Winter Holidays

The Winter Holidays are almost upon us. It is a time of darkness and light, joy and sorrow. It is a time for families to gather together and enjoy each other's company; but it is also a time when loneliness can pierce the heart, and the losses we have suffered can return in gaping emptiness. Family struggles can be magnified, tensions can increase, all in contrast to the images of cheer around us.

Let us remember to be kind to each other. Remember to call the friend who has lost a spouse or partner, a parent or child or other loved one. Make room for the bereaved to talk about those who are no longer with them. Think about inviting the person who lives alone to join in your festivities. Think about visiting a nursing home, or helping in the soup kitchen. Remember to say thank you. Remember to be patient with your family. Remember to forgive.

In this time of long nights and short days, as the cold and snow approach us, let us remember again the values we hold most close to our hearts—love, kindness, patience, gratitude, compassion. I was inspired by a short affirmation written by Thich Nhat Hahn:

I vow to offer joy to one person in the morning

and to help relieve the grief of one person in the afternoon.

I vow to live simply and sanely, 

content with just a few possessions,

and to keep my body healthy.

I vow to let go of all worries and anxiety 

in order to be light and free.

Perhaps we can take the advice of this wise Buddhist teacher, to help us live this December in warmth and peace. May your holidays be blessed!

Rev. Myke

Autumn Equinox

I am writing this on the last day of summer, on the verge of the autumn equinox. Today was a hot day, but the nights have been crisp and getting colder and colder. The lengths of the daylight and darkness are in balance today, and the moon is full tonight, but so far, hiding behind the clouds. When the church program year starts up, things get busy very quickly, and it can be easy for me to forget to go outside.

Going outside is a kind of spiritual discipline for me. I mentioned in a sermon on September 12th that the earth is like our UU Bible, the universe is our sacred text. At least, that is true for me. Now, technically, everything single thing around us is a part of the earth—and so are we. The separation we make between “nature” and “artificial stuff” is artificial itself. So, even inside our houses and surrounded by human-made technologies, we might recognize that all of this is also the earth. But, it seems easier to remember the wonder and beauty of this world when we are surrounded by living and growing things.

Among our human-made technologies we can harbor the illusion that we are in control. When we go outside, we see that life has its own energy and direction, and its constant transformations. One day, a flower is there where none was before. Another day I see the first flash of red leaves on a tree. Every so often, a small animal makes its way through the fields or woods, at the edge of my line of sight. This is my favorite time to be outside in our neighborhood. The flies of summer—which certainly offer their own sermons on how humans are not in control—finally stop their pestering; there is an ease of movement in the cooler weather. The colors are full of angled light.

I was looking up at the stars the other night, and wondering—isn't it amazing that we can see the stars? Just a small shift in the chemical makeup of the atmosphere and we might never have been able to perceive them at all. Yet they have been a source of myth and story, question and exploration for eons. These astronomical bodies are so far away we had to invent a new word for the distances—light years. Yet we can see them with our tiny human eyes. So there I was being amazed about it all, and I wondered, why can we see the stars? And the little thought came to me, we can see the stars so that we'll know we are not alone.

Maybe a different thought will come into your heart, when you are looking at the stars. But I hope you will find wonder and beauty this season. Remember to go outside.

Rev. Myke

P.S. And remember to bring your starry dreams to our 2020 Visioning Day, October 23rd.

20/21 Vision

Did you know that our church will celebrate its 200th anniversary in the year 2021? That is only ten and a half years away from now! Imagine that you are writing up the big news story announcing the anniversary: What would you like to be able to include? In your wildest dreams for our church, what might be a key accomplishment of A2U2 by 2021?

This fall, our church will engage in a process of reflecting on our mission and our ministry. Ministry is everything that we do to live our mission. Every member of A2U2 participates in the ministry of our congregation--that is, we all contribute to whether and how our mission comes alive. Our mission is stated in this way:

We are growing a community 

that transforms lives through the power of love.

We celebrate diversity, encourage spiritual growth, 

and promote social responsibility,

as we walk with care on this earth.

We empower our members to share their gifts

to build a world of compassion, equality, and freedom.

This fall we will be taking stock of how we are doing on our mission, and envisioning what we hope for the future of our church. What might we imagine for the next 5, 10, even 25 years? We can only see clearly when everyone shares their perspectives, their hopes, their fears, their dreams. There will be many ways to participate, from personal journaling and questions to think about in private, to small group discussions, to a large group event on Saturday October 23rd. Stay tuned for more information!

As part of this process of reflection, on six Sundays in September and October, I will devote our worship themes to the different elements of our mission. The titles and descriptions of all these Sundays will be posted on our webpage, so you can see them as a whole.  

Here is the link:  A2U2 worship-topics

I invite you to bring this process into whatever parts of church life have most meaning for you. Perhaps the Spiritual Enrichment groups would like to create discussion sessions on our mission statement? Perhaps RE leaders might have conversations in your teams about how this mission comes alive with our children? Perhaps committees can reflect on how their particular mission fits into this larger mission of the congregation? Our planning team would be happy to help make that happen. And everyone can submit their best ideas for the future--for the 2021 anniversary news story!

Thanks for being the vibrant, loving, wonderful people that you are! I hope your summers have been refreshing, and I look forward to seeing you all again in September. 

Remember to bring water from your travels to our ingathering service on September 12th.

Love, 

Rev. Myke

A wing and a prayer

I think of the wing of a bird

the wing I found

--by the side of the road--

of a bird now dead

the wing so intricate and beautiful

          now in decay

I imagine this--the millions of birds

           beautiful

coming into being, fading away

the artist painting a billion paintings

the stories wondrous, tragic

the story of that bird—alive

       growing feathers, flying, eating

alive and then dead,

       and then the materials un-forming

so brief a story

so brief a life

I imagine The Life

creating itself into a billion forms

and then re-creating another billion forms

with almost infinite variation

         a kaleidoscope

of beauty and diversity

   and different ways of being conscious of the work

   and different ways of participating in creating

       making choices

Can you feel the inner creative energy in each one?

So now I am creating and seeing as Myke

    and how beautiful I am

eyes looking out at this world

heart capable of love

making changes, healing, choosing

and I will dissolve and disintegrate too

and I will reform into a new being

the larger I Am 

--it sounds so static, in a way--

yet it is not static

   it is creating

     evolving

       engaging,

         weaving

             curious

    dare I say hopeful?

(Is there a goal to which it strives?)

(Or is it playing to see what happens next?)

(Am I?)

The stories

billions of stories

Can the stories appreciate the magic

be full of wonder and gratitude

enjoy the show?

I am that

I am the bird who grew feathers and died

and was seen by the Myke

and was photographed by the Margy

I want to wake up.

Holy One,

open my body and emotions and intellect

to be united in awareness with my Larger Self

with the Creator

with the Limitless One

Help me to remember who I Am

as the I

as the Myke

Each being is beautiful

We are all one Being

Each story is beautiful

We are all one Story

Summertime

Once again the seasons are changing and summer is here.  I know that many of you find your truest spiritual connection out in nature, and summer is especially rich with vibrancy.  So some of you will be off communing in the woods or on the water during the next several weeks.  Meanwhile, others will continue to gather each Sunday, and I say thank you to all who will be leading worship, sharing your thoughts, spiritual practices, and insights for the benefit of all.

I will be at the UU General Assembly June 22 - 28, and then doing some clean up in my office, before heading out to commune with nature myself.  I will be away from church in July and August, for vacation and study leave.  Margy and I plan to do some camping here in Maine, and also visit my parents in West Virginia.  I will return August 25th to begin full-time preparation for the autumn season.  

Our double services and religious education will start up again on September 12th with our Water Communion Sunday.  I am thinking a lot about water these days, carrying the sadness of the oil spill in the Gulf.  Oil has been called the blood of the mother earth, and this spill does seem like a grievous wound in our ecosystem.  The Sioux elder Chief Arvol Looking Horse has called for the peoples of the world to join them in prayer that this wound be healed. [Prayer-request letter]  May it be so.  When you visit places of water during the summer, remember that all water is life, all water is sacred.  Gather some in a bottle to bring back for our water communion.

June is a time of transitions.  I say a warm thank you to Barbara Freeman, who has been on the Board since before I arrived five years ago, and has been such a wonderful president.  I work more closely with the president of our congregation than with any other person, and it has been a joy to have Barbara as my colleague and buddy these past two years.  She agreed to join the Committee on Ministry next year, so I am glad I will still have the benefit of her wisdom.  I am looking forward to welcoming Connie Cross as our new President--she brings a wealth of experience from other settings, and a long commitment to A2U2.  Here’s to the next adventure!

What we do today is always built upon the work that others did in the past.  Earlier this spring we held a lunch for former presidents of A2U2.  It was fascinating to hear about the issues that the church was tackling during their tenure, and how many of our strengths today came out of the struggles of earlier years.  We are carrying our link in a long chain of dedicated people.  

This June, the Board recognized another part of that chain, by honoring six of our elder members with the status of “Emeritus Member.”  This is an honorary, lifelong membership given to active members who are no longer able to regularly attend church or participate in most activities.  They are entitled to the full benefits of the ministry of the church, while being relieved of the ordinary responsibilities of membership.  We are grateful for their many contributions of time, talent, and treasure during the tenure of their active membership.  We wouldn’t be where we are without their gifts.  In fact, one of our Emeritus Members was a leader in the fundraising and construction for our actual church building here on Allen Avenue.  

Our new Emeritus Members are:  Ruth Bishop, Beth Kraushaar, Meredith Monte, Ralph Smith, Don Spring, and Ginny Stevens.   Thank you.  We count you among the people we always hold in our hearts.

Joy and peace to all,

Rev. Myke

Standing on the Side of Love

Standing on the Side of Love is a public advocacy campaign sponsored by the UUA that seeks to harness love’s power to stop oppression.  It was launched at General Assembly in 2009, and has been a vehicle for UUs and others to participate in public debates over LGBT rights, immigration, and any situation where people are dehumanized through acts of exclusion, oppression or violence because of their identities.

I am appalled by the increased prevalence of speech and acts that are full of fear and hate.  The “Tea Party” rhetoric is one striking example, in which people are scapegoating the powerless and demonizing anyone who is different in some way.   The Standing on the Side of Love campaign seeks to lift up compassionate religious voices to influence public attitudes and public policy.  Because I was on sabbatical when it got started, I haven’t yet been able to bring this excellent campaign to our congregation’s full attention, but I am hoping that in the coming year we might explore it more fully, and see if it might enhance our own mission of social responsibility and involvement in community issues.

High on the list right now is the recent law passed in Arizona which criminalizes people who are in the country without documentation, and also casts a pall of fear and intimidation over anyone who by virtue of skin color and language is perceived as a potential “illegal.”  For example, what happens if a brown-skin person is pulled over for a traffic violation?  Will all brown skin people now be required to have a passport on hand at all times, to be able to prove that they are not an undocumented immigrant?  There is another part of the law which also criminalizes anyone giving aid or assistance to undocumented persons.  SB 1070 might be interpreted to make it illegal to feed the hungry at a soup kitchen, or give a homeless person a ride to the hospital, or welcome someone into a congregation.  There is a national protest in Phoenix, Arizona on Saturday, May 29, in which many of my UU colleagues are participating.

But this issue is not just one for Arizona.  This week I attended a vigil for a young man who is being detained right here in Portland.  Selvin Arevalo came to the United States from Guatemala ten years ago, when he was 14 years old.  Just before he was set to earn his high school diploma, he was detained after getting into a minor car accident, when he fled due to panic over his immigration status.  He has been a hard-working student, and is only one of many young people who are caught in similarly difficult situations.

To help us begin to more fully understand the human face of this political issue, I have invited my friend Rev. Virginia Marie Rincon to join us in worship on June 6th.  Rev. Virginia Marie has been ministering to the Latino community in Portland for many years, and I hope she will share stories from her work that will open up a window for us.  In the meantime, if you are curious about the Standing on the Side of Love campaign, you can get find out more online, and get involved directly, at www.standingonthesideoflove.org.

Rev. Myke

Allies

I am thinking today about the line in our church mission statement--we celebrate diversity.  We are lucky to be located in Maine’s most culturally and racially diverse city.  To me, we celebrate diversity by being good allies to our city’s multi-cultural residents, and by working to create a city in which all people and cultures are celebrated and can feel safe and at home here. 

What does it mean to be an ally?  When I think about good allies, I think of Rachel Talbot-Ross, our city’s Equal Opportunity and Multicultural Affairs Director.  I have only been in Portland less than five years, but I have seen Rachel everywhere--when African immigrants are feeling hassled by the police, she shows up to set up a dialogue.  She does what she can to support grassroots organizations created by diverse residents, like Tengo Voz, which empowers Latina women.  On a personal note, she has been there for me too, by standing up to support equal marriage for same sex couples.  Anyone I meet who cares about justice and equality will say how tirelessly Rachel works for everyone who might be marginalized or in the minority.

I am thinking about this today because the budget proposed by City Manager Joe Gray would cut the position Rachel holds from full-time to part-time.  I haven’t seen much about it in the news, but I believe this work is much more important to our city than fireworks on the fourth of July.  I know that times are really tough for cities trying to function with less revenue.  But in difficult times, it is even more critical to be paying attention to multi-cultural issues.  We’ve seen scapegoating and hate rise in other parts of our nation--people who are hurting are quick to blame those they see as further down the ladder than they are.  We want to do all we can to keep that from happening here.

I also believe that all politics is personal.  I value the friendship that I have been growing with Rachel, in our common commitment to justice.  To be an ally is to stand with someone who has been there standing with you.  For all of these reasons, I wrote a letter to the city finance committee expressing my dismay at the proposed plan, and attended their first budget meeting.  If this position is cut to part-time, we have to ask ourselves how feasible it would be that as strong and dedicated person as Rachel Talbot Ross would be able to continue in the position.  And it would be a horrible loss if she had to leave.  

If this issue stirs your soul, there is still a little time to add your voice.  (You can phone or send an email to our City Council.   http://www.portlandmaine.gov/citycou.htm)  Our city will only be as diverse and welcoming as we engage in making it that way.  Blessed be.

Rev. Myke  

The "God" Word

Unitarian Universalists struggle with the idea of God, and some of our members tell me they reject all concepts of divinity.  Other members have come from traditions that felt oppressive to them, that demanded belief without room for doubt or questioning.  Others are hungry for spirituality, but unsure what to do with the concept of God.  I hope to explore the question of God is a series of sermons, beginning March 28th, and continuing during the following two Sundays.   

I was wondering to myself, “Why do I want to preach on the topic of God.  Where does it come from in my own heart?”  I think it is partly because of the anger I feel at fundamentalism.  Fundamentalism in any variety puts “God” into a box--fundamentalists will tell us exactly what “God” is, and then use “God” like a weapon to condemn anyone who doesn’t fit their idea of the good and right, including me and you.  Some use “God” to go to war or to commit acts of terrorism against innocent people.  In my view, anytime we think we have a solid idea of “God,” then we’d better smash that idea, because if “God” can be put into a box, that is idolatry, not divinity.

But I also get angry at some of the recent public atheists, like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, and Sam Harris, who’ve written books debunking “God.”  The problem, expressed eloquently by Karen Armstrong, is that their critique of God “has focused exclusively on the God developed by the fundamentalisms, and all three insist that fundamentalism constitutes the essence and core of all religion.”  But I don’t believe in that kind of “God” or in that kind of “religion” either.  I feel their criticism puts exactly the wrong kind of religion in the limelight, and obscures everything that might be illuminating to people who are wondering about spirituality, and other questions of meaning and mystery.

Some would suggest that spiritual searchers should abandon the word “God,” because it has been too corrupted by all that has been done under its auspices.  But that makes me angry too--that people have stolen the word, perverted it really, and in so doing, have built barriers around the possibilities of curiosity and enlightenment.  

Now that I’ve put the topic into my worship calendar, I can see that there is too much to explore for even three Sundays, but I hope to at least start a conversation that can move beyond the fundamentalists.  I remember in one of the theology classes that I taught, we did a continuum about whether people believed in God.  They stood in a line with No on one end, Yes on the other end, and lots of room in the middle.  It was telling that when I asked why people were positioned where they were, a person on the NO end, and a person on the YES end expressed almost identical beliefs.  It is when we get past the question, “Do you believe in God?” that the conversation gets most interesting.

I hope you’ll join me in the conversation.

March 28 Gods I Don’t Believe In

What’s in a word?  Unitarian Universalists struggle with the idea of God, and some of our members reject the concept of divinity.  I hope to explore these questions in a series of sermons, beginning today with an account of the “Gods” that I don’t believe in.  During the next two week, I will take a look at some alternative understandings of divinity that UUs have found more worthy of their faith.

April 4 Go Lifted Up

During this celebration of Passover and Easter, I will explore liberating stories from the Jewish and Christian tradition, stories about God that inspired people in trouble to believe in their own dignity and hope for justice.  

April 11 Threads of Connection

What if a god were not a god?  What if a god were a force, an energy, like gravity or electro-magnetism?  What if god was the energy linking all that exists? What if we were all part of this force? The mystics say we can feel it--the experience of the unity of everything.

Mercy

Those of us who passionately care about making the world a better place; those of us who are change agents; people like ministers and activists--have a struggle in our hearts.  I know it very well myself, in any case.  You will have to decide if this struggle affects you or not.

I want to talk about one of my inner demons--you know, those persistent patterns of behavior that lurk under the surface of our character.  During my sabbatical I got acquainted with many of my inner demons, and found it helpful to give them names, when I was able to recognize them in action.  

So the one I am thinking about today is the Critical One.  What I love about the Critical One is her ability to hone in on what is broken and even come up with some good ideas about how to address the problem.  What I hate about the Critical One is how she always hones in on what is broken, and gets overwhelmed by how much work there is to solve our problems.  What was that beautiful quote?  “Life is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be lived.”  The Critical One has a hard time with that.  When she takes over, I forget about the mystery.  I can do it to myself, I can do it to my family, I can do it to our church, I can do it to our country, I can do it to Life in general.  It probably is part of why I can name so many of my inner demons, and sometimes forget to name my inner beauties.

The first step in dealing with an inner demon is to see it and accept it.  Which of course is just the opposite of what the Critical One would do.  She would fix herself.  I also have to remember that she’s hiding feelings--all demons hide something.  Under my Critical One I find anger.  (How many of us learned to deal well with our anger?)  I also find the vast gap between what we can imagine and dream about, and the pain in us and around us in reality.  

Think about our world.  Has there ever been a time when there was no war, no violence, no struggle, no oppression?  We sometimes like to imagine that there was an Eden of perfect peace and joy.  In fact, it is an amazing capacity that human beings can dream of perfection, can imagine justice and harmony.  (Maybe the Dreamer and the Critical One are siblings.)  But in reality, I don’t think the world has ever been perfect. And that is what shook loose my vision.  The Creator--or if you don’t relate to the idea of a creator--think of it as nature, or the sun shining on the earth, or the Life force--the Creator has embraced us the whole way through.  Life unfolds age after age.  The sun shines on the good and the bad, the environmentalists and the polluters.  Suddenly I realized that this is the experience of mercy--to be embraced as we are.  

I am trying to get to that place which embraces the beauty in what exists right now, not as I dream it could be.  Can I embrace my self, as I am, all my demons included, right now?  Can I notice the beauty in my family, each day?  Can I embrace my church community, all our struggles included, right now?  Can I embrace my country, with its deceit and greed, can I see its hope and courage?  Can I embrace this life, always filled with both beauty and pain?  I do have that power in me, as well as the Critical One.  Maybe I can call her the “Embracer of All That Is.”  Invite her to go to tea with the Critical One, and work out the balance between the two of them. 

       Mercy leads to joy.

Sound of Sweet Silence

Almost immediately after I set up the new blog, I found myself at a loss for words... Or maybe that is not quite accurate... I found myself bewildered by the form, and struggling to sort out which voice this might be, and how it might fit into the many forms of communication I practice in my life.  I have journaled for years and years, and have 4 or 5 boxes of journals in my closet--but that private writing of my soul doesn't quite fit in with this public forum, especially as a person with an already public life as a minister.  And as a minister, I have other forums for expression, most notably preaching, that marvelous challenge and gift to which I devote two days of my life each week, plus Sunday mornings.  Preaching is a distillation of my thoughts and feelings and spirit stirrings in the cauldron of communal life, the relationship with my church community.  And preaching also becomes a public voice, for the sermons appear on our church website in written and podcasting form.   

Then there are the many other forms of communication in the work of ministry.  I have said that most of ministry is about talking and listening, in one form or another.  Meetings with groups, chats over dinner, phone calls, hospital visits, listening to the intimate revelations of the heart.  Not to mention the public voice, the letters to the editor, the presence in the work of particular struggles for justice.  And each of these spinning threads of connection between myself and other people.   So it was easy at first to imagine the blog as another forum, another avenue of expression and connection. 

But then, peering at the blank square of the blog "new post", amidst these many words of ministry, I found myself experiencing a craving for silence.  During my sabbatical I had been visiting a deep silence, a silence that opened up the interior life, a silence that made room for an inner dialogue.  I had the incredible gift of time to wander into the depths of my soul and discover how vast is that terrain--and of course to realize that this inner world is expansive in each of us.  Now, every day I notice my yearning for that silence, and each morning I try to make time to enter it as deeply as I can--but often I am just opening the front door, and pausing in the vestibule.  And yet it is ever present, and illuminates the work of ministry with wings of mystery.  

Is there a bridge that can span the inner silence of one soul to the inner silence of another?  Can I bring my inner worlds into a larger web of communication, and if I could, what would be the purpose?  Is there something about the blog, in the vast hidden expanse of cyber space, that invites this silence to express itself?
And if silence can speak, might it have the capacity to open my ears, or your ears, to hear the sound of one hand clapping?