“But Is It a Religion?”

Presented to the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship

Open House Sunday

September 30, 2007

Rev. Paul Ratzlaff

 

When we Unitarian Universalists try to explain our religion to those who don’t know anything about us, we often start by emphasizing our freedom. We’ll say things like, “In our church we don’t tell people what to believe.” We tell the joke Unitarian Universalists don’t have “Ten Commandments;” they have “Ten Suggestions.” In fact when I tell my story of how I discovered Unitarian Universalism, I emphasize freedom too. I’ll say, “I grew up in a fundamentalist, repressed Evangelical Christian home. I hated my youth, pretending to believe, but questioning everything I was taught. I hated being a hypocrite. So I loved discovering Unitarian Universalism where my doubts and questions were not only welcomed, but prized. What a relief! I was free to be me!” As one person quipped, “Unitarian Universalism – where all your answers are questioned.” We have a hymn we enjoy in which we sing “to question truly is the answer.”

Commonly people will say about us, “oh that’s the church where you can believe anything you want.” That expression of religious freedom, taken to the absurd, leads to all the jokes about us: When (if) UUs pray they begin “To whom it may concern;” or “Dear God, if there is a God, if you can, save my soul, if I have a soul.”

“You can believe anything you want.”

“Anything?” the startled response comes back.

“Oh sure, we’ve got atheists and theists, Christians, Jews, Pagans, Humanists, Buddhists, Yoga, and anything else you can imagine among us. That’s what I love – the freedom!”

“Well, I would love the freedom, too,” the stranger might answer, “but, is it a religion?” (By implication, isn’t it just a hodge-podge of people who love to debate with each other? A kind of social club for dabblers in the religions of the world?)

“But is it a religion?” This is a deep and serious question. First I want to give a brief overview of how we came to be who we are in the year 2007. Then I want to explicate my assertion, “yes, we are a religion, but with a difference.”

I will quickly tell how we got here. We got this tongue-twister of a name for our movement because we are two religious movements that merged into one movement in 1961. Rather than give ourselves a new, simpler name, “The Liberal Church,” or the “Free Church,” folks decided to honor both histories by combining names, hence Unitarian Universalism.

Both movements started out in America as Protestant Christian churches. Both were continuing the Protestant reform of Christianity by getting back to the original teachings of Jesus. The Unitarians emphasized that God was a unity, not a trinity as had become orthodox; the Universalists taught that everyone would go to heaven because God as a loving God could not damn some to eternal suffering. God’s heart couldn’t contain such torture.

Both movements emerged in America in the late 1700s and organized in the earlier 1800s as separate Christian denominations. Here’s the critical point, almost immediately there emerged the transcendentalist movement that argued that each person had a direct relationship to God, the transcendent. Jesus then became less central to worship. (For the transcendentalists, Jesus modeled the direct relationship that each of us could have in our own unique way.)

Battles emerged. Christian Unitarians wanted to define Unitarianism as Christo-centric. But I’m pleased that instead of defining the transcendentalists out of the movement, Unitarians chose define them in. We could be both Christian Unitarians and transcendentalist Unitarians.

I’m reminded of the wonderful short poem by Edwin Markham titled “Outwitted.”

He drew a circle that shut me out--
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!

Next came the humanist movement. Humanists claimed that no divine authority was needed to behave morally. We humans can be good without God. They noticed that morality was pretty much the same throughout all religions, even though the theological trappings varied immensely. Forget about arguing about the gods, the Humanists proclaimed, pay attention to how we behave.

Again battles emerged with the Unitarian and Universalist movements. Conservatives, who thought God was required in worship, wanted to draw the circle to exclude the humanists. Thankfully, the circle was expanded to include now Christians, theists and humanists! “Love and I had the wit to win: we drew a circle that took [them] in.!”

Over the years, the circle was widened to include those who find inspiration in the earth-based religions, in the religions of the east, and so forth until today we have a religion that agrees on seven principles, but acknowledges that these principles can be inspired in many different ways. The six sources honors the very different ways we come to share the same principles. On the back of your Order of Service, you can read our seven principles and six sources.

We like circles. Notice the quilt in the Family Room. It’s a circle with the symbols of different religions enclosing a chalice. We draw on the all these religions to feed our souls.

 

I can imagine someone observing, “Those principles are fine. Who could argue with them? But…But is it a religion?” Sometimes that question means “it’s so confusing having all these possibilities included. I want something straightforward.”

I believe that often under the question “is it a religion?” lie several other questions. 

“Will it support me when I am stressed?”

“Will it inspire me? Will it speak to me over the long haul? Will it still touch me when I’m frail?”

“Will it comfort my children?”

My answer is, “that depends…on you.” As Unitarian Universalist religious community, we suggest deep spiritual resources that may tide you and yours through the most difficult passage, even through dying. We suggest resources that will inspire again and again through the different stages of life. But you have to use them. You have to integrate them. You have made them so much a part of you that they will be there when the going gets tough.

As an inclusive, free faith, we will not tell you that such-and-such is the one-and-only true path. I love the song that the choir sung, setting the words of the Sufi mystic, Hafez: “I have learned so much from God, that I can no longer call myself a Christian, a Hindu, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew… [I would add Humanist.]” In other words, I have had such an awesome experience of connectedness with all of life, that I don’t want to limit myself with a label, and all the label implies.

This is a good example of how we are a religion. In our faith, we hold before us the promise, and the hope that exquisite joy is available to us all. Mystics of all faiths and ages have tried to put words around this transforming experience. As UUs we preach, sing, and exclaim that such delight is possible.

We hold in common that the experience of delight, of vividness, of the sacred, if you will, can be ours. At the same time, we don’t insist on one path to get there. We affirm that different paths appeal to us, because we are diverse. Our minds work differently; our hearts work differently; we come from a multiplicity of stories and perspectives. Some of us would use language like “being in the presence of God” or “experiencing the Christ seed within us” or “feeling the presence of the Shekinah within” to try to give a name to our experience of transcendence. Others of us don’t find that language like that works. We might use the language of Abraham Maslow to talk about “peak experiences.” Yet others might use the language of the “limitless qualities” – loving-kindness, compassion, joy and equanimity – that Buddhists speak of.

Our religion doesn’t insist on one language. But it does hold transforming joy before us. Of course, if you come Sunday after Sunday, you may not hear that message every week. Some Sundays you will hear how we prepare our hearts to experience that joy by, say, expanding our ability to forgive and seek forgiveness, or expanding our generosity, our gratitude.

But it’s all in the service of deepening joy in being alive! 

Ours is also a religion of love. This is clear in our roots; in the Universalist side of tradition that preached a God of such love that God would see us through – all of us humans - to restoration to God’s presence. There was no room for a permanent hell, because God loved us so much. It’s clear in our Transcendentalist roots. Take our Huntingtonian ancestor Walt Whitman who saw God in a blade of common grass, and whose love extended to every human, without regard to their work, their status, their profession.

Today it is also evident that our religion is a religion of love. Listen to the sermons and services of Unitarian Universalist communities week in and week out. Notice how often it is love that is being held aloft, for us to commit to! Again, what inspires you to be more loving varies according to who you are. Some would use the very frail words that we humans have to point to their deepest, most inward experiences. Some might say, “I feel as if I am held by a loving presence that pervades the universe – that’s what I mean by God.” Others might say those words don’t work for me, but I aspire to be fully human, or I want to create in this congregation a model of the beloved community that would offer to our world a place where people are whole, beautiful and at-ease.

In a few minutes the choir will sing “Uma Familia” a Brazilian song, which says, “We are one and the same, tho’ we have different names. Uma familia. We may live far apart, but we are one in the heart.” That’s a love song for us Unitarian Universalists as the religion we are.

This leads to the third perennial theme that makes us religious. We pledge to make the world a better place for all. It’s not enough to have these wonderful experiences of joy and love for ourselves! We much share them so that others will have the experience. “…we are one in the heart.” Again, if you come Sunday after Sunday, you will hear our commitment work toward social justice. You will hear it in our affirmation of marriage equality for same sex couples. You will hear it in our concern for the genocide in Darfur, and our 5K walk/run to raise money for relief through our Unitarian Universalist Service Committee. You will hear it in our homeless program to shelter the homeless this winter. You will hear it in our commitment to increased sustainability for the well being of our planet Earth. You will hear it in our wanting to end the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And on and on. For ours is a religion of doing as well.

“But, is it a religion?” “Yes, indeed, we Unitarian Universalists are a religion of love, joy and working for justice!” And we are a religion with a difference. We encourage you to find the most meaningful way spiritually to deepen your love, your joy, and your working for justice.

But we don’t leave you to find it on your own. We offer a variety of experiences to support you in finding your inner truth. Sunday services, obviously! In addition we offer a variety of small group workshops, discussion and support that will help you experience what works best for your spirit. Check out our Adult Religious Exploration booklet. Pay attention to our Beacon, our every-other-week newsletter to see what draws your inner being.

As I said earlier, you need to make this religion your own. Nothing will be handed to you with a money-back guarantee. But much will be offered, for we have the richness of resources of our history and of each other, and, if you will, of the eternally playful spirit that is ever creative and invites us into joyful service. 

 

As our closing hymn we will sing “For all that is our life, we sing a song of praise, for all life is a gift which we are called to use to build the common good and make our own days glad.” There it is. Joy – gladness, praise – for the gift of life. Love – we heed the call to use these incredible gifts. In compassionate response, we automatically reach out to others. We use the gifts of life to build the common good.

We are a religion of joy, love and work to make this world just and peaceful.