Posted on

The Healing Church

Anonymous writes ,

I have found this topic that I stumbled upon very interesting and surprisingly uplifting.  As one who suffers from recurring episodes of depression I feel sort of motivated to seek a liberal Christian church for awhile,  just for a change.

Unitarian Universalists who privilege intellectual prowess over all other qualities of a human being often point proudly to their Jefferson Bible as a great example of how liberal religion should work. A robust man, that Jefferson! Just took out his scissors and chopped the gospels up, amputating all of that miracle nonsense and keeping just the teachings and the social justice stuff. THAT’S what’s good for all this stupidity that ails America!

Because I am a generally well-respected smartypants with a Harvard degree and an ability to articulate my opinions in the UU setting, I feel perfectly confident flashing a big smile at such moments and saying, “Sure, works if you’re a rich white male. As for myself, I consider the miracles the best part of the gospels and wouldn’t dream of cutting them out of my heart… or my Bible. What an arrogant desecration, although certainly I understand what he was doing as brave and exciting for his time.”

I’m a minister and therefore privileged myself. I can say that and start a conversation from a place of confidence, acceptance and equality. The vulnerable person who is standing on the outskirts of that conversation looking in has no such confidence. What they accurately intuit is that this is no place for a suffering person, not a welcoming spiritual home for someone who has deep doubts about humanity’s inherent worth and dignity, and who comes in need of gentle companionship. How does such a person participate in the verbal jousting we so often mistake for fellowship? They don’t. They just go away, feeling terrible about themselves for not being able to connect with the religious group that advertises itself as the accepting, welcoming, open-minded ones.

When Jefferson took his scissors to the Bible, he cut away all the healings performed by Jesus.  Only the most comfortable individuals would call that the act of an enlightened man. What it says to others is, “You shouldn’t need this.” And that hurts. This is a perfect example of how Unitarian Universalists unintentionally commit spiritual abuse.

 

 

Posted on

The Missional Church and Unitarian Universalism

The Rev. Peter Boullata recently got a lot of well-deserved attention for his articulate, hard-hitting blog post, “The Liberal Church Finding Its Mission: It’s Not About You.” I was one of the many Unitarian Universalists pumping my fist in the air and saying, “YES! Woot!” And also, “BOOYA” and other thoroughly juvenile expressions of excitement and approval.

Peter has got it so right. So painfully right. Our religious tradition has placed its faith in the individual to determine their own “free and responsible search for truth and meaning,” and mostly failed to insist that there are faith claims made by historical Unitarianism and Universalism to which we are beholden as congregations and as members. Rather than affirming those faith claims and shaping our worship, faith formation, evangelism and social justice around them, we have spent our time and effort inventing a totally definition of religion, squabbling endlessly and comically about how we will grandly allow each other (and our ministers) to talk about it and then peevishly refusing to see why are not taken seriously and why we do not grow.

We have thus far in our post-merger existence as Unitarian Universalists treated our theological legacy with white gloves: as fragile, faded archival material to be handled as lightly as possible and then filed respectfully away in an attic or basement file cabinet, or as historical curiosities to be peered at curiously over the top of our spectacles, smiled fondly over, and left in the church library to be studied by the few UUs who ask for a key to the locked stacks.

We have elevated the voicing of opinion to a sacrament, misinterpreting our first principle of affirming “the inherent worth and dignity of all people” to mean that we are obligated to take every idea seriously and consider every person — no matter how dysfunctional, abusive or destructive –of such value to our communities that we indulge their behaviors long past any other reasonable organization’s willingness to do so.  As a result, our congregations are regularly hijacked by the pre-offended, those I call “perma-victims” and chronic critics who have been led to believe that Unitarian Universalism and the local church are more interested in serving their personal opinions and perpetual woundedness than teaching them how to engage in the mutual deepening and spiritual transformation that leads to love and service.

Continue reading “The Missional Church and Unitarian Universalism”

Posted on

Death In the Room

As a pastor, you spend a lot of time passing around the chewing gum in the parking lot with the Grim Reaper, having that “meeting after the meeting” that all church folk are familiar with. I have actually had dreams where I am dancing with him, waltzing beautifully in a large, silent ballroom and feeling romanced and loved by this hooded, faceless Presence. Sometimes I see Death as the Spider Woman, sexy like Chita Rivera in that webbed gown she wore in “Kiss of the Spider Woman,” and I can tell when she’s hanging around a hospital room or bed. She wears heady perfume and smokes thin little cigars, and you can faintly detect their odor under all the other human smells.

And sometimes Death is a stern presence, tall, gaunt and impatient, dressed in a Puritan clergyman’s vestments and tapping his toe, pursing his lips and wanting to quote some more from the Bible — injecting the Word of God into your heretical 21st century nonsense. I always stare him down until he backs against the wall and promises to remain quiet. “This isn’t your gig, Reverend.” He nods and sighs his acquiescence, but his perfect posture never flags.

Now and then Death is a grandmother Jesus, rocking and knitting, looking up and glancing at the suffering one and humming a soft little song to help her baby along. She is calm while everyone else is frantic. She smiles with ultimate understanding but never rises from her chair. This isn’t her work, it is ours, and she is content to be a supportive witness while we attend to it. Even when the last exhalation has occurred and the dying one is finally still, she still doesn’t get up, just tilts her head and checks to see everything is alright, and goes back to her knitting and her humming. She will be the last one out of the room, and she will draw the curtains when everyone is gone.

The Death I have never met is the one who will be there for the person who, after a decade of heroic, exhausting and constant medical intervention to keep herself alive, has decided that she can no longer endure the pain and is stopping treatment. When she told me of her decision over the phone this afternoon, I felt this Death in the room behind me, a strong, young, taciturn farmer with some kind of big rake in his hand, wearing overalls and sturdy boots and a hat to shield his face from the still-strong October sun. He clomped through the house leaving bits of dirt on the floor, and the screen door slammed behind him as he went back outside to the fields. It is harvest time, after all, and there’s work to do.

I wanted to run after him, to shout that he should clean up after himself, that he had left dirt on my floor. More than that, I wanted to pick a fight with him, really, to land a good punch to his jaw. I wanted to pummel him right on the bib of his overalls, to stomp on his boots with my own. I wanted to tear off the sleeve of his worn cotton shirt and make a hankie for myself and for her — something we could hold in our hand and cling to — and leave him bruised and sorry for what he’s taking.

I know what he would say. “Don’t take it personal, ma’am. This isn’t anything you need to fight me about.” And then he would give me a kindly look and again leave the house, this time closing the screen door more carefully behind him.