Monthly Archives: May 2005

Best-case scenario

I walked to the church this morning in my usual daze (I’m not exactly a morning person, except when I’m out fishing). It is a beautiful, sunny morning, and everything looks bright and new. For some reason, the church looked especially bright and new….

It took me a couple of minutes to realize exactly why the church looks so bright and new. The last of the landscaping got finished over this past weekend while I was away in New Bedford. This is just about the last of the capital campaign project that restored the exterior of this historic church. And Susan Conant’s landscaping looks fantastic.

As an interim minister, I especially like the new sign. It is much easier to read than the old one — and much more attractive. Passers-by get a much better sense of what this church is — which makes it more likely that they will stop in for a worship service.

Good things happened inside the church while I was away, too. The preschool class made huge paper “mosaic,” the Religious Education bulletin board got updated, and there’s a nice picture and biography of next year’s interim associate minister, Rev. Jennifer Innis.

This is what interim ministers hope for — that our congregations do great things while we’re away.

Back in Geneva, Ill.

At a special congregational meeting preceeding the regular annual meeting, First Unitarian Church of New Bedford, Massachusetts, unanimously voted to call me as their next minister.

We got back to Geneva after candidating week a little after 9 p.m. We hadn’t had dinner yet, and thought it might be fun to go out to one of the many restaurants and pubs in downtown Geneva to celebrate. The bars were open, but all the kitchens closed before 9 p.m. (Sometimes we forget that we’re living in the Midwest and not in Oakland, Calif., any more.)

What the heck. We went up to the White Hen at Sixth and State, and bought some snacks instead.

Religious intolerance at the Air Force Academy?

Today’s New York Times carries an unsigned editorial calling on the Air Force Academy to stop Christian proselytizing that appears to be sanctioned by high Academy officials. Supposedly efforts to stop the proselytizing have been going on for more than a year, but with little success. The editorial states:

But it turns out that the academy’s remedial program of religious toleration is running into resistance. The Air Force’s chief chaplain expressed displeasure at the object lessons dramatized in a multidenominational educational videotape. ‘Why is it that the Christians never win?’ the chief, Maj. General Charles Baldwin, demanded to know after watching the give-and-take of instructional encounters. General Baldwin had segments cut out on such non-Christian religions as Buddhism, Judaism, and Native American spirituality.

Hmm… I wonder what General Baldwin thinks about Unitarian Universalism? Maybe we should all think about writing to our congressperson or senator to complain about religious intolerance at the Air Force Academy.

(…and you have to love that quote, “Why is it that the Christians never win?”…)

More than you wanted to know about covenants

New Bedford, Mass.

In preparation for the sermon I’m giving here on Sunday, just before this congregation votes whether to call me or not, I’ve been researching covenant. I think of covenants as the promises as religious group makes to one another, and to the wider world. Thus covenants have practical theological implications. So I’ve been searching the Web for examples of covenants used by Unitarian Universalist congregations in North America. Here are some that I particularly liked:

Covenant of the Unitarian Universalist church in Saco/Biddeford, Maine:

In the freedom of truth and in the spirit of Love, we unite for the worship of God and the service of all.

Commentary: A hold-over from a classic late 19th C. Unitarian covenant. Simple, straightforward, and easy to remember, it includes a few key words: “freedom,” “love,” and “service.” Nice that this covenant recognizes that worship services are at the center of congregational life, though these days some Unitarian Universalists might prefer to find another word besides “God.”

Covenant of Second Unitarian in Chicago, Illinois:

We covenant to build a community that challenges us to grow and empowers us to hold faithful to the truth within ourselves. — We will be generous with our gifts and honest in our communication, holding faithful to a love that embraces both diversity and conflict. — Called by our living tradition, we will nurture spirituality within a vision of the eternal, living out our inner convictions through struggles for justice and acts of compassion.

Commentary: The language is a little trendy and middle class (“empowers,” “communication”), but overall reasonably memorable and suitable for reading out loud. For an article on the process used to develop this covenant, see http://www.uua.org/archive/promise/stories3.html

Covenant of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Geneva, Ill.

Being desirous of promoting practical goodness in the world, and of aiding each other in our moral and religious improvement, we have associated ourselves together — not as agreeing in opinion, not as having attained universal truth in belief or perfection in character — but as seekers after truth and goodness.

Commentary: In spite of the 19th C. language (this was written in 1842), this is simple, direct, and to the point. The phrase “not as agreeing in opinion, not as having attained universal truth in belief or perfection in character” serves as an excellent reminder that we are all fallible as individuals. Would be better if it mentioned love, but aside for that an excellent covenant.

The Web site of the Unitarian Universalist Association has a small collection of historic and contemporary covenants at http://www.uua.org/archive/promise/covenants.html

Public hotspots (Finding wifi part II)

((So here we are in West Concord, Massachusetts — I took a break from candidating week, and Carol and I zipped up here to visit our respective families for a couple of hours — and wouldn’t you know it, suddenly we both needed our internet fix….

((We slipped into an ecological engineering office where Carol still maintains a desk and a phone for her non-profit — and managed to pick up an open wifi hotspot from a public-spirited neighbor….

((Signal strength is real low — but we’re both getting through. Thank goodness for wifi good Samaritans.))

Finding wifi and other adventures

Dartmouth, Mass. Carol and I are in New Bedford, Massachusetts — I’m here for a “candidating week” at First Unitarian of New Bedford, and Carol has a job interview or two. Some notes on our adventures…

Very windy and blustery today. After I got back from church today, Carol and I went for a walk near the harbor in South Dartmouth. I am not the most observant person in the world even at the best of times (I have been known to walk right past people I know and love). And today was so blustery, chilly, and wet that I was even less observant than usual.

But even I couldn’t miss the Red-Throated Loon swimming along the causeway crossing the harbor. We got within fifty feet of it. It was windy enough that I couldn’t hold the binoculars steady, but even then that’s the closest, best look I’ve ever gotten of a loon. The checkerboard pattern on its back was clear as could be. Which is a good reason to take up a pastime like birdwatching — it gets you out of your head and into the real world.

Even though I spotted the loon, Carol had to point three times before I could see the little green crab among the stones at the east edge of the harbor.

Later the same day….

This evening, Carol and I headed out to find a wifi connection. We tried a cafe Carol knew about in Warren, Rhode Island. We couldn’t connect — other people in the cafe could, but our computers wouldn’t, for whatever reason.

In desperation, we drove around ((must have … Internet fix … must … have)), taking random exits off I-195, looking for a likely spot. We even parked outside a Comfort Inn that advertised free highspeed access, to see if we could pick up something. No dice.

At last, we hit the jackpot — off to the right, a Panera Bread place — they have wifi! (Needless to say, Carol was the one who spotted Panera…)

So here we sit, eating dinner, checking email, and updating blogs — for us, this is a hot date.

19th C. flower festivals

When did Unitarian Unviersalist churches start doing flower services? We usually associate our contemporary “flower communions” with Norbert Capek, even though he was quite explicit in not calling them “communion” services. But it turns out that Untiarian churches here in the Midwest were doing flower services long before Capek. Here’s an excerpt from the “Records of the Unitarian Sunday School of Geneva, Ills.” describing what was possibly the very first flower service in our Geneva congregation:

Flower Service was held in the church Sunday morning June 13, 1875. The church was tastefully decorated with flowers, the children gave good recitiations appropriate to the season, Rev. R. L. Herbert delivered a short sermon to the children and the choir sand some good selections of music. As the close of the meeting reports of Treasurer and Librarian were read by the Supt of the S. School, Mr Sherwin….

At this point in our history, the Flower Service looked pretty much like the Children’s Sunday it replaced, even down to the annual reports of Sunday school officers, and the recitations by the children. But by 1879, things were starting to change:

June 8, 1879 being the second Sunday of the month the annual Flower Service was held. The church was decorated in much the usual manner and well filled with spectators. The exercise conducted in a very happy manner by the Rev. R. L. Herbert, consisted of responsive reading, singing and recitation….

There were still recitiations by children, but the whole service seemed to be taking a different form. By 1880, there were still recitations by the children, but there was also a “prayer and chant,” a pageant by the children called “Ladder of Life,” and “Passing of the baskets of flowers by four little girls. While they were being passed Miss Ella Howell assisted by the choir sang ‘Consider the Lilies.'”

And by 1891, we read:

The Flower Service of 1891 was held the last Sunday in June. The Service was from Unity Festivals. The speaking was by the younger children of the school….

Unity Festivals, was a publications of the Western Unitarian Conference. This year, Lindsay, Craig, and I are planning to revive this worship service (with a few updates).

More on Unity Festivals later….

Spring watch

With the warm weather of the past two days, some things have suddenly changed. The long spell of cool weather kept a forsythia in the next block blooming for three weeks; suddenly it is covered with small green leaves and the blossoms are at last falling off. Tulip blooms that had stayed fresh for weeks curled and withered in the past twenty-four hours.

Swallows are everywhere over the river now. Rough-winged Swallows have claimed the space around the State Street bridge. I saw a few Purple Martins over the river downstream of the railroad bridge. Tree Swallows seem to be everywhere.

Tree Swallows strike me as utterly alien beings. You can pretend that some birds and animals have vaguely human characteristics — Cardinals seem cheerful, Racoons seem smart and sly, even frogs can seem to take on a human character. But when I look at the bright round, slightly protruding eyes of Tree Swallows, I can’t imagine any human expression there. Whatever thoughts or feelings they have are wholly their own.

What is theology, anyway?

Harvey Cox’s book on pentecostalism, Fire From Heaven, is his usual mix of scholarship, journalism, and diary. But partway through, he comes up with an interesting definition of theology.

You see, from the point of view of professional theologians, pentecostals don’t have any real theology, because they don’t have any professors of theology writing treatises on pentecostal theology. So many people say that there is no such thing as pentecostal theology. Cox writes:

There are, of course, theologians who take exception to the phrase ‘pentecostal theology’ as a kind of oxymoron. But I disagree. By its ‘theology,’ I mean the symbolic cosmos of the pentecostal movement, which is articulated not through formal treatises but in the songs and prayers, the sermons and testimonies. This is where the most fundamental revolution is going on … [p. 201]

Hmmm… The same thing might be said about Unitarian Universalism. The few professional theologians we have these days hold little interest for me — to be honest, I have no interest in doing systematic theology, nor am I interested in reading dead German theologians who write badly, nor do I want to base theology on psychotherapy.

But there are theologians whom I believe are doing really interesting work. Anthony Pinn, an African American humanist who has sometimes aligned himself with Unitarian Universalism, has done a number of books where he goes out into the African American community and simply describes the theologies he finds. Pinn contends that most other African American theologians claim that African American theology is entirely Christian — but Pinn finds a wide range of theologies out in the African American community (see his book Varieties of African American Religious Experience). I think of this as doing “descriptive theology,” whereas most academic theologians do systematic theology [yawn] or “prescriptive theology,” where they tell us what we should believe.

If we started doing descriptive theology of Unitarian Universalism, it might get pretty interesting. It might be fun looking at UU sermons, UU pamphlets, UU songs, and so on. Yes, this means the current hymnal should be studied as a theological work — as should the songs Susan C. is writing for our children’s choir — as should….

In any case, Harvey Cox has gotten me thinking that maybe there’s a better way to do theology. Maybe theology should consist of a mixture of scholarship, diary, and journalism. Maybe we’d be surprised if we started doing Unitarian Universalist theology that way — maybe we’d find out that we really do have a theology that has little to do with the “seven principles” and more to do with the way we lead our lives.