Images of God

My first image of G-d looks very much like Charlton Heston, as Moses, when he came down from Mount Sinai in the Ten Commandments.

This is probably not a mistake.

By that, I mean, that’s probably how the movie moguls wanted it to be.

This is in no way to imply that G-d looks like Charlton Heston.

I know that G-d was supposed to be the burning bush, but as a kid, watching the Ten Commandments over the Easter weekend, I couldn’t yet make that conceptual leap.

So, G-d looked like Moses to me for a while.

Robe and staff, a powerful man, an authoritative voice. An angry G-d with rules that he threw down upon the people, for disobeying.

What is your earliest image of G-d?

By now in my life, Charlton Heston has thankfully been replaced by a multitude of images of G-d, and I no longer have to rely on Chuck.

I’m of an age that when I was a kid, John Denver starred in a movie with George Burns, who played G-d. While I’m sure we didn’t go to the movies to see that film, I’m sure I saw it on television. And so the image of G-d the angry punisher was joined by G-d the loving trickster.

The next popular image of G-d I had was that of Allanis Morrisette, in the movie Dogma. As G-d, she didn’t say anything, and she wore an outfit that seemed to come right out of Forever 21. But as G-d, she smiled, benevolently, and she gave forgiveness and mercy.

Add to this dozens of images of G-d from 16^th century woodcuts, paintings of many periods, and what am I left with?

A complex image, a multitudinous image of what G-d might be. If G-d even is, at all.

Many of us struggle with the idea of G-d. Some of us here don’t believe in anything that even remotely smacks of an idea of G-d, but still this image of G-d is powerful, and even we wrestle against it.

A little earlier in the service you were invited to consider the images of G-d that have failed you in your life.

I haven’t read any of the responses, but I think I can make a pretty good guess about what some of the cards have to say.

We are, after all, a group of people, like many other groups of people, and our common humanity is formed from many common experiences.

I’m guessing there are comments in the cards about abuse, about abandonment, about loved ones dying without explanation. There are probably cards about how life hasn’t been fair, or that G-d didn’t love you in the way you were promised as a child.

I don’t wish to minimize any of those experiences.

I merely name them as being universal experiences.

If we can see that our common humanity is indeed common, then we can not only more easily sympathize with the other 7 billiion people with whom we currently share our planet.

Each of these people has had reason to cry in their lifetime. Sobs of grief, tears of laughter, a deep sigh of contentment or resignation.

The air that is in our lungs right now will someday be in the lungs of all of these people.

One of our favorite hymns goes “When I breathe in, I breathe in peace, when I breathe out, I breathe out love.”

Today we have had five more people join our Fellowship. Five more people with whom we shall breathe, locally, and intentionally, to create community.

Often people who join our community are those who have been disappointed by the image of G-d they were given as children. That image of an all-powerful protector, failed to protect them. Or the image of 

an angry-father G-d scared them. Or the omnipotent G-d abandoned them.

This, of course, can be expanded to also include the churches of our youth.

Like many other local churches, we’ve been talking this month about the theme of G-d. For us, this can be a tricky topic, because there are so many triggers so many of us have around G-d and G-d language.

Even if we don’t believe in this thing called G-d, still the concept exists all around us.

For many years, anytime anyone would say to me “I’ll pray for you,” or “Have a blessed day” my blood would practically curdle. I found their statements to be intrusive and presumptuous. Who decided I needed their G-d for anything?

One day, however, I realized that often these expressions, when offered intentionally and thoughtfully, were mere an act of kindness.

An act of extra kindness.

“I’ll pray for you” doesn’t automatically mean “if you don’t convert, repent and give up your sinful ways, you’re going to Hell where you will burn, burn, burn!”

It is a simple offering of care an intention.

How often to you struggle to find a phase that explains to the person that you care about, that you will think of them, in the most sacred way you know how, in hopes that they will heal, or that their situation will improve?

Tandi Rogers, Growth Strategies Specialist for the UUA, and a friend of mine were having a discussion recently, and she gave me permission to share this story with you.

"In my darkest hour the church curmudgeon showed up on my doorstep with a huge painting of flowers he knew I loved. He walked across my bed with muddy boots, pounded a handful of nails in the wall, hung the picture, turned to me, and said, "I know you're hurting and I'm going to sit here and be with you while you cry some. But we need you. Every morning look up at this picture and know that the world needs you. So do whatever you need to do to get back on your feet, because it's too hard to walk this path with out you.” 

That's why I've given my life to my religion and my religious community, because quite frankly, I've lost my life and was reborn, re-gathered, reclaimed, and recalled. 

Suck it up. We'll let you rock in the corner for only so long. The world needs you."

Might not that man, that curmudgeon become a new image of what we wanted G-d to be? Can we let go of our pain and disappointment about what we thought G-d should have been?

And instead embrace an idea that we are all holy expressions? Each of us is a miracle. A miracle of evolution and natural processes, each of us has survived as individuals because we, most of the time unwittingly, have been able to thwart off the dangers of life so far?

Can you come to see yourself as holy enough to bring a picture of flowers to someone, in your flawed, muddy boots, and hang that picture for someone else?

Can you be gracious enough to be grateful for those muddy boots and the carrying human being they brought into your life?

So often we hear that people join churches to feel a deep connection with something larger than themselves.

Look around you.

Collectively, we are that thing we wish to find.

May we have the wisdom to recognize this truth, the grace to celebrate it, and the wherewithal to endure this, our beloved congregation.

So mote it be.

© 2012 The Rev. Joseph M Cherry

Written for and delivered to

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Stanislaus County

December 09, 2012

Give Me That Olde Time Religion!

I must admit to you a certain, romanticized version of ministry in the 19th century.

There is a certain, heroic quality to the Circuit Riding ministers of the Mid- and Actual West. Riding from town to town by horseback, preaching the Gospel of a God too loving to condemn man, or the Gospel that mankind itself is the power the world needs to address our ills.

Planting churches wherever two roads crossed in a small town.

But then I think about road dust, and no consistent places to rest my head and uncertain sources of my next meal, and I feel less tempted.

But still within in me is the urge to share our liberal faith’s good news of both our own capabilities and responsibilities to make Earth a little bit more like the Heaven we imagine.

A few week’s back, while waiting for others to gather for our semi-traditional meal together before our Board meetings, Dane and I popped into the suit shop. We had a few minutes to kill, and there was a pretty awesome suit in the window, so why not?

They didn’t have that exact suit in my size, but I did try on another three-piece suit. I’ve never had a three piece suit, as they’ve been sort of our fashion for a while, but I think they’re making a come back.

Anyway, while I was trying on the vest part of the suit, Dane said he could see me in the pulpit, wearing the vest, after having taken off my jacket, and rolled up my sleeves, raising a ruckus from the pulpit about a Loving God. Sweating, gesticulating and preaching about our mission in the world: to make it a more just place. If you’ll indulge me, I’ll quote Theodore Parker quickly: “The arc of the universe is long, and it bends toward justice.”

Part of my work as your Interim Minister is to take a good look around the congregation and it’s systems, and to ask a lot of questions. Why do you do this? What is the history behind that? How did this tradition come about? When was this paid serious attention to? Who, at your core, are you?

Church today is in service of the question, who, at your core, are you?

I know that this morning’s service is far from what we’re used to doing, and yet it is part of the fabric, the genetic code of this congregation.

The un-named child from this morning’s story loves all the flowers equally, but still has a favorite. How is that possible? Is it because the child’s sympathy for the flower that needs the most care has tipped their affection, alerted them to their concern?

It takes a gentle reminder from “Mama” that God loves all beings equally and sends a gentle rain on the just and the unjust alike to remind our child that there are no favorites.

How often have you both proclaimed a level playing field of caring, and yet upon further reflection discovered a favorite?

It is probably impossible not to have a favorite in almost anything. We have lots of favorites. Our favorite foods, the flowering bush that never fails to make us smile, our favorite chair here at the church and at home.

We have favorite smells, and favorite colors.

Favorite causes that we support.


My gentle challenge to you this morning, friends, is to spend a little less time with your favorites, and try new things. After all, your favorite flavor of ice cream was once unknown to you.

While we are in this time of church transition, it is an especially good time to try new things here, too. While the congregation works toward making the best match possible with your new, world-class minister, it is a terrific time to try a different committee, or another new way of engaging with the community.

Next week we will be officially welcoming new members into our Fellowship. Lots of new going on.


And so what about the past, what about this “Olde Time Religion”?

It is that, it is our past, and in part it informs both our present and our future. Because we are a liberal faith, open to self-examination, we are not tied to the past as if we were its prisoner, rather, the past is a reference point, a place we have been.

And yes, we, the global we, found comfort there. Or else we wouldn’t have stayed here, where we are. And yes, also, upon reflection and discussion, we have gently moved forward from the past to where we are today.

And the journey does not stop here.

The journey continues on. Someday, 40 years from now, when this congregation is on the eve of celebrating 100 years of Fellowship, someone may discover an order of service from Rev. Jody, Rev. Steve, Rev. Grace, or Rev. Leroy, and say “Well, that’s not how we do it now!” in astonishment and with interest. We cannot predict where we will be in 40 years, just as those folks who founded this church in 1953 could not predict where we are today.

But be it 1953 or 2053, one thing will be constant, our openness to self-examination, our religious practice that beliefs are subject to careful consideration, and that some old practices will be left behind, and new practices embraced.

The arc of the universe IS long, and it does bend toward justice.

And the rain comes to the just and unjust alike.

The question remains, what are we to make of that which have been given.

May we be inspired to use our time and talents in ways that create a more fair, equitable and loving world.

Amen.

© Rev. Joseph M Cherry

Written for and delivered to

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Stanislaus County

December 2, 2012.

A More Perfect Union?

We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Though we think of these words as being universally applicable, and part of the founding documents of our nation.  When it was new, though, the U. S. Constitution was not universally beloved and embraced. In fact, it was far from a done deal from the word go.

Our nation, our democracy, has never, NEVER been a done deal. There have always been those who would prefer things to have gone in a different direction.

Sometimes those people have been us.

Well, I’ll speak for myself: sometimes those people have been me.

There is a lot of talk about the complete breakdown of our political system, stuck in gridlock and ever-increasing bi-partisanship.

And it is frustrating to be on the side-lines, so to speak, and watch all of this happening.

It makes sense to us, doesn’t it, to work together? To be cooperative and collaborative?

So why doesn’t every one see this, when it’s as plain as the nose on my face.

Except, really it isn’t very plain at all.

Yes, it is very upsetting to see our local and federal governments at loggerheads with each other. And while our political system does seem to be getting collectively more divided, this is not unheard of.

This week I got to go see a movie as research for a sermon.  Denis and I went to see “Lincoln.” I went in part because I knew that the movie was going to be based from the text of a book I read called Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, written by historian Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Even though I knew the outcome of the story, the 13^th Amendment passes, abolishing slavery in the United States, and Lincoln gets assassinated, still it was a riveting movie.

And it reminded me of something.

Politicians have been at each other’s throats before, and at times even more virulently than they are now.

Do you remember how shocking it was when House Representative Joe Wilson shouted out at President Obama “You Lie!”?  It was shocking to us because it was a breach of protocol.

This was not the first time that a House Representative from South Carolina behaved poorly in the House Chamber.

In fact, it seems that South Carolina has a rather uneasy relationship with the Federal Government.

South Carolina was the first state to secede from the Federal Union in December 24, 1860, just shortly after Abraham Lincoln was elected president of the United States.

As part of my research for this sermon on the messiness of democracy, I read the Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union. Passed and published by their own delegates in convention, this Declaration lays out in clear detail the many injustices suffered by the citizens of South Carolina at the hands of those states who voted for Lincoln. Especially named the difficulties of the Fugitive Slave Act, and the Federal government’s lack of proper response to enforcing this law.

As a direct action of the Federal government’s in ability to force northern states to return slaves to their rightful owners, the Federal government had failed South Carolina, and South Carolina was going to re-claim it’s own sovereign status as a free state and country.

The next document coming from the South Carolina Assembly was written to their fellow slave states, encouraging them to likewise secede and tear asunder the federal union.

By now you may be asking yourself, “Just what got Reverend Joe on this rant, anyway?”

Here is the answer: I have been thinking a lot about the secessionist movements of the last few weeks.

For those who don’t know about this, here is a very brief, very incomplete recap of the events.

Shortly after the election, some people in Louisiana decided to file a petition with the federal government, requesting secession from the Union. A petition was submitted to the www.whitehouse.gov/petitions on November 7th, requesting that Louisiana be granted to be allowed to peacefully withdraw from the United States of America and be allowed to create its own New Government.

Shortly after the election being the very next day.

Since November 7^th, people in all 50 states have filed petitions on this white house website, each asking for their state to be released from the bonds of our federal union.

It sounds crazy, I know.

Which is why I went back to 1860.

After the election of another president with radical ideas.

From the 1860 South Carolinian Declaration:

On the 4th day of March next, this party [Abraham Lincoln] will take possession of the Government. It has announced that the South shall be excluded from the common territory, that the judicial tribunals shall be made sectional, and that a war must be waged against slavery until it shall cease throughout the United States.

The guaranties of the Constitution will then no longer exist; the equal rights of the States will be lost. The slaveholding States will no longer have the power of self-government, or self-protection, and the Federal Government will have become their enemy.

Sectional interest and animosity will deepen the irritation, and all hope of remedy is rendered vain, by the fact that public opinion at the North has invested a great political error with the sanction of more erroneous religious belief.

We, therefore, the People of South Carolina, by our delegates in Convention assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, have solemnly declared that the Union heretofore existing between this State and the other States of North America, is dissolved, and that the State of South Carolina has resumed her position among the nations of the world, as a separate and independent State; with full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent States may of right do.

It takes 25,0000 signatures on this website to prompt a response from the White House. On the internet, a puppy wagging its tail will get more than 25,000 hits in an hour. Now there is another on-line movement to revoke the citizenship of those who have signed these petitions, some from each of the fifty states.

I don’t know how to move in this next idea smoothly, so I shall just state it baldly. I believe that the secessionist actions of 1860 and 1861, and the current grumbling about secession involve the progress toward equality of African Americans, and I suspect racism.

There were then, and are now, people feeling profoundly threatened by change. Good people, frightened that their way of life is in danger, inspired to act in ways that may be counter to the very goals they hold dear.

Democracy is messy, folks.

That’s all there is to it. It’s messy.

But it is the best system available to us.

This is one of the 7 principles that we, as a Member Congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations agree to affirm and promote.

Principle No. 5: the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large.

Democracy does not work if, at the first sign of trouble, we take our ball and go home. Democracy only works if we stay engaged, trying our best to be respectful of others, staying at the table when we’d rather be off doing just about anything else.

It means not calling that person with whom you don’t agree a nincompoop. It means not undermining another’s personhood because they don’t agree with you.

The best way for us to practice democracy is for us to honor each other, to expect the best from each other, and to be willing to give more credit to our fellows that we perhaps want to.

Whether in the Halls of Congress, the meeting room of a school board, or here in our sanctuary, if we are to practice democracy, if we are to get the most out of democracy, we must be willing to walk, side by side, with those whose opinions differ from ours. We must be willing to talk to each other.

Not to talk at each other, or around each other, or behind each other’s back, but to talk with…

with…

with each other.

To come to the table not so convinced of our own rightness and righteousness.

To share ideas, to come to the discussion prepared for the possibility that you might just be transformed by the sharing you do with your fellows.

Here is the holy work of democracy: to sit together, as equals; to exchange ideas, as people who are brilliant and creative; to not just impart, but also to accept information and ideas.

And then together, we vote.

And together we live with the consequences of that vote.

Walking away will never serve democracy.

Recently, someone, and I really wish I could remember who, said to some of us gathered “How much energy would we save ourselves, if only we complain just to those who can make a change.”

Or something akin to that.

I know that there are people here in this fellowship who are unhappy about one thing or another.

Please hear me clearly: I invite you to come and speak with me.

Come to my table and talk with me.

I am not the all powerful Oz, and I will not be able to fix your concern alone, but together, we might be able to walk, side by side, to either a solution, or a compromise that you can live with.

At the very least, you will have been heard.

If your own, personal goal is to be a productive member of this fellowship, you must be willing to do certain things. One of those things is to behave in a manner which is conducive to the health of the congregation.

I often say that we are a covenantal faith. We are in covenant with each other.

None of us has more power than another. We each get one vote.

To sit back and complain about this policy, this procedure, this perceived slight is no way to help improve the health of this congregation.

It may be very difficult for you to come forward, it may be extremely un-nerving for you to sit at a table and both talk and listen to your fellows. It may be hard for you to, after a long, thoughtful discussion, for you to put your opinion aside, and recognize the wisdom of the people in this fellowship.

And sometimes, a vote will just plain not go the way you would wish it.

Living a spiritual life is sometimes about doing difficult things. Growth as an individual involves risk and discomfort.

It also offers beautiful opportunities to learn, new ways to celebrate and even a deeper understanding of the universe and your holy place within it.

It is only with a full table, full of people with ideas who can share them caringly with each other, people who can explore in open and honest dialogue, that democracy can be best practiced.

Please, come to the table. 

© The Rev. Joseph M Cherry

Written for and delivered to

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Stanislaus County

November 18, 2012