The Unitarian Fellowship of Peterborough

 

(Star Trek Theme Song) Space: The final frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise. It’s five year mission...to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before.

 

To boldly go where no person has gone before. 

 

Once you get over the bold split infinitive...if you can...perhaps you can make contact with the feeling that this introduction to a famous TV series engenders....that sense of awe, of admiration for those who do boldly go, and the enticing, implicit invitation to follow their lead into an exciting adventure exploring completely unknown territory. 

 

But is this a definition of courage that serves us? Do we need to be space explorers or dare-devils to be courageous? I trust not. 

 

You might think of courage as the opposite of fear. But courage is the ability to act in the presence of fear. Courage is, as Dan Rather has said, being afraid and going ahead nonetheless.   Or, in John Wayne’s words, courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway. 

 

Courage is taking a stand. Courage is, as for Pip[1] the salamander, going in pursuit of something that matters, and in that process, to face one’s fears. But some would say that it’s even larger than this...Maya Angelou has said that “one isn’t necessarily born with courage, but one is born with potential. Without courage, we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. [Without courage] we can’t be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest.” So, being virtuous requires courage...moral courage. 

 

I don’t know about you, but that scares me. It says that if I’m not courageous, I can’t be truly kind or generous or honest, at least not to my greatest potential. 

 

Think about it though. Living courageously does mean going against the grain, going against the dominant thinking. Living courageously is not the norm, and perhaps that’s why we admire it so. 

 

It is much easier, of course, aside from the issue of wrestling with your conscience, to go with the flow. To never draw attention to yourself. To avoid rocking the boat. To follow tradition. To stay in your comfort zone. Easier, except for your nagging conscience that calls on you to take a risk, to live more honestly, more fully. 

 

There are few childhood shames greater than to be called a scaredy-cat...to be dared to do something you are not sure you want to do and in those moments, to bear the humiliation of the braver and cooler kids. I imagine most of us can remember being in that position.... being taunted to act against our better judgment. 

 

Come to think of it, I imagine that many of us re-live those moments in our adult lives. Moments when we feel like there is something we should do, or be able to face, or take a stand on, that we just can’t bring ourselves to do...and then we berate ourselves for that cowardice. 

 

Luckily, courage is not a personality trait or an inborn quality. Rather it is a learned skill. It is not an emotional feeling, but a mental ability.   It requires using the uniquely human part of our brains (the neo-cortex) to wrest control away from the limbic brain we share in common with mammals.[2]   (Curiously, the limbic brain is often called the ‘reptilian brain’...yet our salamander Pip was somehow able to access his neo-cortex!) Our reptilian brains are responsible for signalling danger...which is a very important function. But our more-evolved neo-cortex can reason if the danger is real, and if it is, what action is appropriate. Our thinking and reasoning brain can discern if courage is called for. 

 

I was listening to Stuart McLean this week, and he told the story about Dave and Morley going on a cruise. There, Dave made friends with Bruce, an 83 year old man in a wheelchair who had figured out that it was cheaper to be permanently on a cruise than to live in a retirement home. The story, which of course I cannot do justice to, tells of Bruce howling with pleasure when the rough seas combine with his wheelchair to create a sort of rollercoaster ride on the ship’s deck, and of how Bruce decides to take a bungee jump... saying that while his body has failed, his spirit remains intact, and that he is choosing to feed his spirit. 

 

This story tells of a kind of physical risk-taking and daring, which is not the kind of courage I’m focusing on today. But it is about the pursuit of something that is of greater importance than fear. Pip was convinced that finding the magic, or advice, that would help him conquer his fear of darkness was more important than avoiding the darkness itself.   And all of this begs the question...what is more important to you than fear? What makes the risk worth it? Or, in the famous military question, what hill are you willing to die on? 

 

This is not something that I can answer for you. Each of us must look into our own hearts, practice careful discernment, and decide what matters most. What do we, what do you, most fear losing? Because then, in those moments when we see that something we value is in jeopardy, we can choose courage over cowardice. It’s like the strength of a parent’s love for their child, and the wellspring of courage they seem to find, so naturally and automatically, when it comes to protecting and nurturing that child. What other wellsprings of courage might we tap into? The need to have an authentic voice?   A passion for the greater good? An insistence on social justice? A drive to live to your full potential as a compassionate and creative person? Your fiery commitment to environmental issues? 

 

Once we figure out what’s most important, then we have to choose to act in ways that are true to those values. We have to make use of our brilliant neo-cortex to diffuse the sense of danger with a focus on what matters most. The experts seem to agree that courage is like a muscle that needs training. The more we exercise it, the stronger it gets. Thankfully, the more often we use our neo-cortex to help us to act in spite of fear, the easier courage becomes, and the more human, and perhaps the more humane, we become. 

 

There’s lots of information out there about how to train your courage, and I’m not going to belabour it now; rather, I’d like to talk about those ‘most important things’ in the context of this congregation...for what, to what purpose, do we need courage in our quest to create a vital liberal religious community for Peterborough and the Kawarthas? 

 

I was struck in my research by a quote from Ralph Sockman, a Methodist minister of the last century. He said that the test of courage comes when we are in the minority and that the test of tolerance comes when we are in the majority. We speak of tolerance a great deal in this faith. It is a cornerstone of our tradition...a basic acceptance of difference and an honouring of diverse opinions, beliefs, cultures, and practices. Certainly when we gather here in the presence of what is often described as ‘like minds’, we enjoy the benefit of a majority position and that should challenge us to be tolerant of those who, for example, might hold more theistic beliefs or more conservative politics. 

 

But what of the other part of Sockman’s quote? When are we in the minority and are then in need of courage? Certainly in Canadian society, we are a minority. We have only 50-some congregations nationally, and a mere 5000 members...a tiny minority in a population of 33 million. As Dr. Allan Sharp said in his keynote address to the 2006 CUC Annual Conference, there are about as many Unitarians in Canada as there are people in Canada who list the Chinese dialect of Hakka as their mother tongue.  

 

That means we are different. We make different choices and see our place in the world differently. We speak a different religious language. The question I pose is, are we courageous in this difference? Do we boldly go into conversation, into expressing ourselves, into sharing our beliefs? We have an historical aversion to proselytizing, an aversion born of our personal experiences of being berated for our beliefs. But what part might courage play in boldly sharing our convictions that religious freedom, tolerance, and the unalienable right of personal conscience are of utmost value? And what part does courage play when we are in the minority in our positions on human rights issues? 

 

Then, I would posit that we are in a minority when it comes to our focus on being in right relationship, one with another. This is a by-product of our convictions...in order to fully live out our acceptance of one another, as we each exercise our religious freedom, we have to know how to co-exist in a diverse and beloved community. This is a huge task, and one that is not taken on by many other communities in the world. We are willing to be the rats in a laboratory that tests and expands our compassion, our understanding, our tolerance. We believe that what we change here, in ourselves and between us, changes the world. 

 

When I think about where courage is required in my life, this is where I most feel the tug. It’s needed in those times when I should be speaking up for something or someone. It’s needed in those relationships where there is a rub that would be best addressed directly and honestly. It’s needed when I have something to say that feels like it might not be accepted by others. It’s needed when I should admit my failings and be open to learning from others. 

 

In community, our ability to be truthful and authentic with one another atrophies when we don’t practice it, when we don’t exercise it. When we repeatedly settle for not speaking up or for not holding each other accountable, then this behaviour becomes the accepted norm.   Settling, maintaining the status quo, letting our fear rule, is not the courageous thing to do. (It actually scares me to say that.) Loving ourselves and one another requires a great deal of courage. 

 

I never thought I’d be quoting John McCain in a sermon...he is not a Captain Kirk or even a Mr. Spock in my life. In general, I have difficulty admiring him. But, he’s done some good writing on the topic of courage. In an essay called “In Search of Courage”, he maintains that if we’re not afraid, then courage is not required, so in a way, fear is a condition of courage. But, he says, love is also a condition of courage. It is love that makes us willing to take risks, love that makes courage necessary. “You get courage by loving something more than your own well-being...when you love virtue, when you love freedom, when you love other people, you find the strength to demand courage of yourself.”[3]

 

I’d like to quote Robert F. Kennedy, someone who was a real-life Captain Kirk, from a speech made in South Africa in 1966. He said, speaking of courageous leaders:

“These men moved the world, and so can we all. Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events...Each time a [person] stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a ripple of hope. And crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

“Moral courage,” he said, “is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intelligence. Yet it is the one essential, vital quality of those who seek to change a world that yields most painfully to change. 

“The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow [humans] alike, timid and fearful in the face of new ideas and bold projects. Rather it belongs to those who can blend vision, reason and courage in a personal commitment to the ideals and great enterprises of a [new] society.”[4] 

 

Now, I don’t know if you find that as inspiring as the Star Trek theme, but still, it’s pretty inspiring. It calls us to set aside our self-interest and to remember that the greater good, is served by each small ripple of hope and courage that we are able to send out. 

 

Each of us can make those ripples with small acts of courage. One step at a time. One act of courage today, maybe another tomorrow. Each of us can commit to taking risks for those things we find of greatest value in our lives. You may not feel like an incredibly courageous person. You may not feel ready yet to boldly go...at least not alone. But practice. Take a step. 

 

I leave you with one final quote...these the words of Anais Nin. “And the day came when the risk of remaining tight in a bud became greater than the courage it would take to bloom....” May that day come soon for each of us, so that we may all live long and prosper.   

 

Blessed be. 

 

 

 

Take courage friends, remember that there is little we do that does not involve some risk.  

 

May we live lives full of risk and propelled by courage, lives where fear is not conquered but its gifts understood…lives of hope, laughter, dreams, and love. 

Live long and prosper. Amen.

 

 

 

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