Standing for Something

Martha Hodges - 2006-03-05

Whether all is really lost or not depends entirely on whether or not I am lost....

These are the words of Vaclav Havel, the leader of Czechoslovakia’s Velvet Revolution. He ought to know. The world cannot be saved unless we find ourselves first, find our direction and purpose. But the converse may be equally true: It is only through acting in the world that we can discover our direction and sense of purpose-- that we can find ourselves. No one grows into wholeness in isolation. It is the daily give and take, the reflection of ourselves in the eyes of the other, the measuring of our strengths, limitations, joys and sorrows in relationship to others, that leads us to find ourselves. This is how we grow up and grow into ourselves, through acting in the world. This is how we go from lost to found. And this is how the world goes from lost to found -- bit by bit, through the actions of people who understand this.

This is the link between spirituality and action in the world. The dichotomy between those in our churches who wish for a purely spiritual experience and those who value only our social justice efforts is a false one. Self-fulfillment and service fit together like two halves of a moving circle -- a rolling hoop. Neither can carry on for long without the other; movement on one side depends on movement on the other. And they must work together in balance, both moving in the same direction and at the same speed.

We are here today in part to choose a direction for this congregation, for this symbiosis between spiritual growth and action in the world holds as true for congregations as it does for individuals. And for congregations, there is a further dimension to this relationship of mutual dependency. Writers on church growth identify four kinds of growth that are necessary for health. Numerical growth -- the number of members -- is only one kind of growth -- the kind of growth that churches tend to focus on as the answer to all their problems -- the thing that will keep them in business. But here’s a question: Why should they -- why should we -- care about staying in business if this is an end in itself? I learned in a course on organizational behavior that the primary goal of an organization is its own survival. But this can’t be enough for a religious body. It’s certainly not enough for us.

The other kinds of growth a church needs in order to flourish are spiritual growth, structural growth, and growth in witness and service to the world. These four aspects of growth are interrelated and interdependent. Growth in one area nurtures growth in the others. It is this fourth kind of growth -- the determination of mission and the resolve to carry it out -- that we’re talking about here today.

Churches have a mission -- or ought to have -- that transcends simple survival or simple numbers. Your task as members and friends of a self-governing congregation is to discern what that mission is to be. What are we meant to do with the gifts of this community -- the gifts of talent and fellowship, of intelligence and passion -- and yes, our more tangible gifts of time and money? How do we best put these to use in the world? We continue that discernment process today.

Last December, your Board and I met for a day-long retreat. I shared some of the Board members’ dreams of what MVUUF could be in a Forum article a couple of months ago. Besides envisioning this congregation as it might be five or ten years down the road and besides setting individual goals for the remainder of the church year, the Board came to the conclusion that, while there was an awful lot going on in this congregation, we lacked an overarching purpose, a mission, or focus for our energies and resources.

At the same time, I was talking with your Social Concerns Committee about how frustrated they were feeling -- how hard it seemed to be to motivate people to volunteer their time and ideas to the various social justice initiatives the congregation had undertaken.

The need for a defining focus and the need for an issue that would energize members and concentrate volunteer efforts in a more effective way came together in the decision to ask you to choose a focus, the beginning of a congregational mission. Today you will be asked to select three of the issues that have been suggested by you, the members of MVUUF, over the last several weeks. At the end of the service if all goes according to plan, your three top choices will be announced, and two weeks from today, each of these three issues will be presented to you for your consideration. You will have a chance to hear one of your fellow members argue for the advantages of each of these choices and, through this process, we hope to arrive at a social justice focus that this congregation can fully commit to.

Now, not everyone is able or interested in investing in social justice in the same manner or to the same extent. Many of you are already spread too thin, between work and family and other commitments. Some of you, we know, are doing well to make the time to come to church on Sundays, and we respect how difficult it can be to reserve time and energy for volunteering. Your choice, therefore, needs to have the potential to motivate people to make this a priority -- that will be able to inspire you to make the time, even a little bit of time, to help.

And because you all have different needs and preferences in how you spend your time, we are asking you, in making your selections today, to consider which issues can be engaged on a variety of levels and in a variety of ways. Our choice should allow for short term or even one-time commitments of time as well as ongoing ones. An hour or two, or many hours. Projects that call for a variety of skills -- planning, hands-on service, physical jobs and mental work. Local and regional, one-on-one interaction and systemic change. A cause that provides many different kinds of opportunities for people to participate according to their preferences and abilities.

Finally, we ask you to consider which issues have what news reporters call “legs.” Which have the potential to keep people engaged over the long haul? For in order to be effective, to really see results, we need to be prepared and committed to spend a long time with this project. Instead of changing our social justice focus every year, we are asking you to commit to following through with your choice for an indefinite period of years. Of course, this is not to say that you can’t change your minds if this choice turns out to be unsatisfactory, but the idea is that, by sticking with something for an extended period, we can become really knowledgeable about it, experiment with a variety of approaches and, eventually get really good at whatever it is we choose to do.

In this way, we can become known in the larger community as a church that puts its beliefs into action, a church whose statements of values are authentic and credible, a church that walks its talk. A church that lives its faith -- A church that stands for something.

So how does all this relate to spiritual growth? Well, on the congregational level, your choice will help you to discern who you are and who you want to become -- your vision for this community. Redefining this vision and choosing a mission statement that explains what you choose to do to embody that vision -- these are tasks that need to be repeated periodically as a congregation evolves. They are also among the tasks that are especially important to a congregation in transition between settled ministers.

On a personal level, involvement in the social justice project you choose this month will inevitably bring you to a deeper self-knowledge and a sense of your place among others, your place in the world. It will also help you to form new friendships within this community and add dimension to existing ones. But as with most congregational challenges, this opportunity to define you collective mission calls you to look at your life outside of this church and to find analogies there. What you do in church and what you do the rest of the week must compliment and enrich and illuminate each other -- or else what’s the point? What’s the point of coming to church if what happens here has no application to your life the other six days of the week? So what might it mean to discover a “mission” in your own life?

Another word for mission is “call.” I myself have struggled with this term as it’s often used to describe some mysterious and mystical experience ministers are supposed to undergo -- the “call to ministry” is traditionally supposed to come from God. Even Unitarian Universalists ministers and seminaries talk about “call.” I used to dread being asked about my call, because I knew I hadn’t heard anything like the voice of God telling me to become a minister -- nothing like the voice of the lord calling Isaiah, saying “Whom shall I send and who shall go for us?” Strangely, this scriptural passage has always thrilled me. I longed to answer in Isaiah’s words, “Here am I; Send me.” But what is a nice atheist girl to do with this mysterious longing?

When I was asked about my call during the very first week of seminary, I mumbled some answer like, “I guess I called myself.” But I finally figured out that this was a legitimate answer. It counted -- it was okay to understand this urge to do something useful with my life as a call. Maybe it was my authentic or best self that called me, and maybe this was my version of the Holy. Or maybe it was Life itself that I felt had called me -- and maybe this “Life” was my word for what some others might mean when they said “God.” So maybe I had received a call after all.

So what are you called to do or to be? What is your mission, your hero’s journey, as Joseph Campbell called it -- the quest that gives shape and purpose to your life? Is it a call you choose to accept or will you turn away from it? For ignoring a call is a real option. It’s hard enough to figure out what it is, and once you do, answering it may require you to take risks and make sacrifices that you are unwilling to make. And so many of us seek to fill the empty space at the core of our being with less than authentic goals, with diversions, anxieties and ambitions addictions or acquisitions. The need to answer this question about call is one reason many of us come to church, I believe.

On the other hand, if you’re wise enough -- or lucky enough -- to have discovered your mission, the purpose you choose to give to your life, you find that it pulls you onward when fatigue or disappointment make you wonder if life is worth the effort. The same is true for congregations.

A person with a spiritual lodestar to guide her ethical choices enjoys an integrated life in which beliefs and actions are in harmony, at least most of the time -- and when they are not, this person has a built-in means of self-correction, a voice that tells her that something is amiss, that she is not acting authentically. The same is true for congregations who have identified their purpose, their reason for being.

A person who knows his values and seeks to live them out has a way to reconcile conflicting needs within him, or at least a way to understand and live with the tension between these needs and desires when they might otherwise throw him into despair or paralysis. Such a person is not at war with himself. The same is true of congregations. In a community such as ours, in which people hold different convictions about politics and religion, different preferences for worship and different priorities in their personal lives, a mission -- deliberately and democratically chosen, articulated and integrated into its daily functioning -- will help to harmonize the disparate voices within it. With a mission, a focus, this congregation will not lose its precious diversity but it will become stronger and more unified. It will continue to have disagreements, but it will not be at war with itself.

An individual with a sense of purpose knows who she is and a person who knows who she is is likely to have a sense of purpose. Beliefs alone, without action, do not an identity make; the portrait they hint at is shadowy, its outlines blurred. Actions alone, unexamined and unanchored to a conscious set of beliefs, may give clues to a person’s identity, but this picture is crude, without nuance, depth or shading. In order for a person to have a strong sense of himself, he needs both: access to his motivating beliefs, and actions in the world which test these beliefs. The same is true of a congregation. A church with a strong sense of its own identity, with a picture of itself that is clearly defined and multidimensional needs to know its reason for being and to identify its motivating values. Then it needs to test those beliefs and values in action. To give them life through its choices and commitments.

Finally, a person with such an identity -- a person whose life and values are in harmony -- attracts others to her. She knows what she stands for. Her public and her personal life are in harmony. She is a leader. This is true as well for a congregation. A church that acts consistently with its expressed values becomes known in the community. It stands for something in the world. And this attracts people to it. It has a voice. It makes a difference in the world. It grows in numbers, strength, spiritual depth and integrity.

So... This is what you are being asked to do today. To take another step toward creating such a church. A church that motivates its members and is a leader in its community. A church that welcomes differences but is unified in its commitment to ethical action. A church that knows who it is and why it exists -- what it is for. A church with integrity and character. A church that stands for something.

A tall order ... Not something that can be achieved overnight or with one congregational vote. But your vote today will take us closer to finding ourselves as a religious community. What do the joys and the passions of this assembled community call it to do and to become? What is your call, and how will you respond? The choice is all up to you.