A New Religion For Our Time

Given by James Covington on February 10th, 2008

Let me say at the outset this morning that I am beating the drum loudly for UU, almost evangelical. I admit I am reluctant to do so. I don’t want to come across as a great crusader for yet another religious movement. But I believe in UU because it resonates with my own mind and spirit. It excites me because it embraces my personal freedom and humanity. Without dogma, it embraces the good values that I believe are innate in the human race.

Hopefully, today’s sermon will be a helpful review for all of us and I welcome those of you who honor us with your presence as visitors or newcomers. You may know little or nothing about this remarkable faith, but may wish to; it may even be that we are your last, best chance to find a faith you can respects.

If you leave here disappointed, we will regret it, but we will bear you no ill will or condemnation, rather godspeed in your sacred quest; if you are helped in your understanding of us, we will be grateful and thank you for your attention; if you find here a place to continue your search, we will hope to serve you further and take great joy in your presence. Whoever may be here as a fellow seeker;: do not regret that you may have burning questions within, or doubts about yourself or about religion or life itself; we have those all the time. We know how you feel because that to us is the essence of religion.

If you come seeking the human spirit and all its possibilities, well, this is a good place for that too. If there were obvious and absolute proof of a god, and if we knew the mind of that god, we might be surprised to know how much of this life is up to us and not up to god. So we seek also the mysteries and glories of the human spirit, and the questions we are destined to ask whether or not we will ever know the answers.

This religious community is a laboratory of learning in which we help one another navigate the sometimes treacherous waters of living. Our genius is not that we all think alike, but that in all our differences we have committed ourselves to walk together living our values as grounded in our principles.

The Unitarian Universalist congregation, then, is a school of the spirit - helping us probe the depths of worship and worldly work.

It is a locus, and perhaps the only locus, where we can ask those basic questions about the fundamental meaning of our existence. That schooling, I submit, is serious business.

We have no creed to which allegiance must be given. Blind obedience to anyone or anything is out; responsibility to formulate our own faith is in. We are not only allowed, but encouraged and enabled, to become theologians in our own right -putting together the core values that will guide our living.

Let me share with you some of my own journey. As many of you know, except for a few years after I left the Southern Baptist ministry in my late twenties, I have always remained a member, if not a minister of a religious congregation. Upon resigning from the Southern Baptist ministry, I entered the mental health field and moved Northeast, and eventually to New York City. I then joined an American Baptist congregation in the Village in New York City. After about 15 years of active membership at the Judson Memorial Church, I became a Unitarian Universalist and joined the All Souls Church in New York City. I remained an active member there for a couple of years before I decided to return to an active ministry as a UU, transferred my ordination and soon afterward was asked to become the minister of this Fellowship. That was 18 years ago.

I often ask myself, if I weren’t a minister, would I have remained active as a member in a religious congregation? Many of my friends do not participate in any religious organization. And they are all fine outstanding citizens and good human beings. So obviously it is not necessary for one to belong to a religious community to be a good person. Why has it remained so important to me? Even after I resigned from the ministry, I still remained active in a religious congregation. Why have I done that?

I speak only for myself. By now, I know and appreciate that people have different journeys. We live by different subjective realities. So I am not suggesting that my journey is the only true journey. But as to why I have remained active in a religious congregation, the most obvious answer is that I need community–but not just any community, such as a town or village. Those communities are also important. But I need a place where I can join and interact with other human beings in my natural quest for meaning, connection and value.

The quest for meaning is the natural response of the human being who being alive, also knows he will also one day die. This natural response to the duality of life and death, I consider a religious response, from which arises the eternal human questions: Who am I? Why am I here? What is my responsibility? What is my destiny?

The quest for connection, which is not altogether different from the quest for community, is also born of a natural human need for attachment, belonging, and affiliation. We can find that connection fulfilled in many different ways, of course, obviously through marriage, family and friendships, even work. But the connection I experience though religious affiliation, for me, is one of depth, a depth that transcends the immediacy of my life, while it also certainly addresses that aspect. But this connection also nurtures my deepest nature, my soul; and it also connects me to a great tradition, a legacy of human beings who lived long before me, who together, like me, like us, sought to live meaningfully and responsibly–a legacy that will continue on after my own death. It is a connection of the “eternal now.”

As I have matured, my world view and my faith have changed, but rather than abandon faith altogether, I sought and found a new faith that spoke to my own experience and resonated with my changing knowledge of things. And the faith I speak of, is a faith in the core values of my life–values that define the kind of person I want to be and that help me be the best human being I can be–values that will help sustain me in world and ground me in a life that is responsible and compassionate. I believe that the essential nature of the human being is to give–give attention, give interest, concern for detail and for the well-being of another. Call it love.

Being a member of a religious congregation that teaches values of love and compassion, helps me remain true to my faith. God knows, I need all the support I can get to live my values in a world. While one of the basic tenets of my faith as UU is the freedom to choose my own worldview, it does not preclude my responsibility to live the basic values as taught in most religions: love, compassion and justice. While I could certainly live my values without being affiliated with any religious organization, as many people apparently do, I find that my own faith is strengthened and enriched by my membership in a beloved community of human beings who share my values and my quest. These values are best expressed in our 7 principles. We have different beliefs about God, Jesus, heaven, after-life, but our faith is value-centered. Our values are what hold us together. We can’t really answer the question “what do Unitarian Universalists believe?” but we can answer the question, “What do Unitarian Universalists value? It’s just that simple.

However, the major distinction between my faith and that of traditional religious faith, is that I believe in these values, not because they are dictated by religious authority, or a great Enforcer God, but because they are the essence of who I am, honed and shaped by study, observation, experiences, loving parents and a host of wise human beings. I choose to be responsible, to do good–not to be saved from hell, or please God, but to live life in the most meaningful way. I do good for nothing.

I recall one evening many years ago when a Roman Catholic, learning I was a minister, asked about my religion. When he learned that I neither feared hell nor sought heaven, but believed in “the importance of being good - for nothing,” he was incredulous. He said that if he didn’t fear eternal punishment or seek eternal reward there would be no telling what he would do. He was bound to the Great Enforcer, not the moral power of unenforceable obligations.

Why do we honor our marriage covenant even when we are at times unhappy? Why do we sacrifice to raise children when that seems hopelessly frustrating? Why do we keep promises even when we could get away with breaking them? Why do we obey the law even when there is little danger of being caught?

Why do we involve ourselves in community service and social action when no one seems to notice and we often fail? And why have people done these things for centuries? No external power is forcing us to meet these obligations; we are truly on our own, as Boris Pasternak said: not coerced by a club “but an inward music: the irresistible power of unarmed truth, the powerful attraction of its example”.

Finally, ours is a this-worldly religion - our goal is not to escape from the messiness of existence, but to accept our responsibility for helping to clean it up.

I hope I have been able to help you understand the nature of our religious faith. I realize I am speaking up for religious faith at a time when religion has been getting bad press. Religious violence is part of our daily lives. (Think about how easily that phrase, “religious violence,” rolls off our tongues! “Religious violence” should be an oxymoron.)Yet violence is just the beginning of the mess religion is in today.

In an era of bursting human population the Catholic Church continues to oppose birth control. A narrow and distorted reading of ancient purity codes in scripture is used to justify the persecution and marginalization of millions of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. Hundreds of millions of women are oppressed by religious dogmas that treat them like property. The list goes on and on. Horrible things are being done in the name of religion. No wonder we are seeing a reaction against all religion. Books like The End of Faith and The God Delusion are bestsellers.

But my contention is that there is evil and corruption in all things human including religion. We know only too well how oppression, divisive ideology and abuse of power can become the means of control in all human efforts whether they are pursued through religion, politics, government or culture. The problem is not religion per se, or politics, but the human being. While human beings have the capacity for compassion, they also have the capacity for great harm and self-deception. This does not mean that either politics or religion should be abandoned. Rather than abandon them, they must be transformed. Human institutions, yea, even our very lives, always need to be transformed or in the Christian vein, born again, not to be saved from hell, but to save this life, this creation, this world!

Today, we live in a new world, a world in which once isolated religious traditions are in constant contact. We desperately need new religion for a new world. The old religions lead to tribalism, violence, suspicion, hatred, and oppression. We need a religion that transcends divisions, religion that unites enemies, religion that points to a new future that includes everyone.

What might a religion for our time look like? What would a religion need to be today to transcend our tribal allegiances, to harness idealism and compassion, to change lives and give life meaning? This is a huge, huge issue. This affects the future of humanity.

First, I do not believe that a religion for our time can ask people to reject the religious traditions they grew up with. We can, however, create a religion where we draw wisdom and strength from our religious pasts even while we transcend them. I need not reject the precious gifts of community, compassion and passion for justice from my conservative Christian upbringing. Yet I must transcend the narrow theology that would have me think of everyone else is condemned to hell. I need to learn to be open to the great spiritual gifts of other traditions. A religion for our time must draw upon many religious traditions while transcending them all.

A religion for our time must see science and human learning as a partner, not an enemy. We must move beyond treating myths and poetry as if they were history or science. A religion for our time is open to learning and delights in discovery. This tension between science and religion is madness.

And just as a religion for our time respects humanity’s diverse traditions, so too must it respect human diversity. It must begin with the premise that each one of us matters. Women matter. People of all racial backgrounds matter. Poor people matter as much as the rich. Uneducated people matter as much as scholars. People of all sexual orientations matter. Children matter. The aged matter. A religion for our time does not merely tolerate human diversity, it celebrates it.

A religion for our time must be about wholeness, integrity, and engagement. It must promote the spiritual practices that give us depth and insight: meditation, prayer, spiritual guidance, small groups, and music. It must touch our hearts as well as our heads.

Our new religion must promote deep reflection, but it must never, never, become an escape from life or descend into navel gazing narcissism. A religion for our time must be prophetic. It must speak truth to power. It must raise a powerful voice against violence, injustice, racism, economic exploitation, and the destruction of life on our planet. A religion for our time is not afraid of power. It uses power. A religion for our time must strive to transform the world.

Just imagine such a religion! Imagine a religion that believes in the inherent worth and dignity of all people; that seeks justice, equity and compassion; that draws upon the wisdom and insight of many faith traditions; that is open to new learning; that respects human diversity; that promotes peace; that demands good stewardship of our planet.

You would think that such a religion would take the world by storm. This is what millions of people want.

You know where I am going, don’t you? I just finished summarizing our seven principles and the sources upon which we draw.

This is us! We can be the religion for our time. You still don’t like the word religion? I understand. Well, let’s call it, as the late Martin Luther King often did: The Beloved Community. We can be the new beloved community of human beings. Come and join us!