HUU Sermon Archives

Why We Come

by Mary Hahn, Meredith Moore, Robin McNallie and Norman Lawson
on February 5, 2006

Reading: Why then do we choose to join together rather than exercise our full freedom to believe what we will in the privacy of our homes on Sunday mornings? Simply because experience has taught us that we need one another. We need guidance in recognizing our tears in one another’s eyes. We need prompting to raise our moral sights. We need companions in the work of love and justice to enhance our neighborhoods and to strengthen our witness in the world. And yes, we choose to join our hands and hearts because we know how easily we slip back into mechanical habits that blunt our consciousness. We need and know we need to be reminded week in and week out how precious life is and how fragile.

Mary Hahn

Reasons for coming - Some come for the music, so they feel uplifted and inspired in ways that words can never manage to achieve.

Some come simply to see their friends and to feel connected to a society of neighbors with whom they share common history, common values, and a common vision. Or perhaps they are feeling fragile and alone and long for a sense of connection to something larger and more enduring than themselves.

Community is about the common life that we share with one another.

Meredith Moore

When Mary asked me to say something today, at first I went into old graduate student hyperdrive.

I cast about for relevant quotes from the philosophers du jour.

I began assembling my own pithy and highly original insights on spirituality, intellectual freedom, social justice, blah blah.

Then, I decided to SCREW IT.

After all, what's required here isn't a jejeune display of my smartier-than-thouness. What's asked for here is to speak about my experiences as a new UU. Something along the lines of a. . . testimonial.

Testimonial. . .I'd never given one of those. How do you go about giving a testimonial.

I watched the 700 club for clues.

Apparently, you begin by admitting that prior to coming to church, you were in a completely down and out, lowly and despairing condition.

Well, that's true enough. When I first showed up at HUU in February of 2003--three years ago this month, as it happens--I was in a sick and sorry state, flat broke, very down and out.

2001 had been a banner year for me personally and professionally, but by fall of 2002 every underpinning of my existence had come unpinned.

The tech bubble, 9-11, the war, the Bush economy, the restructuring of the video game industry, and a near fatal case of writer's ennui had undone me. Knocked the stuffing out of me. Perhaps most painful, my vegetarian natural parenting group had gone Neanderthal Diet.

I'd landed in Rockingham County as a refugee from Silicon Valley Babylon. I came to Rockingham County because I wanted someplace quiet, clean and wholesome where I could recuperate and lick my wounds.

But, really, I didn't want it to be quite so quiet and quite so wholesome. In Rockingham County I felt alienated and lost.

I was perplexed by a range of thorny and vexing questions.

What the hell is Weekly Religious Education--Bible study!--doing in the public school, and why do I need to sign my kid OUT of it?

Where is the Olive Garden? I still haven't found where you've hidden it.

And how--hypothetically speaking--does one establish a cannabis connection in Mennonite country? For medicinal purposes only, of course.

The Daily News Record. Shudder! Every time I open that newspaper I hear the strains of Darth Vader's theme.

Then there were my relatives. Rockingham County happens to be my ancestral heath. The place is crawling with my inbred, Bible-thumpin', gun totin', Republican votin', fetus-lovin', plutocracy supportin' DNA.

Nice as a few of them are, I was told I'd better shut my yap about my politics lest I wake up with a giant cross burning on my lawn.

Likewise, I was to shut up about being a vegetarian in poultry packin' country--lest, I suppose, I wake up to discover a giant flaming drumstick barbecuing on my lawn.

So when I showed up at HUU, I had low expectations. I figured I might feel as Left Wing and Left Behind as anywhere else in Rockingham County. But what I found instead was a happy surprise. I found a cozy haven of open-minded, progressive individuals and free spirits.

I felt welcome, and I did not feel especially diabolically weird.

All my life, I've been fascinated by spirituality, mythology, the history of religion and it's battling Ninja robot metaphors. But. . . I'm not very reverent.

Never once has anyone put something holy in front of me, and commanded me to worship, that did not give me the giggles.

That, and my somewhat sneering skepticism, has kept me from ever joining any sort of organized religion. If anything describes my spiritual identity, it's as an 'irreverent.'

But HUU didn't hold that against me. I was not penalized. And why should I be? Why should the irreverent be discriminated against? Why should the irreverent not have spiritual aid and comfort? Why shouldn't they enjoy the fellowship of decent people? Or monthly potlucks?

When I was growing up in the Marcia Bradyland of suburban Los Angeles--it was actually quite a conservative place, full of John Birchers and defense industry workers and girls with long, straight blonde hair--my parents had a book lying about the house, a cartoon book called The Nonconformists Handbook.

It detailed things like the nonconformist uniform--the same poncho, dirty sandals and lovebeads for all--as well as the same lentil stew and VW bug, standard issue. It belittled the oh-so-threatening counterculture/protest movement, and my mainstream parents thought it a hoot.

But the thing is, I loved that book. I was enchanted. Derisive as it was, it led me to hope there were others of my kind out there, somewhere. I longed to find, someday, my own nonconformist's support group.

I remembered this book as I composed this testimonial. Not because we all wear the same poncho--but HUU is, in the best possible meaning of the words--my nonconformists support group.

Now, I hope I can return the favor to you all.