by Rev. Dr. Marilyn Sewell

First Unitarian Church

Portland, Oregon

CALL TO WORSHIP

Good morning!

May we be reminded here today

of our highest aspirations,

And inspired to bring our gifts

of love and service to the altar of humanity.

May we know once again

that we are not isolated beings,

But connected,

in mystery and miracle

To this community and to one another.

Come, let us worship together!

I have this problem.  People keep telling me I’m going to hell.  Of course I’ve just returned from a trip to Alabama, and there are lots of folks there who think they know who is saved and who is not, so I shouldn’t have been surprised.  But I was.  I guess I’ve been hanging out with the likes of you guys too long.  Let me tell you something—everywhere is not like Portland, and every faith is not like Unitarian Universalism.

The first time it happened was at supper in a bed and breakfast—the only bed and breakfast—in Montgomery.  I was chatting with the wife of the couple who owned the place, and because there had been a fierce storm a few days before, the conversation got around to tsunamis.  I said something like, “Well, a tsunami could hit any coastline, you know.  It could hit the Oregon Coast just as easily as anywhere else.”  Whereupon this kind and pious Southern woman whose husband had just prayed at length over our soup, said, “Did you hear about the Christians?”

“The Christians?  What do you mean?” I asked.

“Well, these Christians in Indonesia had wanted to celebrate Christmas, and the Muslims wouldn’t let them, so they went up to higher ground to celebrate, and then the tsunami came and killed all the Muslims.  I think maybe God was sending them a message.” 

I was stunned by that remark.  I said, “Well, the problem with that story is that it would imply that God favors Christians over Muslims.” 

Her mouth dropped open.  “Well, He does!”  I took refuge in logic, always a mistake in these encounters, explaining that little Muslim children grow up to be Muslim because their parents are Muslim, and the same with Christians, and that different cultures . . . etc., etc., well, you get the drift. 

Right away, she saw that I was a terribly fallen creature, and she began to set me straight.  “That’s why we send missionaries,” she said, “Don’t you believe in pre-destination?”  And she said it in this incredulous voice, as if anyone who had an ounce of brains was, like herself, a fundamentalist Presbyterian.

“You mean, do I believe that God has decided who is saved and who is not saved before they are even born?”

“Yes,” she answered.

“Well, if the salvation question has already been answered, why would you need missionaries?”  Again, my steely logic had no effect.  I will not bore you with the rest of the dinner conversation, but as they say, it went downhill from there. 

This was nothing, though, compared to the conversation I had on the flight returning to Portland.  I was quietly reading my novel when the woman next to me said, “I hope you don’t mind if I talk.”  I did, as a matter of fact, because I have so little time to read fiction—but I could see that she was nervous about flying and needed a distraction.  She was blonde, with short curly hair and a round face and on the chubby side.  After the obligatory, “Where are you from?” the conversation went straight to religion, straight to hell, so to speak—I ask you, why does this happen to me?  She confided in me that she worked for a creation evangelist—that is, a man who goes around the country debating people who believe in evolution.  She told me that this evangelist had two ancient rocks with drawings on them showing humans and dinosaurs together, proving conclusively that they were on the earth at the same time.  “And what is his background?” I asked.  “Educationally speaking, I mean.”

“He was a high school biology teacher before he got into creation evangelism,” she said. 

Okay, I know I should have said nothing.  I know I should have said, “You know, I just want to read, if you don’t mind.”  But I did not.  The Universalist in me—the tolerant, warm, compassionate one went out the window, and the Unitarian—the judgmental one, the intellectuaI snob, took over.  I said, “Do you understand that no reputable scientist in the world believes in creationism?  Not one?  That no university anywhere would hire any scientist who believes this?  That there’s not one shred of evidence that this theory is true?”  Again, logic failed.  It doesn’t matter what scientists think, she said—she believes what God says.  At this point I told her that I was a minister, which was of course another huge mistake.  She said, “Well, that’s a problem in itself.” 

“You mean, women shouldn’t be ministers?”  I asked.

“Of course not.  The Bible makes that clear.  God does have some standards, you know.”  Besides which, she let me know that she was saved, and obviously I was not.  This lady minister was headed for hell.  I would like to tell you I responded with kindness and sweetness of spirit, but I did not.

This was not, of course, the first time I’d been told that I’m going to hell.  The first time was when I decided to leave the Catholic Church.  I was thirteen, and I had come to a point when I could no longer believe.  Transubstantiation—or the changing of the bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus (literally, the priest said) transubstantiation—was a concept I simply couldn’t believe, and confession was becoming awkward, because some of my sins were—well, in bad taste I thought—and I didn’t want to confess them to anyone, much less to Father Goubeaux, the local priest.  So I stopped going to church.  After several months Father Goubeaux came calling. 

I remember the scene so plainly.  He sat on one end of the sofa in his black cassock, and I sat on the other.  He didn’t lean back, but sat right on the edge of the sofa, his silver hair standing out like little wings from the sides of his head, and his teeth, which never all quite fit into his mouth, looked sharp, like knives.  “Marilyn Jane, you must come back to St. Margaret’s,” he said.  “If you don’t come back, you’ll go to hell for all eternity.”  I didn’t like the sound of that—eternity was a long time to spend in a burning lake of fire.  I reflected for a moment. 

I asked, “Father, do you believe that God knows everything?”

“Yes, of course, my child,” he said.  His face seemed to relax a bit.

“God knows every thought in my mind and every wish in my heart?”

“Yes, my child.”  And his face softened even more.

And I answered, “Then it will do me no good to pretend to believe, will it?  Because God knows what is really inside me.  I can’t come back, because it would be like telling a lie to God.”

Father Goubeaux’s face fell.  Another soul had slipped away.

I was freed from the Catholic Church, but not free from the flames of hell as yet.  My grandparents, with whom I lived, insisted that I go to church somewhere—I could choose, but I had to go somewhere.  So I started going to their church, which was Southern Baptist.  The Baptists told me that Catholics were not Christian (their knowledge of Church history was skimpy)—and that since I had been baptized Catholic—yes, you guessed it: I was going to hell.  I began to feel the pressure.  I remember the night I finally walked the aisle and accepted Jesus as my savior. 

The week-long revival was winding to a close, with visiting preacher Angel Martinez in the pulpit.  An ex-Catholic.  That evening he wore his usual outfit—a white suit and pastel tie, which set off his dark good looks.  He was, in fact, about the best-looking man I had ever seen.  He preached with great passion, compelling people with his flashing eyes to heed his words.  The congregation sang: “Softly and tenderly Jesus is calling, calling for you and for me.”  My feet moved almost without my bidding out of my pew.  I was going to Jesus, but I was looking at Angel, and I knew I had to go. I went down to the front and took the hand of the local pastor.  He asked, “Do you come tonight, accepting Jesus as your savior?”

“Yes,” I said. “Sort of.”    

“What’s that?” he said.

“Yes,” I said, knowing that there was no place for questions, no allowance for subtleties.  I really didn’t understand this atonement idea—how one person could make up for another person’s sins—but I wanted the salvation question answered once and for all.  I was baptized, immersed, a week later, my skinny body rising up out of the water, with the white fabric clinging to it, humiliated like a wet puppy in front of my friends, but I felt no different afterwards.  I hoped that Jesus would understand that I had done my best. 

I came to understand only in my adult life, many years later, what salvation really is—it is a radical turning in a different direction.  It has nothing to do with being sprinkled or immersed or adhering to the sacraments.  As I see it now, salvation is acknowledging that you don’t belong to yourself, acknowledging that you serve something larger than yourself, at which time you become partnered with the Divine.  I remember the day, actually, that I made this choice.  I chose to believe.  Heaven?  I don’t worry about the afterlife.  I trust that whatever is, will be all right.  And hell?  There is hell enough on this earth, and it looks like being separated from God and from one another.  It’s choosing to be separated.

After I went to seminary and began to learn about Universalism, I began to understand why I was particularly drawn to this side of our faith.  The Universalists emphasized always the love and benevolence of God.  In the Winchester Profession, which was a kind of loose codification of Universalist theology, written in 1803, we find the words, “We believe that there is one God, whose nature is love, <a God> who will finally restore the whole family of mankind <make that humankind> to holiness and happiness.”  Recently a member of my family gave me a bronze plaque that reads, in Latin:  “Bidden or not, God is there.”  That’s the Universalist message!   Hosea Ballou, the famous Universalist minister, in his “Treatise on Atonement” made that same radical claim (incidentally, this year is the 200^th anniversary of that very significant book)—Ballou said that God’s love is always there, no matter what.  When a person separates himself or herself from God, it is that person who is the unhappy party, not God, said Ballou.  God simply is, and God is love.  And what is hell, according to Ballou?  A state of rebellion to what is, to the unity of the universe.  Such a theology requires a strong dose of humility—requires putting God at the center, making God the measure of things, that is to say, making love the measure of things—a theological bent more characteristic of the Universalists than the Unitarians.

The Universalists emphasize mercy over judgment, a predilection that comes perhaps from their origins among the humble and the largely uneducated classes.  In my experience it is generally those who have known need themselves, those who are the most vulnerable in this world, who have the most potential for compassion.  The Universalists are known for their tolerance—and they learned the value of it well, for they themselves were assaulted verbally from many pulpits, accused of licentiousness and immoral behavior, and basically characterized as the scum of the earth.  It was a class thing, you know.  Churches and public buildings turned them away.  It should be said that the early history of Universalism was colored by much intolerance from both the Calvinists and the Unitarians.    

Nevertheless, Universalism continued to spread its indigenous roots, for it is a hopeful faith: John Murray, the founder of American Universalism, preached the message, “Don’t give them hell, but hope.”  Universalism posits a benign force working within each one of us at the very center of our being, drawing us to goodness.  Evil is always temporary, perhaps even a necessary step in learning, but never triumphant—love is the nature of the universe, and abides.  Perhaps this helps to explain the Universalist emphasis on forgiveness.  If a loving God is always there, forgiving us before we even think to ask, then how can we be any less forgiving of our neighbor? 

Universalism was evangelical, yes, but evangelical in bringing the good news of salvation to all: all were to be saved; it was a church of the people.  It was emotional.  It was benevolent, merciful, forgiving, charitable, tolerant, egalitarian, compassionate, and indomitably hopeful. 

Universalism grounds us theologically in our First Principle:  “We believe in the inherent worth and dignity of all people.”  That would be all people:  people of all colors, of all nationalities, of all sexual orientations; people who are wealthy and people who are walking the streets with only the clothes on their back; young people and people bent with age; people who work with their hands for a living, like my parents, and people with multiple degrees who mainly talk for a living, like me.  You see, that woman on the plane was wrong, oh so wrong—God doesn’t have any standards at all, when it comes to loving!  No matter what kind of odious things a human being may have done, we are loved, we are eligible for forgiveness.  No standards at all.

Because all are welcome at the welcome table, diversity is not only implied by Universalism, but is theologically inescapable.  We’re all here together, on this darkling plain—knowing so little, seeing so little—suffering as people have suffered through the ages, but held all the while in the arms of the Beloved, who gives us a promise that will take us through trying times, and this is the promise: love is stronger than death, and in the end, all pain, all contradictions, all persons, strange as it may seem to us in our limited view, all will be reconciled in the Unity that is Love.  As hard as it is for me to understand this, and to accept this, I will be reconciled to the owners of that bed and breakfast, and I will be reconciled to that frightened woman on the airplane.  I am called by my Universalist heritage to a greater love than I yet have attained.

You have heard that sometimes it has to get worse before it can get better?  I think we’re going through a period like that now.  But people are beginning to catch on.  You really can’t fool all the people all the time.  I personally believe that we are now living through a backlash to the new world that will one day emerge, that is even now emerging—a backlash from a conquering paradigm to a sharing paradigm, to something much more akin to our Universalist values.  I see a world coming in which the earth is counted precious, and cared for; a world in which the most vulnerable among us have a voice; a world in which the color of your skin makes you interesting to others, not frightening; a world in which the economy serves the people, instead of the people serving the economy; a world in which our love and caring do not stop at the borders of our land.

We have a message that the world sorely needs, and it goes like this:  there is only One Love, One Great Mystery, and we hold that love in our very flesh.  No one is unworthy of this Love, and it is our task on this earth to watch for it and receive it, as its various manifestations break out all over the place and surprise us into being.  We are to take that new being, and to bless others, in turn.  We have healing to offer a hurting world.  May we have strength of purpose and courage of heart to take up our call.  So be it.  Amen. 

PRAYER

God whose name is Love, we pray this morning for one thing—we pray for open hearts.  We shut down so easily, and shut others out.  Forgive us.  Help us to be bigger people than we are, and when we are frightened at the enormity of the tasks we face, in our own lives and in the larger world, let us rest in the Love that is ever with us, and that will never let us go.  Amen.

BENEDICTION

As you leave the sanctuary with your flower this morning during our flower communion, let the beauty of this flower remind you of your own beauty—and notice how your flower has opened to the light—may you also open as have the petals of the flower.  Go in love, and go in peace.  Amen.