Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing

Sometimes, a sermon is hard to write. Sometimes it is difficult to get an entire service to come together as a coherent whole. Sometimes my life gets so busy that it is hard to find time to think about a sermon, let alone write one. Sometimes we ministers feel like our creative ability is exhausted. Especially toward the end of year – there is an expression that is borrowed from another process: “We feel like we are pumping sand instead of water.”

For me, creating a sermon can be difficult when I take on a sermon topic that has not come from within me or from the context of my everyday ministry. This can happen when I do a sermon based on a topic chosen by someone else. Yet, in the case of an auction sermon, I have never been disappointed even though I never know what the topic might be. Especially when the person who won the auction bid comes to me with a deck of tarot cards like Terry Caton did months ago.

Terry invited me to pull a card from the deck to reveal the focus of her auction sermon. The picture on the card is the picture on the cover of our order of service today. The commentary on that Osho Zen Tarot card talks about the small child standing there, convinced that there is no way to get into what we can imagine is a gate to a front yard or a garden.

Actually, we might ask this question on either side of a gate when there seems to be no clear way to get in or out. We have all experienced being on the outside of something we wanted to be part of. Feeling left out may cause us to hear an old message playing in our minds, a message coming from experiences as a small child. I will come back to Terry’s topic, but allow me to diverge for a moment to comment on several special occasions that also presented themselves to me this Sunday.

Our congregation observes its ninety-fourth birthday this weekend. Starting as a tiny Unitarian congregation in 1916, we survived and flourished against all odds of succeeding. The First Unitarian Church of Trenton met and overcame numerous challenges to its existence. It almost disbanded several times in despair of ever attracting enough members. The vibrancy and strength of UUCWC today is something noteworthy. We should celebrate on our 94th birthday because there were many challenging years among those ninety-four.

Recall that three years ago, we applied for Green Sanctuary status and we finally met all the Unitarian Universalist Association requirements. It was complicated and involved significant expectations. Receiving the designation as a Unitarian Universalist Green Sanctuary is noteworthy and something to be celebrated. Naturally, we invited a number of those involved to take part in the service today. Because of this, we added a fifth candle to our “Candles of Fellowship”.

We light these candles of fellowship because they symbolize significant vital concerns that we have intentionally designated as important to our congregation: Along with being a Peace Site, a Welcoming Congregation to Gay, Lesbian, Bi and Transsexual (GLBT) people, an accessible congregation and being on a Journey Toward Wholeness, we add Green Sanctuary.

One more occasion came about in recent weeks. One that brings with it the possibility of a major conflict within our community centered about Unitarian Universalist principles. A young member decided that the one place he wanted to do a project that would help qualify him as an Eagle Scout was here at his congregation because this place is significant to him. He plans to raise the money for and build a labyrinth on our grounds.

Still, as positive as his project is for us and as positive as participating in Boy Scouts is to many, their national leadership continues to actively exclude those who are gay and those who hold a nontheistic perspective. As you might imagine, suddenly every element in today’s service became vibrantly alive. All the special occasions started weaving together to create a vibrant whole; the fact that our congregation has been able to survive difficulties and be able to thrive as a faith community for 94 years; our fellowship candles that stress our commitment to be a Unitarian Universalist Welcoming congregation to those who are GLBT; and central to that, is Terry’s sermon on the Gate to Belonging.

First, a bit of recent history, about 8-10 years ago, another young boy within our congregation proposed doing his Eagle Boy Scout project here at his church. That was a time of critical confrontation between the national leaders of the Boy Scouts of America and Unitarian Universalism. The Boy Scouts of America’s top officer officially rejected our “Religion in Life” requirements. He did so, because the Boy Scouts of America’s national leaders objected to our policy of recognizing the inherent worth and dignity of all people regardless of sexual orientation. They objected to the fact that Unitarian Universalism has the audacity to welcome atheists and agnostics into membership as well as theists, those who lean toward Christianity, Judaism, panentheism, earth based religion and others.

What were we as a church to do? The Boy Scouts of America is an organization that provides good opportunities for many young boys include many Unitarian Universalists. Indeed many Unitarian Universalists have been leaders of the organization. There really is not any other organization available in most parts of the country that provides similar opportunities. Still, the Boy Scouts of America is an organization whose national leaders are clearly anti-gay and forcefully reject our broad theological inclusivity. We have long welcomed and celebrated the presence of members who are agnostic or atheistic. Our congregation was one of the first five congregations designated as a Welcoming Congregation to GLBT back in 1991.

The national leadership of the Boy Scouts of America is actively exclusive even though many local councils try to operate with a “do not ask do not tell” practice. Some BSA councils actively and openly do protest the exclusive position of their National Board.

We turned that original Eagle Scout project down. Even as we did so, we, gay and straight together, did not feel good about refusing the young boy’s project. However, what were we to do? We are an active Welcoming Congregation within the UUA, accepting and celebrating members, be they GLBT or questioning. We want the gate to belonging, here at the Unitarian Universalist Church at Washington Crossing, not only free of chains but swung wide open.

I have thought often about that time of conflict. The family of that scout left UUCWC. We maintained our position as a Welcoming Congregation. As a young boy, I was a boy scout. I made it to the level of First Class before our troop died out. Our son was active in Cub Scouts, but not as he became older, so I have never had a significant identification with Boy Scouts.

However, in reference to that young boy and his Eagle Project, I always wondered: could we have come up with an alternative option? Could we have on one hand not endorsed the exclusiveness of the Boy Scouts of America, yet on the other hand found a way to accept the project proposed by a boy who had found value in our congregation and at the same time found meaning in his local scout troop and activities? Could there, I wonder, have been a third way?

Now we have been have been given a new opportunity, a new challenge to see if we can look at a similar conflict but do it differently and find a third way. How can we “Open the Gate to Belonging” here at UUCWC a little bit wider without giving up our strong commitment to civil rights to people who are GLBT and those who do not believe in a traditional God. How can we do that and in the process work to open the gates to belonging a bit wider in our larger society?

It is a big challenge! Some of you may question if it is even possible or worth the effort. To identify or be identified as an atheist frightens a majority of Americans and homophobia infects every corner of our society. President Obama recently made a major change making hospitals across the country as accessible for same sex partners as they are for married couples. There is the promise of change in our armed forces for individuals who are gay or lesbian. Here in New Jersey, we have civil unions for same sex couples, but clearly that does not result in marriage equity. At the national level, same sex marriage is far from being recognized along with the full civil rights that go with that status.

I met with several of our Coming of Age students Thursday and we talked about the importance being part of a community that can provide support and comfort. “Take My Hand,” the anthem sung by our choir today by our own Kathy Frey, stresses the significance of having community.

“Take my hand and guide and walk with me
Through the cold and the dark of night,
Through the wind and the stormy skies,
Take my hand, walk with me…
The journey may be hard at times,
the way not always clear;
But knowing that we’re not alone
Will take away the fear.”

We do strive to be the kind of community described in the opening words by Star Hawk. We do want to be a community, as she wrote, where, “…there are people to whom we can speak with passion without having the words catch in our throats. Somewhere a circle of hands will open to receive us, eyes will light up as we enter, voices will celebrate with us whenever we come into our own power. Community means strength that joins our strength to do the work that needs to be done.” We all crave for “Arms to hold us when we falter. A circle of healing. A circle of friends. Someplace where we can be free.”

Each one of us is at various times the small child on the cover, standing on one side of a gate, looking longingly through the bars and wanting so badly to get in. There have been times when I felt like a small child, left out and excluded. It does not feel good does it? Being excluded causes us to feel weak, vulnerable and alone. Being left out can transport us suddenly and mysteriously back to a time in our youth when we were literally quite helpless, small, and felt excluded. It is dangerous to compare pain or exclusion, because we can always find someone who has experienced worse or more intensive pain.

Truly, each one of us needs a circle of hands that will open up to receive us. We all need eyes that will light up as we enter a room. We all need voices that will celebrate with us whenever we come into our own power and comfort us when we face our deepest sorrows.

Community can bring us the strength that joins our strength to stop us from feeling small and helpless and provide us with the power to do the work that needs to be done. Deeply rooted tapes of pain and exclusion play repeatedly, not only within society as a whole, but within our very own minds and hearts. We need to work actively to end these tapes.

Look again at the picture of the small child before the chained gate. Notice, if you have not already done so, that the lock on the chain is actually open. Too often, when we feel locked out, or locked in we may be unaware that there just might be another way through.

I certainly do not have the answers to how we can accomplish this. I do know that it could involve us in publicly challenging the Boy Scouts of America’s leaders on the national and council level. Still, just maybe with the help of a community, this creative, caring and compassionate community, we will be able to create a wider circle of hands open to receive and hold us.

“The journey may be hard at times,
The way not always clear;
But knowing that we’re not alone
Will take away the fear.”

No single person here can possibly have all the answers to how we can accomplish this. It might mean that we encourage the boys in our congregation who are Boy Scouts to earn our UUA “Religion in Life” emblem even though the Boy Scouts of America do not not accept it. But just maybe with the help of a community, this creative, caring and compassionate community we will be able to discover new ways to respond to old challenges and arrive at a third or alternative way.

“Take my hand and stay with me
’til the light at the edge of the dawn
burns so brightly it calls to me.
Take my hand and stay with me.”

Maybe with the help of a community, this creative, caring and compassionate community even though others may draw a circle that shuts us out, labeling us as heretics, rebels, people to flout, we along with love will have the wit to win by drawing a circle that takes more and more people in!