The UU Umbrella
UU Fellowship of Midland, MI
March 18, 2007
Jane Thickstun

Reading

The reading today is by William Schultz, past president of the UUA and Director of Amnesty International.  The passage is taken from his chapter on “Our Faith,” the first chapter of the Unitarian Universalist Pocket Guide.

            Our history is important to us.  Both our Unitarian and our Universalist traditions rejected the notion that “higher” authorities– be they theologians or bishops, rabbis or preachers– could impose their views upon the laity.  This is the historical source of our commitment to freedom of belief, congregational polity, and lay empowerment.  But our traditions also supply us with a rich legacy of positive affirmations, from Universalism’s faith in the benevolence of God to Unitarianism’s assurance that human beings have within them the capacity to shape the future.

            The result is that today our tradition provides us with a lodestar and a sort of “early warning system” for the recognition of tenets at odds with the norms of our faith.  The tradition is not definitive– it will inevitably be modified and even superseded by new “revelation”– but if you hear someone preaching hellfire and damnation or that the future is solely in the hands of God, chances are it’s not a Unitarian Universalist!

            Individual freedom of belief exists, then, in dynamic tension with the insights of our history and the wisdom of our communities.  It is this tension which puts the lie to the oft-heard shibboleth that Unitarian Universalists can believe anything they like.  It is true that we set up no formal religious test for legal membership, that we welcome the devout atheist as readily as the ardent Christian, but it is not true that one can subscribe to views at variance with our most basic values.  Clearly, one could never advocate racism or genocide, for example, and still in any meaningful sense call oneself a Unitarian Universalist.

(p. 3-4)

Sermon

            Last fall, I was interviewed by a student from Delta College, who was doing a project on religious tolerance.  She seemed to know a little bit about Unitarian Universalism; at least she knew that we are very tolerant of most religious views.  She asked me what religions people came to us from, and I explained that we have people who have come to us from Catholic and various Protestant backgrounds, as well as from Jewish backgrounds, and many who had no prior experience of a church community.  She then followed up with something that made me realize that she thought Unitarian Universalism was just a place where people of different religions got together, and not a religion itself.  So I explained that, while it’s true that we don’t have a creed and we’re not defined by what we believe or by what we practice, we do have a proud heritage and a unique religious outlook that welcomes all and is attractive to those who seek their own way.

            There is a lot of confusion about what Unitarian Universalism is.  It’s often confused with the Unity church, a liberal, new age Protestant group, or even with the Unification church, better known as the Moonies, who used to evangelize in airports.

            I’ve heard it called a cult, and I’ve even heard a Unitarian Universalist say they thought that it was kind of cool when people thought that.  But we’re not a cult, and it’s really not something we ought to aspire to.

            Athough it can be used as a more generic term in the anthropological classifications of religious groups, the word “cult” usually has quite a negative connotation.  It is generally used to mean a religious group that’s outside the norm in it belief and practice, with its followers often living in an unconventional manner under the guidance of an authoritarian, charismatic leader. Cults attract followers who are in some way disenfranchised from the mainstream of society, and they demand an unusual level of loyalty, often thought to be achieved through some form of brainwashing.  Cults' insularity and distrust of society sometimes lead to violent conflicts with the law.

            Do you remember Rev. Moon's Unification Church and Hare Krishna?  Or the 1978 incident in Jonestown, Guyana, when Jim Jones and more than 900 of his followers committed mass suicide?  Then in 1993 a gunfight near Waco, Tex., between federal officers and David Koresh and his Branch Davidian followers led to a 51-day siege that ended in a fire, leaving Koresh and 82 people dead.

            Unitarian Universalism has no charismatic leader, and doesn’t ask its members to do anything dangerous or unethical.  We don’t brainwash people; indeed we insist that they think for themselves.   Though our lack of a creed is unusual, our people fit in with conventional society and our demands on our members are probably less than with any other religious group.  We aren’t even as good as most religions in asking for your money.  We have a long, respectable history involving some of the most prominent figures of public like in this country.  Unitarian Universalism is not a cult.

            I have also heard our Fellowship called a social club, and in many ways, unfortunately, that is very apt.  A social club exists to serve itself and its members, in particular to allow them to enjoy themselves with others like them.  A religion, on the other hand, exists to serve something higher than the social needs of its members, though it may meet those as well.  The distinctive feature of a religious group is its focus outside itself; its desire to serve others and the world through its devotion to selfless principles.  We would do well to be more focused on serving others beyond ourselves, at least if we wish to keep our tax-exempt status as a religious institution.

            We are also not a philosophical debating club.  Though we spend a lot of time talking about beliefs, thoughts, and ideas, and many of us enjoy stretching our minds, that is not the purpose of our existence.  A religion doesn’t exist to serve its members’ intellectual needs any more than their social needs, though it may meet them.  We enjoy breaking bread together and, say, discussing the merits of a democratic system of government, and these activities help us in many ways to be better able to serve a higher cause than our own enjoyment.  But utimately it is our devotion to serving that higher cause that gives our existence as Unitarian Universalists its true significance.

            A common misunderstanding is that Unitarian Universalism is an interfaith institution –

a place where people of diverse religions can come together.  Like the young woman who interviewed me, I find many share this misconception, even some within our midst.  Yes, we have a diversity of theological beliefs expressed here, and yes, people come to us from many backgrounds, religious or otherwise, but Unitarian Universalism is a religion in its own right.  While many of us felt when we found it like it was a perfect fit, it wasn’t created when we walked in, nor was it even created with this Fellowship.  Unitarian Universalism is much bigger than our local expression.  It was not created to meet our needs or to fit with what we think it should be.  I think a lot of us have frustrations with our denomination sometimes because we see that others think of it differently, or we see it going in a direction we don’t like.  

            While we study world religions for the wisdom we can glean from them, not all religions are equally important to us.  We come from a liberal Christian tradition, and our heritage is an important part of our identity still today.  Just like you wouldn’t be who you are today if you hadn’t had the upbringing you had, this is part of what Unitarian Universalism is.  That’s why the children spend a year of every three focusing on our Judaeo-Christian heritage.  The holy writings of these traditions found in the Bible are our scriptures, even though we don’t use them much, and even though we find inspiration in much of the world’s literature.  Embracing this tradition is embracing our own past, whereas we study world religions in order to learn about our neighbors.  Unitarian Universalism is not an interfaith organization, but a religion, with certain limits in how we worship and how we believe. 

            We are so proud of our acceptance of all beliefs, based in our affirmation of the authority of individual conscience, that we often lose sight of the basic beliefs inherent in Unitarian Universalism.  As UU’s, we believe in the inherent worth and dignity of every person– a belief in the potential of every individual, which leads to a belief in the authority of the individual conscience in religious matters.  We have no creedal test for membership, and feel that anyone who wishes to join us in the search for truth and meaning should be welcome.

            But how inclusive are we?  Does everything imaginable fit under our wide umbrella?  It is, after all, still an umbrella, not the whole sky.  We can’t be everything to everybody.  We do have an identity, no matter how elusive it seems when you try to pin it down.  As Schultz says in the reading we heard, there’s a dynamic tension between our individual freedom of belief and the insights of our history combined with the wisdom of our communities. 

            So when might the freedom of belief that we so strongly uphold conflict with the insights and wisdom of our history and our communities?  Are there beliefs and practices that fall outside the scope of our UU umbrella?

            As Schultz points out, views at odds with our most basic values, like advocating racism or genocide are obviously outside the pale.  We would also include the belief that there is one and only one way to believe about religious matters, because that goes against our basic belief in the authority of individual conscience.  We believe there are certain things we can know and certain things we can’t know, and about the latter we can only form best-guess beliefs based on our experience.  We are a community of seekers, seeking together; our Credos are always works in progress; we don’t claim to know anything for sure beyond what science can tell us.  We form beliefs about those things we can’t know, like the structure of ultimate reality, or what happens to us after we die, but these are just working hypotheses – we can’t claim any certainty about them.

            What else might fall outside the scope of our UU umbrella?  It’s hard to say.  As our faith gets further and further from our beginnings, it opens up more and more. 

            This is not a cradle-to-grave religion, where people are born into the faith and families stay with the faith for generations upon generations, except for a small percentage.  This is partly because we appeal to a highly mobile section of society, but also because our low-expectation religion doesn’t command the loyalty that some faiths do.

            We are a religion of people who come into it as adults, because they want a religion that honors their minds and their experience.

            People come in, and then they find that it’s not exactly a perfect fit for them, or they come in and find their views changing.  Because of our creedlessness, the denomination has opened up further and further over the years, starting with the liberal Christianity of our founders to the Transcendentalism of Emerson and his influential gang, to the humanists of the early 20^th century, until by mid-century even people from Jewish backgrounds have felt comfortable coming in.  Everyone who comes into the denomination changes it a little, but everyone also has to come to terms with the denomination as it is, and as it changes.

            So how inclusive are we?  We don’t seek to exclude anyone.  We are proud of having no creedal test for membership – no words that people must agree to believing in order to become members.  We don’t exclude anyone intentionally, though it would probably do us a lot of good to examine the ways we might be excluding people unintentionally.  But ultimately, the question of who fits under our UU umbrella is a matter of choice – we let everybody in, and ideally are equally welcoming to all who come in our door, and it is up to them to decide whether they feel comfortable with us or not.  There is no other way to determine whether someone’s belief system can fit within Unitarian Universalism or not.

            Not everyone will feel comfortable with us.  People visit and never come back, some people stay for a while and then leave, some come and stay but never become members.  Sometimes we can be as welcoming and wonderful as possible, but it’s just not a good fit.  But other times we can act in ways that exclude;  say things that deride other people’s belief systems.

            And so it is up to us to look to ourselves and examine just how open and accepting we are.  As Rev. Bruce Southworth says in the prayer I shared earlier, “We gather to share in a search for what gives our lives meaning, We are challenged to encourage the spiritual growth of each other, no matter how different our paths may look.  We are challenged to accept others in our congregation, and in the world around us, no matter how different they are from us.”

            You may remember a poem that for a long time was on the cover of the order of service every week here.  The poem is by Edwin Markum and has long been popular among UU’s.

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.

            May we accept the challenge to accept others, no matter how different they are.  May we accept the challenge to encourage the spiritual growth of each other, no matter how different our paths.  May we share the good news of our Unitarian Universalist faith with others, and let them decide if they might be enriched by being in community with us.

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Midland is recognized by the Unitarian Universalist Association as a Welcoming Congregation. We welcome, affirm, promote and celebrate the full participation of all persons in all of our activities without regard to age, gender, sexual orientation, race or any other such category of exclusion.

Please feel free to contact us with any feedback, corrections or questions at jaham@delta.edu