RAGING AGAINST THE DYING OF THE LIGHT

RAGING AGAINST THE DYING OF THE LIGHT

A Sermon by

James Ishmael Ford & Cathy Seggel

27 December 2009

First Unitarian Church

Providence, Rhode Island

Text

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave and close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,

Because their words had forked no lightning they

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,

And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight

Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,

Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.

Do not go gentle into that good night.

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Dylan Thomas

James

As this just past decade and the new millennium began people were brooding over what to call it. I gather folk still are. My friend and colleague Walt Weider suggested we name it the “cheerios,” and wait to see if the name was ironic. Of course we now know. It was.

Without chanting the litany of hardship, and occasional bursts of glory for this past year much less this past decade, the ending has been hard. Last Sunday was difficult for me personally. I have a lot invested in our Sunday worship and this was the first time ever that I’ve not only had to cancel the formal service but also, because I was suffering from a chest cold, and just could not trundle up the three miles from my home to be here to offer those stalwart and, frankly, foolish souls, who would come anyway, a cup of hot chocolate. Here in New England there will be church closings, but I hope that not being here with some warmth and cheer for anyone who comes will never happen on my watch again.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. Not by a long shot. Tuesday we hosted a funeral for a college student who had died from N1 H1. While not a member of our congregation, the family had attended here briefly when they first relocated from New Mexico, and through the University and friends of our youth, there were so many connections to the family we felt this very much an event of our community, and of course opened our doors for them when they needed a larger sanctuary. Janet and Nancy and Alan from Brown’s chaplain’s office officiated. I sat up in the balcony with Neil where I could watch the service and Fred’s playing. Posey who had done much of the organizing sat to Fred’s other side. Someone who noticed suggested a rose between two thorns, which I thought inappropriate. Cathy who had many connections through the youth sat down within the congregation closer to the front.

It was a powerful service. Filled with anecdotes about a wonderful young woman who should have made a mark in this world. Listening to everyone I realized she did anyway, even with only eighteen years to do it. Also I watched her parents and felt some ancient kinship with those who know the sadness of losing a child. There’s that Chinese blessing, grandparent dies, parent dies, child dies. Any other order is a disruption of the way things are supposed to be. It’s unspeakable.

So, this week wasn’t going well.

Then we gathered for our Christmas Eve celebrations. Our five o’clock service with Marcia leading the children’s choir was a delight, and pretty much this side of complete chaos. Well mostly. About a hundred and fifty children and adults with I swear forty infants burping, farting, punctuating moments with brief shrieks provided a rumbling backbeat to all that went on. Pure delight, one hundred percent alive. And the nine o’clock where Fred’s leadership brought our choir to its very best, I mean astonishing best. One of the most moving services I’ve ever had the honor of participating in. We had somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred and fifty folk present, and when they sang, the music just filled this old Meeting House. The whole service, combining music and readings old and new, was just so inspiring. And even though I was a principal designer, only there did the truth of the matter begin to be my truth. This was a service about birthing hope.

I had a conversation later with neighbors who brought a batch of Chinese exchange students to the service. We discussed the nature of this program where we juxtaposed the traditional story, and I mean right out of the gospel according to Luke, with modern readings that deconstructed the whole thing. Very Unitarian Universalist, but I was worried it could be confusing, for those not familiar with us, and more so for those who don’t have all the details of our culture down. Although I felt comforted by the knowledge the music alone should have been worth the price of admission. But I was assured they got it. And they told me. The whole thing was about how a child’s birth is the great symbol of hope birthing into the world. It’s a universal human message.

I know that was the message I heard in my heart. And you know, I felt that seed of hope as something true in me. Over these past hours that seed has germinated. It has even begun to flower. I remember in a visceral body knowing way those bonfires burning atop hills in Pagan Europe signaling the light struggling against the crowding dark night. And of course I remembered Dylan Thomas’s poem. I remembered the struggle and the power and the beauty of it all, the beauty of life itself in its terrible majesty.

Now I look out at this New Year, frankly surprised that we have survived another three hundred, sixty-five days. And I wonder, what is next for this poor hurt world. What sadness? What joy? Very much, what joy?

Cathy

I am usually up for a snow day, still look at the school postings even though none of our family is affected any more. But, like for James, having to cancel our pageant morning hit hard. I missed seeing everyone and sharing the story that warmly bridges our way to Christmas. There was no real choice, safety wins.

So, the week went by and I am always a bit more hopeful once the big holiday passes. Of course, I know that fall in New England is filled with beautiful color and even squeaks out some warm days. But, the light is dwindling and with that, a shorter and shorter number of my peek energy hours. I start to feel anxiety, as a multi-tasking, busy person, fighting the urge to slow down and hunker down in order to deal with cold and darkness. Not unlike the other animals and plants, I sense the loss of the sun in a visceral way. Thus, I celebrate the coming of the winter solstice that heralds an unnoticeable instant longer of daylight, a tiny spark in the dark. As a matter of fact, I often hostess a gathering on New Year’s morning, all traces of red and green garlands packed away and replaced with ivory or silvery decorations. I begin to exhale and take in the lessons that winter teaches, knowing that the promise of spring does begin after enduring that longest night of the year. The lessons are challenging but worth the effort as we seek ways to feel safe, warm and less alone.

Our culture pushes against the natural world’s cold and dark rest period. What if we went to bed earlier or cuddled up, reading, rather than leaving our homes for long workdays despite the chill? Could we balance our tendencies to overwork with appreciation for evening hibernation?

Apparently, in 1910, on his deathbed, O. Henry cried out, “Turn up the light! I don’t want to go home in the dark.” Darkness often signifies the fear and uncertainty that humans sometimes face. To counteract the primal worry or dread, we tell stories to make sense of the mystery.

Each faith tradition or culture has its method of raging against the dark, like the Hindu festival of Divali, celebrated on the last day of the year. People dress in white and bright colors; houses are painted with fresh white wash prior to the day, and completely cleaned on the day of the festival. Rituals are performed to banish Alaksmi, the goddess of bad fortune. People bang on pans and light candles or small oil lamps in every room of the house in order to scare her away. After dark, cities are lit up with fireworks and big bonfires. Today, Divali is thought to be an auspicious day, when darkness is banished, not only from homes, but anger and hatred, removed from minds and hearts. On Divali, lamps light the way to universal love, happiness, health and prosperity.

What do we do to bring courage, patience and love to ease winter pains and strengthen our clarity of purpose? What fires do we light?

I remember chilly winter times, growing up, when my mother would have my sister and me play “beach.” She dressed us in bathing suits, spread towels on the living room floor, set out a picnic lunch and sand toys and pumped up the heat. Was she acting out her own need for light and warmth to return to Northern New Jersey? What was she afraid of? Now, at 86, her single pleasure is to sit, propped behind the front storm door for a sunny break, basking like a lizard. Seasonal Affective Disorder? You bet. Fear of isolation and scarcity-Yes.

Now, I have trained myself to sometimes find a little clarity, patience and wonder by looking at the sun shining on the snow. There are other lessons. Some of us learn humility, gratitude and love when we prepare meals for the Sandwich Brigade, host families at the Food Share Pantry, mentor youth, struggling through adolescence or lobby for marriage equality and affordable health care. Is that raging against the night? Or, is it combining our separate lights to be nourished by the glow?

Just as the ancients lit their fires, we light our fires to remember our connections to the earth and our connection to life and death and life again, our connection to hope and courage, even in the darkest times of life. From ancient times to our times, from far away places to right here in Providence, the spirit of light shines forth to remind us that there is more that connects us to one another than that separates us.

James

It’s easy to be maudlin in this season. Like the mythic tryptophan in a holiday turkey, there’s lots of bad music around lulling us into a stupor. Now it’s a good thing to nestle up in the warmth and enjoy a good fire, to be with family, to enjoy enforced quiet; for a moment, to savor the moment. In this world of hurt, it’s good to notice and savor the lovely moments. And there sure have been some in this crazy busy year.

But, let’s remember the real reason for the season. It is as normal and natural as the tilt of the planet in its turn around the sun, in the great dance in the great night. The call within all the stories if, like those Chinese exchange students, we hear the story and its deconstruction at the same time, about all the stories, they are about facing full on what is. For us now is the task of finding the light inside the dark. It is about life in all its hurt and glory.

So, let’s not take this season passively. This isn’t a television show, this is our lives. Even though the longest night is past, and slowly, slowly the sun will return; we humans are called to sing it forth. O Henry was right. “Turn up the light! I don’t want to go home in the dark.”

Turn up the light.

Turn up the light.

And have a glorious New Year.

The Day After Christmas

After a lovely day filled with cooking and cleaning and then feeding and visiting we went to bed early. At three thirty this morning Jan & I were up, Jan finished the last of her packing, and I drove her to the airport. She'll be spending the next week in Los Angeles with family leaving auntie, the cats, the fish and me to fend for ourselves...

Okay for today, anyway. I have some errands to run and must finish tomorrow's sermon.

Still, good to stop for a moment. This is Boxing Day of mysterious origin, also the feast of St Stephen. And we're now officially launched, at least in our Western calendars, into Christmastide, the twelve days of Christmas which will lead up to the feast of the Epiphany.

The song association for our time and place is that fit of fluff, the Twelve Days of Christmas. I just looked on Youtube and my goodness people do feel free to play with it.

Here's one I liked...



Peace on Earth!

And goodwill to all!

Thinking of Nothing: The Book Review

The other day I received a note from a fellow Zen practitioner. For the tag line he used one of those jokes floating around the web.

"Zen is not easy. It takes effort to attain nothingness. And then what do you have? Bupkis."

As I read it I felt a flash of guilt.

I recalled being contacted with an offer of a copy of a book to review. Actually the book has been sitting on my bedside for a while, and as it is essentially a compilation of quotes, I've enjoyed dipping into it most nights of most weeks.

But the review just never quite happened.

Well, here it is early Christmas morning. I'm sitting in the family room, the family not yet up, my laptop on my lap, a cup of coffee by my side, and I'm looking at the book.

Journalist Joan Konner conceived of it and edited it.

The title is You Don't Have to be Buddhist to Know Nothing.

It is a delightful conceit. A compilation of non-Buddhist bon mots, sayings, anecdotes, passing thoughts, all touching upon nothing.

The quotes come from an astonishing range of people. Emily Dickinson, Voltaire, Harold Pinter, Alfred Hitchcock and Kung Fu Panda just barely begin the list...

Among those I really liked is in the section called "cemetery." Edmond Jabes, a luminary of the twentieth century French Jewish community provides a quote that caught and tickled me. I gather it to be a text from his gravestone, although I might be wrong. I hope I'm not...

"Silence precedes us. It knows we will catch up."

Konner reflects about the reasons for this book briefly in her forward. It's an interesting piece that shows some insight into the spirituality of emptiness. She asserts, and for me critically, how her book shows, "if nothing else, that Nothing capital N, exists simultaneously with Everything, capital E." I consider this insight the foundation of my own life. And it can be the gate to liberation for all of us.

At the same time despite some Thomas Merton and one quote from St John of the Cross, Konner seems to miss the wealth of the Christian apophatic tradition. Actually she doesn't seem quite to get the religious encounter with nothing and nothingness writ large. She seems to think there is little connection to religion in nothing. Considering the title of the book she makes an assertion I find confusing. "Religion admits no nothing, no uncertainty, no unknown or unknowable." Konner then says "God appears to fill the void."

She writes this apparently ignorant of how that ancient and problematic and seriously weird word does indeed point for many to nothing. And then goes on to quote Thomas Merton writing of his own spiritual journey. "From moment to moment I remember with astonishment that I am at the same time empty and full."

Really a small quibble. And not at all meant to discourage someone from getting this book. The introduction is actually quite intriguing. It suggests a spiritual insight from a non-spiritual person. Which I find delightful. And important.

It has long been my thesis that if the great insights of the Zen way, particularly how we are at once unique creatures precious beyond description and that each of us is at bottom boundless, open, empty, nothing - then that insight should be stumbled upon by people outside the Buddhist world.

Konner shows it is.

I very much recommend this book.

Christmas in the Trenches

Lest we forget...

Wishing You a Unitarian Universalist Christmas

I learned to read at my grandmother's knee, she resting her large family King James Bible on her lap.

As written words came to be mine other things happened, as well.

She believed the big and well worn book told the sacred story of the world.

She believed and so, so did I.

Many, many years have passed.

My world has become bigger, my vision of faith is informed by many perspectives. Among other things I draw upon the wisdoms of Vedanta, Scientific perspectives, Humanism, Buddhism and most of all of Zen.

Today my faith is in a world where every single thing emerges precious and unique and passing, passing; and at the exact same time united as a boundless openness, by a reality where all those words I've learned fall away.

Just this.

Sadness and joy.

Just this.

The expressions of the twin knowings are many, flavored by disciplines and culture.

And loving my home and my family and the people among whom I move and live and have my being I've found the best expression for that for me to be within the family of Unitarian Universalism.

Day in and day out it is found in the zendo, on the pillow, and how the world presents as a floor spreading out before my gaze. Hints of sandlewood hanging in the air. Muffled noises rising and falling.

And it presents as many other things through the day and the week and the month and the year.

Which brings us here to this magical moment in the Western calendar.

One need not believe the historicity of the moment to know the moment.

Just this.



Just this.

Inspired by all this, an invitation...

For those in the Providence area, looking for a place to honor the day and keep its spirit, but at the same time wish an openness to the fullness of our existence, might consider joining us for our Christmas Eve worship services.

At five o'clock we'll observe our family service. While there will be a current of quiet, the exuberance of children will mostly inform the hour. Of course there will be much amazing music. Also, while people are invited to sing the hymns out of their hearts with whatever words they wish, the printed texts have been adapted to our contemporary liberal faith. It should be a lovely, lovely time.

At nine o'clock we'll observe our contemplative service. Here ancient hymns and carols are sung without feeling a need to adapt them, trusting we can see through the old masculine by preference language and other usages that normally give affront to the liberal ear. We blend the story as told in Luke (of course using the King James version) with contemporary reflections. All blended together with some of the best music to be heard in Rhode Island.

Cathy Seggel our Director of Religious Education and I will officiate. Readers will come from our High School, young adults home from college, together with a few adult ringers. Our children's choir is led by Marcia Taylor and our adult choirs by Fred Jodry.

Lovely, lovely.



Just this.

Robert Bly Noted

Robert Bly was born on this day in 1926.

Not precisely my cup of tea, but genuinely an interesting guy who opened the way of the heart for lots of people, particularly men who might not have otherwise stumbled onto the path...

Christmas Wisdom on the Web

"Everything I have ever been, I still am. although in transformed ways. At Christmas time all those images of Jesus from Christmases past come fully to life. I walk around with tears in my eyes. Tears of joy, tears of rage, tears of hope, tears of despair. Secular, humanist, Marxist, Quaker, Buddhist tears. Human tears. Complicated tears. Wonderful tears."

Richard Hayes

The Snow Man

One must have a mind of winter
To regard the frost and the boughs
Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time
To behold the junipers shagged with ice,
The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think
Of any misery in the sound of the wind,
In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land
Full of the same wind
That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

Wallace Stevens

Abner Kneeland's Passion and an Invitation to Cross the River

On this day in 1833 Abner Kneeland published a letter which was published in both the Universalist journal, the Trumpet and the Boston Inquirer. In it he officially repudiated the Universalist orthodoxy, following his earlier voluntary leaving of the Universalist ministry. The letter was simple enough. It was addressed to Thomas Whittemore, editor of the Trumpet and read:

Dear Sir: You observed to me the other day, that people still consider me a Universalist, and said to me "If you will acknowledge that you are not, I will publish it." I told you, in substance, that in some respects I am still a Universalists; but that in others, I am not. I shall now answer you more at large, which I hope you will publish in full, and thereby redeem your pledge. I still hold to universal philanthropy, universal benevolence, and universal charity. In these respects, I am still a Universalist. Neither do I believe in punishment after death; so in this also I agree with the Universalists. But as it respects all other of their religious notions in relation to another world or a supposed other state of conscious existence, I do not believe in any of them; to that in this respect, I am no more a Universalist than I am an orthodox Christian. As for instance:

1. Universalists believe in a god, which I do not; but believe that their god, with all his moral attribures, (aside from nature itself,) is nothing more than a chimera of their own imagination.

2. Universalists believe in Christ, which I do not; but believe that whole story concerning him is as much a fable and a fiction, as that of the god Prometheus, the tragedy of whose death is said to have been acted on the stage in the theatre in Athens, 500 years before the Christian era.

3. Universalists believe in miracles, which I do not; but believe that every pretension to them can either be accounted for on natural principles, or else is to be attributed to mere trick and imposture.

4. Universalists believe in the resurrection of the dead, in immortality and eternal life, which I do not; but believe that all life is mortal, that death is an eternal extinction of life to the individual who possesses it, and that no individual life is, ever was, or ever will be eternal.

Hence, as Universalists no longer wish to consider me as being of their faith, and I no longer wish to be considered as belonging to their order, as it relates to a belief in things unseen, I hope the above four articles will be sufficient to distinguish me from them and them from me. I profess to believe in all realities of which I can form any rational conception, while they believe in what I believe to be mere ideal nothings to which they give both a "location and a name."

In giving the above a place in the Trumpet you will let me tell your readers, in my own language, what I do, as well as what I do not, believe and thereby oblige your once brother of the same faith with yourself, and still your personal friend.

Abner Kneeland

For this and two other articles originally published in a Freethought journal, but reprinted elsewhere as well, Kneeland found himself tried, five times, and eventually convicted of blasphemy. A paper by Gale Alexander and Stephan Papa would call him the "last man jailed for Blasphemy." At least in the United States...

The whole affair was aired in the papers of the day as a major scandal. Other liberal thinkers, mostly Unitarians, including Ralph Waldo Emerson and Theodore Parker tried to intervene but to no avail. Kneeland served sixty days in jail.

Among the ironies in this, and there are many ironies in this, today a significant number of contemporary Unitarian Universalists, heirs to the institution from which he was excluded and for which he was imprisoned, hold views very similar to those expressed in that letter.

And I'm quite interested in his thinking. Now that letter was meant to express what he did not believe. Elsewhere he published what he called his "Philosopher's Creed." It expressed his views in more positive terms.

I believe in the existence of a universe of suns and planets, among which there is one sun belonging to our planetary system; and that other suns being more remote, are called stars; but that they are indeed suns to other planetary systems. I believe that the whole universe is NATURE, and that the word NATURE embraces the whole universe; that GOD and NATURE, so far as we can attach any rational idea to either, are synonymous terms. Hence, I am not an Atheist, but a Pantheist; that is, instead of believing there is no God, I believe that in the abstract, all is God; and that all power that is, is in God, and that there is no power except that which proceeds from God is all in all; and that it is in God we live, move, and have our being; and that the whole duty of man consists in living as long as he can, and in promoting as much happiness as he can while he lives.

I'm just fascinated with how much I am in agreement with the former reverend Kneeland's sentiments expressed in 1833 some hundred and sixty six years ago.

Now I'm not in complete agreement. In particular the notion that there was no historical Jesus is not part of the mainstream of contemporary thinking. That is I have no doubt Jesus existed, although I reject the "orthodox" view of who and what he was, which of course, is Kneeland's real point.

I'm also not completely comfortable with the part of his assertion about our purpose being to live as long as we can. But that's something I need to think about more. I'm certainly in agreement with him that we have some sort of duty to further the project of happiness for all during our time on this planet.

But what most intrigues me is his pantheism.

For me the problem with contemporary atheism is its bare materialism.

It misses, I believe, something about what we really are.

Of course there is another view that is equally off the mark for me. And that's anti-materialist spiritual assertions. We get a lot of this in various religions. Just as wrong.

For me the material and the spiritual are two ways of perceiving one thing. Each word fails as we approach the reality of what is.

Like all words at some point material and spiritual fail...

But Kneeland tries to put words to it. A noble if doomed effort.

And there's another point here, the real point for us as we live in this poor, beautiful and hurting world.

I'm of the opinion that Abner Kneeland posits a view of reality that is about as close to what is as one can get by thinking about the great matter.

I'm unaware of what actual experiences he may have had that brought him to this place. What I have read suggests his vehicle was reason.

One wild spiritual teacher I once knew like to recite a little ditty.

You can get more stinking from thinking than you can from drinking, but the feel is for real.

Now that's not completely right, either. Thinking and feeling are the two ways we perceive. In fact they're not two but facets of one thing. So one without the other is, of course, incomplete. In fact to follow one without the other is to invite much tragedy.

And so, Mr Kneeland's dilemma. As I see it reason alone only takes us to a view of the promised land, like Moses standing above the river Jordan gazing across to the Holy Land, to which he could not go.

He saw it. I'm sure Kneeland saw it. But I'm not so sure he made it to the farther shore.

Seeing through a glass darkly, he gets it, and he points.

But to cross the river and to walk into that land we need both mind and heart.

I cannot pretend to read Abner Kneeland's heart. Maybe he made it. There is no doubt in my mind there is much heart about him and his life. Just as there is much wisdom in the teachings of our ancestors. And who knows how many of the ancestors made it, as well.

We only get partial stories.

Still, partial or not...

The stories our ancestor's tell in fact point to how to do this. The analysis of Kneeland and other's point to how we can do this.

But the key to building the boat or the bridge is bringing heart and mind together. Actually if you look at the picture of the river posted above, sometimes, all you have to do is roll up your pants and wade across. When we bring heart and mind together it is as easy as pie...

The good news is that's all we need.

All we need do is open our hearts and minds

and the vastness that is will be there.

Always has been...