Our Better Angels
The winter holidays mean something different for everyone. They may mean something different for you than they did for your younger self. This time of year gives us many opportunities for personal growth as we challenge ourselves to interfaith dialogue. This sermon was delivered on December 19, 2010.
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We were planning a winter holiday gathering for our classmates at Starr King School for the Ministry. My friend Ruth (not her real name) and I were in charge of creating a flyer. Before we could even pick out clip art, we had an interfaith dialogue.
Starr King is a Unitarian Universalist theological school. Like many UU congregations, the school embraces people who have complicated religious backgrounds, people who are Buddhist or Pagan or Jewish as well as being UU. In addition, Starr King is at the forefront of inter-religious studies, and some non-UU students find that the program there is the most hospitable one for their interests.
My friend Ruth, for instance, is Jewish and not UU, but she didn’t want to be a rabbi. She was taking classes in spiritual direction from mostly Christian instructors at one of our partner seminaries down the street. My individual spiritual practice is Pagan, I live in an interfaith Jewish-UU household, and I was raised as a liberal Christian. Just between Ruth and me, we covered a lot of ground.
At the time, I was all about reclaiming symbols of the Pagan Yule that had been co-opted by Christmas.
“How about a Solstice tree on the flyer?”
“No trees. This is not a Christmas party. This is a holiday party for everyone.”
“But the tree isn’t really Christian.”
“It is to most people.”
“O.K. How about a holly wreath?”
“No! No trees, no wreaths, no stockings, no mangers.”
Clearly I was not getting it. I felt frustrated at our limited options. I’m sure Ruth felt frustrated that someone like me, who should know better, wasn’t being sensitive. Whatever their deeper history or meaning, evergreen trees are symbols of exclusion for her. (She’s not alone. A study at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia showed that the un-remarked-on presence of a 12-inch Christmas tree in a psychology lab room resulted in feelings of exclusion and less self-assurance in non-celebrating university students.) An over-abundance of Christmas-specific icons crowds out the evidence of religious diversity.
Snow-related clip art didn’t really make sense in Berkeley. I think we ended up with pictures of food on the flyer.
Food, as it turned out, was just the thing to unite a diverse student body. Students brought holiday treats made with traditional family recipes, creative vegetarian dishes, or whatever they could pick up on the way. There was plenty for everyone to eat. Full tummies make for a happy common ground.
By the time the singing got started, Ruth and I were on the same page. There are a few secular winter songs. Beyond those, people shared from their own traditions and invited others to sing along. Ruth had a Hanukkah song that joked about food being the secret of the Maccabees’ success against Antiochus. The chorus went like this:
One latke, two latkes
And so on into the night
You may not guess
That it was the latkes
That gave them the courage to fight
The holidays and traditions that each one of us celebrated at home were carried into the room through song. We did sing a few Christmas carols, and it was amusing to hear a little bit of chaos when we got to the places where UU’s change the words. That particular evening, lyrics were just more reminders of our diversity.
The winter holidays often present points of challenge and tension. They bring up strong feelings about our families of origin, the paths we have chosen, and a society that may or may not welcome us as we are. For some of those encounters, survival is the best we can do. Other times, encounters with holiday tensions can be points of spiritual growth and opportunities for dialogue.
Our theme for this month and next month is “acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.” The winter holidays give us lots of moments to take up that challenge. The symbols and music of this season telegraph messages about what we hold most deeply. What is an angel but a messenger? We can choose to send and receive angels of peace as we move through December and January.
I’m coming to understand that there are frames of mind and habits of speech that help us to invoke our better angels. One suggestion is for each person to speak for himself or herself. When we speak in the first person, the discussion can be based on relationship rather than arguable points. Secondly, we can listen. Be curious about the other person’s experience. Put another way: exchange differences, rather than trying to spend all of your time on the common ground. Third, get comfortable in our mythic stories, play with them, and invite others to dwell in those stories with us. Stories are also messengers.
Speak for yourself. Exchange differences. Live in the stories. These are three ways to find the angels of peace within our interfaith holiday encounters.
Speak for Yourself
I am indebted to the NPR program On Being and to host Krista Tippett for helping me think about today’s topic. In an essay last month, she wrote:
On my radio show, which covers issues of faith and moral imagination, I encourage my guests to follow a couple of ground rules: No abstractions about God, and speak in the first person, not on behalf of your group or tradition (or God). This makes statements of belief much more hospitable, easier to hear. A listener might disagree with your opinion on ultimate questions but can’t disagree with your experience of them. There is a profound difference between hearing someone say “this is the truth” and hearing her say “this is my truth.”
When my friend Ruth and I were designing the event flyer, it was actually a testament to the strength of our friendship that she could be candid with me about what made her feel uncomfortable. For her to speak up, she had to know that our relationship and the community were building at school could withstand that moment of tension. She could have let it go, once again letting the dominant culture make her feel invisible. I’m glad she didn’t. By speaking for herself, she led me to think about what was important for me to bring from my heart and experience into the event.
In my household, we face this challenge every year in our family meetings leading into the winter holiday season. We have to talk about year-end charitable giving, guidelines for gifts to extended family and to each other, and whether and how we will decorate our home. Some things change from year to year – our priorities, our financial means, our needs, the needs of people we love. That’s why we have to have this meeting every year.
We each have things that are personally important. Becky likes to think creatively about gifts for people she cares about. Uri likes to make food. I like to eat food and to wrap presents. One of the things that became clear early on is that an evergreen tree was not going to work for our family. Other kinds of evergreens, maybe. For us, the tree is too much of a symbol of one tradition’s dominance in the larger culture. Even though this feels like the most authentic approach for our family, I am sometimes ambivalent. When I do feel drawn to having a Solstice tree, I have to stop and reflect on what’s really important about that symbol. Talking it out in our family meetings helps me to do that.
I find that the process of getting ornaments out of the box and holding them in my hand, remembering times past, is part of the magic. Actually having the tree sit there is not as important as the process. I also like having things look a little different. Decorations other than a tree actually accomplish that more effectively for me. We took a break this year, but in the past we’ve hung garlands around doorways and banisters. I have a few decorations, and I can find different things to do with them like making a wreath decorated with details personal to us. Visiting my Dad and helping him with his decorations also takes care of some of the tree energy.
When we’re having our family meetings, it can be difficult for me to speak from my own needs and wants. I’m tempted to keep quiet and try to give other people what they want, or I’m tempted to just insist on doing things my way to “save time.” Neither attempting to read each other’s minds nor sidestepping the discussion will help us in the long run.
As Krista Tippett points out, when we’re talking about issues of value and meaning, speaking in the first person helps us to hear each other. Rather than arguing about truth with a capital “T,” we sit firmly on the ground of experience. In our discussion and sharing time, I am always eager to hear about the things that have happened to you and the things you have made happen that help you understand what it means to be human. During a season of the year that is known for creating memories, let’s share what those memories have taught us.
Exchange Differences
A second bit of strategy for holiday encounters is to listen and to ask questions that get to the heart of diversity. Exchange differences. Common ground can be a great entry point, and deeper relationships ask us to go past that into the realm of the uncommon.
I found this to be true at an interfaith prayer summit this past Tuesday. We were there to pray with and for the DREAMers, young activists who grew up in this country and want to give back by getting an education or serving in the military, but can’t because they are undocumented. The DREAM Act would have provided a path to citizenship for young people who were brought to this country before they were 16 and have lived here for at least five years.
Anyway, we were there to pray with and for these young activists. They traveled a long distance, braving the cold and risking deportation, to speak to their Senators. The Interfaith Immigration Coalition called to clergy from across the religious spectrum and all over the country to come to Capitol Hill. Religious leaders from target states accompanied the DREAMers on their legislative visits after the prayer summit. The rest of us were there to lend support. It was an interfaith gathering where people spoke clearly and eloquently about why this issue is a religious and moral one for them.
Troy Jackson, an evangelical pastor from Ohio, wore a University of Cincinnati Bearcats scarf in honor of a young man from his home state, Bernard Pastor. Bernard graduated in the top five from his high school this past spring. He volunteered in the community and led his teammates in the national anthem before soccer games. Bernard came here with his family when he was three. He has been in jail since November awaiting deportation.
Pastor Jackson said that, as an evangelical, he believes in conversion experiences. He cited the story of Saul on the way to Damascus, describing the way Saul was intent on punishing and persecuting Christians until he was met by a light flashing from Heaven and the voice of Jesus. Paul was converted from hate to love, and Pastor Jackson made it clear that he thought such conversions to love and justice were still possible among those who persecute others.
Rabbi David Saperstein, Director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, recalled the Biblical and modern stories of the people of God moving from place to place as they fled from hostile lands or went in search of a better life. He described the concept of the stranger, quoting one of the passages that call us to love the sojourner as ourselves, for we were once strangers in the land. He said:
There is not a Jew in America [who] doesn’t understand the pain of being denied the opportunity to live with full protection of laws in equality in the land in which we live. There is no clearer mandate in the Bible, there is no rule repeated more times than Gods’ call to treat those who live in our midst, who cannot yet be fully citizens in this country, to treat them exactly as we treat ourselves, to treat them as though they are our own.
(Thanks, Jim Wallace, for capturing this quote on the Sojourners blog. )
Many of the Christian faith leaders talked about Advent, saying that this is the time of year when we are reminded of a special concern for young people in our midst. Christians tell the story of a baby born far away from his parents’ families. The Book of Matthew says that the life of the young Jesus was threatened, and the family took refuge in Egypt. These clergy talked about a season of hope fueled by their faith.
After the prayer summit in the chapel of the Methodist Building, we walked hand-in-hand around the Senate office buildings, then across the street to a nearby park. The religious leaders encircled the students. With so many of us in dark suits and clerical collars, I was reminded of penguins keeping each other warm. The students began singing the national anthem, and we joined them. They knelt in the cold grass as we continued to surround them and touch their shoulders in blessing. From there, we went through security to stand in the atrium of the Hart Senate office building. Prayers were addressed to Creator, God, Spirit of the Mother, El Señor Supremo, Source of Life Known By Many Names, and La Virgen de Guadalupe.
One of the things I found so powerful about this event is the way each person spoke their own truth, testifying in the language and framework of their own faith about why this issue was important to them. We could have spent the day politely ignoring our differences. Instead, we were able to draw from our deepest longings and convictions. This was possible because we were committed to listening.
Certainly, it helped to have common ground. Jim Wallace of Sojourners said that any time you have the UU’s and the Pentacostals working on the same side, you better listen. Still, I think something can be learned here about lifting up diversity in our interfaith encounters over the winter holidays. An exchange of differences is a gift.
This morning’s Time for All Ages story (Elijah’s Angel by Michael J. Rosen) describes such an exchange. Elijah tells of his faith experience, and Michael is clear about being a Jewish kid. They listen to each other. Elijah sends his artwork with a prayer, and Michael gives him a menorah made with his own hands. Their friendship is enriched by curiosity and generosity of difference.
Dwell in the Stories
In addition to speaking in the first person and listening as we exchange differences, we seek our better angels through mythic stories. I have spoken before about legends being messengers from generation to generation. This is especially true as we approach the religious celebrations that are important to us. I believe that, once we have become comfortable with the tales of our own traditions, once we have made a home for ourselves in those stories, we can invite our friends to visit us there. Character and drama express complex truths in a way that is easier to share than abstract philosophical points. At Tuesday’s prayer summit, several of the religious leaders used examples from the great stories of their traditions.
Rev. Peter Morales, our elected President of the UUA, wrote about stories as powerful messengers in his holiday epistle. He spoke of the tradition of Las Posadas from his youth in San Antonio, explaining, “In Spanish a ‘posada’ is a place of lodging, a resting place, a place of shelter on a journey.” Las Posadas involves a procession of people, some dressed as Mary and Joseph, going from house to house and asking for shelter.
For Rev. Morales, this story brings alive certain things about his faith. It illustrates the urgency of immigration reform, certainly, and he also says that the story reminds him of the physical and emotional shelter that we give and receive in our congregations. He asks us to think of times when we have been Mary and Joseph, and times when we have been the one behind the closed door. Rev. Morales continues:
Recall, too, all the times you have been the kind-hearted innkeeper. Think of the times you were there, really there, for a child, a partner, a friend, even a stranger. Think of how precious those times were. When we allow the love that lives in our hearts to express itself, we are a blessing to those around us and a blessing to ourselves.
So ends the reading. As much as I love principles such as “justice, equity, and compassion” and “acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth,” there is something more visceral in imagining ourselves as part of the mythic stories that undergird our spiritual paths.
What stories do you hold sacred? What are the legends you would share as messengers of peace? Our better angels are disguised as characters in many different dramas.
For me, the winter solstice is a time to recall the story of Mother Night and the sun (my memory of this story is aided by the retelling in Circle Round: Raising Children in Goddess Traditions). The sun had grown tired from the daily effort of lifting itself up over the horizon and gently kneeling down at each sunset. Each day, the sun rose a little later and went to bed a little earlier. Mother Night said, “Come and rest in my arms.”
The sun went to be cradled in the Great Mother’s arms, sleeping and growing younger all through the night of the Winter Solstice. The people of earth noticed the sun’s long absence. They lit fires and sang songs of gratitude to awaken the sun again. And so it was that the young sun was born again, gaining strength each day as it learned to rise a little earlier and set a little later throughout the rest of the winter and into the spring.
I think we have all been the sun in this story, tired and seeking rest at the time of the winter solstice. I invite you to dwell with me in the story as one of the other characters, Mother Night. Together, as a circle, we can create the sheltering embrace that allows weary stars among us to regain strength. As a community, we light a flame of hope and sing songs of gratitude to give energy to the turning of the year.
Conclusion
December is coming to a close, yet I think we will all have more opportunities before the year is out to turn moments of holiday tension into spiritual growth. We invite the angels of peace when we speak gently in the first person, when we speak and listen in an exchange of differences, and when we invite our loved ones to dwell in the stories with us.
I wish you Solstice blessings. May we find rest and the strength of a new day. May our memories of Hanukkah inspire us to light flames of hope regardless of the odds. Merry Christmas. May we create a shelter for those who seek. Happy new year. Let our songs and stories be messengers of love.
So be it. Blessed be. Amen.
