February 16, 2006
UNEDITED
Rev. Barbara McKusick Liscord
Unitarian Universalist Congregation in
Milford, New Hampshire
Love
Will Guide Us
Each Sunday morning, we
affirm that Love is the doctrine of this church. What better time to
talk about what we mean by Love than during the week of Valentine’s
day.
When we talk about love…
we mean a wide circle of love- including sweethearts, family
members, friends, neighbors and strangers. This doctrine of ours-
this doctrine of Love that we affirm each week, is no easy doctrine.
It demands much of us. It gets right to the center of our faith and
indeed to the purpose of life. The purpose of life is to love well…
and while we admit to human imperfections in this regard… at least
we can continually learn and grow toward loving well. Michael
Beckwith, founder of the Agape
International Spiritual Center puts it another way: “We are on the
planet to be and express the Divine Love of God that is alive in
every fiber of our being, waiting to be released through us onto our
world. Living as love is a way of life that brings heaven on earth."i
If we are to live this
doctrine, we must personally and as a community ask the question “How
well do I love?” In an article in the UU World magazine, my
colleague, Fred Small says, “It is the most demanding, concrete,
radical and important question we can ask ourselves.”ii
Fred writes of a story on
NPR’s This American Life on evangelical Christians who
systematically walk the streets of Colorado Springs block by block
praying for strangers in their homes. They don’t ring door bells.
They just walk and pray. They pray for the reporter too. They pray
that she, a secular Jew from Chicago, will come home, to know Jesus
as her friend and savior. The reporter finds herself strangely drawn
to these people and their communal life of faith, love and service.
She even contemplates leaving her old life, but goes home to Chicago
in the end.” What is striking about this story is that a loving
community with a very different theological grounding than the
reporter would have such power to make a liberal Jew ponder
conversion to evangelical Christianity.iii
In this liberal religious community here in Milford, we practice-
practice- and learn from each other how best to live a life of faith,
love and service. And this wide circle of love is both the core and
embrace that holds us together.
But
unlike the evangelicals reported on in Colorado, it is this love in
practice that draws us together rather than the theology behind it.
And yet we sometimes forget this core of our faith. In John
O’Donohue’s book Anam Cara, he talks about the importance of what
he calls “affection.” He points out that “most fundamentalism,
greed, violence and oppression can be traced back to the separation
of idea and affection.” I think this is an excellent thing to keep
in mind, when we are attached to an idea and intent on expressing our
opinion- it is easy to dismiss the other as misguided or ignorant.
Can we find away to express our opinion – our good idea, but hold
the other in affection or lovingkindness at the same time? A lawyer
in Fred Small’s congregation was asked “why he comes to church
and without hesitation the lawyer replied, ‘for the opportunity to
be kind’”iv
One
way to practice the wisdom of not separating an idea from love or
affection comes from eastern traditions. Fred Small describes a
course on spiritual practice in his congregation. Whenever someone
in the group wants to speak he or she bows slowly to the group, who
acknowledge the next speaker by bowing in return. Upon finishing
speaking, the speaker bows again and the group returns the bow. The
practice deepens conversation, reduces interruption and
attention-grabbing repartee, and expresses reverence for each
person’s contribution. Now I wonder how things would unfold if we
did this at our committee and council meetings.v
Can you imagine it at all our meetings in the public arena? Another
practice that engenders respect and affection for each individual
person that is fairly widespread at our committee and council meeting
and small group ministry sessions, is the practice of the check in.
After our chalice is lit and a time of centering silence or reading
or prayer is offered, each person around the table is invited to
share how they are… this may be just a short minute or two for each
person in our committee meetings and a longer time in our small group
ministry sessions. But this practice allows us to get to know each
other as individuals, so that it is more difficult to separate our
ideas from affection. As we know each other, we grow in sympathy and
kindness. We grow to be people with greater creative capabilities
and able to fulfill the ultimate purpose in life- to love well.
Some
of you may have heard the feature on NPR last week about a marriage
proposal.vi
A certain aspect of this couple’s love for each other is also the
kind of love we mean when we say that Love is the doctrine of our
church. A young man had proposed twice to a young woman and been
turned down both times. She had turned him down because for a long
time, he had been unable to commit. When he finally proposed the
first time, he did it out of panic- and she didn’t want to respond
just out of compassion for his panic. She didn’t trust his level
of commitment. And indeed, he did remain fundamentally indecisive.
As he wrestled with the decision about whether or not to ask her
again, a friend asked him, “Does it really matter who you marry?”
So he asked her again and even told her what his friend had said
that made him decide to make the commitment and ask her again to
marry him. At first she turned him down, but eventually accepted his
proposal. For years, her mother had been telling her something
similar… “Marriage is not about finding the right person, It is
about being the right person.” Now there’s a wise mother. It is
not about finding the right person. It is about being the right
person. In our couple relationships and in our families, as well as
in our neighborhoods, religious and civic communities, it is about
being the right person in how we relate to others. The fact
is that this is the kind of love that is imperative for all people in
our world torn apart by violence and suffering. As poet W.H. Auden
wrote, “We must love another or die.”vii
In
Anam Cara, John O’Donohue acknowledges that friendships can turn.
Sometimes partners or members of a community “fix on each other at
their points of mutual negativity. When you meet only at the point
of poverty between you, it is as if you give birth to a ghost who
would devour every shred of your affection. Your essence is rifled.
You become helpless and repetitive with each other. Here you need
deep prayer and great vigilance and care in order to redirect your
souls.” Because experiences in love relationships can hurt us
deeply, we need to take care that we don’t carry around in our
hearts the corpses of past relationships. Some may even become
“addicted to hurt as confirmation of identity.” “Where
friendship recognizes itself as a gift, it will remain open to its
own grounding of blessing.”viii
O’Donohue says that when friendships go through troubling times,
you may need to change the rhythm of seeing each other and come into
contact again with the ancient belonging that brought you together.
If you invoke its power and presence around you, this ancient
affinity will hold you together. (People) who are really awakened
inhabit the one circle of belonging. They have awakened a more
ancient force around them that will hold them together and mind
them.”ix
In
Scott Peck’s book, The Road Less Traveled,x
he defines love as “the will to extend one’s self for the
purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth….
Love is an act of will namely, both intention and an action.” It
seems to me that in addition to intention and action, we need to also
drop our limited expectations of the other. There is a paradox in
love- that we must intend and act with kindness at the same time
remaining open to accepting the other as they are. I don’t mean
that we shouldn’t hold people accountable for their own abusive or
unkind behavior. In the reality of domestic violence, the batterer
says, “I love you.” And he may indeed feel remorse and a certain
kind of love in that moment. But love is also about behavior, right
action, right relations. So the love we talk about in our
affirmation each Sunday morning is not just the love that we feel,
it is the love that we do.
Almost
2 weeks ago, I testified to the House Judiciary Committee in Concord
against the constitutional amendment which would define marriage as
between one man and one woman. The fact that the amendment would
limit rights and effectively discriminate against certain people
should be enough to defeat the amendment. But I am also concerned
about how this focus on gender clouds what is really important in
couple relationships and families. Stable couple relationships based
on respect, responsibility and kindness are good for children and for
the adults who participate in them- no matter what their gender.
Same sex marriage does not threaten our family life. Healthy
relationships that weave healthy communities do not depend on gender.
They depend on respect, responsibility and kindness.
In one
of our small groups last week, the facilitator asked the members of
the group to ask themselves several questions about loving well.
I’ll end with these questions for you to answer for yourself- and
you can find ways to translate them into questions for your life each
day: “How well did I love my spouse at breakfast this morning? How
well did I love my friend, my neighbor, my co-worker the last time we
spoke? How well did I love the cashier who was slow, the bagger who
used too many bags for my groceries, the driver who honked at me?
How generous am I with my love? Do I visit the sick and infirm? Do
I visit the prisoner? Do I welcome the stranger? Do I assist those
in need? How far will I go for love? How much will I risk?”xi
As we
gather each morning and affirm that Love is the doctrine of our
church… may we be re-inspired to love well. “Loving kindness is
the warm heart of our living faith.” Without it we cannot live our
principles to honor each individual’s inherent worth and dignity,
to accept and encourage one another and to work toward justice in the
world.”xii
It
starts here in our hearts. It lives in our actions. It starts here
in our reaching out to one another. When we are in pain. When we
are feeling strong. At some time or another we all need someone.
How well do we love? Do we dare invite each other to share the whole
of our lives? Leaning on each other. Supporting each other. Giving
to each other and to those beyond these walls. In joy. And
together. May it be so! Let us join in singing “Lean On Me.”
i
http://www.agapelive.com/
ii
Fred Small, How Well Do We Love?,
http://www.uua.org/WRLD/0399comment.html
iv
Fred Small, How Well Do We Love?,
http://www.uua.org/WRLD/0399comment.html
v
Quotes and paraphrase. Fred Small, How Well Do We Love?,
http://www.uua.org/WRLD/0399comment.html
vi
Fresh Air, WNPR, February 11, 2006.
vii
Fred Small, How Well Do We Love?,
http://www.uua.org/WRLD/0399comment.html
viii
John O’Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. New
York: HarperCollins,1997. Page 12-13.
ix
John O’Donohue, Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom. New
York: HarperCollins,1997. Page 24.
x
Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled. Page 81-83.
xi
Fred Small, How Well Do We Love?,
http://www.uua.org/WRLD/0399comment.html
Unitarian Universalist Congregation
in Milford