify and control them in the service of ideology, however precious. It encourages people to unfold according to their true and authentic nature, to live with integrity according to their own heart’s leaning. As Unitarian Universalists, we do not ask members to adopt any creed or doctrine. People are accepted as they are, whether they are Christians, Buddhists, Jews, humanists, atheists or simply searching. Whether they are straight, gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgendered. Whether they are socialists or republicans. Whether they vote Labour, Liberal or Conservative. Whether they are white or people of colour. All have worth and dignity. All are welcome at the table. … Believing that all people have spiritual needs, we invite whoever would come, asking only that people give the same respect and tolerance to others that they would want for themselves.
Prayer by Marilyn Sewell (adapted)
Father, Mother God, here we are together—
rich and poor; educated and not so well educated;
gay and straight; people of all political opinions;
some of us with light skin, some of us with darker;
some of us walking, some of us unable to walk:
none of us as whole as we would like to be—
help us to know that we are all your children and we are all holy stuff.
May we be a blessing to the life of anyone who enters this sanctuary—
and may this church be a true sanctuary—
and may those who come as strangers in turn help us grow in wisdom,
in compassion, and in joy of living. Amen.
Reading from We affirm and promote The Inherent Worth and Dignity of Every Person by Marilyn Sewell, from With Purpose and Principle: Essays about the Seven Principles of Unitarian Universalism. (adapted)
Though our first principle is the foundation of our theological and relational lives in community, we must acknowledge that there are questions and contradictions that plague us. One of these questions emerges in regard to the tolerance we profess. …
When we reject individuals because we disagree with their perspective on religion or politics, we are violating our first principle. “We need not think alike to love alike,” wrote Francis David, an early martyr. Our tradition pledges us to be deeply respectful of others, even when we cannot accept their values or theological perspectives. … On the other hand in the name of radical respect, sometimes we find ourselves being foolishly tolerant of individual behaviour that should not be accepted because it is destructive of the larger community. …
We are called upon to reject the easy answers and to struggle with the values and conflicts inherent in human life. We must study and reflect and think and write and get beneath the surface of things, or else we will become facile in regard to… significant moral and ethical issues. …
Imperfect as we are, this principle calls us into right relationship with others. It calls for profound respect, even when we differ with the views and behaviour of another. It calls for gentleness and forgiveness and the understanding that redemption is just a decision away. It calls us to leave the safety and sameness of our suburbs and stand against hunger and hopelessness in our urban streets. [It is] a covenant of relationship.
Time of Stillness and Reflection Marginal Wisdom by Leslie Takahashi (adapted)
They teach us to read in black and white.
Truth is this—the rest false.
You are whole—or broken.
Who you love is acceptable—or not.
Life tells its truth in many hues.
We are taught to think in either/or.
To believe the teachings of Jesus—OR Buddha.
To believe in human potential—OR a power beyond a single will.
I am broken OR I am powerful.
Life embraces multiple truths, speaks of both, and of and.
We are taught to see in absolutes.
Good versus evil.
Male versus female,
Old versus young,
Gay versus straight.
Let us see the fractions, the spectrum, the margins.
Let us open our hearts to the complexity of our worlds.
Let us make our lives sanctuaries, to nurture our many identities.
[silence]
The day is coming when all will know
That the rainbow world is more gorgeous than monochrome,
That a river of identities can ebb and flow over the static,
stubborn rocks in its course,
That the margins hold the centre.
May it be so, Amen
Musical Interlude I Giorni by Ludovico Einaudi
Address First Principle: The Inherent Worth and Dignity of Every Person
In 2019, I spent a wonderful week at the Nightingale Centre in Great Hucklow, attending Unitarian Summer School. The theme for the week was “Theology in the Flesh” and the theme talks in particular were wonderful illustrations of how British Unitarians perceive the inherent worth and dignity of every person. Two talks in particular ‘spoke to my condition’ as the Quakers say…
Rev Winnie Gordon, minister of our Birmingham congregation, spoke movingly of her experiences as a black woman first attending, and then leading, Unitarian congregations. She spoke of her consciousness of looking ‘different’, and called Unitarians out for not being nearly as inclusive in practice as we are on paper. That she has to wear a mask to be accepted. She was also concerned about the general Unitarian resistance to engaging in worship with our hearts, rather than our heads. She spoke wistfully about her past experience of worshipping in an evangelical congregation, where it was quite usual to call out ‘Amen’ or ‘Alleluia’ during a service and where people worshipped with their bodies as well as their heads.
This resonated with me. I can remember attending a Baptist service in our village on one free Sunday some years ago, and wrote an article about it for The Inquirer. I wrote: “The thing that really struck me about it was how much the congregation was involved in the service. Unlike the average Unitarian service, when the worship leader leads the worship, and congregational involvement is limited to singing four hymns (often not very well) and perhaps participation in the Lord’s Prayer, this congregation seemed to be emotionally and spiritually involved in the whole service and there was much more opportunity to participate.
The other thing that I found so different was the joy that the congregation seemed to be feeling, that they seemed to have a personal relationship with God through Jesus, and wanted the whole world to know about it. No-one was shy about showing their feelings, which is so different to the average Unitarian congregation member.” I went on to say that “I know that many Unitarian congregations would be deeply suspicious of a ‘happy-clappy’ type of service. Nevertheless, I cannot help noticing that whenever we are together in large numbers, for example at the GA meetings, or at Summer School, we too can sing lustily and with joy and be more emotionally involved in worship.”
I’m guessing that this kind of worship was what Winnie was talking about. The publication and reception of my article was a good example of Unitarians not respecting the worth and dignity of others: it appeared under the title ‘Should Unitarians get happy-clappy?’ – an unsubtle sneer about such worship, which I was furious about; and the following issue featured a very indignant letter from someone equally furious at the idea that we might abandon reason and experience more overt joy in our worship. I found the whole thing quite sad.
I chose to include two contrasting readings by Marilyn Sewell in the service. The second one detailed the good ways in which Unitarian Universalists (and Unitarians) appreciate the worth and dignity of every person – we don’t ask our members to adopt any creed or doctrine, and we are accepting of people just the way they are. “All are welcome here” says our hymn. But are they? In our third reading, Sewell wrote that although we might say we affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person, in practice, and I quote: “we must acknowledge that there are questions and contradictions that plague us. One of these questions emerges in regard to the tolerance we profess…”
I found this question to be a live one among British Unitarians when I carried out my survey into Unitarian beliefs and values some years ago. In the second section of the survey, I asked participants about their beliefs about the “Unitarian trinity” of freedom, reason and tolerance. The results were interesting, as I noted in my summary of findings:
“Through the individual comments it became clear that freedom of religious belief must have limits, that it entails responsibility, and it requires a critical approach. Naturally the individual must decide where to set limits … [and] Respondents agreed that a critical and reasoned approach to matters of religion and spirituality is important, but many accepted that there is also a need for spiritual engagement, and that reason alone has its limitations. [and] Tolerance was related in the minds of many respondents to the issue of freedom of religious belief. It was recognised that it is often difficult to put into practice. Many respondents found value in a tolerant approach to the beliefs of others, but it was clear that it must have limits, specifically that Unitarians should not tolerate particular beliefs and behaviours which are harmful to others. Some disliked the word ‘tolerance’ itself, suggesting that it has some negative connotations. Tolerance is generally recognised as an important concept for Unitarians, but the extent of its adoption will vary from person to person and situation to situation.”
In other words, we are all individuals, with different beliefs and differing levels of tolerance for the beliefs and behaviour of others. Indeed most of the questions in my survey had similarly diverse responses, with widely varying levels of understanding and acceptance of anyone perceived as ‘different’, whether in their appearance or in their religious or political views. Which seems to me to be quite a distance away from affirming and promoting the inherent worth and dignity of every person.
Is that too harsh? Perhaps it is… I do believe that we are doing many things right. For example, I would say that for most Unitarians these days, people of whatever sexuality or gender identity are welcomed in our communities. Yet we are still (largely) a predominantly white, middle-class denomination with little first-hand experience of the problems faced by the other in our wider communities… the unemployed, the homeless, the mentally-ill, the refugee. This is not to say that there are not fine examples of Unitarians in this country reaching out to help these people – much sterling work is done by individuals and congregations alike. But by and large, we are not unemployed or homeless or refugees. Although many of us have suffered from differing forms of mental illness.
Returning to Summer School, the other talk which spoke to me was Jen Hazel’s. Jen is American born, and became a Unitarian-Universalist as a young adult. She has a beautiful singing voice and has worked freelance in various community engagement arts projects with a speciality in helping people with severe learning disabilities access the performing arts as artists. She currently lectures in singing and acting through song at East 15 Drama School.
And she is fat. I was going to say, “carries quite a lot of weight” or “is overweight”, because the word “fat” is so pejorative and judgmental, but Jen herself referred to her body as “fat”, so I will do the same. She spoke about how people who are overweight or obese (I’m avoiding the word again!) are harshly judged by others– as weak-willed, not deserving of medical care, unattractive – the litany goes on. Fat people in our society are subject to stigma and discrimination. It is an attested fact that teachers have lower expectations of fat students, for example. And Jen said that fat people are often considered to be “fundamentally weak or flawed” in some way.
She argued that this bias against the body (any body, not just overweight ones) goes back to the Christian Church’s scholars who taught denial of the body in order to bring ourselves into union with God. The first Principle of the Unitarian Universalists speaks of “the inherent worth and dignity of every person”, the implication of which is, we are already worthy, just by being human. Jen commented that this sounds “pretty on paper”, but believes that every one of us needs to examine our unconscious assumptions and biases about “the other”.
Jen actually referred to the first Principle quite extensively. She explained that in order to “be in right relationship with others”, as Marilyn Sewell puts it, we need to love the whole person, warts, body fat, and all. That feeling pity and charity towards the other is not enough.
The Quakers believe that there is “that of God in everyone”. If this is so, surely this means that every person has inherent worth and dignity? That every person is worthy of love and respect. So easy to write or say, so damned hard to do.
But at least it can be a gold standard, to which we can aspire. So that every time we meet a new person, we do not judge them by what we see on the surface, but take the trouble to get to know them properly. So that the divine spark in us can reach out to the divine spark in them. We are all human and imperfect, and all need the love and support of others to make our way in the world.
Which brings me back to the words of Sunshine Jeremiah Wolfe, which I shared at the beginning of the service: “We gather in faith in ourselves and those around us. Not a faith that requires perfection or rightness in one another. Rather, a faith that in our shared imperfection we may learn to stumble and fall together. Faith that we will help one another to rise and to try again and again.”
May it be so. Amen
Closing Words
Spirit of Life and Love,
Our time together is drawing to a close.
May we treat every person with respect,
Knowing that each has inherent worth and dignity,
That each is unique, precious, a child of God.
May we return to our everyday world refreshed,
may we share the love we feel,
may we look out for each other,
and may we keep up our hearts,
now and in the days to come.
Amen
Postlude Stella del Mattino by Ludovico Einaudi