C. David Pruett
Professor Emeritus
Department of Mathematics & Statistics
James Madison University

Presented at Harrisonburg Unitarian Universalists
June 23, 2013

Introduction

The Catholic theologian Thomas Berry–who preferred to be called an eco-theologian, or better yet a geologian—observed, “We are in trouble just now because we do not have a good story. We are between stories.”

I think what Father Thomas meant was that the scientific discoveries over the past five centuries since Copernicus have eroded our ancient myths of meaning without providing us with palatable alternatives. This has forced what Ilya Prigogine, Nobel laureate in chemistry, has deemed a “tragic choice” between “an alienating science” and “an unscientific philosophy.” And in that either/or choice can be found the seeds of much human dysfunction.

Recognizing how crucial a viable story is if the people are to thrive, or at least survive, Berry dedicated his life to understanding and articulating the “new story,” a cosmic creation myth that weaves together modern scientific insights and ancient wisdom, with fidelity to both. He joined with cosmologist Brian Swimme to write The Universe Story in 1992. Reason and Wonder is my attempt to tell essentially the same story in a different voice.

One of the first to begin weaving the new story was Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. Berry, who died in 2009, was widely recognized as Teilhard’s heir apparent. This highly educated audience is well aware of the scientific cornerstones of the new story: the theory of evolution and Big Bang cosmology. However, there is an aspect of the new story that is only beginning to emerge. I believe that the second quotation from Teilhard read earlier sheds light on one of the great mysteries of the universe. Laying open that mystery is the subject of today’s talk, which I title “On Evolution, Entropy, and Love: Three Facets of the Cosmos.”

[Read more…]

from Richard Carl Wolf
June 16, 2013

Many years before I actually left the Catholic Church, I gradually left the belief in God as a “Trinity of Persons”. Thanks to the native elders who adopted me and the scholars of phenomenology who taught me, I moved around ideas of God as exclusively a “someone”; a someone who required or even appreciated anything like a worship of “Him.”

Yet I still wonder how to translate Trinitarian God paradigms into my post-Christian, quasi-atheistic theology. While naming persons of God just doesn’t work for me anymore — too much like making God in human image – I still want to be able to enter into an attitude of prayer (a raising of the mind and heart) with the Catholic priest who comes to visit my husband, with school officials who begin meetings with Christian prayer language, and when twelve step meetings close with the Lord’s Prayer.

So while I’m hearing the words of the “Sign of the Cross,” or listening to people address a “Heavenly Father”, or pray “in Jesus’ name” – my mind translates the “persons” of God into qualities that a “mystery” of God might hold. I’ve turned “three Persons in one God” around to a contemplation – a consideration of the worth – of three God’s in one person – and that one person being me, you, and each “one” who moves around here.

For me Father God, the creator, is the simple and apparent fact of being – I am – and apparently you are, too. The second Person, the Son, the redeeming One, is potential, the power to keep on becoming. And the third Person, always the least like a person of all, is the fact of our breathing – our capacity to move on to something more – personal and communal actualization.

If I do something like “worship,” it’s when I recollect at least these three aspects of life’s Great Mystery. My Holy Trinity is fact of being, potential in being, and actualization of being, together with you and all my relations.

Here’s a humanist, or maybe a UU, sign of the cross: Mind knows the worth of being; Heart holds the worth of potential; arms make goodness real, performing worthy deeds.

UU Children’s Religious Education: Passport to the World of Faith
Julie Caran
5/26/13

Good morning. I want to start by addressing the title of this service. “UU Children’s Religious Education: Passport to the World of Faith.” In a way, saying that UU RE provides a passport to the world of faith implies that we are not part of that world. Is Unitarian Universalism a faith? I had difficulty answering that question until I became immersed in UU religious education.
When I began attending a UU church as a young adult in 1999, I, like many of you, had the experience of discovering a faith and a community that echoed my personal theology – my ideas about God – as well as my principles – the behaviors I saw as right and true. As with any new discovery, this one was exciting! I shared my interest with a protestant coworker and friend. Brian had a strong Christian faith, was very smart and had strong convictions, and was willing to agree to disagree when necessary. I enjoyed engaging in conversations with him about theology, faith, and religious institutions, but he simply could not wrap his mind around Unitarian Universalism.

“How can it be a church,” he asked me, “if you’re not all worshipping God together? Isn’t that the definition of church? A place of worship?”

I was stumped at the time. With Methodist, Jewish, Catholic, and Episcopal institutions in my background, I had been immersed in many religious communities, and they all had one common quality – the people gathered together to worship with those who shared their faith in God.

What is a church? Isn’t it a gathering of people of faith? The refrain of a song I learned in Sunday School circled through my brain: “I am the church, you are the church, we are the church together. All who follow Jesus all around the world – yes, we’re the church together!” My definition of church no longer seemed to fit, since I knew Jesus was not the primary focal point of my new faith community. In fact, neither was God.

Yet I did see TJMC, my new UU church, as a faith community. I recognized this immediately, but without a background in UU religious education, I lacked the vocabulary to explain this. [Read more…]

May 12, 2013
Ascension Sunday
Mother’s Day
by Rev. Emma Chattin

Lighting the Chalice, Reading
We remember our mothers, those who bless us with their presence,
those who have gone on before us, and the mothers among us today,
our Mother Earth, and those who give birth to new things
all over the world, and everywhere in our universe.
We lift our gentle thoughts in gratitude,
letting them rise above our being,
as the flame rises and ascends
from the cradle of the chalice.

First Reading ~ Acts 1: 6-14
While meeting together they asked, “Has the time come, Rabbi? Are you going to restore sovereignty to Israel?” Jesus replied, “It’s not for you to know the times or dates that Abba God has decided. You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; then you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, and even to the ends of the earth.” Having said this, Jesus was lifted up in a cloud before their eyes and taken from their sight. They were still gazing up into the heavens when two messengers dressed in white stood beside them. “You Galileans – why are you standing here looking up at the skies?” they asked. “Jesus, who has been taken from you- this same Jesus will return, in the same way you watched him go into heaven.”

Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a sabbath day’s journey away. When they had entered the city, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying, Peter, John, James, and Andrew; Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew; James ben-Alphaeus; Simon, a member of the Zealot sect; and Judah ben-Jacob. All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers.

Second Reading
~ from Fr. Richard Rohr in Everything Belongs
All spiritual disciplines have one purpose: to get rid of illusions so we can be present. These disciplines exist so that we can see what is, see who we are, and see what is happening. On the contrary, our mass cultural trance is like scales over our eyes. We see only with the material eye.

If we are to believe Jesus, nothing is more dangerous than people who presume they already see. God can most easily be lost by being thought found.

[Read more…]

Adapted by Les Grady from Active Hope by J. Macy and C. Johnstone
Sunday, April 21, 2013

What Aileth Thee

Adapted by Les Grady from Active Hope by J. Macy and C. Johnstone

In their book Active Hope authors Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone use the story of “Parsifal and the Fisher King” to illustrate a situation of great suffering not being acknowledged and of people carrying on as if nothing were wrong.  Today we are experiencing a similar situation in climate change.  Climate change is not something that will happen at some future time.  It is happening now and it is affecting real people and real ecosystems.  Yet we seldom talk about how we feel about it; about what our concerns are.  Rather we act as if all is well.  Why is that?  What keeps us from facing a disturbing and troubling truth?

Before addressing those questions, I first ask you to confront how you feel about what is happening around the world today.  I would like for you to close your eyes and listen to some statements I will make.  As you listen, please concentrate on how they make you feel.  Don’t analyze them intellectually.  Rather, feel how you respond viscerally.  I will pause for a few seconds after each to allow you to contemplate those feelings.  Afterwards I will address how our failure to acknowledge our feelings can block our ability to act on the problem.

[Read more…]

by Keo Cavalcanti
March 24, 2013

Every time I read W. H. Auden’s “The Unknown Citizen” poem I am reminded of the unenviable task that befalls us sociologists. We are a funny bunch… We spend a lot of time looking for stable and predictable patterns of behavior in society. We do so by comparing certain groups to other groups, by identifying what members of each group share in common, and how those characteristics influence the way they act and live.

The main character in Auden’s poem is entirely predictable, as a citizen of that particular society, living at that particular time.

These days the art of survey research has reached such a level of sophistication, that knowing someone’s level of education, income or occupation, or that person’s gender, age, race or ethnicity, or even her zip code allows us to predict, with a great degree of certainty, not only how she is going to vote, but her attitudes toward a good number of social issues and even her taste in shopping, restaurants and magazines.

Read The Gift of Small Rebellionsin pdf format