Because I was asked...
(Caveats: Professionally, I am a party planner. I wrote this one a one-hour lunch break while shoveling down two day old pasta salad. Be kind. )
To me, the good news of UUism is that we are a voice of integrity of the mind and spirit in a world where integrity of any sort is talked about a lot more than it is practiced. To be a UU is to live an examined life.
I said things like “I believe in the communion of saints, the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting” for years without thinking through what those words meant.
One of the finer things about UUism is not just that you have the freedom not to say things like that. It is that when you do say them you will mean them and you will believe them because your life has served as evidence that nothing else can be true. We are a community who ideally keep one another morally honest. To be a UU is to reject the notion that justice will be provided in heaven so seeking it on earth is of relative unimportance. And to be a UU is do understand that, God or no God, humanity’s duty is to take care of one another.
UUism’s good news is that religion wants to be free and that freedom and reason functioning together can bring one a spirituality nourishing to the intellect and the soul that lets you function as a whole. For me, relieving the tension of “God both universally loving and universally powerful, despite the evidence you see in your life that both could not possibly be the case” was a wonderful thing.
If UUism has bad news, it’s that we have work ahead of us. We can’t go to church every Sunday, “punch the God clock” and go home.
But the good news silver lining is that it is work ahead of US. We together form a loving, thoughtful community who approach these questions with together, keeping one another honest and sharing the insights that work for us.
Heard any better news recently?
CC
4 comments:
"Religion wants to be free."
I think that line is going to go places.
I think it is very good news for people who have become disgruntled with the religion in which they were raised and are looking for a place to hang their hat on Sunday mornings. Which is probably why UUs largest demographic is not "born and raised UUs". With such an emphasis on "self examination" is there any surprise that UUs are oft chided for being "navel gazers"?
As far as being kind please understand I think you rock, are more articulate than me, and did a way better job than I could manage. I tried convincing a humanist co-worker that he should check out a UU congregation, I failed. I keep looking for better arguments in favor of checking UUs out. I don't know if this gospel would have done it.
"We can’t go to church every Sunday, “punch the God clock” and go home."
It is strange how UUs - the great proclaimers of freedom and tolerance - take regular pops at what they percieve to be happening in other churches.
So tell me, what to UUs do on a Sunday - punch the thin air and then go for a coffee?
"Punching the God clock" is my husband's description of what it felt like in his Lutheran church when he was a kid.
Christians who come in on Sunday to get forgiven and then go back to ignoring religion or sinning for the rest of the week are apparently common enough that my presbyterian minister discussed them all the time when I was a kid.
This was, obviously, I think, a post about ideals. Ideally UUs don't do that. Of course ideally Christians don't do it either.
Anyway, I was being a little jingoistic about my own faith here, but I really didn't mean it as a slam on any specific faith.
Sorry about that.
CC
Post a Comment