Praise It! A Sermon Towards Gratitude

“Praise It” A Sermon Towards Gratitude

Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker 

November 17, 2013

First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh (PA) 

In her poem, entitled “Otherwise,” the poet Jane Kenyon reflects on her blessings. She writes:

“I got out of bed on two strong legs. It might have been otherwise.

I ate cereal, sweet milk, and ripe, flawless peach. It might have been otherwise.

 I took the dog uphill to the birch wood. All morning I did the work I love.

At noon I lay down with my mate. It might have been otherwise.

We ate dinner together at a table with silver candlesticks. It might have been otherwise.

I slept in a bed in a room with paintings on the walls, and planned another day just like this day.

 But one day, I know, it will be otherwise.”

Kenyon wrote this poem in 1993, upon hearing her husband, Donald Hall’s cancer diagnosis. Ironically, it was Kenyon, not Hall, who died a year later from a fierce and swift onslaught of leukemia. “Otherwise,” came unexpectedly, with the sunrise one day, with no regard for the silver candlesticks, the paintings, the Birchwood, the flawless peach.

Even so, Jane Kenyon continued to pen grateful verses.  Life became “otherwise,” yet, the poet rested in the grace of her days, as surely as she rested in the arms of her husband at midday. In a poem written during her decline, entitled  “Twilight: After Haying,” Kenyon reflects that:

“Yes, long shadows go out

From the bales; and yes, the soul

Must part from the body:

What else could it do?

These things happen . . .the soul's bliss

And suffering are bound together

Like the grasses . . .

The last, sweet exhalations

Of timothy and vetch

Go out with the song of the bird;

the ravaged field

Grows wet with dew.”

I’m awestruck and humbled by the attitude of gratitude expressed in Kenyon’s reverie. I’ll call it “Otherwise-wisdom, or “other-wisdom” for short.  In her, I recognize a strain of what my colleague, Gary Smith, calls “thankfulness, absolutely.” 

That’s what I’m selling this morning—“thankfulness, absolutely.” It’s a variety of praise that exists beyond entitlement, beyond judgment, beyond “Why ME?”  A challenge to be sure, in that, we’re asked to embrace praise as ideology and life practice, rather than as a response to individual life events…good, bad, or otherwise. 

Given the savagely competitive society we’ve created and in which we live, many of us are lured, quite seductively, into the attitude of gratitude by comparison. We imagine life could be better or that we are entitled to have more than we do. If we are abused, living without basic needs, oppressed, or unfulfilled in destructive ways, then I would agree that life could and should be better, or “otherwise.”

For the most part, though, we live mostly middle class lives. We’ve got lots of “stuff.” We are primarily a middle class religion. And, despite the liberalism we typically espouse as Unitarian Universalists, I fret that our consumerist society has brainwashed us, too, into thinking we can acquire happiness or virtues like gratitude with our “Capital One” Platinum cards. What’s in your wallet?

This equation employs a suspect thanksgiving theology, distinctly anti-Universalist, which we encounter, chapter-and-verse, throughout Scripture. It makes us good doobies for “thanking we all our God,” because He, (She or It) anoints us deservedly with plenty, while inexplicably, allowing so many others to waste away in genuine famine, economic injustice, or oppression. Before we know it, entitlement becomes embedded like a splinter in the soft tissue of our privileged lives. More than a few analysts have connected the dots, for example, between US aggression in the world and our seemingly endless consumption.

My colleague Peter Fleck explains thanksgiving by comparison this way. He says it’s a kind of “food chain” praise which points out that at least the person in the next hospital bed is sicker than I am. It’s the kind of thanks that, when we read about that missing 11-year-old, we run and hug our child. The type of gratefulness, that when we read the police blotter, we’re relieved that our name has stayed out of it for another week. This is the moment when we utter the prayer, “There but for the grace of God go I.”

Is this so bad? After all, I look out on a congregation touched by grief and by grace; illness, death, despair, frustration, malaise, as well as good health, success, vitality, new possibilities. Shouldn’t we be thankful that life hasn’t gone horribly “otherwise” on us?

I’d argue that “other-wisdom” is truly wise when the comparison remains within the Universe of one’s own life.  It isn’t “I’m better off than so-and-so,” but rather acknowledging down to the bone that “it might be otherwise” and, in response, praising rather than judging, and cultivating  “thankfulness, absolutely” in each moment.

It’s not: “Sally down the street got out of bed on two legs stronger than mine, and I resent that;” Or, “Jim across the hall is more fulfilled in his work than I and its just not fair.” (Even if these observations hold some measure of truth) We spend far too much time resenting what’s missing, clinging to our entitlement and notions of cosmic fairness.

To meet a person who embodies “pure” gratitude is rare, isn’t it? Many folks  (and even felines like Mr. Pusskin from our children’s story this morning) don't truly appreciate what they have until it is gone. For some, having lost the opportunity to praise, they simply find another reason to be judgmental. 

With “other-wisdom” you’re better able to develop and maintain perspective; as in, “my life offers me some blessings, flawed as it is. At least for today, I have a ripe peach for my cereal, OR perhaps two strong legs, OR work that fulfills me,” OR some combination of these blessings. Other-wisdom” preaches that although things are not perfect in my own life, I am still grateful for what I have, what I can do. This praise practice can right-size your ambitions down to human scale. Tom Owen-Towle tells of a youngster who explained to him that “the seven wonders of the world are to touch and to taste and to see and to hear…and then to run and to laugh and to love.” Tom writes: “Now there’s a girl already awash with life’s palpable joy and splendor.”

To help us  grown-ups recover this simple gratitude, Greg Krech, a Zen Buddhist teacher, asks us to pursue a praise practice in three parts: Notice, Reflect, and Express. He observes, “The more I think I've earned something or deserve something, the less likely I am to feel grateful for it.”

“As long as I think I'm entitled to something I won't consider it a gift. But when I am humbled by my own mistakes or limitations, I am more likely to receive what I am given with gratitude and a true sense of appreciation for the giver as well as the gift.”Krech explains that, “To experience a sense of heartfelt gratitude, you must develop a practice. Without practice, there is no development of skill - only an idea. You cannot become a grateful person just by thinking that you want to be grateful.

Rather, we can develop a new habit of attention – to notice the concrete ways in which the world supports us each day. Then, we can embody a new habit of praise– expressing our gratitude to others. According to research, an added benefit of praising, by the way, is better health, better relationships, and a higher degree of life satisfaction.

So, will you start your practice today to Notice, Reflect, and  Express? Will you  praise it?

Of course, I want life to be blessed for each and every one of us gathered here in this Sanctuary, but I have no way of knowing what that might look like in real time, and neither do you.  In an Arlo and Janis comic strip, Arlo admits:  “I’m not thankful the azalea died...I’m not thankful for the interest we pay on our credit card. For everything else, I’m thankful!” “That was a strange sort of blessing,” says Janis.  To which Arlo responds, “Well, I figured it’d be a heck of a lot faster that way!” 

Is it realistic to expect Arlo to feel grateful for his dead azaleas? Of course not. Yet, he’s got it partially right. This human, finite existence is a package deal. The challenge resides in cultivating “other-wisdom,” thankfulness absolutely, and perspective, come what may. So, will you praise it?

Meg Barnhouse gives us a glimpse of this, too, in her amusing reflection that we heard earlier. I love her ideas for fortune cookies such as “Don’t try to improve yourself today” and “ Seven people love you madly,” and “They appreciate what you did,” and “You will see three beautiful things tomorrow,” and “You will figure something out two days from now.”  Oh, and my personal favorite: “The next two years are just for fun!”

I join in the chorus of her invitation that “together we can whisper peachy little perspective shifters into one another’s days. And I share her anticipation of the twinkle that might light up your eye as a result of elevating praise over judgment.

Have I mentioned yet how exceptionally hard it is to accomplish this Zen-like gratefulness? Oh, well let me do that right now. It’s tough!  Very tough. To be clear, I’m not suggested that we shouldn’t desire any adaptations in our lives. No suffering martyrs need apply.

What concerns me is when the script goes haywire and our lives veer off in unscripted directions, and we cry foul. Azaleas die on us. People die on us, too. Us! Characters we hadn’t anticipated enter stage left, while scenery from some zombie movie drops down behind us.

Being a good person is no guarantee. Just look around you. We are good people touched by triumphs and tragedies. Circumstances could certainly be “otherwise” in many of our lives, and we needn’t relish everything that happens to us. That would be impossible, and would require living entirely without ego, emotion, desire, or attachment to others.

In response, we can endeavor to Notice, Reflect and Express, mindful that the spiritual practice of praise is quietly pro-active, beyond either whining or boasting.  As we witness and experience life as co-creators on the planet, we are called again and again to acknowledge the amazing mix of pain and joy. The personal becomes the universal, and we perceive ourselves as part of a bigger picture beyond our own disappointments.

We might awaken to the connection between the despair in our individual lives and the larger suffering in the world in places like the Philippines or Haiti or in the next pew, or just a mile or so away in some of our more disadvantaged Pittsburgh neighborhoods. This recognition alone may blunt judgment and foster deeper gratitude. So, will you praise it?

Sometimes all we need is the right question to shift our perspective. My colleague Tom Disrud recounts a story about the writer Sue Bender and her husband.  In their early 60s,  they decided they needed to get their financial affairs in order and write a will and establish a living trust for their sons. They meet with a lawyer one bright November morning, and he asks them, "What would you like to do in case there’s an exploding turkey?" 

"Exploding turkey?" Bender asks. The lawyer continues: “What if the whole family was together at Thanksgiving and the turkey exploded? If the four of you were killed at that moment, who would you want to have your worldly goods?"

“At first, the question was a little unsettling and surreal for her. Perhaps it was the image of the bird blowing up in their dining room. But it later turned out to be quite fruitful. She writes that it made her think about what was most precious to her.  She writes that now, when she has a particularly difficult day, she makes what she calls a gratitude list. She writes down all those things she has been thankful for that day.” Naturally, I don’t wish for any of us to experience exploding turkeys two Thursdays hence, but I do hope we encounter surprises. A life of praise comes with intentionality and awareness.” 

Shakespeare put these words in the mouth of Henry IV: “O Lord, that lends me life, lend me a heart replete with thankfulness.” Shakespeare’s God is a Universal, life-giving God, who equates thankfulness with simply being alive.

 For all that is your life, will you unwrap a fortune cookie of “thankfulness, absolutely?” Fully aware that “it might be otherwise,” will you paint a thank you note on your palm -- for the Cannon towels, the two strong legs,  the respite at noontime, for the kettle boiling over, the chapel of eggs, the ravaged field grown wet with dew, the air-drying wishbone on Thanksgiving Eve?

“You will see three beautiful things tomorrow. “ Remember to notice, reflect, and express, and then utter that one all-purpose prayer from the depths of a grateful, hungering heart: “Thank you, thank you, thank you, for lending me this life… good, bad, or otherwise.”

So, will you praise it, and say “Amen?”

© 2013.  The Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker. All rights reserved.  The Rev. Zucker  and cited authors may be quoted with proper attribution.

We Are All Cracked Pots...and That's the Beauty of It.

On November 3, Hindus the world over will begin the annual celebration of Diwali, the festival of lights. Diwali involves the lighting of small clay lamps filled with oil to signify the triumph of good over evil. These lamps are kept on during the night and one's house is cleaned, both done in order to make Lakshmi, the goddess of abundance, feel welcome. Firecrackers are burst because it is believed that it drives away evil spirits. During Diwali, all the celebrants wear new clothes and share sweets and snacks with family members and friends. In honor of Diwali, I offer this Fable from India: 

A water bearer had two large pots, each hung on either end of a pole that he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it, and while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water at the end of the long walk from the stream to the house, the cracked pot arrived only half full.  

For a full two years this went on daily, with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments, perfect to the purpose for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.

After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the water bearer one day by the stream. "I am ashamed of myself, and I want to apologize to you." "Why?" asked the bearer. "What are you ashamed of?" "I have been able, for these past two years, to deliver only half my load because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to the house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work, and you don't get full value from your efforts," said the pot.

  The water bearer felt sorry for the old cracked pot, and in his compassion he said, "As we return to the house, I want you to notice the beautiful flowers along the path. "Indeed, as they went up the hill, the old cracked pot took notice of the sun warming the beautiful wild flowers on the side of the path, and this cheered it some. But at the end of the trail, it still felt bad because it had leaked out half its load, and so again the pot apologized to the bearer for its failure. 

     The bearer said to the pot, "Did you notice that there were flowers only on your side of your path, but not on the other pot's side? That's because I have always known about your flaw, and I took advantage of it. I planted flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back from the stream, you've watered them. For two years I have been able to pick these beautiful flowers to decorate my table. Without you being just the way you are, we would not have this beauty to grace our home."  Here ends the fable.

As we enter into the American holiday season, as well, please try to remember that each of us has our own unique flaws. We're all cracked pots. Don't be afraid of your flaws or unforgiving of the flaws you see in others. Acknowledge them, and you too can be the cause of beauty. Know that in our vulnerability we might find our strength, and we can drive away  dark impulses by lighting lamps of self-care, self-love, gratitude and empathy for others. Happy Diwali, and may the spirit of Lakshmi visit you and bless you and yours with abundance. 

In faith,

Rev. Robin

The Answer is "Everything" - a sermon to celebrate a meaningful birthday, creative aging and embracing the 3rd Act with courage and optimism.

The cake we shared after the service on April 7..with purple forks.

The Answer is “Everything!”

Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker

First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh

April 7, 2013

There was a woman named Helen who had been diagnosed with cancer and had been given 3 months to live. Her Doctor told her to start making preparations to die.  So she contacted her pastor and had him come to her house to discuss certain aspects of her final wishes. She told him which songs she wanted sung at the service, what Scriptures she would like read, and what she wanted to be wearing.   The woman also told her pastor that she wanted to be buried with her   favorite bible. Everything was in order and the pastor was preparing to leave when the woman suddenly remembered something very important to her.

"There's one more thing,” she said excitedly.

"What's that?" came the pastor's reply.

"This is very important." The woman continued. "I want to be buried with a fork in my right hand."

The pastor stood looking at the woman not knowing quite what to say.

"That shocks you doesn't it?" The woman asked.

"Well, to be honest, I'm puzzled by the request," said the pastor.

The woman explained. "In all my years of attending church socials and functions where food was involved, my favorite part was when whoever was clearing away the dishes of the main course would lean over and say 'you can keep your fork.'  It was my favorite part because I knew that something better was coming.  When they told me to keep my fork, I knew that something great was about to be given to me. It wasn't Jell-O or pudding. You didn’t need a fork for that! It was chocolate cake or cherry pie. Something with substance. So I just want people to see me there in that casket with a fork in my hand and I want them to wonder 'What's with the fork?'  Then I want you to tell them: 'Be hopeful. Something better is coming, so keep your fork too."'

The pastor's eyes were welled up with tears of joy as he hugged the woman  good-bye. He knew this would be one of the last times he would see her   before her death. But he also knew that Helen had a better grasp of life’s blessings than he did. She KNEW that something better was coming.

At the funeral people were walking by the woman's casket and they saw the pretty blue dress she was wearing and her favorite bible and the fork placed in her right hand. Over and over the pastor heard the question "What's with the fork?" And over and over he smiled. During the eulogy, the pastor told the people of the conversation he had with Helen shortly before she died. He also told them about the fork and about what it symbolized to her. The pastor told the people how he could not stop thinking about the fork and told them that they probably would not be able to stop thinking about it either. He said, “Keep your fork, and let it remind you oh so gently of Helen and that something good is surely coming.”

I love that story, and Helen, well, she is a great role model, isn’t she? This woman, facing death but embracing possibility, absolutely epitomizes optimism and faith. As a group, we Unitarian Universalists may not share Helen’s theology or her view of the afterlife, but like her, we are hopeful people.  And, in our midst, we have so many wonderful role models of strength and graceful, creative aging - remarkable women like Gen Mann and Christine Michaels, who shared their reflections about creative aging with us this morning.

These women are what I would call grounded optimists, and most of the time I am one, too - a real dyed-in-the-wool, half-full glass, triple layer-cake kind of gal.   That’s probably why I ended up becoming a Unitarian Universalist because this liberal faith of ours is essentially an optimistic faith. My message this morning is one of hope and optimism. Of course, it would be irresponsible of me to suggest that life; a truly human life is an either/or proposition. It isn't. Our lives and this world are composed of good news and bad news, controllable and uncontrollable forces, and a perfect life is an oxymoron.

Our human predicament is a little like this infamous lost cat ad found in England and posted on the Internet that I shared last January when I preached about perfectionism. It reads, "Lost cat -- old, mangy, one-eyed, limped, neutered, crippled. Answers to the name: "Lucky."  Life can be so like that. One day, it’s raining on our parade and the next, we've experienced a moment of splendor and a break in the clouds.  It's unpredictable -- triumph and tragedy, joy and sorrow, suffering and renewal.

I haven’t always been able to see or believe in life’s silver lining. In 1986, when I was 29, my vivacious lovely mother, Flora, died at age 55. It was heartbreaking and confusing to watch her suffer and deteriorate from a non-operable brain tumor. She had been looking forward to her own third act…becoming an interior decorator and adoring future grandchildren. Since then, I’ve come to realize how ill equipped I was, in so many ways, to cope with the magnitude of this loss.

Despite the many exceptional older women role models I’ve encountered these past 26 years, the one I lacked was the very one that could enable me to envision my own third act -- my own mother. Over the years, no matter how I tried, I simply could not picture myself as a woman beyond age 55. A friend suggested I have an age progression photo of myself done. I passed on that, but it was tempting. Anything to catch a glimpse of myself, silver-haired and etched with wisdom and a life fully lived; posing with grandchildren at high school graduations.

Then something stunning happened. I was enjoying a glass of wine after conducting a wedding in November 2010. It was the last wedding in a long season of weddings during which I had eaten my weight in hors d’ouevres.  My voice was raggedy and hoarse as I shared my weariness with an older guest seated at my table. 

She looked at me warmly with sparkling blue eyes and said, ”You need to take care of yourself, Reverend. You are going to live a long time.” I was dumbstruck. “How do you know that?,” I asked quietly. “Well, because I do,” she replied, her graceful smile framed by shiny silver hair. “Take care of yourself, you’re going to live a long time.”

This encounter caused me to examine how little confidence I had had in my longevity, and the ways that had impacted my daily wrestle match with life - How controlling I could be, how frantic I felt at time to get things accomplished, to see my children through milestones, to sustain normalcy.

I would hold my breath waiting for results from annual physicals and mammograms. At times, I worried that I was cursed and destined to repeat my mother’s karma.  I had trouble planning for old age because I didn’t have any tangible sense of it. Some days it felt like I was just tearing pages off a calendar in some doomsday countdown.

In 2011, I grew tired of this cycle. I made the decision to set a new course and embark on a new road, and I moved here, home to Pittsburgh.  Then, in April of 2012, I turned 55, the same age as my mother when she passed.  How could this be? It made no sense. I feel so young, so full of life. How could she have died at this age? I went to visit her grave on my birthday and read the inscription we had chosen: “Beautiful and Noble spirit” and the tragedy of her early demise took on a new dimension.

Later that day, I was out walking my dog, Kip, and  feeling a familiar  malaise  again – the old fear, the belief that the future had no shape and was too flimsy to grasp. And the question came to me, somewhat self-pitying, given all my relative blessings, “What can I look forward to?” The toxic chatterbox in my head was stirring up trouble again. “Nothing,” she sneered.  The loop began - I’m not partnered, I’m not sure what will happen in my ministry or career.  Really, what can I look forward to?” “Nothing.”

As I ambled along Mifflin Ave, crocuses were popping up through the spring soil, and a different voice (perhaps the voice of the wise wedding guest or the voice of my mother)  broke through the gremlin’s drone and said softly, “Everything, Robin. You can look forward to everything, if you choose to. Looking forward is a choice. Being willing to look forward to everything, come what may, is a decision that is open to you now, Robin.  The answer is “Everything.”

And it was like the sun had come out in my soul. I believed in that moment  that I was not my mother, that I was going to live a long time and that I had a choice. So I made it -- I would look up, look out, and look forward. We all throw around the idea of epiphanies and revelations - this felt like the real deal.

Buddha famously advised: “You must let go of the life you planned in order to embrace the life awaiting you.” That day, my 55^th birthday,  I loosened my death grip on mortality, and the future I had yearned has come to nestle in the open palm of my hand.

I am healthy, fit and feel more peaceful than I have ever felt. My children are functioning and happy.  My ministry here has flourished and grown. I cannot imagine my life without you, dear congregation. And, I met Michael, my beloved partner and we are envisioning an active, connected and vibrant future together.  The answer is “Everything.”

On April 18^th (in 11 days) I will turn 56. It seems like a small miracle to me. Through the dark days of aimlessness, I kept my fork and I’m so glad I did , as there will be cake, not just in coffee hour after the service (chocolate, by the way), but in all the quiet moments of grace, bright moments of joy and even in the dim moments of sorrow. The answer is “Everything.”

Our former UU president, Paul Carnes, echoes this view. "Life is so great a blessing,” he tells us, "that every tomorrow we project, every time we aspire or dream, every time we set our alarm clock in faith that the sun will set to rise again, we bear witness to our optimism." Every time we keep our fork, in other words, we "practice a resurrection" of sorts as we rise again and again in hopefulness.

Not surprisingly, it turns out that the key to staying healthy and living longer is attitude, essentially deciding you are not old and decrepit (despite any evidence to the contrary).  I’m not even sure what it even means to be old anymore. The humorist Bill Guest says you’ll know you’re old when, among other things, you wear a nametag as much or yourself as for others and happy hour is a nap.

Nevertheless, in an article for the Chicago Sun Times, Alexia Ruiz, quips that those of us lucky enough to grow old must contend with miserable stereotypes of what its like: the frailty, the forgetfulness and the early bird specials.”  Yet, in aging, as in many things, attitude can make all the difference and has a greater impact on health, happiness, and longevity than the date on our birth certificates. In a study at Harvard, psychologist Ellen Langer found that expectation, not biology, leads many older people to set physical and intellectual limits on themselves. Langer concluded: “They assume they’ll fall apart, so they let it happen. They pull the plug on learning, growing, deepening, and connecting. Decline becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

Through her research, Langer learned that men and women over 50 with more positive perceptions of aging, who are more willingness to accept the inevitability of aging (without denial), live nearly 8 years longer than those with negative attitudes. It turns out that faith, meditation, and belonging to a religious community like First Unitarian can lead to a longer and more fulfilling life, too – so stick around.  Langer writes: “The misery myth is one of the most pernicious myths, because when you think the future is really bleak you don’t plan. But when you think, ‘I’m going to be the coolest 80 year old who launches a line of hip clothing for old people, there is so much possibility.”

These findings conjure a memory of an elderly woman I came to admire in a previous ministry named Thelma. She was often known to proclaim, "This has been a perfect day!" It was her trademark phrase, even though she was nearly blind and crippled with arthritis. She used to say that all she needed was “a pinky full of hope.” In her case, a gnarled and throbbing pinky…but so much hope, faith and simple gratitude in that one small digit. 

Both Helen and Thelma would tell you that there is cake in all of it, all of life, even the hard parts. And neither of them would fib about death, either, because they accept that life is finite. Many forces in Western cultures have conditioned us to be afraid of this, to fear aging. We joke that 50 is the new 35, and although this may be truer than in previous generations, it will not stave off an eventual end time. 

We are poised, you and me, between then inevitable and the possible. And there is an alternative to fear and loathing – it’s using our finitude as a spur to live with courage and optimism, rather than with dread. To drink from a half-full glass. To proceed with what the theologian Paul Tillich calls "the courage to be" in the face of our finitude. To push life out of our inner tombs of pain, fear,  and disappointment.  To answer “Everything” to the question of what life might offer you or teach you.

I stand here, looking out on a congregation of people who have had their share of glories and regrets. Oh, I have too, and I ask myself: Would I live the same life? Do I have a do-over option? No.  Will the future be a proverbial bowl of cherries? Unlikely. No,  I am not looking forward to creaky limbs, forgetfulness, or gravity. But, in 11 days  I will be 56 (just sayin’)  and I am not going to wait until I’m 80 to don my purple hat to go out and have fun with the world.  As I approach this milestone birthday, I’m  elated to have what the actress Laura Linney calls “the privilege of aging.” And in some ways, I will be living this miraculous third act for two, for all the years, the decades, my mom never got. 

How about you? Can you answer “Everything” to some part of the future you have doubted or feared? None of us knows the future, yet we can only be open to it and bring our inherent UU optimism into that future, if we are not afraid of it's ugliness or unpredictability; and if we are not too cynical about its potential. Ironically, the story is often told that when we get to the gates of heaven, St. Peter will ask not what we hope for in the next life but whether we have lived this one to the fullest.

Along with Thelma and Helen, Christine and Gen, I encourage you to live and age as fully and creatively as possible, fork in one hand, half-full glass in the other, prepared for the worst, yet seeking the best; holding on to what is good without ignoring the heartbreak.

So,  keep your fork, even though we struggle some days to get out of bed. Keep your fork, even if you’re down to a pinky full of hope, and what is good often feels like its slipping through your fingers. Keep your fork even though optimists like Thelma and Helen die, too. Keep your fork and live your own “Everything” in this weary, wonderful world.

It has been said that "If a person gives up hope he has entered the gates of Hell, whether he knows it or not, and has left behind his own humanity."  So, keep your fork close at hand, and when people ask, “What’s with the fork?” tell them (and yourself): “I’m leaving room for cake.”

Amen.

© 2013 Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker. May be quoted with proper attribution to author and sources.

Do You Know the Way to Light? A sermon about enlightenment for Divali

Do You Know the Way to Light?

A sermon about Enlightenment for Divali 

Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker

First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh

October 28, 2012

Some time back, I clipped a cartoon from the New Yorker magazine for my fridge showing two bald, robed yogis sitting lotus-style in an ashram (or spiritual retreat) under the watchful eyes of a Shiva statue. One is turned to the other, saying: “I’d read so much about it beforehand that I couldn’t help being disappointed when I actually became enlightened!” 

Of course, the ironic humor of the cartoon resides in the unlikely notion that anyone who had genuinely achieved enlightenment would remain so earthbound and cerebral as to be disappointed about anything!

For the most part, religions do hold out some possibility of enlightenment, and you needn’t don robes, and sit on a cushion in a mountain cave to get a taste of it. To “enlighten”  or “to shed spiritual light upon”  represents the central purpose of religion in the first place. And Hinduism, the religion we are exploring together this morning, is no exception. In fact, the pursuit of light, the immersion in one’s inner light, and the Hindu festival Divali, the annual celebration signifying the journey away from spiritual darkness, typify this illuminating religion – colorful, wise, peaceful, mythic, and accessible, especially for us religiously open-minded, mystically-inclined Unitarian Universalists.

Hinduism is an ancient religion, with its roots in India. Scripture includes the sacred wisdom texts known as the Vedas; the Hindu devotional classic, the Bhagavad Gita, and a collection of spiritual dialogues known as The Upanishads.  As my Harvard professor Diana Eck explains, “Hinduism embodies a rich sense of plurality saturated by a Oneness in the one Supreme Being, Brahmin.” 

It is a polytheistic faith, in which adherents can worship or undertake a devotion practice (or puja) to more than 330 million Gods and Goddesses, each embodying different legends and a particular desirable attribute. Some of these deities are more prominent than others (and we find several of them on our special Divali altar this morning).  For instance, Lakshmi, the primary focus of the Divali celebration, represents prosperity. Ganesha, the elephant God, represents wisdom, Kali signifies strength, and Saraswathi is the goddess of knowledge.

During Divali, celebrants offer puja (or prayer) in honor of a favored Deity. Houses all over India twinkle, as families eat special foods, exchange gifts, and set off fireworks.  Rows of wicks within diye, clay lamps filled with mustard oil, light the way to welcome the Hindu god Rama, who returned thousands of years ago to reclaim his kingdom after 14 years in exile.

            It’s been said of Unitarian Universalists, not inaccurately  – “if you’ve met one…well, you’ve met one!”  The same can be claimed, even more emphatically, of Hindus.  They are not all like Mahatma Gandhi, or Deepak Chopra, or a Bollywood movie star; nor do they all resemble TV’s Apu, the Hindu Quik-e-Mart owner on The Simpsons, and devotee of the elephant Diety Ganesha, who admonishes the irreverent Homer Simpson to “stop feeding peanuts to my God!”

If you were to ask a Hindu the central question of this sermon: “Do you know the way to light,”  she would explain that the answer will be given in two parts.

First, she may suggest you alter the question to make it plural. Do you know the ways to light? Hinduism contends that there are many paths to the summit; “many strings in the lute,” as the poet Tagore tells us.

The great Hindu swami, Vivekananda, who helped introduce his relatively exotic tradition to America at the 1883 World Parliament of Religions, once remarked that “truth is a pathless land. ”  This suggests  (at least from my perspective) that truth itself exists beyond or outside of a single chosen path, while the paths themselves, practiced faithfully, also represent vehicles of truth leading to greater spiritual depth, self understanding, perhaps,  even enlightenment, as known as liberation (or moksha).

The Transcendentalist movement in the mid 19^th c within Unitarian Universalism was strongly influenced by the spiritual foundations of Hinduism.  In Henry David Thoreau’s classic, Walden, the author writes: “In the morning, I bathed my intellect in the stupendous and cosmo-gonal philosophy of the Bhagvat-Geeta..in comparison with which our modern world and its literature seem puny and trivial.” He notes quite poetically that “The pure Walden water is mingled with the sacred water of the Ganges.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson learned about Hinduism from his formidable aunt, Mary Moody Emerson, and by the 1820’s, he was writing about India in his journals.  He  obtained copies of the Bhagavad Gita in the 1830’s and began publishing excerpts from the “Ethical Scriptures” in The Dial, the journal of the transcendentalist circle.

“Unitarians were increasingly drawn to India’s religious ideas: its insistence on the oneness of the divine, the presence of the sacred in all existence, and Hinduism’s capacity to point to the transcendent unity of diverse paths and ways.” (Diana Eck) We hear the resonant strum of Hinduism’s lute strings in Emerson’s definitive transcendentalist essay entitled, “The Over-Soul.” He writes: “Meantime within man is the soul of the whole [Hinduism’s Atman]; the wise silence; the universal beauty, to which every part and particle is equally related; the eternal ONE. “ [Hinduism’s Brahman].

Ralph Waldo and Henry David understood that the second part of the answer to our central question: Do you know the way to light? is a brief two-word response: Inquire Within.

Like all religiously authentic people, Hindus are expected to take their religion off the shelf and personalize it through dynamic actual existence, to find keys to their own enlightenment through spiritual practice, devotion, and discipline. One must walk the talk, or find oneself walking and talking and stumbling and learning through as many cycles of incarnations (or samsara) as needed on this earth to work out one’s karma (that is, deeds from past lifetimes).

There is no golden ticket to punch.  Lakshmi  isn’t going to drop prosperity into the lap of any devotee. Through mindfulness and practice, the devotee must discover enlightened ways to bring more prosperity into his or her own life. Perhaps by practicing what Buddhists call enlightened self interest – an act which benefits both the individual and the community.

Yoga, a spiritual practice connected explicitly to Hinduism, and which I practice myself, is anything but newfangled. Evidence of yoga postures were found on artifacts that date back to 3000 B.C. as well as in the oldest-existing sacred Hindu text, the Rig-Veda.

The word, “yoga”  actually means “to yoke with the divine,”  not “to cripple oneself trying to bend in half like one’s far-more-experienced and limber teacher!”

Physical forms of Yoga have gained enormous popularity in the West, and sadly, have been corrupted by some teachers and schools, becoming competitive and hard-edged. I mean, “Boot camp Yoga” - do I detect a disconnect there?

Yet, Yoga is not just physical asanas. Devotees also practice jnana, yoga of the intellect; bhakti, which centers on the heart, karma yoga (the only most closely associated with Gandhi) which motivates right action, or “the way of works,”  and, raja yoga offers a path to God through experimentation on the Self. 

True yoga must be taken off the mat and into the world! Sweat all you want, bend and balance, and practice and breathe…but  by all means, bring some raja and some bhakti to your effort; inquire Within. Otherwise, it’s just a fitness class with an exotic twist.

Through yoga or another chosen dedicated practice of meditation and self-knowledge, we can awaken, by realizing that Atman, the pure soul within each person, and Brahman, the Ultimate cosmic reality, are one.  The light of the Universe shines within us, through us, and around us. We each shimmer like a knot in Indra’s fabled cosmic net.

Do you know the way to light? Inquire Within.

One of the aspects of Hindu teaching  I most savor is the use of wisdom tales and riddles, often with some amusement or a twist, to illustrate concepts as complex as enlightenment.

In the classic Hindu wisdom tale , Tat Tvam Asi, a seeker went to a great master, a renowned yogi.  Bowing reverentially in the traditional manner he said: “O master, I seek enlightenment, please initiate and teach me so that I may attain That!” The master replied in a kindly manner: “Certainly my son, tat tvam asi, which is Sanskrit for You are That.” The master continues: “The divine Self lives within you. Meditate on that Self, know that Self, merge in that Self, realise that Self!” The seeker was disappointed. “O master, I know all that already. Why, that very teaching was featured in this month’s Yoga Journal. Please give me the secret teachings, I want the real stuff!”

The master said: That is all I know. That is my entire teaching I have no secrets. There is nothing that I have not given you. However, if you are not satisfied, you can go down the road to the next swami’s ashram and see if he has something more suitable for you.” The seeker approached the other guru and said: “O master, I seek enlightenment, please give me the initiation and your most secret teaching so that I may attain That!” The guru said: “I do not give my teachings so easily. You must earn them. You must do sadhana, spiritual practice. If you are sincere then you can stay here and work for 12 years. Only in this way will you earn my initiation.”

The seeker was delighted: “That’s just what I wanted. That is real spiritual life, real sadhana. I’ll begin at once.” The guru assigned him the job of shovelling buffalo dung in the back paddock. The years went by. Each day as he shovelled the dung the seeker dreamt of his future enlightenment. He ticked the passing days and months off his calendar.

Finally 12 years were up; the great day arrived. He approached the guru with hands folded palm to palm. “O my guru, I have served you faithfully for 12 years. I request your teachings and initiation as you have promised. Please bestow your grace upon me.” The guru said: “My son, you have served me well. You truly deserve my teaching. Here it is: “Tat tvam asi. You are That, the divine Self lives within you. Meditate on that Self, know that Self, merge in that Self, realise that Self!”

The seeker became enraged. “What! Is that all? The guru up the road gave me that the first time I met him and I didn’t have to shovel buffalo dung for him for 12 years!”
 “Well,” said the guru. “That was your decision, but the truth hasn’t changed in 12 years.”   

Do you know the way to light? Inquire Within.

This tale strikes a particularly resonant chord for me because just about 12 years ago, I purchased tickets to hear a talk given by the Dalai Lama at MIT. He had been there at a symposium on science and religion ( a fascination of his, I understand).

When he came onstage, people went wild –“Elvis is in the house” wild! He sat in a chair and his feet dangled off the ground. He was like a large happy child in orange and red robes in an oversized Lazy-Boy. Gosh – why are these spiritual teachers always so much smaller in stature than the imposing figures we imagine them to be?

The format was Q&A and the questions began about how a seeker could achieve enlightenment. The Dalai Lama would listen and smile; a reverent silence  would pervade. Wait for it, he’s going to say something earth-shatteringly wise! “I don’t know, but that is a very good question,” replied the Lama, over and over again,  to more questions than not. In essence, the Lama was teaching us:  Inquire Within. Or as the Buddha himself revealed: I am not the moon. I am just another finger pointing at the moon.

A special form of smugness can pervade assemblies such as this  – one can practically smell the aroma of “I’m already more enlightened than the average Joe because I was wise and spiritual enough to purchase this ticket.”

Let me tell you - I thought there might be a collective meltdown in the room. People were annoyed. I paid 100 plus dollars for this!? Who made you a Lama anyway? I could sense how hard folks were trying to keep the serene “I belong here” expressions on their faces. It was squirmy and awkward, but the memory reminds me to check my projections about gurus, stay in the moment, inquire within.

Earlier this month, I traveled to Washington DC to hear the contemporary spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle speak at the Warner Theater.  I admire him. He is deservedly popular, in my opinion,  and some of you may be familiar with his books. The event was advertised as “an evening of presence with Eckhart Tolle,”  so I suspected he would share his valuable insights about the egoic mind and the pain body and the enlightened moment  somewhat more off-the-cuff than his very smooth and accessible CDs.

When Tolle entered the stage from the wings, I sensed some surprise among the crowd that he was not more debonair. There he was, quite hunched over and diminutive, not especially GQ in his attire; the quintessential philosophy wonk.

His talk was extemporaneous and occasionally even a wee bit rambling, punctuated by an unexpected goofy little laugh. In pockets around the theater, I could feel frustration, impatience, a “get on with it, and tell me the secret” vibe. Tolle kept on. Some folks began checking their text messages, others fell asleep, while others stayed with him, as best they could, in the presence of the moment.

Was it life-changing? No. Was the experience yet another opportunity to seek stillness in the moment, the only reality I’m actually experiencing anyway, the only place I could possibly wake up and find even a shred of enlightenment?  Yes. So, the event delivered as advertised. 

Maybe you feel impatient or even agitated listening to this sermon, right now, in this moment, the only reality you actually experiencing. When is she going to tell us the secret? Maybe you are already wondering if there will be cookies at coffee hour today or if you’ll be able to follow the confusing repeats in the hymn we’ll be singing when I’m finished.

Do I know the way to your light? I have some ideas and resources to share, just like Tolle. But I say, yet again: Inquire Within. Whenever I sense in others a zeal to  line up behind me so they can “follow” me on the path, I tell them clearly: I am just another finger pointing at the moon. I am not your light. However, as your minister, I will stand here on the edge of the path and shine a flashlight down upon it, so that you might not trip quite so much along the way.”

In a nutshell: If a teacher, a minister, a therapist, anybody, tells you they have the secret password to your enlightenment, I suggest you strap on your sandals and head to the next village. Charlatans abound in the world of spiritual growth and even renowned teachers, roshis, yogis, ministers, and gurus have lost their way, been seduced by adoration, and fallen from grace believing they are the moon and not the finger pointing at it. 

When I lose my own way and find myself in a dark corner, when I fall out of the moment, I follow my own counsel, and I inquire within, reminding myself that I am not my self-defeating thoughts or emotions, my “egoic mind” or my “pain body”  -- I am the person aware of them.

Eckhart Tolle would call this a moment of clarity and consciousness. As best I can, illuminated at times by just a sliver of light, I stumble back to the present moment, the only reality I am experiencing anyway, the only place I could possibly wake up to any semblance of enlightenment.

By inquiring within we are reminded, through the richness and beauty of spiritual practices, including those found in Hinduism, how glorious yet limited we humans truly are; how forming some connection to the sacred enriches us; that we are flawed, yet improvable, through the practices of mind, heart, hand, and spirit.

We may awaken to an awareness that enlightenment is found in those moments of Being, the admission that we are not enlightened, and in some devotion to growth. We may find that in the open arms of Hinduism’s plurality,  we’re better able to recognize the arrogant Western preoccupation with exclusivist religions -- the ones which extol bigger, better, best; one-size-fits-all, one way to the Light, or be damned!

We may discover, yet again, that the way to light, be it through Unitarian Universalism or Hinduism, or any other legitimate path, requires intention in both our action and our stillness. 

Hear these words from Hindu sage Krishnamurti:

“When you understand the mind and the mind is completely still, not made still, then that stillness is the act of worship; and in that stillness there comes into being that which is true, and which is beautiful, that which is Light.”

Do you know the way to light? The truth has not changed for 12 years or 1200 years -- Tat tvam Asi. You are That.   

Inquire Within.

Jai Bhagwan (the divine in me recognizes and honors the divine in you.) 

© 2012  Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker. All rights reserved. Material may be quoted with proper attribution.

A Tale of Two Tattoos: A sermon towards forgiveness for Yom Kippur

A Tale of Two Tattoos

A Sermon Towards Forgiveness for Yom Kippur

Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker  

September 23, 2012

First Unitarian Church of Pittsburgh

            This is a tale of two tattoos -- a parable of regret and redemption.

        There  was a man  who had been a devout Jew. As a boy and young man, he had joyfully worshipped his God in the village shul, and he kept all of God's commandments and laws.

       When he entered his twenties, the man turned away from God, he rebelled against his law-laden religion, and went off to live in a faraway city. Once there, he chose a secular life, and in an act of clear defiance against his tradition, he had bold colorful tattoos inscribed over the surfaces of his arms and chest. Each time he admired the tattoos in the mirror he felt liberated from his restrictive past. But, one day he awoke and yearned to turn back to his God, to reenter his community. In keeping with tradition, the man knew that he would first have to undergo a mikva (or ritual bath) in order to purify himself before God prior to entering the temple. He returned to his village and hurried excitedly to the mikva.

         Once he had disrobed and was poised to step into the bath, a community leader blocked his way and angrily admonished him that, according to strict Jewish law, no one who had demeaned and mutilated himself through the act of being tattooed was permitted to enter the mikva for fear that it would defile the water.  The tattooed man sat dejected on the edge of the bath and began to softly weep. Would he never be reconciled again to his God or to his community?  would his tattoos forever be like the proverbial Mark of Cain,  preventing his redemption.

       A second man came upon him crying, and bent down to inquire of his suffering,  and the tattooed man explained his plight. The second man held out his arm, upon which one could clearly see a crude row of blue identification numbers that been tattooed there, against his will,  by the Nazis at Auschwitz. The Holocaust survivor took the tattooed man's hand and gently said, "Come. Let us step into the bath together."

       I love this tale because it is so  poignant, and also because it has everything to do with what I'd like to get at today in my sermon -- brokenness and wholeness, perfection and humanity, estrangement and reconciliation, forgiving and being forgiven -- the human condition in a nutshell.

     First, I'd like you to consider which of the characters  in the parable you most identify with. Is it the sincerely repentant tattooed man, whose  mistakes  have estranged him from his community,  but who  seeks the healing waters of forgiveness and redemption? Is it the perfectionistic community leader, who arrogantly steps into the shoes of a wrathful God and is unwilling to absolve the sinner?

    Perhaps it is the Holocaust survivor, who has somehow moved beyond the heinous trespasses against him despite the daily reminder of his tattooed forearm;  a loving comforter who forgives the tattooed pariah on behalf of his community and as a representative of a loving God?

       I 'd guess that each of us can identify with all of them in one way or another. So why is it that the words, "I'm sorry," the phrase, "I forgive you," and the admission, "I messed up, I am imperfect, Please forgive me,"  tend to get stuck in our throats?  Why do we often sit dejected on the edge of the bath, when the healing waters swirl nearby? Why don't we hot-tail it down the  dusty road out of Grudgeville? 

    September 17 was  Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and September 26  is Yom Kippur, the  Jewish Day of Atonement. As some of you know, I was raised in a Jewish home. Yet, during my formative years at Temple Beth Shalom, the High Holy Days were more about "dressing up" than "fessing up." (I called it the fashion and forgiveness follies!) It wasn't until I was a young adult, and had decamped from organized Judaism, that I began to grasp the deep personal and the universal significance of Yom Kippur.

    Now,  even though I am a UU minister and no longer think of myself as religiously Jewish, I welcome this yearly opportunity for us to join in spirit with our Jewish neighbors to contemplate our transgressions; and to restore our right relation to ourselves, to  the Sacred as we each know it, and to one another. It is a time when we're meant to deal with remorse  in a healthy way, as we lift  oppressive guilt from our hearts and souls through forgiveness. It is a time  to choose the cleansing bath of self-love and renewal, rather than the hair shirt of  self-loathing.

     The Jewish wisdom text, the Talmud, explains that on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, God opens up three books: one for the completely wicked, one for the completely righteous, and one for those in-between. The completely righteous are immediately inscribed in the Book of Life. The completely wicked are immediately inscribed in the Book of Death.The average, or "in-between person," ( a description that likely fits most of us here at First Unitarian) are kept in suspension until Yom Kippur. They have ten days, known as the Days of Awe,  to make amends, to experience teshuva, or turning. A key passage from "The Gates of Repentance," the Yom Kippur liturgy book  explains:

      "The leaves are beginning to turn from green to red to orange," it reads. " The birds are beginning to turn and are heading once more toward the south. The animals are beginning to turn to store in  their food for the winter. For leaves, birds, and animals, turning comes instinctively. But, for us, turning does not comes so easily. It takes an act of will for us to make a turn. It means breaking old habits. It means admitting that we have been wrong, and this is never easy. It means losing face. It means starting all over again. And this is always painful. It means saying I am sorry. It means recognizing that we have the ability to change. These things are terribly hard to do."

       Who can argue that self-reflection is not easy, forgiving our imperfection is not easy, forgiving trespasses against us is not easy, renewal and rebirth  are  not easy. Teshuva does not come so easily for us.  But the alternative is no cakewalk,  either -- not forgiving begets hard feelings, hard hearts, a hard and heavy burden to bear, a one-way ticket to Grudgeville, and a hard road back to wholeness.

     In all honesty, I don't think I can go any further in this sermon without mentioning   "sin, " a very prickly and tough word to say and hear because it pushes so many hot buttons. "Sin," or what a colleague calls "the second most dreaded word in Unitarian Universalism."  Apparently,  there is some debate about whether it is the word "evil" or the word "stewardship" that takes the top prize! At any rate... venal sin, mortal sin, cardinal sin,  original sin -- it all gives some of us the willys! Unitarian Universalists are notorious for avoiding this topic. We even expunged the following line from Rumi's famous poem when we concocted our UU hymn #188: "Come, come, even if you have broken your vows a thousand times. Come, come, yet again, come." 

        So, what does a nice mystical humanist like me mean by "sin," and what does it have to do with forgiveness and with us UUs ? In my view, the liberal theologian Paul Tillich got it just about right  when he defined sin as our estrangement from the sacred as we each understand it (or what I will refer to in this sermon as "God," since it is the term used in the Jewish context),  and the corresponding separation from our best selves and from our community.  We lose the relational, we are  isolated from meaning; we are left in what Tillich calls, "sin."

       Remember that when Cain is driven from the Garden of Eden after the sin of killing his brother, he laments: "My punishment is greater than I can bear." As Tillich puts it,  sin (as estrangement)  becomes it own punishment. Don't we  see this outcome at work in the despair  of the tattooed man, and in the lack of connection we encounter in Grudgeville?

         I agree with Tillich that if we are to even consider a concept of God, then it is a loving, forgiving God rather than a wrathful, vengeful one who tends the wounded and chastised soul.  The Universe  wants us to be whole and reconciled, renewed in the warm healing mikva rather than stuck miserably on the cold hard edge of the bath.

       My former husband, David, a childhood altar boy (who is now a non-practicing Catholic/Taoist/UU) , recalls almost viscerally the palpable relief and renewal which accompanied absolution.  "I felt like I was in a true state of grace," he remembers. "There was something so potent about hearing the priest say I was forgiven -- my sin was lifted; I would walk out of church and the whole world would seem new to me, the slate was wiped clean. "

       A UU friend of mine here in Pittsburgh, also raised as a Catholic, puts a different spin on confession. She  recalls how her priest would begin each Lenten Mass by bellowing, "We are all sinners here." (and he didn't mean sin in Tillichian terms). For the remainder of the service, she would sqwunch down in the pew so that he couldn't see her sinful face or read her sinful thoughts. She knew that later she would have to confess her sins to him and she felt such anxiety and shame.

       She told me, "Now I confess my mistakes directly to Universe and to the people I've wronged. I don't want or need a surrogate. I can forgive myself and love myself now in a way that wasn't really possible back then." My friend concedes that it took a lot of practice before she could  eventually internalize forgiveness without hearing it from the mouth of a minister or a priest.

     It may surprise you to learn that the concept of sin figures prominently in the observance of Yom Kippur, as well; so much so that the traditional opening words of the service are: "By consent of the authorities in heaven and on earth, we permit sinners to enter and be part of the congregation." Typically, everyone in attendance assumes those words are addressed to him, to her. Religion and conscience have communicated the idea that they have not always been the people they should be, and it is to Judaism (and the Rabbi) that they turn for  an affirming message of forgiveness and acceptance; it is to God (or Yahweh) that they turn for transformation. 

      The point is that whether we are Jewish, Christian, UU, or otherwise, we need to recognize having done wrong, regret it, and resolve not to repeat it. We need to confess -- one way or another. It is a "terribly hard thing to do," but personally, it sounds  like something worthwhile. And we need to speak louder than the whispering citizens of Grudgeville.

Personal responsibility is key. Even if the proverbial scapegoat (the azazel form Leviticus) carries your sins, your mistakes on its back, you must go into the desert, too. As Rabbi Gluskin explains in our reading earlier, we are sent along to have the light of the desert shine on our souls while the goat carries our stuckness. Notice, though, that the goat does not zip off on its own. Rather, we walk alongside, reflecting and forming an image of ourselves that can survive without the destructive behaviors that create the need for forgiveness in the first place.

      Yet, to suggest that we're pardoned by God  for our misdeeds is not really accurate or even a statement about God's emotional generosity. It is a statement about ours. When push comes to shove, will we be the self-righteous community leader or the compassionate  Holocaust survivor?  Will we thrust forward a hair shirt or a helping hand?

       In our responsive reading earlier, we repeatedly recited: "We forgive ourselves and each other; we begin again in love."  That could well be a mantra for our times!  Especially, since some of us have no doubt internalized a message from parents, teachers, loved ones, and society that we are only deserving of love, praise, or forgiveness when we are perfect or pretty darn close. 

     It just isn't so.  In his book, How Good Do We Have to Be, Rabbi Harold Kushner argues that the most valuable phrase in the Torah  comes from Genesis 17,  when God says to Abraham, "Walk before me and be tamim." Although the King James translates "tamim" as "perfect" and the RSV opts for "blameless," Kushner prefers the translation, "whole-hearted." God asks Abraham to be whole-hearted and to have integrity,  not to be perfect. What about us? I believe that if we can learn to embrace our own inherent fallibility, and strive for wholeness rather than perfection, then we will also become  more capable of tackling the challenge of forgiving trespasses against us and against the community.

    In the novel, The Brother's Karamozov,  the character Ivan recounts in excruciating detail the atrocities he has witnessed on his journey across Russia, and he asks his brother Aloysha, "Is there in the whole world a being who would have the right to forgive and could forgive such a man? I echo Ivan's sentiments when I ask, How can we forgive, how do we forgive  the unfaithful partner or disloyal friend, the oppressor, the misbehaving President, the neglectful parent, the unfair teacher, the bullying sibling, the rapist, the child molester, the hate monger? When it is all happening to us, how do we deliver the goods?

     First, let's be clear. Forgiving is not condoning, soft-pedaling evil or downplaying  sin.  In the end, forgiving is about us and about liberating ourselves from the anger  and resentment of the past. Forgiving frees us of the double jeopardy of a miserable life added to the pain of the original wound.

    Forgiveness is a healing bath that can soothe  past wounds that we can neither change or forget. Surely, we see this notion exemplified in the Holocaust survivor. He  can not rewrite history or expunge sins against him, but he can make choices about his future -- will he be estranged or reconciled; courageous or self-pitying; broken or whole,  even when confronted with a painful and permanent scar? The people of Grudgeville face similar choices. So do we.

     I'd like to pause here for a brief period of silence in which we each might reflect on these choices. Who needs to hear the words, "I'm sorry" from your lips; from whom do you long to hear the words, "Please forgive me." How might this change your life? How might you find a way to get there?  (Pause for silence)

    The time for turning is at hand.  If you feel like the tattooed man, or like the Holocaust survivor, or like the mayor of Grudgeville,   take heart and look around you for a dejected comrade or for an outstretched hand. Your mistakes  are no more unforgivable. Your imperfections are no more remarkable. Even if you have broken your vows a thousand times, come, yet again, come. Consider whether the 10 days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are called the "Days of Awe" because the feeling of forgiveness, given or received, is truly awesome.

     Forgiveness is not a magic pill that fixes everything or changes the past. But it can be that open byway to an unseen future that our painful past has shut. When we forgive, we look into the face of another and raise our voices above a whisper to utter precious words. When we forgive, we hold hands with the Universe, walk over a threshold, and experience the healing that is just  waiting for us to make it  real.

   We take one another's hand,  and we step together into the  mikva.

   Bless us now. Shalom and Amen.

c 2012 Rev. Robin Landerman Zucker. All rights reserved. Material may be quoted with proper attribution.