HomePeople join a religious congregation for many different reasons; an important one is for personal transformation. How does this congregation bring the opportunity for transformation into your life?
Good morning!
Today, as most of you know, is Fellowship Sunday, a day when we celebrate who we are as a congregation and what we are about, what we exist for. It is also hoped that people (you) will make a commitment to the congregation, a commitment both of time and of money. There they are: there are those dirty words, “time” and “money”. I rarely speak dirty words from the pulpit. Now they’re out there, so let’s move on.
People seek out and join religious communities for a variety of reasons. Often it is because they want their children to have a religious education. Sometimes it is for a sense of community, a sense of belonging. Sometimes it is because they themselves are in crisis and they seek to find comfort or hope in a world that seems to lack these. Or they come seeking answers to big questions: What is the meaning of life? Why is life the way it is? Why is there evil in the world? Why is there Good in the world?
Whatever the original motivating purpose might be, most people stay in a congregation because they find something of value for them which might answer their original reason for coming or might answer a question or a need they did not even know they had.
In all cases I believe the reason for staying has to do with personal transformation, it has to do with something that happens inside the person. That may be as simple a thing as discovering a place where your doubts are welcomed rather than rejected, or where your theology or your lack of theology or your love or you yourself are welcomed rather than rejected. That alone—finding a place of welcome and acceptance--is transforming. I have a place to be; I have a place where I am “home”. For some individuals, that has never been true before. What a moment, to have that happen. What a change in a person’s life.
But I also believe that a change like that, as dramatic and meaningful as it is, has a time limited effect. At some point people want and need to move beyond that kind of moment, they want further change and development in their lives. The moment of acceptance, as dramatic and important as it may be, ultimately yields to a desire for more.
That’s like most religious moments, isn’t it?
In many stories of religious transformation, a person is changed and, once changed, is changed forever.
Not so for me.
I said just a few weeks ago that I awake to the world around me on a fairly regular basis; that is because I fall asleep to it in between those moments. There are flashing insights into the world that fill my heart and mind, and then fade.
Buddhism says that everything is momentary and temporary. For me--if I have had instances of enlightenment--it is as if enlightenment itself is as momentary and fleeting as a raindrop or morning dew. It appears before me shiny and bright and then evaporates in the warmth of the sun’s light. It is something I must recapture again and again.
Our sense of connection to a community is like that for some of us, and maybe for most of us. It needs to be continually renewed and strengthened or it fades away. And that renewal depends upon the continual value of the community in transforming our personal lives.
There is a continual human drive for the next step, the next part of our growth process. Very few of us would stay here for long if we did not have some kind of deepening of relationship with others and with the congregation. The initial attraction can wear out, so to speak.
I at least seek an ongoing deepening of my own religious being, my own spiritual being. That “being” encompasses all aspects of my self—or of my own relationship to various aspects of myself: intellect, emotion, spirit. And that is reflected in my relationship to three dimensions, a “trinity”, if you will: those are my relationship to myself, my relationship with other people and my relationship to whatever is “ultimate”; call it God, the Goddess, the Cosmos or any other name.
On the dimension of relationship with my self: Who am I today and who am I becoming? As I change my status in life, growing older, whether setting out on my own, transitioning from one job to another, marrying, having children, having children leave home, retiring or living in my later years, who am I becoming and how do I understand myself at this new point in my life? And what will I seek or need five, ten or fifteen years from now? And how does this stage of my life affect how I see and experience others, how I see and experience life, the universe, or ultimate truth?
I want my religious community to help me seek answers to those questions. I want my religious community to help me to deepen my being in that way.
And whoever I am or am becoming, I want my religious community to help me to see new ways of being, new ways of growing myself into being a better or maybe just different person. I want to think and feel my way through the ethical and moral issues of my individual life and of my life in society. And that raises another “trinity”. I want a religion that helps me to feel good, be good and do good.
I want to feel good about myself, about the person I am and the person I can be. I want to love life and have a deep appreciation of the world and the universe and my place in it.
I also want to be good. I want to treat those around me well and to be better at that on a daily basis. I want to be a good child, partner, parent and friend; and I want to get better at each of those. In a world of conflicting values and calls upon my time and my resources I want to find the best way to balance my life, not just for me but for others. And I want a congregation--a religious community--that will help me sort through some of the issues and questions that life raises.
I also want to do good. I want to help to transform the world in some way. I want to do that in a way that touches upon my passions, that feeds me at the same time. That might mean that I join others on the Midnight run. It might mean teaching in the Religious Education program or advising the youth group. It might mean working for peace or justice, or coaching a soccer team, or bringing the gift of music to a nursing home. I want a congregation that gives me many different opportunities to do good; not as burdens but as callings.
I want all three of these aspects--feeling good, being good and doing good--I want all three of these together, because I believe they go together. But at different times in our lives we need to focus on one or another, rather than all at the same time.
But in the long run, transformation of me should change how I view and relate to my self, to others and to life.
Transformation should open my eyes to the suffering of others, should give me compassion to respond to that suffering, should even give me compassion for those who impose suffering on others, and it should help me to see that in some way I too, impose suffering on others. I know, some of you don’t want to hear that, but my claim to you would be that it is true, and that it is all the more reason to have some level of compassion for others who impose suffering.
Transformation of myself is one aspect of growth; transformation of society is another. And I would claim to you—and you can agree or disagree—but I would claim to you that personal transformation is mere selfishness unless it results in social transformation. By their fruits shall ye know them. And that is an additional aspect of the “doing good” part of the equation.
Doing good operates on two different levels. There is social service and there is social justice. Service is being a volunteer at a pet sanctuary or working on a project like the Midnight Run. It is a form of help that serves the immediate needs of people or of other living creatures. Justice seeking is about transforming society so that there is no longer a need for the immediate help that a service provides. Where social service work brings food and clothing on the Midnight Run, social justice work seeks to end homelessness and poverty.
One can get into trouble when doing that. Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador, who was assassinated in 1980, once said, “When I fed the poor they called me a Saint, when I asked why they are poor, they called me a Communist”. Being grounded in community helps in times of such trouble.
Those are all reasons for being in community, for being in a place where one can draw strength and hope and personal renewal.
And how does one find strength and hope here; how does one find personal renewal.
One can do that through the mutual nurturing of this community. One can do that through joining programs like A Year to Live or Small Group Ministry or the continuing RE program Ageing to Sageing, programs that nurture and help to grow the self. One can do that by service through the Caring Committee or going on the Midnight run, or engaging in other Social Action projects, programs that nurture the self through helping others. One can do that by taking part in the Program Groups that help the individual to explore and express their own spirituality, helping others to deepen theirs at the same time. And think of all of the other ways that one can find means for self growth, self expression and service to others all combined: The choir, the rock and soul review band, the green sanctuary program, the Creative Café, the Coffee House, the men’s group, the women’s groups, the Darfur Action group and so much more. These are all astonishing opportunities for personal growth and nurture.
And there can be so much more. What do you want to do; what fires your imagination; what lifts your spirit or soul? If it does it for you, it will do it for someone else. Let’s make it happen here. And where better to do so than in a place where if things don’t work out as you had hoped, well, we are a loving and forgiving people.
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