-- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Meditation: by Rebecca Parker
Your gifts - whatever you discover them to be -
can be used to bless or curse the world.
The mind’s power,
the strength of the hands
the reaches of the heart,
the gift of speaking, listening, imagining, seeing,
waiting
.
Any of these can serve to feed the hungry,
bind up wounds,
welcome the stranger,
praise what is sacred,
do the work of justice
or offer love.
Any of these can draw down the prison door,
hoard bread,
abandon the poor,
obscure what is holy,
comply with injustice
or withhold love.
You must answer this question:
What will you do with your gifts?
Choose to bless the world.
Reading: by William Murry from A Faith for All Seasons (p. 58)
We tend to believe the world is just and orderly, and if that is the case, then there must be a good reason why we suffer. Hence we try to blame someone or something, and often we can think of reasons to blame ourselves. “If only I had gotten him to a doctor sooner…” “If only I had been there at the time…”
In my first parish, a couple active in the church had lost their only son at the age of fourteen in an auto accident. As I talked with them about it, it became clear that to some degree at least they felt that something they had done had been responsible for their son’s death, and nothing I said could dissuade them from that view. It was as though they needed to believe their son’s death was punishment for their sins.
I now know there are both psychological and theological reasons for the persistence of the view of suffering as punishment. Psychologically it is a way of dealing with the guilt every person feels; for if suffering is punishment for sin, then it becomes a way to atone for sin.
Theologically, the persistence of the idea that suffering is a divine punishment involves the whole concept of a just universe. If goodness is not rewarded and evil is not punished, it is difficult to maintain that we live in just, fair, and orderly cosmos. And if the universe is not just, then what does that do to belief in God?
Reading: by Kathy McTigue from a piece entitled “How to give a blessing” (UU World, Winter 2011)
The morning after my father died, following three days and nights of an around-the-clock vigil with my siblings, I had to go to the grocery store to buy a few things for dinner. When I arrived at the check-out counter and the clerk distractedly said, “How are you?” my brain went blank. I couldn’t say “fine,” or even “okay.” I wasn’t okay. I wasn’t even in my right mind. I was numb, sleep-deprived, and saturated with the mystery of our mortality. That’s the only explanation I have, because to my horror I found myself blurting out a real and honest answer. “I’m not so good,” I said. “My Dad died last night.”
With his hands filled with the apples, chicken, and bread, the poor clerk turned red and started to stammer. The people behind me looked longingly at the check-out lines they should have chosen, the ones that would not have placed them in earshot of the too-much-information lady. I was mortified at having revealed to an unprepared stranger just how not-fine I was. Everyone froze in this moment of uncomfortable paralysis—except the young man bagging the groceries, who had Down syndrome. He stopped moving completely, looked straight at me, and with a little slur and great emphasis said,
“I bet you feel really sad about that.”
The simplicity of that little expression of kindness and solidarity allowed both the clerk and me to escape. “Yes, I do. Thank you,” I said to him, and then I was able to walk out with my groceries… I thought about that encounter for a long time. The young man bagging groceries would be considered disabled, in thought, speech, and movement. Yet he was the only one able to offer what counted in that particular moment: He knew how to give a blessing.
When the Going Gets Tough
A Sermon Delivered on April 22, 2012
By
The Reverend Axel H. Gehrmann
You will probably not be surprised to know, that I like coming here to worship on Sunday mornings. I like the music and the meditation, the singing and the stories. I like to take time to ponder big issues of meaning and morality, and to be in the presence of others with questions and concerns similar to my own. But one of the things I like best, is our tradition of silently lighting candles of joy and concern.
It is a simple ritual: we are simply invited to reflect on what has been happening in our lives this past week, on good things and troubling things. Of course much more has happened than we could ever expect to remember in the space of a few moments during a worship service. And yet, for me, these few moments serve as a crucial reminder that there is a lot going on in my life. A lot more than I often realize. A lot of experiences I have yet to come to terms with.
More often than not, it seems my weeks are rushed, and I am speeding from one thing to the next. Moments when I have been frustrated or sad, or anxious or glad. Moments when I let tiny, trivial things tip my mood from good to bad. Or moments that were more profound than I realized – something important was said, a connection was made, something beautiful and deeply moving occurred.
I can’t recall every important experience, but even so, it is good to take a breath and acknowledge that a lot is going on. And because the full meaning of it all can’t be put into words, it is good to honor the significance of events with a simple symbolic act of lighting a candle. The flame is bright and warm, ephemeral and mysterious, but unmistakably real.
On some Sundays, a few of us offer small insights into what has been going on, writing a few words on a card that I read. A grandchild was born. An aunt died unexpectedly. An anniversary was celebrated. A parent entered hospice. Someone had a heart attack. Someone had a tumor removed. Someone fell and broke five ribs. Recovery is slow and trying.
On other Sundays, all candles are lit in silence, and as I watch the quiet procession of those lining up in our center aisle, I am reminded that there is a lot going on in each of our lives. That every single person in our pews carries within them a world of experience just as profound and challenging, and wonderful and overwhelming, as my own. Each of us struggling. Each of us doing the best we can.
And as a congregation, we try to respond, offering support or advice, or delivering a home-cooked meal. Or when tragedy strikes, sometimes simply acknowledging, “I bet you feel really sad about that.”
* * *
Pain is an unavoidable part of living. Sometimes bad things happen. Those we love may die. We ourselves may find ourselves victims of illness or accident. Our friends may disappoint us. It is in times of sorrow and suffering, that we humans are most likely to ask “why?” Why is this happening to me?
Few people have written as eloquently and insightfully on the human search for answers to the question “why?” as the Austrian psychiatrist Victor Frankl.
Frankl was born in 1905. As a young man he worked at Vienna General Hospital in suicide prevention, before establishing a private practice, and later heading a neurology department and working as a brain surgeon. Frankl was a brilliant doctor. But his insights into the human psyche were profoundly deepened by his experiences after being deported to a Nazi concentration camp in 1942.
Maintaining a focus on his own scholarship in the midst of increasingly horrendous conditions helped him preserve hope even in bleakest times. Observing the fate of his fellow inmates, he came to identify certain mental attitudes that tended to foster a spirit of resilience and endurance. The most essential of which is a sense of meaning and purpose.
Our human longing for meaning is not merely a frivolous intellectual exercise we are privileged to pursue when our essential needs for food and shelter have been met. Our need for meaning goes much deeper. Without it we can’t survive.
Frankl agreed with Nietzsche, who wrote, a person “who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.” Life is potentially meaningful under any conditions, even the most miserable. We each have the capacity to creatively turn life’s negative aspects into something positive. Even the most destructive events hold a potential for something constructive.
In the concentration camps, every day contained a multitude of hardships and dangers. Frankl believed that each of them could yield some subtle benefit – even if only the satisfaction of having overcome them. In this way we can transform senseless suffering into human achievement and accomplishment.
Frankl was inspired by people like Jerry Long. Jerry Long was paralyzed from the neck down at age seventeen after a car accident left him quadriplegic. Within a few years, Jerry learned to type using a stick in his mouth. He attended classes at a community college by phone. In a letter to Frankl, Long writes,
“I view my life as being abundant with meaning and purpose. The attitude I adopted on that fateful day has become my personal credo for life: I broke my neck, it didn’t break me. I am currently enrolled in my first psychology course in college. I believe my handicap will only enhance my ability to help others. I know that without the suffering, the growth that I have achieved would have been impossible.” (Man’s Search for Meaning, p. 172)
Of course this is not to say that suffering is desirable. Whenever possible, we should determine the source of suffering and remove the cause. But when we can’t remove the cause, when pain is unavoidable, still we have the power to determine our own attitude toward the situation in which we find ourselves.
In this way, the meaning of our lives is not something we discover, it is something we create. We create meaning by engaging in work that serves a greater good. We create meaning in how we engage with others people and world. And we create meaning in the attitude we take toward unavoidable suffering.
In this way, the meaning of our lives is not something we determine once and for all. It is rather a creative dimension of our every deed. It is continually shaped and re-shaped. The meaning of life is different for every person, and changes from day to day, and from hour to hour. Meaning cannot be found in general and abstract terms. It is always specific and concrete.
As Frankl puts it,
“To put the question in general terms would be comparable to the question posed to a chess champion: “Tell me, Master, what is the best move in the world?” There is simply no such thing as the best or even a good move apart from a particular situation in a game and the particular personality of one’s opponent. The same holds true for human existence.” (p. 131)
* * *
This is the same point Leo Tolstoy makes in a story that was first published in 1885 called “The Three Questions.” It’s the story of a king, for whom the personal search for meaning boiled down to three questions: When is the right time to do each thing? Who are the most important people to work with? What is the most important thing to do?
The king calls on all his advisors and counselors, his scientists and philosophers, to offer answers to his questions. But all the answers he receives are contradictory and unsatisfying. So the king decides to visit an old hermit who lives in the woods, and who is renowned for his wisdom. The king knows the hermit only welcomes common folk, so he dresses in peasant’s clothes, and leaves his guards behind as he approaches the hermit’s hut.
The old hermit is digging in his garden when the king steps up and poses his questions. The hermit doesn’t respond, immersed as he is in his exhausting work. So the king offers to help. He says, “Give me your spade, let me dig.” The hermit thanks him, and sits down to rest. Though the king asks his questions again, the hermit won’t answer while there is still more work in the garden to be done. So the king keeps on shoveling, hour after hour.
Just as the sun is starting to set, a stranger comes running out of the woods, with his hands pressed to his stomach. When he collapses in the garden, the king and hermit see that he has a deep gash in his stomach, and is bleeding profusely. The king does his best to stop the bleeding and bandage the wound. Then he carries the stranger into the hut, and lays him on the bed to sleep. Exhausted from the day’s labors the king himself falls asleep on the ground.
The next morning when he wakes up, he is surprised to see the wounded man sitting up in bed looking at him. Grateful for the king’s help and compassion, the stranger confesses that the reason he was there was that he had intended to kill the king, because the king had executed the stranger’s brother and taken his property. But the king’s guards saw him and wounded him on his way to the hermit’s hut.
Now that the king had saved his life, the stranger pledges his allegiance to him, and asks to be his servant. The king, in turn, restores the stranger’s property, and counts himself fortunate to have turned an enemy into a friend. After the stranger leaves, the king again turns to the hermit with his questions: When is the right time to do each thing? Who are the most important people to work with? What is the most important thing to do?
The hermit replies that his questions are already answered. The king is puzzled, so the hermit explains: When the king approached the hermit a day earlier the most important time was when he helped dig in the garden. If the king had simply turned around and left, he may well have been killed by the would-be assassin. So, the most important person was the hermit, and the most important thing to do was help him. Then, when the stranger came running out of the woods, at that time, the most important person was the stranger, and the most important thing to do was to help him by tending his wounds, and making a friend.
So the answers to the three questions are: Now. Now is the most important time, the only time we can act. And the person you are with, whoever that may be, that is the most important person. And the most important thing to do, is to help and to heal – to do good in whatever way you can.
* * *
The meaning of life is created moment by moment. And yet the moments of our lives do not exist in isolation. As one experience follows another, ever greater dimensions of meaning are created.
Frankl imagined our life is like a story told in a movie. The movie is made up of “thousands of individual pictures, and each of them makes sense and carries meaning, yet the meaning of the whole film cannot be seen before its last sequence is shown. However, we cannot understand the whole film without having first understood each of its components, each of the individual pictures. Isn’t it the same with life?” Frankl asks. “Doesn’t the final meaning of life, too, reveal itself, if at all, only at its end, on the verge of death?” (p. 168)
* * *
Our lives are filled with joys and concerns. Blessings beyond our knowledge and sorrows beyond our understanding. When bad things happen, we may be deeply shaken. We want to believe in a world that is just and orderly, and so we desperately search for a good reason tragedy has struck. Someone or something must be responsible. Are we being punished for wrongs we have done? Who can we blame? Should we blame ourselves or others? Or should we blame God?
We will never find satisfactory answers, as long as we dwell on the past, which we cannot change. The meaning we seek can only be found in the future, in our own actions, in our own attitude. We create it.
The world does not single us out, to bless or curse us. It’s the other way around. We have the choice to either bless or curse the world.
Life is a gift: the mind’s power, the strength of our hands, the reaches of our heart.
May we use our gifts to bless the world.
Amen.
