Question Box
by Rev. Colin Bossen, August 16, 2009
It is good to be back in the pulpit this morning. I stand before you reinvigorated after my vacation and study leave and ready to get down to the business at hand. That business is the same as it is every other Sunday. It is to strive with you to create a loving community that is joyful and welcoming to all and that struggles for justice in this world.
I return to recommitted our collective project and with an ever deepening sense that as members of this community we are each called to love, cherish and nurture each other. And it is partially in the sense that our work is a collective project that I present to you my sermon this morning. Rather than a typical sermon with a discrete message it is a series of reflections born from questions submitted to me over the last month by members of the congregation. All sermons are in some manner a dialogue between the preacher, the gathered community and the shared religious tradition. This sermon is even more so. It is an attempt to respond to the nine questions on topics ranging from the theological to the personal to the congregational that I received from five members of our beloved community.
Our first question reads: "How do we do Social Justice? Where is the line, legally, we cannot cross? What can we do? I’m thinking of a Social Justice letter-writing group."
The answer to this question depends, in part, by what is meant by social justice. I draw a distinction between social service and social justice. Social service is providing services to the needy and marginalized in our society. Volunteering at a soup kitchen, tutoring disadvantaged children and working with refugees are examples of social service.
Social service is something that almost all religious communities engage in. Our congregation is currently working with several refugee families from Bhutan. Every few months we also try to provide an opportunity for our members to engage in a social service project. At the end of June a small group from the Society participated in Rebuilding Together Cleveland, a one day work party to conduct minor repairs on the property of a low income homeowner. Earlier in the year some of our members also took part in Interact Cleveland's annual Homeless Stand Down, a several day long retreat providing homeless people with the opportunity to relax and escape from the elements during the depths of winter.
There are no real constraints on the kinds or amount of social service work that a religious community can do. Indeed there are some people in the United States who believe that religious communities should be the primary provider of social services.
In contrast to social service, social justice is an attempt to in some way change society so that it is more just. Often social justice takes the form of advocating for changes to the laws that govern the country. It can also mean trying to organize people for social power so that they can take control of their own lives. Creating unions and co-operatives, speaking out against war and in favor of religious or political freedom and teaching our children values counter to those held by the mainstream of American culture are all forms of social justice.
The separation of church and state enshrined in the Constitution of the United States means that there are only specific kinds of social justice that a religious organization can engage with. Religious communities risk losing their tax exempt status if they endorse a particular political candidate or particular piece of legislation. However, a religious community is allowed to take stands on issues. This means that it is permissible for us to say that we support single payer health care, an end to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, gay marriage or whatever else we want as long as we don't come out for or against a specific of piece of legislation. The church could issue a statement saying that we support gay marriage and not endanger its tax exempt status. If the bill to legalize gay marriage is House Bill 123 we could run into trouble if we said that we were in favor of the specific bill rather than the general principle it upholds.
The issue is slightly more complex if the legislation under consideration is a ballot initiative. Also, members of a religious community can get together and advocate for a specific piece of legislation or politician. They just cannot do it as an official group of the congregation.
A social justice letter writing group might be a good fit for our congregation. As long as the group did not claim to speak for the whole congregation it would not run the risk of running foul of tax law. It could be an opportunity to educate other members of the congregation about particular issues and speak out in favor of a more just society. I imagine it would also build community for those participating in it.
Our next question is: "Why do so many Unitarians act so negatively toward their Christian fellow beings?"
This is a complicated question. I suspect that many of those who harbor hostile feelings towards Christians have been injured by some community of Christians or individual Christian in the past. Many of those who I know who are hostile to Christians are ex-Christians themselves. Their hostility comes directly from their own negative experience with Christianity. Others are people who have always been non-Christian but who have experienced discrimination from Christians. Perhaps in school they were singled out and picked-on because they were not Christian. Or maybe they resent fundamentalist Christians for trying to impose their moral values on the wider society.
Our third question: "How about a worship service explaining the health care issues in depth? Thanks for the considering the idea."
I have at least three responses to this question. First, I certainly will consider a worship service on health care issues. The issues are complex. While I have opinions I cannot pretend to be an expert on the subject. Whether or not we actually have a service on the health care issues will depend upon when the vote on health care reform takes place. Services for the next month or so are already planned so if the vote takes place in September we probably will not have a service on the subject. However, if the vote is delayed we might be able to hold one.
Second, this subject is probably something that lends itself to a Sunday morning forum or after service discussion group as much as, if not more than, a worship service.
Third, in case we do not have a service on health care let me briefly summarize my thinking on the health care issue. I am in favor of a single payer or national health care system. Either system would be a dramatic improvement over what we currently have. According to the World Health Organization, the health care system in the United States ranks 37th in the world. This put us behind almost all of the European countries, Canada, Japan, Costa Rica and several of the gulf states. Yet the United States spends more on health care per capita than any other country in the world.
The low ranking of that the United States health care system gets is due to a combination of the expense of the system and the system's failure to provide health care to everyone. Over 47 million Americans currently lack health insurance and, according to journalist Amy Goodman, 50 people die a day due to lack of access to adequate health care. Countries with either single payer or national health care do a better job at providing health care to all of their citizens. At the same time they control costs more than the American system does. This suggests to me that ultimately the only real solution for health care reform is to move to one of these models.
If I had time I would make the additional argument that the expense of our private health care system is making it difficult for many businesses to employ U.S. workers. I would also say that while I am not thrilled with President Obama's proposed health care reforms the fact that they include a public option--the first step towards a single payer system--suggests to me that they are worthy of support. Rejecting them because they are not good enough seems too much like making the perfect the enemy of the good.
Our fourth question: "Why is our congregation the Church home for so few Afro-Americans? What can we do to open our doors more to the mixing of people?"
In her essay, "The Problem of Theology in the Work of Anti-racism: A Meditation" African American Unitarian Universalist minister Rosemary Bray McNatt offers a story about her encounter with Coretta Scott King. She writes:
"During an hour of wide-ranging conversation, I mentioned to Mrs. King that I was in seminary to become a Unitarian Universalist minister. What frankly surprised me was the look she gave me, one of respect and delight.
'Oh I went to Unitarian churches for years, even before I met Martin,' she told me...And Martin and I went to Unitarian churches when we were in Boston.'
What surprised and saddened me most was what she said next...the gist of it was this: 'We gave a lot of thought to becoming Unitarian at one time, but Martin and I realized we could never build a mass movement of black people if we were Unitarian."
The rest of McNatt's essay is essentially a meditation of why the Kings would not have been able to build a mass movement of black people as Unitarian Universalists. McNatt concludes that the lack of African Americans in many of our congregations is primarily due to two factors. The first is that many of us are too theologically narrow and insecure to actually practice the theologically pluralism that we preach. Some Unitarian Universalists grow down right hostile to those with different theologically understandings, especially if God language or a belief in God is involved. Given that African Americans are, in general, more likely to be theistic than whites this limits our appeal.
Second, since most Unitarian Universalist congregations are predominately white there is often a large cultural gap between the way our communities worship and the way most African American religious communities worship. This necessarily means that many African Americans who visit a Unitarian Universalist congregation are not comfortable with the form of worship they fin.
As for the second part of the question, there is a lot we could do to open our doors to a more diverse range of people. Some of you may remember Mark Morrison-Reed who was here in February. Mark is a, perhaps the, leading scholar on the African American experience of Unitarian Universalism. He believes that the handful of our congregations that have successfully become multiracial have done so under an activist minister who fostered visible community engagement and specifically nurtured multiracial leadership within the congregation. Such ministers challenged their congregations to develop more multicultural styles of worship, richer religious language and a deeper connection to the surrounding community. If we are serious about building a multiracial religious community we might do well to follow Mark's formula.
Our next question: "I’ve heard people say, ‘If something isn’t fun, it’s not worth doing.’ I have fantasies of committing violent acts against these people, despite my general non-violent tendencies. I do hard work that isn’t always ‘fun,’ but is making a positive difference in the world. How do I respond to the above comment without committing assault?"
Take a deep breath. Whenever I am confronted with people who anger me I try to take a deep breath, close my eyes and focus on the physical experience of being in my body. I find that this resets my mind and allows me to respond to a given situation rationally than rather just emotionally.
You should realize that people have different ways of being in the world. Some people value hard work and others do not. If we are all going to be able to live together peacefully we need to respect our differences and let others do as they please as long as what they do is not harmful.
A question pertaining to congregational life: "When will work start on the sanctuary/new RE space? I thought that was supposed to happen this summer?"
The new space has been delayed because of issues with the City of Cleveland Heights. We have been told that we will not be issued the necessary permits to begin work until we have architectural drawings. The Board is now working to obtain said drawings and as soon as we have them we will begin construction of the new space.
Another question about race: "I've encountered two articles recently about 'white privilege,' and I've started to understand the difference between overt or subconscious prejudice and white privilege. I've got a pretty good idea of how to identify prejudice that lies in my heart, and how to respond to overt prejudice in the world. But systemic disadvantages befuddle me. A couple of the many examples of white privilege that I heard were 'When I ask to speak to the manager, I almost always encounter someone of my own race.' and 'I can swear, or dress in second hand clothes, or not answer letters, without having people attribute these choices to the bad morals, the poverty or the illiteracy of my race.' What can I do about this deeper, larger social injustice? Just ... be attentive, listen for opportunities to educate others, and wait?"
Among the more interesting theorists on the subject of white privilege are the editors of the now defunct journal Race Traitor. In each issue of the journal the group published a manifesto of sorts entitled "What We Believe." It reads, in part:
"The key to solving the social problems of our age is to abolish the white race, that is, to abolish the privileges of the white skin. Until that task is accomplished, even partial reform will prove elusive, because white influence permeates every issue, domestic and foreign, in U.S. society.
The existence of the white race depends on the willingness of those assigned to it to place their racial interests above class, gender, or any other interests they hold. The defection of enough of its members to make it unreliable as a predictor of behavior will lead to its collapse."
In sum, according to these theorists, the way to address "this deeper, larger social injustice" is to give up some of your own privileges, specifically the privileges that you derive from what one of my friends once called "the complexion connection." What those privileges are, how one gives them up and whether the whole concept of white privilege is even a valid one could be the subject of another, or perhaps many other, sermons.
A hint on how to do this, offered by the civil rights and labor activist Staughton Lynd, is to engage in what he, riffing off of Archbishop Oscar Romero, calls accompaniment. This is when a middle or upper class person chooses to live amid the poor and marginalized and assist in their struggles for justice. Doing so places the middle or upper class person at risk because he or she is rejecting the comforts and privileges that he or she has in favor of standing in solidarity with the marginalized. These actions often bring the systems of oppression operative in our society into a clearer focus and undermine them by erasing the artificial divisions necessary to maintain such systems. Lynd quotes one of his mentors, Norman Morrison, to demonstrate how easy accompaniment can be: "The key is to acquire a skill useful to poor and working persons. Armed with such a skill, just behave as a moderately decent human being and 'accompaniment' will be a piece of cake."
Our eighth question is, perhaps, somewhat lighter: "Should I dress up for church on Sunday? Why or why not? (But I like coming in my pajamas! But I feel it is disrespectful to come in my pajamas!)"
The short answer is that you can wear anything you want on Sunday. The long answer, like a lot of long answers, is more complicated. Many people believe that how we dress for religious services is a reflection of our religious values. Such people would argue that dressing casually in your pajamas implies that you do not take the religious community very seriously. In some religious traditions putting on special clothes for worship services is expected. In others practitioners are expected to dress a certain way at all times as a sign of respect for their community and God. Collectively how we dress communicates to newcomers and outsiders a great deal about our community.
Dressing overly casually for Sunday service might be taken as a sign that one does not take the community very seriously. To some it might also imply that the casual dresser has significant enough privilege that he or so does not need to worry about how he or she appears in public.
Our final question mirrors a couple of earlier ones: "How can we best respond to intolerant religions, without disrespecting the members of these religions? When I hear fellow UUs mocking people of other, less tolerant beliefs, I am conflicted. I agree that there are some hateful denominations. But I feel that mocking or belittling their beliefs just reflects badly on me and my beliefs. Is this a 'love the sinner, hate the sin' or 'respect the inherent worth and dignity of the person, but not their beliefs' sort of situation? What is the best response?"
I agree that it reflects poorly on people when they mock the beliefs of others. I recognize that many Unitarian Universalists have been wounded by more conservative religious traditions. I find that the best way to engage with those traditions is only to worry about them when the actions of their members in some way impact my life, the wider community or the planet as a whole. In such cases I try to focus on the behavior and ideas that I find objectionable rather than belittling people. This can be difficult. However, if we are truly going to respect the plurality of ways of being that exist in our world we have to accept that there are many people out there with different values than ours. Such people are worthy of respect and we need to figure out how to live with them while both honoring our differences and protecting our own communities.
With that answer our sermon draws to a close. I hope that you have found the vignettes and reflections I have offered to be useful and, perhaps, a little illuminating. And I invite you now to rise in body or in spirit and join with me in singing hymn #121 We'll Build A Land.