Religion
I wrote this sermon in 2006 for the Progressive Faith Bloggers Conference. I was thinking of it recently, and it just seemed so appropos for where I am, and where things are, so I thought I'd repost it.
Finding and claiming our prophetic voice
The readings this morning from Amos have, I think, something to teach us. Amos was a reluctant prophet. He didn't start out being a prophet. He was, in his own words, “a herdsman, and a dresser of sycamore trees.” He was just your ordinary guy, your average joe herdsman and farmer. He was a reluctant prophet. He lived in one of the most prosperous times in the kingdom of Israel's history, during the reign of Jeraboam II, nearly more than 2700 years ago. Amos' primary message was to the wealthy, to remember their responsibility to the poor, and to those who were in religious leadership, to return the people to true faith, instead of empty ritual. These are, I think, things we could imagine saying today. He felt that God called him out of that ordinary life, into the extraordinary life of calling Israel's people to measure themselves against God's “plumb line” of justice. In many ways, probably, Amos was a lot like you and me.
Unlike a lot of other prophets of his time, Amos didn't rely much on apocalyptic language, or esoteric symbols. He was frank and straightforward in relaying what he perceived to be God's message to Israel's people. He saw the injustices of his time, and felt called to speak out against them, to remind Israel of God's demand for justice for all of its people.
I was telling a friend that I wanted to preach about the prophetic voice of bloggers, and she looked at me kind of puzzled. As we talked more, it came to be clear that when she thought of prophets, she thought of that more traditional view of prophecy, more like “fortune telling,” or forecasting the future. I explained that mostly, people used the words of prophets in retrospect to prove a particular point that the original prophets probably didn't have in mind. Not there is no such thing as the kind of prophecy that might indicate aspects of the future. But to my mind, it's not the most important kind of prophecy.
What I want to talk about today, is Amos' kind of prophecy, the prophecy that most of you in this room are quite familiar with, and perhaps even do on a daily basis, like on the aptly named community blog “Street Prophets.” This kind of prophecy sees the injustices of our time, and speaks plainly and forthrightly about them. Sometimes, this kind of prophecy does include “what if?” And the “what if's” are important too. What if we don't pay attention to the injustices in front of our face? What if we don't pay attention to the dangers that are facing us as a nation, and as a world? What might happen to us? Amos asked these questions, too.
We live in interesting times, times that need plain, ordinary jane and joe prophets like Amos. We live in dangerous times, and we need prophets like those of you in this room. But we also live in complicated times. Unlike Amos, who was, for the most part, speaking to one people, with the same faith tradition, we need to speak to many peoples, with multiple faith traditions, or, in some cases, no faith tradition. How do we find, and use, our prophetic voice in the cacophany of many voices, many agendas, many points of view and perspectives? How do we stretch our voices outside our own small pockets of progressive people of faith? How do we preach to more than just the choir? And, for those of us who are Christians, how do we express the caring, open and accepting gospel we know?
There are four guidelines that I try to live by, in exercising my own prophetic voice. I sometimes fail, but these are the standards that I try to meet. These are ways that I think may help us to get our message heard further out than our crowd, and engage others in dialogue. These guidelines have been deeply informed by both my Buddhist practice and my Christian faith. And, to some extent, by experience. The first guideline is to be in touch with, and speak from, your heart. Second, the means are the ends. Third, be willing to be wrong. And fourth, always assume good will on the part of others.
So, first, be in touch with, and speak from, your heart. Speak from your knowledge and understanding of God, however you define God. Or speak from some other perspective that comes from your heart. What does that mean, really? For one thing, for many of us, our faith and experience of the divine is a central part of our lives. If we can't speak from that place, if we feel the need to suppress, or to modify what we say, we compromise ourselves, and what we have to say. Also, it's usually not our rational minds that get us into trouble. We react and speak out of fear so often, sometimes we aren't even aware that we do it. Being in touch means being aware, and awake, to our attitudes, attachments and aversions, and learning to speak from that place of awareness. Being in touch with what's really important to us, being in touch with our hearts, with our experiences and knowledge of God, is important. And I think Amos would agree.
Second, the means are the ends. All three of you that read my blog know that's kind of a common topic for me. In fact, I think that if there was a broken record for me, it would play “means are the ends,” over and over again. I doubt that many people in this room, or in the progressive movement in general, would disagree with the quote by Ghandi “Be the change you want to see in the world.” But what does that really mean? It means that if we want to live in a world that is open, accepting, and peaceful, we have to be open, accepting and peaceful. Like that bumper sticker, there is no way to peace, peace is the way. Peaceful dialogue, peaceful language, that Buddhist concept of right speech, is the way. The energy I spend working for change using methods that are enemies to change ends up getting me nowhere. It's two steps forward, two steps backward. I'm still in the same exact place I was when I started.
One of the things I've learned from my years of Buddhist practice is that it is, really, all about me. That is, each of us has control over the decisions we make, and the ways we act, and react, the words we speak and write. If we really want to live in a different world, we have to live and act differently, be aware of what we do, and what we think about what we do, why we do it, and how we do it.
The third guideline I follow is: be willing to be wrong. Of course, I'm never wrong about anything. Actually, I'm probably wrong about almost everything, including a good bit of this sermon. One of the things that gets us into so much in trouble is our attachment to our own point of view. Do you know that there are two ways to hold a penny? You can hold it like this (show the downward fist) or like this (the upward palm). Sometimes, we hold so strongly onto our points of view because we are afraid we'll lose something. Holding our opinions like we hold the penny, in the open palm of our hand gives us opportunities to let other things influence us, it leaves us open to new ideas, and new ways of looking at things. And we still get to keep the penny.
We have come to our opinions through our experiences, and not everyone has the same experiences in life, so, it makes sense that people have different opinions. And what appears one way from our perspective, is quite different from another perspective. Unlike in Amos' time, when everyone had the same paradigm in which they lived in the world, and Amos could draw on that paradigm to explain to Israel where they are going wrong, we live in a time of many, many paradigms. Things that are clearly wrong in one paradigm are just fine in a different one. So as prophets, we need to both speak from the heart, from our own knowledge, and also accept that there are many other ways to understand the world. And what we need more than anything is dialogue between people with different perspectives. Thich Naht Hanh once said of dialogue, you don't really have dialogue unless both parties are willing to change. In order to be willing to change, we have to be willing to be wrong.
The last guideline is to always assume good will on the part of others. This one is sort of a sub guideline to the “means are the ends” one. It can be a tough one. Because, in fact, not everyone is of good will, so it seems, well, absurd, polyannish, naïve, fill in the blank, to assume everyone is of good will. We are, as Christians, encouraged to “see the God” in everyone we meet. Jesus would have us love them as we would love ourselves. Most of us don't assume that we ourselves are of bad will, so, why would we assume that of others? And, it is surprising what assuming the good will of others can do. If you assume someone you disagree with is of good will, you actually find yourself willing to listen to what they have to say. Listen to their point of view, listen to their perspectives.
Everyone has something to teach us. Every person we meet can teach us something about ourselves, about them, about the way the world works. And assuming good will is a way to help us be open to learning from people, and share goodwill, to spread it around. There are times when the favor will not be returned. Either someone will assume we are of ill will, or the other person will, in fact, wish us ill. That is unfortunate. It's happened to me. But the times that happens are far outweighed by the positive effects of being open. And, I think, like non-violence, it is a way of being that, frankly, can embarrass those who don't act in the same way.
These four guidelines have been really helpful to me in both my on-line electronic life, as well as my real, in person life. And I've yet to regret adopting these guidelines. They aren't necessarily for everyone, but they work well for me, and I think can be a good set of guidelines that might help our prophetic voice go beyond our little pocket. After all, if we want things to really change in this country, our voices have to be heard far and wide.
I've had a blog for three and a half years. I started my blog when it was becoming clear that Bush was going to invade Iraq. I felt completely powerless to have any effect on what was happening. Since then, blogs have changed the landscape of public discourse in this country. Yearly Kos is a nationally covered event, bloggers are talked about on TV and in the newspaper, politicians feel the need to talk with bloggers. Further, right now, people have begun to notice that there is, in fact, a religious left. That, contrary to the rhetoric of the right, there are progressive people of faith, whose politics are deeply informed by their faith. This is the time for us, as ordinary jane and joe reluctant prophet-bloggers (or not so reluctant) to speak from our hearts, to speak of injustice when we see it, to be like Amos.
I've spent a lot of time in my life trying to fit myself into varied spiritual boxes. I was a Presbyterian, then I was a Nazarne, then I was a humanist, then I was a Pagan, then a Buddhist, then a UU, and lastly a progressive Christian. Lately, I have come to realize that there are aspects of all of these identities in my spiritual and religious life at the moment, but none of them can singularly hold me. I've known for a long time that being a Progressive Christian wasn't really enough to describe me, and at many times I've called myself a "Buddheo-Christian" (this term did not originate with me.) But even that isn't really enough - it doesn't reflect the influence of other traditions in my spiritual life.
I was talking with Ruth yesterday, and she has a way of seeing things about me that I sometimes have a hard time seeing. She said that I was simply a contemplative.Somehow, that seemed so straightforward and true. That seems like a container that can fit me.
I was looking at the etymology of "contemplative". It's lingusitically connected to contemplation. Contemplation is from Latin, and includes such meaning as "act of looking at" and "to gaze attentively, observe" and to "to mark out a space for observation". I like that latter meaning - "to mark out a space" - I think of that in terms of both time and intention: to set aside time and effort to observe.
What is the observation? Rather often, it's my mind. But sometimes it's about observing creation - the natural world, and all beings in it.
This also feels like it allows for a more intimate connection between my scientist self, my writer self, and my spiritual self. And it feels like it can explain a lot of what I feel called to do in ways that being a Christian or a Buddhist didn't quite explain to me.
This is a great song (and catchy, too.)
My spiritual journey through this life has been interesting, at least. I started out life as a mainline Christian (Presbyterian), was a Nazarene for a while, then wandered a bit, explored Paganism, picked up a Buddhist meditation practice, then returned to Christianity more recently, but a type that is neither the faith of my childhood, nor the faith of my fundamentalist early adulthood. These days, I find myself holding less tightly to the label Christian that I relatively recently re-adopted. I'm finding myself willing to live with the complexity of what it means to follow two different faith traditions (Christianity and Buddhism) at the same time.
I've always thought that every faith is simply an approximation of what's really true. We humans are limited beings, and we're not capable of fully understanding the truths of the universe - the best we can do is approximate.
If you google "New Monasticism" you'll come up with a few useful links, and this wikipedia entry. New Monasticism is one of the more recent movements, largely from the evangelical realm, that tries to get back to the roots of what's important in Christianity. Like the "Emergent Church", it is a criticism of the status quo in Christendom - suggesting more of a focus on the teachings of Jesus, and of community.
I'm mostly a fan of both of those movements. Moreso of the new monastics, since I know at heart I am somewhat of a monastic.
Two things have come across my desk recently, that I find disturbing. First, something called the "Manhattan Declaration" (Subtitled, A Call of Christian Conscience). It affirms three truths, and I'm sure you already know what two are: "sanctity of human life" and "dignity of marriage as the conjugal union of husband and wife". The third is, well, strange, to say the least, given the first two: "the rights of conscience and religious liberty." I guess they must not mean the rights of conscience for women, or the rights of religious liberty for people (like me) who think that God dignifies the marriage of two men, or two women.
