Sermon
The Rev.
Feb.16, 2003
A Story for All Ages: Bartholomew and the Oobleck by Dr. Seuss
Joshua turned back at that
time, and took Hazor, and struck its king down with the sword. Before that time Hazor was the head of all
those kingdoms. And they put to the
sword all who were in it, utterly destroying them;
there was no one left who breathed, and he burned Hazor with fire. And all the towns of those kings, and all
their kings, Joshua took, and struck them with the edge of the sword utterly
destroying them, as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded. But
So Joshua took all that land
. . . . He took all their kings, struck
them down, and put them to death. Joshua
made war a long time with all those kings.
There was not a town that made peace with the Israelites, except the
Hivites, the inhabitants of
In days to come the mountain
of the Lord’s house shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and
shall be raised above the hills; all the nations shall stream to it. Many people shall come and say, “Come, let us
go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; that he
may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.” For out of
I
read the newspapers and listen to the news and I hear the same message repeated
over and over again: We stand on the
brink of war. It may still be averted,
but it is unlikely. But in reality, I
believe we are already at war. The
conflict with
There’s nothing new about
war. The bible is filled with stories of
war. Joshua burns Hazor to the
ground. “And they put to the sword all who were in it, utterly destroying them; there was no one
left who breathed, and he burned Hazor with fire.” All of this, of course, was done as the Lord
commanded. Such events are so common
place in the biblical world that I sometimes wonder why they bothered to record
them. What’s unusual would seem to be
peace. But peace is not absent from the
bible. In fact, there are more
references to the word peace – or variations thereof – than there are to the
word war – or its variations. I have to
admit I was a little surprised to make that discovery. But it’s true. And “they shall beat their swords into
plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword
against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.”
I
believe it is important to note the parallels between current and biblical
events because all of the sides in this current conflict are claiming divine
justification for war.
Not
much has changed. The same kind of
rhetoric is being exchanged by all of the parties today. Just a few days ago, there was a
tape-recorded statement released by Osama Bin Laden. He justified the terrorist war against
“The sense of having the moral high ground can
justify extreme acts. It is much easier to sell a war, for example, when one
claims to have the high ground… When you frame a conflict as God’s people
versus Satan’s people, one side can only annihilate the other.”
That does not mean, however,
that it is wrong to frame issues in moral terms. Indeed, it is essential to do so. As Dr. Pagels went on to observe:
“We
need moral language to better understand horrific acts, such as the terror
attacks of 9/11. But it’s distorting and destructive when applied to whole
blocks of people or countries. Religious language is unifying, but it can be
divisive since it bypasses the brain and goes straight to the gut.”
Unfortunately, there is a long history of
religious language being used to divide and to destroy, instead of being used
to unite. I believe the rhetoric being
used by all the parties to the current conflict – Saddam Hussein, Osama Bin
Laden, and that of our own President – exemplifies that history and points to
what I think is a deeper problem within religion – of how religious language is
used not just in times of war, but in every day usage to cast the world – and
people – in terms of absolutes – of good and evil, of the divine and the
demonic. Religious language – the way in
which we talk to one another about religion – can be healing. Words can unite people. But they can also inflict terrible
wounds. The old children’s rhyme says
sticks and stones can break my bones, but words can never hurt me. It is not true. It’s one of the great lies of the world. There are words that can hurt a person more
than the thrust of a knife. Such is the
power of religious language.
I believe religious language
is at its most powerful – for good and for evil – when it describes what a
person believes. I remember several
years ago sitting with a small group of people as we took turns discussing our
personal religious beliefs. One man
talked at length about his beliefs – most of which were about what other people
believed. He labeled all those who did
not share his beliefs as worshippers of Satan.
When asked if he knew that most such people didn’t believe in the devil,
he responded that it didn’t matter because the bible was clear that if a person
didn’t believe as he did, then he or she was a Satan worshiper.
His
words were hateful to me. I felt no
connection with him at all. Then someone
in the group confronted him and asked him to stop talking about others and to
start talking about himself – to explain to us how what he believed had
affected his life. The angry words
stopped and he began to speak from his heart.
He described a life filled with drug abuse. He described how he had been abused as a
child. He described a succession of brutally
abusive adult relationships. He told us
how his beliefs had led him out of that and given him a new life. I did not agree with his beliefs, but that
didn’t matter. I was deeply moved by
what he said, and I felt a real connection, a human kinship with him. For the first time I understood why his
religious beliefs were important to him.
The religious tradition of
this church is one that does not have an orthodoxy, a
set of right beliefs. We have no
creed. That does not mean one can be a
member of this church and believe whatever he or she wishes. I think that is one of the two most common
misunderstandings about Unitarian Universalism.
A member of one of our churches is not free to believe what he or she
wants to believe. Rather, each person is
free to believe as his or her conscience requires. Not because one’s conscience will necessarily
be right, but because it is the best we have.
And right or wrong, each person is responsible for the consequences of
such beliefs.
But I said there were two
common misunderstandings about our tradition.
Just as we are not free to believe what we want – by which I mean what
is convenient or pleasant – neither are we free to behave just any old way. We are bound by conscience in matters of
belief and by a covenant of right relationship in matters of behavior. And I believe the history of religion calls
for us to recognize the importance of that covenant of right relationship, of
that covenant of right behavior, in matters of religious speech.
We live, of course, in the
land of the First Amendment. We have
freedom of speech. But that is a
political freedom, and as such it deals with issues of power and control. Yes, each and every one of us has the right –
or more correctly, the power – to say whatever comes to mind. The covenant of right relationship does not
call upon anyone to abandon that right, that power to say whatever he or she
wishes. Rather, it calls upon us to
recognize that while we may have the right to say it,
it may not be the right thing to say. It
calls upon us to temper our choice of words – especially our religious words –
with mercy.
I believe it is easy to be
intemperate with religious speech – especially where beliefs are
concerned. I know that there have been
times when I have spoken angrily to others about my beliefs. I have also been on the receiving end. I had a recent experience of that. Just a few weeks ago I happened to be
speaking with someone – from another state – who asked me about my religious
beliefs. I gave a brief explanation. He responded by telling me that what I
believed was stupid. He proceeded to
tell me that my beliefs meant I must hold some particular theological
conclusions. What they were is
unimportant, except to understand how specific and how wrong he was.
I said, “Excuse me, but in
fact I don’t believe that.” He promptly
told me that he had studied religion and philosophy at length and I just didn’t
understand what my beliefs really were.
As I listened to him I realized he wasn’t talking about my beliefs, he
was talking about his. I experienced
what he said and how he said it as a desire to control and to dictate to me
what I believed. The thought occurred to
me that perhaps he did so because he was insecure about his own beliefs.
When I was in seminary, the
first course I took was a class on Indigenous Religions – the culture and
religion of native peoples. One of the
readings for that course was Dee Brown’s book, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee.
In there I came across this passage from Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce
(316):
The earth was created by the assistance
of the sun, and it should be left as it was . . .. The country was made without lines of
demarcation, and it is no man’s business to divide it . . . . I claim a right to live on my land, and
accord you the privilege to live on yours.
I remember thinking at the time that it
was an allegory for religious freedom. I
claim a right to believe as my conscience requires, and I accord you the
privilege to believe as you must. It is,
of course, easier said than done. I
think it can only be done by the man or woman who is at peace with himself or
herself. I don’t think it has anything
to do with what an individual may or not believe. I learned that lesson from the teacher of
that first seminary class.
His name was Terry Muck. Terry is an evangelical Christian. Before becoming a seminary professor he had
been the editor of Christianity Today,
the national magazine for conservative Christian Evangelicals. No one would think of questioning his deeply
held religious beliefs as a conservative, Christian Evangelical. But he was also a professor of comparative
religions. He taught the class with a
compassion – no, a reverence, for the religious beliefs of native peoples that
I found astonishing. It was not just
intellectual curiosity. There was no
hiding his genuine respect for native traditions.
One day in class he was
describing a Native American worship service he had attended. Not one of the staged events, but the real
thing, the kind few people outside that tradition are privileged to
attended. He was quite excited and
emotional about what he had seen. As he
was describing the ceremony, he stopped in midsentence, looked around the class
and said, “You know, there’s just something wonderful about worshipping with
other people.” That evangelical
Christian taught me what genuine respect and tolerance for other people was
about. He made me realize that respect
and tolerance for others has nothing to do with any kind of glib belief in
diversity. His respect and tolerance for
others was rooted in his own firmly held religious beliefs. As much as any person I have ever met, he was
at peace with himself and his own religious beliefs – and by being at peace
with himself, he had no fear of those who believed
differently.
One of the lessons I learned
in that class was that native peoples do not see the religious in life as
separated from the secular. All of life
is religious. The nature of one’s
character is rooted in one’s religion – and one’s religion is rooted in one’s
character. I believe the person who is
at peace with his or her own religious beliefs will be at peace on other
matters as well – and with other people.
That does not mean agreement with others, but the ability to accept
others for who they are by first accepting oneself. All this comes home to me in the memory of
something from a long time ago.
It was 1973 and I was about
to graduate from law school at the
I believe that our religious
community is one founded on the notion of a covenant of right behavior. One way of saying that is that we need not
believe alike, but we are called to love alike.
I believe our commitment to right behavior – our commitment to love
alike – has no more important application than speech. But the ability to turn that idea into a
reality – the reality of a community where religious language unites us instead
of separating us – depends on the individual’s ability to make peace with himself or herself.
It depends upon the ability of the individual to have such confidence in
one’s own beliefs that he or she need not fear the different beliefs of
another. Hans Kung once said, “No peace
among the nations without peace among the religions. No peace among religions
without dialogue between the religions. No dialogue between the religions
without investigation of the foundation of the religions.” I believe that dialogue about the foundation
of religion takes place when people have the courage to use religious language
to describe the self and one’s own beliefs instead of using it to define
others. I don’t think there is much that
any single person sitting here this morning can do about what is happening in