Yesterday was the beginning of a new near, an opportunity to take a pause from the rush of our work-a-day lives and catch our breath, a time to reflect on the successes and failures of the passing year. Not so that we obsess on our shortcomings more to allow us to take stock of those areas in our lives that would benefit from greater attention. Our home lives, our work lives, our congregation life, our inner life - all of these are areas to which we "should" be devoting time and attention. Each can potentially be made better through a focused concentration and forethought on what it is we want from them.

I don’t pretend to be a marriage counselor or a life coach. But, I hope that as a Unitarian Universalist I can take seriously the third Unitarian Universalist Principle of “acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations”. So, that’s what this essay/homily is all about: the tenets of my liberal faith as embodied in our seven Principles. For those of you who, like me, are new to Unitarian Universalism, unfamilliar with the Seven Principles, or, also like me, are getting a little long in the tooth and somewhat forgetful you can find the Seven Principles on the UUA website at uua.org/beliefs/principles/index.shtml.

As a UU minister with whom I am a Facebook friend said in a recent post, the Principles are not a covenant of faith nor could they really be called a theology in and of themselves. The Principles are instead a set of guidelines, ideals of right relation to ourselves, our congregation and the world around us. And as Rob Smith and Dipak Panchal, the co-chairs of the Standing on the Side of Love team at Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation (www.vuu.org/ssl), wrote in an article in the congregation's December 2011 newsletter, these Principles, all of them, are rife with contradiction or rather with paradox.

To quote that article in part: “it is in these very paradoxes that true power for growth and forward movement lie”. They go on with the example of the First Principle, our affirmation and promotion of the inherent worth and dignity of every person, saying that through this Principle “we are simultaneously asked to believe two things: that we are called toward unconditional love for others and, that we are to have that same unconditional love for ourselves.”

This is a difficult challenge, to love others as you love yourself... It seems to me I’ve heard that phrase before somewhere...

Many of us are really good at sharing and showing our love for others. Our partners, our children and our friends know beyond knowing that we love them. We’re able to show the love of others to the stranger on the bus, the waiter at the restaurant and even to those with whom we disagree but we’re not so good at the loving ourselves part. Self love sounds just a little too much like self important or self centered.

We give others of our time and effort but we pay little heed to taking the time to meet our own needs. Time enough to read that book, time enough to get some exercise, time enough to take that class we’ve always wanted to take, time enough for self reflection and spiritual practice, time enough for a walk in the park, or a hike on the mountain, or a run alongside the canal. As my favorite author put it in in the title of his seminal work, “Time Enough For Love”. Self love.

Perhaps, like me, you often spend too much time idle and leave the little things to build, one sock on the floor becomes a pile of clothes at the bedside, one day without skimming the pool becomes a weekend without skimming and the pool becomes a close approximation of leaf stew...this too is a form of denial of self, as contradictory as that seems. We really do feel better about our world and about ourselves when the environment we inhabit is well tended, and not seeing to that need is just another way to deny your love to yourself, at least, I think, it is for me.

Our second UU Principle calling us to justice, equity and compassion in human relations again presents us with a paradox, does “in human relations” mean when in direct relationship person to person, or does in mean in all relations? Plus there’s the whole “how-well-do-i-know-that person-and-how-well-do-I-like-them” dilemma. I know that I find it much easier to engage with compassion toward those with whom I agree than those with whom I passionately disagree. I think there’s a little bit of human nature in that, sadly. An example that comes to mind is the tragedy that recently befell the Duggar family.

For those who don’t know them, the Duggars have a reality show called “18 Kids And Counting” that airs on TLC. The Duggars have a deeply held religious belief in the sanctity of children. As Michelle, the mother, puts it: “saying there are too many children is like saying there are too many flowers”. So strong is that belief that their family now numbers 19 children. To them every child born is a blessing from God and a testament to his Grace. Contraception, therefore, is blocking the will of God and something they will not use. Although I deeply disagree with them and there are a great many studies that show that the quickest way to eliminate poverty and suffering in the world is to give women control over their reproductive freedom, the Duggars hold childbirth and child rearing as a sacrament. So, imagine their grief when, in early December of 2011, Michelle miscarried their 20th child. Heart stricken and grieving the Duggars named their unborn daughter Jubilee Shalom Duggar and held a memorial service on December 14th.

In most cases the news reports were less than kind and online commentary from the public was brutal to say the least. Comments ranged from “having 19 children is criminal” to “what did they expect” to “this is God’s way of telling them to stop having children” and worse. Not all the comments were this heartless but most were.

I tell this story to emphasize that compassion for many people, I might even hazard most, depends both on proximity and on agreement. And that justice and equity are often built upon our own biases. That’s certainly been my struggle with this particular Principle in the past year and I imagine it will be my struggle in the coming year as well: understanding how my own biases and privilege as a white, heterosexual, upper-middle-class man influence what I consider justice and equity and finding compassion in my heart for everyone in the family of humankind both known to me and unknown.

Our third Principle: acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth, is as challenging as the first two. Is acceptance in this sense related solely to someone's spirituality? And what defines spiritual growth? I think this is especially difficult for a faith without creed or even a coherent and communal theology.

An atheist friend and I had a conversation recently in which I told him that a place like VUU might be just the thing for him, that there were, in fact, many people in our congregation and in UU congregations around the country who identify as non-theist or even atheist. In the study our search committee did last September fifty-nine percent of our congregation listed Humanism as their spiritual identity. That’s fairly consistent with UU congregations around the country. So, an atheist would likely feel quite comfortable in our company.

But not this particular atheist. For him, rationality is his “religion” (note: those are my words, not his). Faith in a higher power, or in anything outside the realm of direct human experience and unprovable through empirical evidence is giving one’s self over to irrationality which, in his mind, is unacceptable. His question to me was “isn’t one of your Principle’s an acceptance of another person’s spiritual path and an encouragement to their spiritual growth?” Of course I answered yes. “Well then”, he said, “that counts me out.” Not only would he have had a hard time “accepting” someone's desire to forgo rationality in favor of magical thinking but he couldn’t imagine encouraging such a thing.

Another UU friend of mine had a different take on it in a recent Facebook post. She said: “As a UU I know what I believe and can tell folks in 2 or 3 sentences. I can also tell folks succinctly what our Unitarian and Universalist ancestors believed. But when people ask me what UUs believe today I invariably end up hemming and hawing and rambling out something semi-academic and utterly uninspiring.”

Reverend Peter Boulatta, a UU minister in Minnesota, might have said it better in a post on his blog (http://bit.ly/tAgovp): “...many thoughtful UUs (talk) about our creedless religion, our covenanted communities in which one is free to search for truth and meaning. It’s likely that thoughtful UUs (explain) being gathered around basic principles and values rather than beliefs and doctrines. But what (people hear is): We don’t believe anything. We’re just making this stuff up as we go along to suit ourselves.”

Now while that might be true for many, it doesn’t have to be. The UUA and VUU have a great set of tools to help congregants come into a deeper understanding of their own spiritual truth. One of those is a class called “Building Your Own Theology”. But that class is just a start, and we have ongoing work to do as individuals, in covenant together, to grow our spiritual armor and refine our own truths. UUism isn’t a blanket to believe anything you want without examination. In my mind it’s a framework to help guide you along a never ending road of self discovery and moral development.

I wonder if we do too little encouraging and too much accepting...

The fourth UU Principle says we affirm and promote a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. Free and Responsible. We have a right to a community of peers that won’t tell us what the One Real Truth is, and we expect that. But, with that right comes a responsibility to own the truth to which we come, to own the defense of that truth, to constantly test it, distill it, filter and refine it to ensure that it is in fact a real truth and not a convenient hat rack on which we hang our preconceptions. And, with that right also comes another responsibility, to hold each other accountable for taking that journey and finding that truth. After all, right there in the the covenant of our congregation, printed in our order of service every week, we say that the quest for truth is oursacrament...our sacrament...our sign of inner grace...our thing of sacred character.

A religion, any real or meaningful religion, should give us a frame of reference that informs our lives in a positive way, that helps us be better people, more loving people, more grounded people, kinder, more compassionate people. We owe it to each other to hold ourselves up to the light of discernment and to challenge others to hold themselves up to that same light.

If the other Principles are rife with paradox, the fifth UU Principle is a Gordian knot. To go back to the newsletter article from the SSL@VUU co-chairs "“the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large” ...includes both the importance of democracy and the right of conscience. The tension in that statement, between the value of individual thought and action and the value of group consensus, is similar to the tension between the value of talking and the value of listening. Both are important, but they stand in fundamental opposition. We cannot do both at the same time. Which should we do more?”

UUs believe, and rightly so, in the precept of congregational polity. Each congregation is a petri-dish of democracy in action but it’s a democracy where each person is encouraged to find their own personal truth. We are all acknowledged to have a right of conscience - we can abstain, absent, disagree, and in all other ways advocate our own position but at the end of the day we take a vote and majority rules. Even among our congregation's board and the UUA board in the end, we vote. And voting takes time... a LOT of time...

So, we’re called to take action in the world but constrained by the democratic process from moving quickly. We’re asked to come to agreement through polity but we come with our own truth. It’s a wonder that buildings stay standing and we somehow have services every Sunday!

Our sixth Principle leads us toward the goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all. Well...we talked earlier about justice and its subjective nature. Here, in America, we call killing in the name of punishing killers "just". In Afghanistan they call caning a women who refused to marry her rapist just. In France they use a Napoleonic system of justice - guilty until proven Innocent.

I often wonder if my donations to Amnesty International or Amfar or the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee will ever do more than move us just a little farther toward a peaceful world. Still, I’m optimistic in my cynicism. As Dr. King said: the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice. And so, I’ll continue to do my small part, to learn about the world so that it becomes a little smaller, to use my privilege to make the opportunities for others a little bigger and I’ll continue to hope that, together, our efforts bend the arc a little farther.

The last of our UU Principles says that we "affirm and promote respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part". Affirm and Promote - I really worry that although we affirm this loudly, we promote it softly. I see the world we are creating when, every day, the food we eat and the goods we purchase are packaged for mass consumption and I worry about the coming-of-uppance humanity faces on the near and immediate horizon where sea levels and global temperatures rise while clean living spaces and arable land shrink. Are the small changes we make in our own lives: recycling, driving a hybrid, composting, reusing and re-purposing enough to change the tide? I’m not so sure. But I am sure there’s more that we can do.

So where is the paradox in this Principle? Where is the tension? Well, I’m still working on this one. Perhaps, I need to attend a few Green Sanctuary meetings...I’ll try to work that in to my schedule this year...

Our Unitarian Universalist Principles, or at least most of our Principles, are filled with paradox. But, such is everything in life. By facing that paradox we come away strengthened in our understanding and so the choices we make moving forward are better informed and hopefully better in affect.

I said at the outset that the New Year was a time of reflection and renewal. It’s a time where we examine the past and plan for the future. It’s a time when we pause and take stock, where we try, if only for a short time, to gain clarity. So, I leave you with a charge. Take time this month, perhaps even this week to think about your own truths, your own spiritual path, whatever that may be.

As you think about what you want from the coming year in your career, your relationships, your family life, think too about your growth in spirit. How will you grow your understanding and enrich your way of being in the world? And how will this new year be different for you on that spiritual sojourn? Perhaps, as I do, you can use the UU Principles as guideposts on the walk. And remember as you stumble along your path that even if you fall, you can always begin again. And you don't even have to wait for New Year's Day to do it!

I wish you light and love. Blessed Be.

Can questions win the day?

Today I failed again. Eager, too eager, to prove my point I engaged in "lively debate" by arguing my point first and listening or asking questions last. And, of course it accomplished nothing. Nothing was learned, no ideas were exchanged. My "opponent" left with his own ideas validated by the vitriol of the argument, vindicated and secure in the belief of the superiority of his ideas. And I in mine.

I'm working, every day, on "active listening" and on "being present". It's something I find I'm able to do so with my wife, at least most of the time, and with my friends, some of the time, but not with those with whom I disagree. And, it seems to me that those are the most important exercises in active listening. Can I listen, without interruption, without a need to "correct" what I believe to be factual errors, without immediately arming my next rhetorical smart bomb? So far, the answer is no.

But, today I recognized that failing, again. I've seen it before and noted that it as a failing. Engaging in a back and forth volley of idea vs. idea, particularly in this age, a time when, if we choose, we can live in our own personal sound garden, completely protected against any idea that threatens to shake our world view or challenge our belief systems. The world of Fox news and MSNBC and Google search results tailored to our most read sites, make it all too easy to enfold ourselves in the warm embrace of those whose opinions we share and never venture out to understand the opposing view.

The problem then, is the ease with which it becomes possible to demonize the other side. All of "those" people are neoconservative, Fascists or left-wing, socialist fruit-loops. And so the "debate" continues. With no movement toward consensus. With the polar opposites moving every farther apart. Confrontation becomes the norm. And, when confronted isn't it our nature to dig in our heels and protect ourselves? I'm convinced, more and more each day, that the current model of opinion clashing with opinion, as exemplified by modern news outlets, only pushes us further and further apart eroding any bridges that can be built as quickly as the first stones are laid.

And so, from now on, I am vowing to listen first, and only to ask questions. I will no longer confront, as is my habit. Instead, I will ask questions. I will ask, and I will listen and then I will ask again. My hope is that this will lead my toward a better understanding of those on the opposite side of "the issues" from me, whatever those issues might be.

I don't expect this to be easy. In fact I expect it to be incredibly hard. I expect to fail more than I succeed in the beginning. But I will try. And when I fail, as I know I will, I will forgive myself, learn what I can from the experience and try again. To listen, to question to engage without confrontation.

But first I will ask the other person in today's drama for forgiveness. And let him know that although we disagree I truly wish him well.

PS - he accepted my apology. It was a good day.

Standing on the Side of (Eternal) Love

It’s Wednesday the 6th of October, three days until our wedding. And I am feeling introspective.

Carolina, my fiancee, and I have decided that the only way to do justice to my proposal at the 2010 UUA General Assembly is to do Justice in the taking of our vows and the celebrations surrounding the event. We have decided that after going to General Assembly and advocating for a “Justice GA” in 2012 we would like to help to set the tone by having a “Justice Wedding” in 2010. In other words, we will have a three day weekend of events oriented to foster the values in which we believe and to promote the causes that match those values. In fact, rather than ask for gifts, we are asking our guests to give a donation in our name to Standing on the Side of Love.

The “wacky wedding weekend” begins on Friday evening with a free screening of 9500 Liberty followed by a community forum to discuss the film. 9500 Liberty tells of a town in Virginia which passed an anti-immigration law similar to Arizona Senate Bill 1070 (SB 1070); it demonstrates the devastating social and economic impact of the “Immigration Resolution” that was felt in the lives of real people in homes and in local businesses. It reveals the ferocious fight to adopt and then reverse the policy inside government chambers, on the streets, and on the Internet. 9500 Liberty provides a front row seat to all three battlegrounds.

The debate around SB 1070 has been heated, not only here in Arizona but everywhere in the country. Many see us as a bellwether state where the issue of undocumented immigration (I refuse to use the dehumanizing term “illegal”) is concerned. Carolina and I feel very strongly that SB 1070 is a hateful law designed to marginalize people of color and turn neighbor against neighbor. Further it is a first step down the slippery slope of anti-immigrant hysteria. As such, she and I, along with HUNDREDS of our Unitarian Universalist (UU) family, marched in protest of the law, some even choosing to take arrest to make the point that this law is not only not the real will of the people it is unconstitutional and should never have been signed. We will continue to do outreach to the Latina(o) community here in Arizona and to use our privilege to work toward the defeat of SB 1070 and the passage of humane Comprehensive Immigration Reform.

On Saturday we have decided to hold a PReception prior to the marriage ceremony on Sunday the 10th. The PReception too is a “social action” event in that all of the dishes and flatware being used to serve our guests is either made from post-consumer materials or is biodegradable or compostable. We feel very strongly in the idea of “pack-it-in, pack-it-out”. The native Americans have said that one shows respect to the land by leaving as little a mark on her as possible. It would be a travesty if our celebration were to leave refuse in landfills that would outlive our families to several generations.

On Sunday the 10th of October, 2010 Carolina and I will take our vows and again there will be a social action element. We have asked all of our guests to come wearing a Standing on the Side of Love t-shirt. I hope to see a SEA of yellow shirts surrounding us as we pledge ourselves to one another. Also, we have decided to take a page from another great organization, whiteknot.org, and will be providing a piece of ribbon and a pin to each of our guests. Carolina and I are being hand-fasted and as the knot is tied around our wrists we will ask our guests to tie a knot in their ribbon to symbolize our support for of all of those, including our minister and some of our wedding party, who are not able to tie the knot due to their sexual orientation.

We thought hard and long about whether we should even take vows given that many of our friends cannot. We consulted with friends and gathered opinions and came to the conclusion that this would be yet another opportunity to use our privilege to the advantage of our cause. We are in a position, as a white, middle class, heterosexual couple to show the world that the lack of equal marriage for our GLBTQI friends and family is as much an issue for us as it is for them. Where the rights of our brothers and sisters are denied so too are our rights denied. We hope that by this small action we can move a little closer toward the day where all people can enjoy the rights and privileges of marriage regardless of whom they choose to love.

The final event of the day will be a flashmob. We plan to take those of our guests who are willing to a local store (to be named later) and protest in support of Equal Marriage and against the corporate donation to anti-gay homophobic candidates in certain state elections. Imagine if you will between thirty and fifty (perhaps more!) people in your local store suddenly bursting into song: “we are standing on the side of love...” all of them but two in BRIGHT yellow shirts and those last two in wedding finery - he in a tuxedo (with a cumberbund and bow tie in SSL yellow) and she in her poofy, beaded cake-topper wedding dress (with a matching sash in SSL yellow). We plan to sing a song or two and then leave, all the while handing out SSL cards denouncing homophobia as the great sin. It should be a blast.

We are planning to blog again about the events and tweet (twitter.com/acmehero) as well as post to Facebook to give a real-time feel. And, of course, we will be videoing the events as much as possible. I will try to send those in to the SSL folks as well. Perhaps we can inspire other events like this around the country. Wouldn’t that be great? Weddings all over the country where core values like diginity, environmental responsibility and giving back to the community are a central focus. We hope to see it. Until then and evermore Carolina and I will be Standing on the Side of Love in Arizona.

Jazzmine (or, 15 years of love)

Darkness had fallen and I had no heart.

She had left me and taken it with her in a box

Alongside the extension cords.

It was clear that I did not know how to love, myself or others.

I could no longer see the sun.

Then, like HD's army, you came into my life

And put me back together.

One touch at a time,

One reassuring glance at a time.

One request for affection at a time.

You taught me to live again, to love again.

You gave me healing and allowed me

To find my own forgiveness and to forgive her.

You led me through the darkness,

Picking out the path from her - to her.

I knew cats could see better in the dark...

Good Without God - Humanism's Unitarian Universalist Roots.

Cover via Amazon

This post is one part history lesson, one part book report and one part personal philosophy. It is the story of the second oldest faith tradition in human history one that could currently be said to encompass the beliefs of roughly fifteen percent of the US population, forty million people, and about one billion people worldwide. By pure numbers alone it accounts itself as the third largest faith tradition of the all behind Christianity and Islam. At present it is the fastest growing “religious preference” in the United States and the only one to have increased its percentage of the population in every one of the fifty states over the past generation. It could arguably be called the single most influential source tradition within my faith of Unitarian Universalism: the Humanist tradition.

According to www.uua.org Humanism is defined as a non-theist tradition that focuses on human potential and emphasizes personal responsibility for ethical behavior. Rev. Sarah Oelberg, who is quoted in UUA.org, describes Humanism as including the following values:

• Showing love to all humans is a worthy goal.
• Immortality is found in the examples we set and the work we do.
• We gain insight from many sources and all cultures, and there are many religious books and teachings that can instruct us about how to live.
• We have the power within ourselves to realize the best we are capable of as human beings.
• We are responsible for what we do and become; our lives are in our own hands.

That is a good nutshell but I think the book Good Without God, by Greg Epstein Humanist pastor at Harvard University, can do a better job of narrowing down the Humanist philosophy. We’ll take a look at Rabbi Epstein’s views on Humanism in a little bit. First though, let’s take a look back at the history of Humanism, a long and rich history, much of which Epstein outlines in his book, and one in which as a Humanist and a Unitarian Universalist I take great pride.

I said in my opening that Humanism is the second oldest faith tradition in human history and I think that is likely true. As Epstein puts it:

“picture what most likely happened the first time someone came up with a theory about God or gods, or goddesses, one of his family members scowled, bushy eyebrow raised, and grunted the equivalent of “Don’t be ridiculous!” If religion is ancient, the Humanism and atheism are most likely almost as old.”

After all, doubt is as much a part of the human condition as faith, and is arguably equally strong. Humanist ideas are as old then as religion itself. Indian thinkers were penning Humanist ideas in Sanskrit more than 500 years before the early books of the Bible were likely written. Greek thinkers like Epicurus and Eastern thinkers Confucius wroate about Humanist ideas as did Middle Eastern thinkers such as Ibn Al-Rawandi whom Epstein quotes, addressing God:

“Thou didst apportion the means of thy livelihood to Thy Creatures like a drunkard who shows himself churlish. Had a man made such a division, we would have said to him, You have swindled. Let this teach you a lesson”.


The Judeo-Christian, Islamic and Hindu words are all rife with the writings of free-thinkers who questioned the beliefs of the faiths of their countrymen all across the ages. From the earliest writing to the present day there are many who choose to look beyond the conventions of their culture and kin and find a deeper meaning solely within the human condition itself. Today, we call that Humanism. 

But, that word did not really come into our vocabulary until the early twentieth century. It was solidified with the drafting of the first Humanist Manifesto in 1933, a document born of Unitarian and Universalist roots. Of the thirty-four signers of the document, eight of them were Unitarian or Universalist clergy. Humanism is deeply ingrained within our movement.

In 1998 a survey was conducted among Unitarian Universalists to examine the philosophical makeup of our membership. Fully forty-six percent of our congregants at the time identified as Humanist. Both Epstein and I lump many different belief systems into the Humanist bucket. I think that’s fine, there’s room at the inn. As Epstein says in his opening chapters:

“If you identify as an atheist, an agnostic, freethinker, rationalist, skeptic, cynic, secular humanist, naturalist, or deist; as spiritual, apathetic, nonreligious, “nothing”; or any other irreligious descriptive, you could probably count yourself as what he, and I, would call a Humanist.”

So what is Humanism?

According to the third Humanist Manifesto:

“Humanism is a progressive philosophy of life that, without supernaturalism, affirms our ability and responsibility to lead ethical lives of personal fulfillment that aspire to the greater good of humanity.

The lifestance of Humanism—guided by reason, inspired by compassion, and informed by experience—encourages us to live life well and fully. It evolved through the ages and continues to develop through the efforts of thoughtful people who recognize that values and ideals, however carefully wrought, are subject to change as our knowledge and understandings advance.”

Blah, blah, blah.

I am currently facilitating a Building Your Own Theology (BYOT) class, in it I am continually asking: what is it that makes Unitarian Universalism a religion? How can a non-creedal belief system with no dogma and no formal catechism be considered a religion? A dear and wise woman answered that for me. She said a religion is a belief system that informs all aspects of your life. I find that a very useful description.

Unitarian Universalism and more particularly our Humanist tradition, more than meets this criteria for me. It provides me with a framework for understanding myself, the people with whom I interact, the world around me and my place within it. There is a great song in the Unitarian Universalist supplemental hymnal Singing the Journey titled “Where Do We Come From?” We’ve sung it many times in our congregation. We all know it, many if not most of us by heart. 

“Where do we come from, what are we, where are we going? Mystery, mystery, life is a riddle and a mystery.”

How does my Humanism help me answer these questions? Let’s take a look.

Where do we come from?

This is perhaps the second most driving of these three questions in terms of its influence on religious thought. What is the origin of life?  Epstein handles this with his typical style:

“Our history began with the Big Bang…it continued with this galaxy’s first star, which appeared five billion years later and the Milky Way’s birthing of our sun five billion years ago. With the formation of the Earth a billion years later came the first living cells, and then two billion years after that came new kinds of cells that “invented” both sexual reproduction and the predator-prey relationship. These twin developments led to an ever-quickening spiral of change… (leading directly to)…humans, self-awareness... (and our)…creation of myth…religion…culture…and eventually…American Idol.”

The story of evolution holds an epic beauty that in my never-to-be-humble opinion has far more impact than any mythological creation story.  It doesn’t make human beings less special to accept that we are a part of a larger unguided process, it makes us more special. Out of the roughly five billion years of our Earth’s history humanity has been around for one twenty-five thousandth of that time. Let me say that again, one twenty-five thousandth…of that time. We are singular in history, unique, the culmination of every biological process since the dawn of time. But, as a Humanist I don’t pretend that the Theory of Evolution is an absolute certainty.

I have Christian friends who are wont to remind me that my “faith” in evolution is no different from their “faith” in God. Epstein reminds us to remind them that the question is not about whether one believes, but upon what evidence one’s beliefs are based. While we both share a faith, theirs is in something which cannot be studied or proven or even argued with any degree of certainty at all. Whereas my faith is in humankind itself, in our ability to think, and reason and through those faculties arrive at conclusions based upon the best evidence available at the time, and further on our ability to revise those theories when and if new evidence to the contrary comes to light. Epstein asks: would you want to fly in an airplane designed by an engineer with no advanced scientific degree, who in fact did not believe in science, and instead consulted the Bible or the pop for advice on how to build airplanes? Probably not. The scientific method is the single best tool humans have ever developed for understanding the underlying workings of our world.

Those who are in my BYOT class have heard me more than once say that I have a real problem with the word faith. To me it has always meant turning off my rational mind and accepting a premise because someone “said so”.  However, one of the first pieces of concrete awesomeness I found in Epstein’s writing is that I shouldn’t be allergic to the word faith. Rather, I should recognize that my faith is not in some improvable negative (i.e., God does not exist) but in the capacity of humans to “live well based upon conclusions and convictions reached by empirical testing and free, unfettered, rational inquiry.” In other words, as Humanists and as Unitarian Universalists we question everything, including our questions! We are, to use Epstein's phrase, the Keepers of the Question. And that is a holy calling!

What are we?

Which rules the day, Nature or Nurture? Or is it, as some religionists would have us believe, solely the guiding hand of our Loving Father that determines the person we are to become? Are we evil by nature as the Calvinists would have us believe, driven to serve only our own base natures and separated from the Grace of the Almighty? Is it only the belief in a higher power that cajoles us into good behavior? Even more important is the question of what constitutes “good” behavior. How can one know what is good? Or, as Socrates asks it: is that which the gods love good because they love it, or do they love it because it is good?

To my mind, it is our capacity for thinking, for rational action, that leads us to do good not the invisible hand of a faceless god. There are many species that have self awareness, the ability to understand that they are a unique, individual entity, to, for example, recognize themselves in a mirror. But it is a unique capacity of higher primates to have “other awareness”, to empathize, to be able to walk a mile, or even a few feet, in someone else’s shoes. That, is a capacity unknown to any other species. And that awareness, not just that we are unique, but that so are Tom, Dick, Sarah and Sally, is what leads us to goodness. It is our ability to think beyond our own needs and desires to the needs and desires of those around us.

This, by the way, is a fundamental truth outlined in every major religion in the world,a fact Epstein points out in his book. Reciprocity, paying it forward, treating people with the same dignity we would like shown to us, call it what you will. In Christianity it is called the Golden Rule. In Islam, Muhammad, all praise be upon him, said “No one of you is a believer until he desires for his brother that which he desires for himself.” Buddhists have been told: “hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful.” In Judaism, the Talmud instructs: “what is hateful to you, do not to your fellowman. That is the entire Law; all the rest is commentary.” In other words, look inside ourselves for our own desires, project those upon our neighbors and treat them as ourselves.

To the Humanist something is only good or bad to the extent that is helps or harms humanity itself. We are singly the most cooperative species in the history of life to date. Our ability to come together in crisis or for a common purpose is evidenced every day! From people leaving their livelihoods and loved ones to rush to the aid of New York in the aftermath of 9/11 to the multi-day ordeal of a child lost in the woods and a community coming together to find him to the clean up efforts happening right now all along the Gulf coast. Ours is a community of goodness! If fully one quarter of those people self identify as agnostic or atheist or Humanist, then what is their driving urge? If we are baseless, false and evil in our core and only able to find good to the extent that we connect to a higher power, then the question should really be why are we as good as we are as often as we are?

It is my contention, and I don’t presume to speak for anyone other than myself in this, that humans more often than not, when given the opportunity, will do the right thing. When given a chance we will help those around us. When given the opportunity and when other factors, such as poverty for example, are not driving a wedge between ourselves and our humanity, we will choose to help rather than to harm, to uplift rather than to tear down. And there are examples of this all around us in our everyday lives.

Now that is not to say that there are not examples of evil in the world as well. Clearly there are. But they are not the norm. The very fact of their aberrant nature is what calls them out so loudly and why we are so appalled by them when they do come to light.

Where are we going?

I said earlier that the first of these three questions: where do we come from, was likely the second most driving from a religious perspective, this last question is without doubt, the most contentious. It is the one that drives us to look for a higher meaning in the first place. Where are we going?

For many if not most people this question means “after this lifetime”, but not for a Humanist. We freely admit that we simply don’t know what happens after this life ends. The most likely answer, given all of the available empirical evidence to date is that nothing happens after this lifetime. And that, quite simply, is the reason we need to have an impact now.

We gain immortality to the extent we impact the world during our lifetime. We gain immortality through our children, by guiding them to live a life of purpose, by passing our genes on to the next generation, and they, in turn passing theirs on to the following generation and on and on. We also live on through the work we do to make the world a better place.

Mother Theresa will not be remembered by her children and grandchildren, but she will be remembered but thousands, if not millions, for the work she did in providing solace and comfort to those in need around her. She will be remembered in that she paid forward, putting in place a framework to continue that work well into the future.

Warren Buffet will be remembered not only for his laudable contributions to the business world but for giving away his entire fortune to worthy causes, that legacy will stretch from this generation into the future beyond his children’s children’s children’s lifetimes.

I want to be clear that I think striving to better ourselves, to get that great job, or new house, or awesome iPod-thingy is not in and of itself a bad thing. Not at all! Warren Buffet couldn’t have given away forty billion dollars to charity if he hadn’t earned it to begin with.

But there are too many people, we meet them every day, for which the next great thingy IS their life’s calling. And what happens once that thingy is achieved? Does it make you happy? Sure! For about a minute. And then there is a new thingy or a better house or a higher paying job to get get get.

It should also be said that there is such a thing as too much austerity. I do not want to live in the woods and navel gaze or give up all my possessions and minister to the poor on the streets of Phoenix. And I don’t recommend that for you either - its much too hot. But a life of balance where we give as well as get, where we rest as well as work, where we look to the welfare of others as well as to our own, is a life of real happiness. At least in my opinion. My Humanist faith tells me it matters very little where we are going, what matters are the choices we make and the actions we take along the way.

We Unitarian Universalists would do well to remember our history. Ours are not “new age” philosophies, and ours is not a new age religion. It is a religion that grows from the strong roots of liberal Christian traditions that are ages old and finds truth in religious teachings from all over the world with histories longer than any of the Abrahamaic religions. It draws strength from the words and deeds of humans throughout history who have shared their wisdom with us and spoken truth to power. It acknowledges the power of the natural world to inform our lives and guide us to our higher selves. And, it recognizes that our own humanity and the human condition itself is as much, if not more, inspirational than any revealed truth. Unitarian Universalists don’t need the one perfect truth. Not as long as we continue to be the Keepers of the Question.