Meditations and Musings

I don’t remember exactly how the subject of the full moon came up. Something about it being Halloween, I think. Anyway, as we were chatting and packing up our work-out clothes at the gym, I said something about it maybe being a full moon. He said he thought it was, and he knew because he followed a different calendar. A lunar calendar. A “Middle Eastern calendar,” he said. Cautious, sadly, to tell a white stranger that it was Islamic. But I asked, if he didn’t mind telling me

Love is Loud Love, says the old covenant, Is the spirit of this church Love. The spirit of our church I hope so Because Love has things to say Love is joy and laughter, giggles and silly love songs But Love speaks, too, to the real pain in the world Love knows. It knows hate and fear Selfishness, Greed Bullet and blade The cutting edge of indifference Love knows And Love does not let us turn away It does not rest in thoughts and prayers Love knows the names Says the names out

In the summer of 2024, Unitarian Universalists adopted a statement of our faith. In true UU fashion, it is in our bylaws. Article 2 specifically. And it names "love" as the center of our theology. Or for those who don't love the god-ness of the word "theology," then we could say Article 2 envisions "love" as the starting place as our ethical practice. We're gonna spend the next many years figuring out what that means. At least I hope so. I know I struggle a bit with how we ca

To look deeply into the suffering of those who have caused us to suffer is a miraculous gift. Thanks to our observation, we now know that the person is suffering. He may think that his suffering will be lessened if he can cause us to suffer. Once we are in touch with his suffering, our enmity and bitterness towards him will vanish, and we will long for him to suffer less. Thich Nhat Hanh There is a simple Buddhist prayer that I repeat periodically through the day. Not delibe

For 170 years, religious liberals have been inspired by Rev. Theodore Parker’s imagining of a moral arc to the universe. Like Parker, we may not fully understand that universe, can only see a “little ways” along the arc, but still hold fast to the belief that “it bends toward justice.” It is a compelling vision, and I have turned to it many times. But a prophetic moral imagination must remind us that Parker did not quite imagine enough – his vision creates a risk of complacen