Another quip has been making the rounds within our circles. It asks: "If religious oppression increased in our country, and UUs were arraigned for our spiritual thoughts and practices, would there be evidence enough of our faith for us to be convicted?"

It is a blessing to be able to laugh at ourselves, and like most caricatures, these carry an element of truth.

In reaction to the "otherworldliness" of some other religions, we have determined to be practical. But I think we often sacrifice opportunities for depth in our quest for "practical solutions." And we do sometimes fall into the habit of proclaiming freedom for its own sake.

I.

This time of great cultural transition challenges us, perhaps more than any other historical epoch, to question the depths of our faith. We have a renewed interest in what we are calling "spirituality."

This interest has motivated our Unitarian Universalist Association to offer our congregations an intensive exploratory program, entitled "Fulfilling the Promise," which invites us to re-vision ourselves and to write current mission statements. It also encourages us to re-covenant, that is, to reaffirm ourselves as a community which is more than an aggregate of independent individuals. (Incidentally, our committee on ministries is considering whether this program may be of special benefit to us in our two-year period of redefinition.)

The perennial religious question is prevalent on our minds, that is: "Upon what foundation may I ultimately depend? Upon what can I finally rely when my efforts fail?"

We UUs are committed to building a better world. The religious question arises relevantly for us in the form of: "How do we respond to our limited influence?" There are very few of us, I suspect, who have not, at one time or another, confronted it.

After a recent service, one member told me she had worked intensively for several years in Mountain Lakes, with a large group of people, for a historic preservation. It was on the verge of acceptance by the town. At the last minute, a small number of resisters inflamed people's fears, promoted false information against enactment, and the town's governing body capitulated. All of her work and that of a large group of people came to nothing.

Difficult times in our personal lives also challenge us to become more resourceful. When the times are tough, we must dig deeper.

II.

Some of us derive our ultimate source of strength from persons closest to us: our family, or our spouse, or our children. For me, such support is crucial, but it is not enough, for I know that my loved one may die before me. And we cannot always depend upon our children.

Others of us have rested our faith in the capacity of humankind to progress to a community of justice, care and love. We cannot guarantee success. And these days, we are confronted with doubts.

Some of us believe in the power of technology or of the Internet to save us. But technology seems a weaker and weaker candidate, and the Internet carries liabilities as well as blessings.

For me, nature has always been sustaining. In periods when I have felt hopeless, confused or isolated, I have reconnected to the natural world. Its vitality has always restored me.

But each year, the availability and quality of these natural places declines. Those that remain are losing their restorative quality because they are becoming more and more domesticated. Like most indigenous peoples, I also feel displaced from a sacred source in my life.

Many of us find sustaining power in this congregation, or the larger movement of which we are a part. It is important for us to celebrate together, to rejoice at new births, to honor lives at our memorial services, to celebrate marriages, and to support one another in our personal challenges and in our individual commitments for a better Earth. Our community provides us with an encouraging unity.

One Bill Donnelly, quoted in Roger Sanjeck's The Future of Us All, speaks bluntly about the power of community:

"All of life, every place, is the same thing -- trying to get people to see that we're all in the same damn thing together. I've been standing on the street corners and hollering for 50 years, and it doesn't amount to nothing. (But) let one (other) person (say), 'Yeah, we're in the same boat together,' then everyone says, 'Hot damn, we're in this same boat together. Let's get together and paddle this boat.' " [Community News, April 11, 1999]

We are, all of us, in this boat, paddling our way.

For many of us, the above sources of nurturance and meaning are sufficient for our lives, and we are in the process of deepening and enriching them. But many of us are exploring other roots as well.

III.

The majority of us have found our way to this community by stretching ourselves beyond cultural expectations and approved boundaries. UUs are made, not born, only about 10 percent of us growing up in a UU environment. (For those listening to this talk who are lifelong UUs, I hope you will also get something from it.) I suppose I am a fairly typical example of a "convert" to UUism.

I grew up in a conservative Southern family. My mother was a Scotch-Presbyterian, and my father was an Episcopalian who converted to Presbyterianism for the sake of the family. Our family was also segregationist, and quite conservative politically.

Without describing the various influences that contributed to my change, suffice it to say that during my college years, I began to question the perspectives of my upbringing.

Being quite conscientious, I made an appointment with my Presbyterian minister and explained to him that I must drop out. He told me that having been baptized, this was impossible, but that he could register me as inactive. I let him record me as extremely inactive, and I suppose that should nothing else work out, I could write this note on my application for Heaven.

But I was lonely as an isolated liberal in a college which, though outstanding in academics, was reflective of a provincial Southern culture.

I was overjoyed when I discovered Unitarianism. I began attending the Unitarian Church of Charlotte, N.C. The church opened a window to me, letting in the fresh air of exploration, and it arrayed before me a diversity of perspectives on life. In this sanctuary, I felt permitted to affirm myself truth, and to declare myself an agnostic, integrationist, socialist, and other despicable adjectives not befitting a Southern gentleman. I was no longer alone.

Our UU congregations encourage us to expand our horizons, and they open options. We familiarize ourselves with universalized experiences that have been tested over time. It is an extremely important step along the way of spiritual search for us to assimilate a range of experiences, so that we have perspective from which to judge what is right for ourselves.

Unfortunately, our exploration in breadth sometimes becomes our last step. If we remain content merely to indulge ourselves in a smorgasbord of religious cultures, but never embed ourselves in any one in particular, we confuse breadth with depth. Our initial exploration will become our limitation.

Another minister has written: "The problem with the cafeteria approach is that we often select only desserts and leave behind the nutrition that is harder to swallow." ... We may become mere "haphazard borrowers of other people's religions." [Susanne Meyer, CLF, Feb. 1999, Vol. LVI, No. 6]

We are not as versatile in encouraging diversity in depth as diversity in breadth. At some point we must, I think, settle down, come to one place and seek its highest heart.

IV.

UUism provides me with a methodology of reason, trust in my own experience, appreciation for life's large diversity. They are the instruments I use to search through humankind's religious and philosophical experience. These attitudes are my search engines, but these are not my sources.

I begin my exploration by accepting the experience of humankind as the instrument through which to determine what is true. In that sense, I am a humanist. But I don't want to measure the experience by the instrument.

For me, life is larger than my human experience. At the very least, it includes other life forms on Earth, animals and plants, and the biospheric functioning of Earth, which some call Gaia. The universe put us here, not the other way around, so I am willing to accept human perception as a starting line, but not as the finish. Perhaps I am a "cosmosist," because I want to view human experience from the vastest possible perspective.

At last I have centered into a practical form of "Earth-centered Buddhism." I am an "Earth-centered Buddhist Unitarian Universalist" -- an "E-CBUU"!

I remain a UU because I know I will never be able to fully grasp the experience of a particular perspective, or of an indigenous person, for that matter. I remain a UU Earth-centered Buddhist because I wish the freedom to roam around Buddhism and not be encased by some specific form, such as Tibetan, Zen or even the Vipassana which I now practice. I cherish the fact that I can utilize Buddhist meditation practices and at the same time draw inspiration from native peoples, and that I will gradually develop my beliefs, but this will never mean that I have to leave my UU home. I can change my religion without changing my church.

Whatever the tradition we explore, whether Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, or pagan or humanist traditions, we will want to separate the core from the surrounding presentation, the message from the media and the messenger from the message. Religions are forever mixing up the truths the messenger teaches with the messenger. Did Jesus really mean "No one comes to Heaven except by me" -- or "by what I am teaching"?

But at the same time, we want to get beyond the superficialities of various perspectives -- we need to incarnate the essence. To read a book on Buddhism is not to understand Buddhism. To visit a Southwestern Indian dance is not to fully appreciate what it means to be a Hopi. Abstract principles, no matter how noble, will rarely sustain us through physical calamities, through the loss of loved ones, through political oppression, through personal hurt. We must incorporate a practice or ideology into the guts of our being. In the terms of traditional Christianity, we must "make the Word flesh."

For this reason, it is helpful to explore matters of the spirit in intimate settings as well as in larger celebrations. One to one, or in small groups, we can listen to the immediate experiences of others, provide others with our insights, and most importantly, learn more about ourselves by listening to what we are saying as we are called upon to express our deeper resonances.

V.

Most of the traditional religions have recognized that we progress through steps toward spiritual deepening. Some have been extremely flexible in creating various orders uniquely tailored to the needs of individuals at different states of religious experience. Whereas many have dramatically failed at appreciating the variety of our paths, they may have outdone us in appreciating the steps of the journey.

We are all at different frontiers of religious experience. As we enter UUism, we will rejoice in our liberty of expression. But after a while, we may search for something deeper than the celebration of our freedom. Or perhaps some crisis in our lives will challenge our faith.

As we deepen our connection to the sources that sustain and enrich us, we will discover a wonderful blessing. We will find ourselves recognizing a diversity in depth that is more significant than that of breadth. We will discover that those of us who are at a similar depth will have more in common whatever our formulation, e.g., pagan, Buddhist, Christian, humanist, than people of one of these various expressions will have in common with each other when they are at divergent depths.

For example, humanists who are open-minded to the unknown and mystery of life will discover more in common with liberal theists, who are similarly open, than either will experience with their more literal peers. Pagans who are mindful of the depth of myths will find more in common with UU Christians who also appreciate the mystical.

We travel down different roads. And we are at different milestones on each. As we reach similar milestones, we will find we have even more in common. We have a lot to learn from one another. And one of our learnings is to learn about the meaning of diversity -- both horizontally and vertically.

Our journey is a grand adventure.

May we move along our chosen paths with all deliberate speed -- may I say "Godspeed" -- toward the place of wholeness, peace, courage and love ... the end of all our searching.

The sermon in a Unitarian Universalist setting is never the last word on any subject, but rather an invitation to further dialog.

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