Easter Sunday – Renewal & Reclamation Rev Pam Rumancik March 31, 2013
In churches all across the country this morning folks are celebrating the Christian holy day of Easter. Triumphal music is being played and Alleluia’s are being sung. “He is Risen” is proclaimed with jubilation and rejoicing. Death has been conquered and believers will have life everlasting – or so the story goes.
It is a good story – one that’s been told for a couple thousand years and one which still has great appeal. Victory over death. Something firm to hold onto in a world which seems to be constantly changing . The promise of a world of justice, of happiness, of freedom from any kind of want – waiting just on the other side of death. That would be something to be excited about. If you just place your faith in the story of the cross, you will be rewarded with the joys of heaven in the afterlife.
But here in our Unitarian Universalist churches we don’t share that triumphalism – at least not in the same way. Easter is a day to celebrate rebirth, renewal, the cycles of life beginning again with the freshness of life new born. It is joyful, it is grateful, it is even a little sticky sweet – notice we do have eggs hiding all around the sanctuary – but triumphant seems a little over the top.
It’s odd because for me, and I suspect for some others, it almost feels like there’s something missing.
I know a couple of lifelong UU’s who have taken one or more forays into mainline Christian churches for at least a while for that very reason – seeking that mysterious missing element. They had a sense that Christians had something solid to hold onto – while Unitarian Universalism is a faith of ambiguity and relationality.
It’s true - Unitarian Universalists live within a world that is complex with many shades of not only grey, but blue, magenta, chartreuse & gold. We generally agree that there are few to no “one size fits all” answers – that life is not black and white, no matter how convenient that would be.
We celebrate the diversity of human experience and accept that a multiplicity of perspectives enriches our experience and makes our own lives deeper and richer. Life is a multi textured and multi dimensional experience; one that we embrace when we are grounded and feel solid in our lives.
But all that complexity can also leave you feeling a little lost.
It’s like sailing out in a wide ocean, beautiful sun sparkling off the rising waves, fresh sea air, amazing seascapes and discoveries in every direction. Full of wonder and awe – that is until a storm hits.
The storm can be anything; the loss of a job, the death of a partner, a difficult health challenge – but suddenly that beautiful ocean of possibilities becomes a raging sea – where it seems there is little to hold on to and not much in the way of guidance.
It’s no wonder that one of the symbols embraced by contemporary Christian churches is the lighthouse. “Come here” they say “find safe harbor in the storm of life. Come here and get out of that dangerous and unpredictable sea” and many, many people take them up on it.
I think of a woman named Helen. As a young woman she suffered two miscarriages, the birth of a still born daughter and the death of a two year old son in the space of about 6 years. She only had one child survive to adulthood.
The death of the two year old little boy was the storm that swamped her. She was lost and adrift until found by some women from the local southern Baptist church. They surrounded her with love, gave her hope that she’d meet her lost children again in heaven, and offered a community which supported her in the depth of her pain.
She found love, a life boat in the storm of her life and no matter what crazy things they might say the bible says, she believes it, because it comes from a place which plucked her from the storm and gave her safe haven and security.
I know that in this church we have many stories of people going in the opposite direction. Folks who have fled churches which offered safety and security but denied their ability to think and reason for themselves; which traded freedom for security, which asked them to leave their intellect and curiosity at the door. These traditions claim to offer a safe harbor but actually seem to be offering a tiny pond in lieu of the glory of the ocean.
And the ocean calls; sailing out into the ocean of possibilities is exhilarating – you never know what next you might find or discover. There is freedom and adventure and gusto.
But does this mean metaphor mean we are only a fair weather faith? Is it only good when the skies are clear and the waters calm?
This is a criticism of Unitarian Universalists. That we only appeal to people who are already having a good experience of life – that we have nothing to offer to those navigating stormy seas; who are struggling with poverty or addiction, loss or suffering.
I don’t believe that’s true – and for two very different reasons.
I do believe that Unitarian Universalism offers a solid lifeboat in troubled waters – like many other faiths out there it offers the safe haven of community. It is the relationships in our churches – within and around us – which can be our saving grace. It’s the folks who remember to call when we’ve dropped away – who keep calling when life is getting really difficult.
I was just talking with a member the other day whose husband is in hospice; she’s been his sole care giver for quite some time. During our visit I asked what sustained her. What was keeping her afloat during this difficult time? She mentioned the names of several church members who have been up to visit or who have continued calling. She named two who still ask her to go to lunch or a movie with them even though she hasn’t said yes yet.
It made my heart happy – to hear that she wasn’t forgotten and I strongly encouraged her to say yes next time they called. The fact that they continue to call helps her feel loved and connected – even though she can’t make it into church right now.
Unitarian Universalist churches do provide community – but it’s really important to note that it is not an automatic event. Like just about any endeavor – you get out of it what you put into it. Community is a living, changing & evolving entity and if you do not invest in that community with your time and presence and energy – you will not enjoy its fruits when you need support.
This is one of the huge drawbacks of the unchurched who name themselves spiritual but not religious. They may have wonderful and amazing spiritual lives when times are good – when the sun is shining. But when storm clouds threaten there may be no one to turn to for help and sustenance.
The blessing of Unitarian Universalism is that you have the freedom of search, the independence from dogma and creed, but you also have a sustaining community in times of trouble. When the ocean kicks up a storm there is a boatload of folks to pick you up and give you rest.
This is an obvious saving grace of Unitarian Universalism, but as I said, it is not exclusive to our faith. Most other faith communities offer this same gift of community – as long as you are willing to conform to the creed or set of beliefs they hold.
There is however another way that Unitarian Universalism provides guidance and support in the rough patches of life. Our six sources of inspiration, listed in the front of your hymnal, provide a wide variety of human wisdom, gathered through the centuries. Our sources are:
§ Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder
§ Words and deeds of prophetic women and men
§ Wisdom from the world’s religions
§ Jewish and Christian teachings
§ Humanist teachings
§ Spiritual teachings of Earth-centered traditions which instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.
These sources are not creedal tests. They don’t tell us what to believe or offer promises of a certain tomorrow if we follow their rules. They do help us gain a sense of the larger questions of life – and how humans have been struggling with and answering those questions for a very long time.
They help us widen our lens from the details of supernatural and fantastical stories and reclaim the deep messages behind them. They help us find the gold within the ore, the meta story which nourishes and sustains.
For example is our Easter story today. A story of triumph over death – of a God who redeems sinners through the death of God’s son.
On the surface there is much to object to – at least for me.
- A God that is appeased by suffering and death
- A God that creates people to be fallible and then punishes them for being so
- A God that only saves the elect few who believe correctly
These were the very issues which moved me out of traditional Christianity and into Unitarian Universalism - even as I felt a deep connection with the teachings of the Jewish Rabbi Jesus who taught about the power of love. For me a God which acts outside the rules of this reality is much less believable and impressive than a unifying ground of love from which all reality arises and returns.
Any yet – there is deep wisdom to be found in the story of the resurrection. The meta story of having to die to things which we believe are true in order to find a life that is fuller and richer than we yet imagined speaks to both my experience and my understanding of life.
How many times have I had to painfully release some false self image in order to claim a more life affirming one?
One example from the last few years comes to mind. All my life I’ve prided myself on my physical strength for my size and gender. As a young woman I could load and stack 50 bales of hay on the back of a pickup truck. As I got older I could work as long and hard as my husband, no matter what work we were doing on the house, and then go care for the kids and get them to bed. More recently I worked just as hard as any of my male coworkers at Home Depot – loading rolls of carpet and toting cases of ceramic tile. For my size – I felt mighty.
But I got sick a few years back and while I tried to figure out what was going on I lost a lot of my physical strength. I had to learn to conserve my energy – to rest often, to not be the one working the longest or the hardest. I could no longer claim my identity as a physically strong woman. Who was I?
This was actually really painful and difficult. I spent a lot of time feeling like a failure, like I was not enough, because I could no longer fit that one definition of self.
When I finally let go of that identity, I felt tremendous relief. By redefining who I was in the world – no longer a physical identity but an intellectual and spiritual one- I discovered an emotional and spiritual strength that I hadn’t known was there. I uncovered an identity which helped me grow into the fullness of my ministry in ways I had not previously imagined.
This is incredibly helpful – especially now – because I realize that my physical being will continue to change, will continue to decline as I grow older and this new definition of self will make it much easier to go with the flow of life.
What things have you let go of in order to become more? What parts of your psyche have had to be released or shed in order to grow into a fuller sense of you?
This for me is the reclamation of the story of Easter. It may not be true as I once believed it to be true – but it is again true as a deep and abiding story which can guide my life and widen my soul.
How many stories are there that you can reclaim? That you can look at with a different lens and find nourishment and sustaining grace?
Unitarian Universalism offers us this wonderful and amazing gift. It allows us to step out of one understanding of the world and into another through our relationships, through our conversations, through our dialogues and even through our misunderstandings if we just stay at the table. The crux of Unitarian Universalism is our covenant to love alike even when we don’t think alike – to stay in open conversation and relationship even when we have profound differences. This orientation opens up oceans of discovery we would never find on our own – or if we were stuck in some seeming safe harbor.
Today we celebrate Easter Sunday – not as a victory over physical death because none of us can possibly know what happens after we die. Today we celebrate Easter as a guiding path to living a rich and nourishing life of rebirth, renewal, and reclamation.
Like the seed which falls to the ground and dies in order to sprout new life, we have to break out of our own stuck places and set off for new horizons.
As Unitarian Universalists, we invite all who would journey to join us; we have a vessel big enough for all who yearn to sail.
Sounds like a wonderful thing to celebrate with joyful acclamation – Amen & Alleluia!
Dante's inferno starts something like this: In the middle of the road of my life I awoke as if in a dark wood where the true way was wholly lost. 
