A sermon delivered by The Rev. Kathy Schmitz on January 20, 2008
At Pathways Church, A Unitarian Universalist Community in Southlake, Texas
Sharon Salzberg (American Buddhist Teacher)
Reading before the sermon: from Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness
by Sharon Salzberg (American Buddhist Teacher)
page 10-11, the story of Ashoka
Meditation: combined words of UU ministers Kenneth Patton and Frederick Gillis
(SERMON SLIDE)
I have always wanted to be one of those ministers who could burst into song in the middle of the sermon. However, as it turns out, I am not a minister who should engage in such activity – as an act of kindness. So today, I have asked for a little extra help from the Music Team. My remarks this morning come is the form of two reflections. In between the two, we will allow the Music Team to burst into song.
I will also, this morning, allow technology to assist me, as we hear some words spoken in their original voice.
Let us begin.
In our nation’s capital, a prophetic voice once spoke these words.
(The Rev. Dr. martin Luther King Jr. August 28, 1963, at the Lincoln Memorial, Washington D.C.)
(SLIDE OF MLK ALONE)
And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on
the red hills of Georgia, the sons children of former slaves and
the sons children of former slave owners will be able to sit down
together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today! [End quote]
And it goes on. It echoes in our minds.
It speaks of a dream. A dream of the way things can be. A vision of a possible future.
But let us not forget that before The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. spoke of the dream, he spoke of the reality of the injustices faced in his day. It is the dream that tends to get quoted but we delude ourselves if we forget that King also condemned racism – in no uncertain terms!
Earlier in that same speech Dr. King spoke these words:
In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."
But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. [End quote]
These two section highlight 2 of the 3 components of King’s thought that were critical to his effective voice.
It was critical that King was willing to name the injustice… AND…
It was critical that King could articulate the other possibility, the dream.
King put before us a map.
We are here. We need to get to there.
But King did more.
King told us how to get from here to there.
This is the third critical component of King’s thought.
We are here. We need to get there. And here is how we do it.
In still the same speech, King spoke these words:
But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. [End quote]
We are in a difficult place but there is another place, a place to which we can travel, and together, together we will travel the high road to get there.
I want to talk about that high road.
I want to talk about that high road as articulated by King and so many who came before.
As Unitarian Universalists, we draw on many sources for our inspiration and wisdom.
(SLIDE WITH SOURCE TEXT)
One rich source on which we draw is those who have taken up the challenges of this life before us.
The list of sources which we often sight can be found on one of the large posters in the front lobby. It included one which says:
We draw on the…
Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion and the transforming power of love;
(repeat)
We are inspired by the words and deeds of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
(SLIDE WITH MLK ALONE)
Oh, you know, he was not a Unitarian Universalist. He was a Baptist.
But he also drew inspiration and wisdom from those who came before him.
Jesus of Nazareth, no doubt.
But also, Mohandas K. Gandhi.
(SLIDE WITH MLK AND GANDHI)
Oh, you know, Gandhi wasn’t a Baptist? Or Christian? Or a Unitarian Universalist?
He was a Hindu.
And Gandhi also drew inspiration and wisdom from those who came before him.
He treasured the scripture of his own tradition, especially the Bhagavad-Gita. He also read Christian scripture and is said to have been especially fond of Sermon on the Mount.
He was inspired as well when he read the writings of Henry David Thoreau.
(SLIDE WITH MLK AND GANDHI AND THOREAU)
Thoreasu, by the way, was not a Hindu. Or a Baptist. He was a Transcendentalist with ties to the Unitarian movement of his day.
And who did Thoreau read? Well, he was among those Americans who were reading the first translations of texts from India and other places in Asia. Thoreau was strongly influenced by the teaching of Buddhism.
(SLIDE WITH MLK AND GANDHI AND THOREAU AND BUDDHA)
And why was Thoreau able to read the teachings of Buddhism?
Well, as we learned in this morning’s reading (from Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness by Sharon Salzburg, page 10-11) the Buddha’s teachings were spread by the children of the Indian Emperor Ashoka after his battlefield transformation. A battlefield transformation that caused him to change his rule from one of violence to one of justice and benevolence. All as a resulted of his seeing a single Buddhist monk, “his being radiant with peace and happiness.”
This is a long list of people. People from different times and places and traditions.
It is a long list of people. With much in common.
They shared a desire to spread justice and peace.
They shared a desire to end violence and suffering.
They shared a willingness to find inspiration and wisdom in the words and deeds of people came before them.
In all times and places and traditions, there are those who would spread justice and peace. There are those who would end violence and suffering.
Big names like Buddha, and Jesus, and Thoreau, and Gandhi, and King. And nameless monks wandering across battlefields.
Revolutionary teachers, and Buddhists, and Christians, and Hindus, and Transcendentalists and more.
Peoples whose hearts were big enough to understand, to truly understand, that the only way to bring peace and love and justice into our lives is to bring peace and love and justice into the lives of all people.
People whose hearts were in a holy place.
People who are, and can, be a source of inspirations and wisdom for us as we seek to build a better world in our day.
People who can inspire our hearts to be in a holy place.
Before we continue, I invite you to a few moment of reflection on the condition of your heart, and where it finds inspiration, while members of our music team sing of When Our Heart is in a Holy Place (#1008, Singing the Journey)
(SONG SLIDE)
(singing)
(SERMON SLIDE)
The end of loving-kindness – its goal and hopeful result – is the creation of the world we wish to see.
If we share a desire to spread justice and peace…
If we share a desire to end violence and suffering…
If this is our end… then our path is loving-kindness.
As The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929-April 4, 1968) reminded us:
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
If our end is a world with more peace and justice, and our path is loving-kindness, how are we to get on the path?
Well, for one things we do not get on the path by simply listening to the great voices from the past .. or from holding them up… or even by worshiping them.
We get on the path by following them down it.
All these names that we recall, surely they were important in their time, without a doubt their message is important today, and yet, they did not change the world by themselves. The changes they helped to bring about, came about, because people allowed themselves to be inspired. Things changed because people, regular everyday people, like you and me, took a step from here, onto the path that leads to there.
You, and me, and our neighbors and friends, we are the ones who will make a difference in the world.
How we live our lives matters. It matters deeply.
You, and me, and our neighbors and friends, we can be the ones to inspire someone, who inspires someone, who inspires someone.
We can be like the nameless monk.
If we share a desire to spread justice and peace…
If we share a desire to end violence and suffering…
If this is our end… then our path is loving-kindness.
In the Buddhist tradition this teaching is called metta, M-E-T-T-A). Metta is a word from the ancient language Pali in which the Buddhist teachings were first recorded. Metta is usually translated as love or loving kindness. Metta means to hope for, and work for, the well-being of all.
We often get confused because the word love is used in so many different ways in our language and culture.
In her book titled Lovingkindness (page 18-19), American Buddhist teacher, Sharon Salzberg, explains the confusion.
In our culture, when we talk about love, we usually mean either passion or sentimentality. It is crucial to distinguish metta from both of these states. Passion is enmeshed with feelings of desire, of wanting or of owning and possessing. Passion gets entangled with needing things to be a certain way, with having our expectations met. The expectation of exchange that underlies most passion is both conditional and ultimately defeating: “I will love you as long as you behave in the following fifteen ways, or as long as you love me in return at least as much as I love you.” It is not a coincidence that the word passion derives from the Latin word for “suffering.” Wanting and expectation inevitably entail suffering.
Salzberg explains that metta is different. She continues:
By contrast, the spirit of metta is unconditional: open and unobstructed. … A friend may disappoint us; she may not meet our expectations, but we do not stop being a friend to her. We may in fact disappoint ourselves, may not meet our own expectations, but we do not cease to be a friend to ourselves.
Salzberg then turns her attention to the others area of confusion. She writes:
Sentimentality, the other mental state that masquerades as love, is really an ally of delusion. It is a facsimile of caring that limits itself only to experiences of pleasure. Like looking through the lens of a camera that has been smeared with a little Vaseline, sentimentality puts things into what is called “soft focus.” We cannot see the rough edges, the trouble spots, or the defects. Everything appears just too nice. Sentimentality finds pain unbearable and so rejects it.
Metta, Salzberg continues, is the practice of continual opening ourselves up. She tells us:
When we practice metta, we open continuously to the truth of our actual experience, changing our relationship to life. Metta—the sense of love that is not bound to desire, that does not have to pretend that things are other than the way they are—overcomes the illusion of separateness, of not being part of a whole. Thereby metta overcomes all of the states that accompany this fundamental error of separateness—fear, alienation, loneliness, and despair—all of the feelings of fragmentation. In place of these, the genuine realization of connectedness brings unification, confidence, and safety.
Some will say that this is a tall order.
Yes it is.
That is why we are here, and the world we wish to see is there.
The road between here and there is hard.
That is why, after millennia of human civilization, we are here, not there.
Yes, the road is hard. But as far as I can see it is the only way to get from here to there.
Remember King’s words:
In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again, we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
This is the message that we have received over and over again.
The words and deeds of prophetic women and men … challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil, yes, to confront them, with justice, compassion and the transforming power of love;
The end of loving-kindness – its goal and hopeful results – is the creation of the world we wish to see.
If we share a desire to spread justice and peace…
If we share a desire to end violence and suffering…
If this is our end… then our path is loving-kindness.
It is a tall order.
It is true the path is hard.
Sharon Salzberg gives us these words to encourage us on the path. She reminds us that beginning again in love is what we will need to do… beginning again over and over and over again. She writes:
Be patient with yourself in this practice, and try not to hold rigid expectation of what you should be experiencing. … When we have rigid expectations, we can feel a great sense of helplessness if those expectations are not quickly met. We see our actions as being fruitless, not going anywhere …. Remember that whatever anger, fear, or sorrow arises will pass away, and we can always return to the intention to care for ourselves and all beings. Beginning again and again is the actual practice, not a problem to overcome…
Loving-kindness is the high road. It is a hard road. Still, it is the road that has been pointed to by prophetic women and men for millennia.
It is a hard road and we will stumble on our way. But do not despair.
we can always return to the intention to care for ourselves and all beings. Beginning again and again is the actual practice, not a problem to overcome…
Beginning again and again. Every day, every moment, in love.
Please join me in a moment of silence.
(silence)
(PRAYER SLIDE – OPTIONAL)
I invite you now, if you will, to join me a spirit of prayer and meditation
Spirit of Peace, Source of our Greatest Understanding,
Fill us this day with reserves of love.
Reserves of love…
… that will sustain us in our most difficult days.
… that will call us back, again and again, to our best selves.
… that will lead us to travel the high road in our quest for freedom and justice and truth.
Spirit of Peace, Source of our Greatest Understanding,
Fill us this day with love… that we may be a blessing to the world.
Amen