The Unitarian Fellowship of Peterborough

A favourite voice of Universalism, Clinton Lee Scott, spoke to the primacy of an ethical attitude; in a poetic meditation he called “The Larger Fellowship.”

These words come from a sermon by the Rev. Thom Belote, one he preached on Valentine’s Day this year.

So...what’s in your wallet?

If that line sounds familiar, it’s because the credit card company, Capital One, uses it to suggest that having their card will give you more choices, expose you to fewer limits and conditions, and just generally make life sweeter. If you believe the commercials, when you’re in a tough situation, when stranded, when trying to figure out a way to use your air miles...having that card in your wallet will be your salvation.

 

When I was an adolescent, perhaps even into young adulthood, I used to love to look through my friends’ wallets and pocketbooks...with permission of course! Aside from it being an intensely personal exploration, it’s fascinating, really, the information you can find there. Because most everything that someone puts in their wallet is something that they feel a need to keep close or that they feel they will need to prove themselves, or to pay for something, or to refer to.   As Thom Belote said in his sermon,[1] you might find a drivers license, a credit card, a gym membership, a student ID, a “rewards” card from this store or another, a library card, a punch card from a coffee shop or a favourite store. You might also have photos of the most important people in your life, or a clipping with a meaningful poem or quote, or perhaps a few practical things...a band-aid or a condom. If you were to look into my wallet, you might find some coupons, suggesting that I am somewhat frugal, and a few business cards that tell the story of my everyday connections...the dog kennel, the chiropractor, my hair dresser. 

 

And have you ever had your wallet stolen? The last time that happened to me I was parked in the lot of Unity Unitarian Church in St. Paul on a Sunday morning... back in the days when I was checking out Unitarianism. I might have taken it as an omen, but I had foolishly left my wallet lying on the seat; when I came out after service my car window had been smashed, and my wallet was gone, along with my day planner with my favourite pen, and my cell phone. Certainly, there are financial and identity worries when this happens, but the greatest crisis, at least for me, was in the time and effort it took to put it all back together, to collect all the pieces of my life into one place again... safely tucked into my wallet. 

 

But it does make you wonder. When that thief, or the person who finds a lost wallet, or a paramedic on an accident scene, is looking through a wallet, do they get a picture of the wallet’s owner? Certainly, a profile of a life and what matters to that person could be assembled. From the identification in a wallet, one’s involuntary associations could be assessed...age, race, family name, medical conditions...as well as one’s voluntary associations...favourite coffee shops, political affiliations, club memberships, even the choice to be an organ donor. 

 

This gives me pause to ponder. I take a look at my own life and am struck by how group-aphobic I can be. True, I can generally be sceptical and suspicious. As I was writing this sermon, I got a phone call offering to lower my interest rate on my credit card. When I asked which specific card, the caller hung up. I wanted to be sure they were really a part of ‘my group’, connected with the credit card I hold. Now clearly, there is some valid reason to be suspicious of these kinds of phishing schemes, but still, even when asked if I want to have a customer card for the grocery store or the shoe store or...whatever else, I give it more than a second thought. Do I want that extra group-clutter in my life? Do I feel I have an ongoing relationship with this business? Do I want my name to be on their mailing list or to be part of their affinity group? And so, nearly every day, in some way, we are asked which groups we want to be associated with, which clubs make up our identity. 

 

“Joining a church is not a marriage, but it certainly is not the cheese of the month club.”[2] Joining a church is serious business and it’s really important that everyone considering membership give it careful reflection. It won’t surprise you, I suspect, that people have a variety of responses to the idea of membership in this congregation. For some, it elicits memories of a past less-than-voluntary association with a religious organization. For some, it raises suspicion...about...I don’t know...creedalism...brain-washing. For some, it feels like a natural and comfortable place to find community and belonging. Others don’t think a church should keep a membership list...those who are in, and those who are out. For still others, the decision to join is a long and heart-searching process. 

 

As it was for me. At dinner on Friday night, with Rev. Martignacco, I realized that she was the student minister helping with new member classes at the First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis....classes that I took a full three years before joining a UU congregation...and then it was a different congregation in a different state. The membership classes were just a start for me. I needed to be absolutely sure that this was a group I could trust and that I wanted to form part of my identity. 

 

One of the things James Luther Adams is know for saying is that “by their groups you shall know them.” This is clearly a take-off on the words of Jesus...’by their fruits ye shall know them.’ Jesus was talking about how our actions speak louder than our words...and that our true characters can be seen in how we act and what we do; James Luther Adams was talking about, as I understand it, how we are known, understood, even formed, but the groups with which we choose to associate. He had a kind of conversion experience during WWII, when he heard an anti-Nazi say, “If only 1000 of us in the late twenties had combined in heroic resistance, we could have stopped Hitler.” From this experience, Adams came to the conviction that a critical element in democratic society is voluntary association as a way to assume civic responsibility.[3]

 

And so for Adams, belonging to and participating in a religious community was essential to his ability to act effectively in the world. He freely chose, voluntarily, to become associated with more than just a few groups who he felt were doing work that was central to his identity and with groups through which he could do more than he could do alone. He took this very seriously as his civic and moral responsibility. By doing this, he became known as someone who lived his convictions and acted out of his beliefs. 

 

While doing my summer reading last year, I came across the idea that participating in religious community is generally perceived as discretionary...something extra. This attitude is present in the common self-description of being spiritual but not religious. Such an attitude believes that one can be spiritual alone, and does not need a group, especially not an organized group, to fulfill this basic need. Being part of a group is optional. 

 

Optional yes. Voluntary indeed. Discretionary perhaps. So why bother to be part of a group? What is it about groups that are so powerful, even necessary? 

 

Well, there’s the point of agency, central to Adams’ thought, to which I’ve already referred. He writes in “On Being Human Religiously”:

“the freedom to form, or to belong to, voluntary associations can bring out innovation or criticism in the society. Freedom in this institutional sense distinguishes the democratic society from any other... Socially effective freedom requires participation in associations that define or redefine freedom and that attempt to articulate or implement that freedom. ...the individual through association with others “gets a piece of the action.””[4] 

 

It seems to me that this ‘piece’ is communal pie...the bakers and the eaters and the slicers are one and the same. Pie is simply better eaten in community. It is only by being active in a group that we can hope to build that group into one that, in our case, implements and expands the presence of religious freedom. It is only through participating in a group that we help it to be what we want it to be, so that it can in turn nourish us.  

 

Another reason that groups are so important, and why this particular community is so important, is that here we are reminded that we did not begin as separate entities, that connecting with each other is central to the human task, and that spiritual growth, while possible as an isolated self, is deepened and strengthened in community. Our theology is relational. Our theology insists that we exist in an ocean of interdependence. If you believe that, then your theology insists that you make community a primary focus of your life.   Theologian Ada Maria Isasi-Diaz has written that “Life is life [only] if it is linked to others.” 

Our theology is also one of liberation, and I suppose that this can be confusing for us. We are free. We believe in freedom. But freedom is empty without responsibility. We have to follow through with our choices. This, I think, is what our affirmation is talking about when we say that we will ‘serve the spirit of freedom.’ This congregation, which exists to be a liberal religious beacon and to insist on the values of freedom, tolerance and reason in religion, cannot exist without your service to and for those values. 

 

Here’s an important distinction...at least it’s one that is meaningful for me. There is a huge difference between established or expected church attendance and an intentional commitment to a community that includes being present on Sunday mornings. I love what Jovanna Soligo has previously shared in this sanctuary, and which I repeat here with her permission, that she at some point made an intentional choice, of her own free will, to be here at the Fellowship on Sunday every morning that she’s in town.   Deciding that this is where she chooses to be, and the group with which she wants to be associated, is a very different thing than feeling coerced, or expected, or guilt-ridden about attendance. You might ask her how this decision has affected her commitment. 

 

This intention is an action of the heart. I’ve told you before that the story of the Little Red Hen is one that is imbedded in my psyche. And I’m always struggling with it. In the traditional story, the Little Red Hen, after not getting help with meal prep, refuses to share with those who didn’t help. But this is not who I want to be. I want to be a Little Red Hen who shares anyway. When I am cleaning up after an event here, or making the tea before a meeting, or shovelling the snow, I could become, and sometimes do become, a little bitter or burnt out. But what I want...the way I want to live...is as someone who intentionally contributes as much as I can to this community because I treasure what it is, and because I believe in what it can be. And so, I remind myself that all that I do here...from the mundane to the sublime...while my employment, is also my spiritual practice...the practice of building a community that is capable of being transformational in individual lives and in the life of this town and its surrounds. I want to be known by my group...the Unitarian Fellowship of Peterborough. And I want this group to be something I am intensely proud to be associate with. 

 

A friend in Minneapolis recently sent me a copy of an article she wrote for her neighbourhood newspaper. In it, she speaks of the power of neighbourly love by listing all the small individual acts of community that happen in the blocks surrounding her home. At first, upon reading her column, I felt envious, and then thought, no, I have to become the person who is participating in making neighbourhood happen. Her happy neighbourhood is not a random occurrence, but an intentional work of participation. 

 

Have you seen the YouTube video of a flashmob in the Antwerp train station, where the voice of Julie Andrews singing “Doe a Deer”, breaks into the PA system? A man and a little girl begin to dance, and one by one, two by two, others join until the whole spacious atrium is filled with a hundred people or more in a choreographed dance. It engages all who see it...with surprise, with joy, with a desire to participate, with tears of amazement. A flashmob is meant to be a completely random-appearing outbreak in normalcy. But a flashmob is never truly random...and this particular dance was planned and rehearsed and dreamed of. It took long hours of coordination and participation for it to appear ‘spontaneous’ and to move the hearts of those who saw it.[5]

 

Over and over we walk through the train stations of our lives. Over and over we leave and enter our homes, passing the homes of our closest neighbours. Over and over we come to worship here, as the central act of this religious community. We create a certain normalcy that might seem ho-hum and predictable. But sometimes it is exactly this normalcy of practice that allows for the in-breaking rush of spirit that changes us forever. Some of that spirit grows from the very dependability of our presence here for one another. Some of that spirit surprises us through the experience of the other...when we feel challenged to reflect on who we are. Some of that spirit calls us to do justice in the world. And some of that spirit literally pulls us to our feet in joy. But, you gotta be here to be part of it. You gotta be part of it to make it happen. 

 

I know I’m preaching to the choir. You’re here. You’re participating. But I am calling on you to reflect on what this community means to your identity, and even more, what you mean to the identity of this community. You are the Unitarian Fellowship of Peterborough. Without you, it is nothing.

 

I wager that one’s faith, one’s religion, one’s spiritual community, is seldom present in our wallets. Sure, you might find a prayer card, or maybe a favourite scripture passage. Maybe. But rarely.   Some of you carry a wallet card with the UU principles on it; that would be a start, and if you’d like one, you can pick one up at the welcome table. Be a card-carrying Unitarian. 

In that spirit, I have made Unitarian identity cards for our new members. Perhaps with help we could make similar ones for all of us. Perhaps carrying this membership card in your wallet will make this community a more visible part of your identity.

We come together to be a community that has an expressed purpose. That purpose includes the transformation of individuals into individuals who have a role in the transformation of others. Having this card in your wallet just may be our salvation. 

 

May it be so. Amen.   

 

Sometimes in our lives, we all have choice, we all have freedom...

But if we are wise, we know that there’s always an outcome

Lean on this, when you’re not strong, and you’ll find that only in community can you become your best self. And only with the presence of each one of your beautiful selves, can this community continue to become all that it can be... There is no ‘we’ without us. We are us. 

Amen.

 

 

 

 

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