This service was conducted by Rev. Dan Harper at First Unitarian Church in New Bedford.
Readings
Before the first reading this morning, I should a word or two about what a “Question and Response Sermon” is.
In our religious tradition, what holds us together is not a creed, but a covenant, a set of voluntary agreements and promises we make to one another. In other words, our religious tradition emphasizes relationship, not belief.
This state of affairs is confusing to some people — How, they ask, can you have a religion if you don’t believe in anything? One possible response to this question is that we think it’s better to concentrate on the promises that hold us together, rather than abstract beliefs which would more than likely drive us apart. Another possible response to this question is that of course we do believe in things — life and love and the power of truth. And another possible response to this question is that we believe in the power of questions — and when the glue that holds us together is relationships, we are freed to ask difficult and interesting questions; and the responses to those questions often lead us to engage in further questioning together.
The first reading this morning comes from Henry Thoreau’s book Walden, the opening sentences of the chapter titled “The Pond in Winter.”
“After a still winter night I awoke with the impression that some question had been put to me, which I had been endeavoring in vain to answer in my sleep, as what — how — when — where? But there was dawning Nature, in whom all creatures live, looking in at my broad windows with serene and satisfied face, and no question on her lips. I awoke to an answered question, to Nature and daylight. The snow lying deep on the earth dotted with young pines, and the very slope of the hill on which my house is placed, seemed to say, Forward! Nature puts no question and answers none which we mortals ask.”
So writes Henry Thoreau, telling us either that questions may not be as important as we think, or that a sufficient answer to any question may be had by simply looking reality in the face.
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Before I get to the second reading, let me say another word or two about this Question and Response Sermon. My sermons are usually written in response to something someone in this congregation has said to me. But in a question-and-response sermon, the relationship is a little more direct. You ask questions about religion, and I respond to them right here and now. You will note that I said I will respond to your questions, but I won’t pretend to answer them, for when it comes to religion I haven’t yet found a final answer to anything. If I don’t get to respond to all the questions this morning, I promise that I will provide written responses in the summer newsletters. And I’m sure some of the questions will be so meaty and interesting that I will want to address them more fully in sermon sometime in the next twelve months.
The second reading this morning is one of the readings I used for last year’s Question and Response sermon, but it was just so good I can’t resist using it again. This is from one of Mark Twain’s speeches, given at a 1909 banquet honoring one of his friends, Mr. H. H. Rogers. I should tell you that at the time of this speech, a half crown would have been worth about sixty cents. Mark Twain said:
“[Others have said] Mr. Rogers is full of practical wisdom, and he is. It is intimated here that he is a very ingenious man, and he is a very competent financier. Maybe he is now, but it was not always so. I know lots of private things in his life which people don’t know, and I know how he started; and it was not a very good start. I could have done better myself. The first time he crossed the Atlantic he had just made the first little strike in oil, and he was so young he did not like to ask questions. He did not like to appear ignorant…. On board the ship they were betting on the run of the ship, betting a couple of shillings, or half a crown, and they proposed that this youth from the oil regions should bet on the run of the ship. He did not like to ask what a half-crown was, and he didn’t know; but rather than be ashamed of himself he did bet half a crown on the run of the ship, and in bed he could not sleep. He wondered if he could afford that outlay in case he lost. He kept wondering over it, and said to himself: ‘A king’s crown must be worth $20,000, so half a crown would cost $10,000.’ He could not afford to bet away $10,000 on the run of the ship, so he went up to the stakeholder and gave him $150 to let him off.”
Thus Mark Twain proves that we should ask questions….
The Question and Response Sermon was entirely extemporaneous, and so cannot be reproduced here.