When we become the gift we give to others

“A blessing spirituality is a relating spirituality. One does not bless without investing something of oneself into the receiver of one’s blessing. And one does not receive blessing oblivious of its gracious giver.”   

  -- Matthew Fox

I knew something was wrong when my phone rang at 5:30 a.m. and I saw that it was my mother calling from California: “Your father had a stroke,” she said. “It’s affecting the right side of his body; he cannot walk and he’s having a hard time finding the right words as he speaks.” When I asked whether I should come out, I heard his voice in the background: “No!” That was a good sign. So, I expressed my love and concern for them, then went through my day in a haze. Not only did I have a very busy day planned, but Bakersfield, CA is difficult to get to from Chicago. That evening was the beginning of my congregation’s Board Retreat, and I had a long planned outing with my daughter that afternoon. 

That night, my mother called to say that my father had a second stroke, and was further disoriented. As she shared the news, I realized that I’ve never heard my mother sound so scared or so helpless. I hung up the phone, emotionally paralyzed, uncertain what to do. “What’s it going to take, Alan?” my wife asked. “What’s it going to take for you to go and provide support to your parents?” She paused, and then in response to my silence, she said: “If it was me, I’d have gotten on a plane after the first phone call.” 

It was only then, in that moment, that my thoughts became clear and I knew what I had to do. I swung into action, bought a plane ticket, and was at my father’s side the next afternoon. In the month of May, our congregation has been exploring what it means to take a path of blessing.  When we reflect on the meaning of blessing, we often refer to a prayer asking for God's favor and protection and we frequently speak of the blessings received, and enjoyed. A crucial part of our spiritual life is to cultivate gratitude and bring our awareness to how we are blessed. 

But there’s another side to blessing, which I like to think of as making space in our hearts for remembering what is truly important for us. And it goes beyond even that, it means listening carefully and finding in ourselves the blessings we can share: to give of ourselves, particularly our attention, our compassion and our support. Often these gifts come wrapped in a simple passing comment or gesture of kindness.

Sometimes what we need is simply to take pause, to find stillness and hold the stillness. Sometimes we can’t see what we need to see until someone who loves us puts a hand on our brow to reteach us to recognize our hidden wholeness. 

When my mother called with news of my father’s illness, I needed a firm nudge, a kick in the pants. I experienced my wife’s words as the voice of life’s eternal spirit, that still, small voice we aren’t always able to hear because we are too distracted: whether too busy, too focused on our work and family, or too caught up in our own story. 

I was with a Pentecostal colleague recently. As we parted, she didn’t say what I typically do: “Have a good day.”  Instead she said: “Have a blessed day.” It was a simple farewell, a charge to notice the blessings in my life and, in turn, to be a blessing to the world. 

Matthew Fox, the author of Original Blessing, a spiritual classic that suggests seeing our lives shaped by Original Blessing rather than Original Sin, says: “Blessing involves relationship. One does not bless without investing something of oneself into the receiver of one’s blessing. And one does not receive blessing oblivious of its gracious giver.”

It didn’t matter there was an especially long security line at the airport; I was clear and comfortable in my mission. When I arrived at the hospital ICU, I witnessed my father in a very tender space. I was at his side for the next 24 hours, and then there to transition him to home. Thanks to good care and modern medicine, my father has regained much of his capacity. He can even dress and feed himself now. And, I have finally come to understand what people have said to me for years: “As our parents become weaker, we are called to become stronger.”

To use a phrase from John O’Donohue, author of To Bless the Space Between Us, “A blessing spirituality is a relating spirituality. It blesses the space between us. It acknowledges the kinship we all share.” When we make space for blessing, we can respond to whatever life brings. We can celebrate our joys and the people we hold dear. And we can, when life obliges, attend to the most painful realities, even illness or loss. 

What now for us in Oak Park as violence escalates among our neighbors?

Rev. Ira Acree of Greater St John's Bible Church in the Austin neighborhood, was quoted on the front page of the NY Times today with the important story that is so difficult of the wider region to acknowledge. It is here.

As I listen to our neighbors to the east of Austin Boulevard, I hear four primary concerns: the lack of economic opportunity due to a lack of economic investment, profoundly poor education, violence, and police misconduct. They are of course inter-related. But the escalating violence is a health issue and a moral issue—that so many young people and families are caught in the middle. 

The Saturday before Palm Sunday, Rev. Acree officiated at three funerals, two of them for a grandson and a grand-niece of two different parishioners. These were young people at the wrong places at the wrong times. The violence is gang-related but many of the victims want nothing to do with them, including the 13 year old recently shot who had pleaded in a video to reduce gun violence. You may have heard about the four youth shot and wounded at Washington and Waller—just a few blocks from us. A few of us joined church pastors and laypeople in that immediate area for a prayer vigil.

It is scary to reflect on what we can do as pastors, deeply concerned individuals or a wider community. As I get to know more people of faith in the Austin neighborhood, I’m struggling with how I for many years ignored this community and how to invite others to begin a relationship. It’s a conversation I hope will grow. Despite that it is overwhelming. Maybe because it is overwhelming. 

I want to lift up Rev. Acree for being a voice in our neighboring community of Austin that has both a footprint and a population larger than Oak Park—where a whole community is often neglected. Yet they are our direct neighbors! 

We happen to live in a location where God calls us to pay attention, engage in some way, grow, and speak the truth in love. And sometimes act.

I’m hopeful the Community of Congregations that draws from Oak Park and environs will mature to a point of truly engaging congregations in the Austin community—and we all will be better for it. This is what this coalition of churches has prioritized over the past two years and I’ve agreed to come on the board and lead it further in this direction. I’m hopeful the Community of Congregations and the Leaders Network which Rev. Acree serves as Co-Commissioner will find meaningful ways to partner. There likely will be other avenues to engage churches in Austin as well. 

I’m sitting in bed with a bad sinus infection, and feel the urge to write all this... and hoping you who are local will join those of us getting involved with the Community of Congregations to begin this nascent work. We’ve got to start somewhere. And conversations are happening and hopefully will multiply. 

May this season of Spring bring flowering to all efforts to engage the Austin neighborhood and the wider West Side. 

With Love with Courage,

Alan

A Reflection on Freedom from Fear

At the congregation I serve, I shared a sermon which many have urged me to share more widely. May it be helpful to you. The podcast can be accessed at http://unitytemple.libsyn.com/freedom-from-fear

Freedom from Fear

delivered at Unity Temple UU

March 6, 2016

I walked into the room and saw a teddy bear. And then, lying on the bed, a young man with blue eyes, sandy brown curls, and freckles. As our eyes met, a smile broadened across his face. He told me his name is Josh. I introduced myself as Alan, the chaplain, for this was in San Francisco General Hospital. He was awaiting a spinal cord operation to relieve him from headaches and welcomed my company. 

We joked and quickly developed a warm rapport. He told me that his headaches are due to the onset of AIDS. He then said that his three best friends had recently died of AIDS. We talked about issues of rootedness, love, and loss. He said, pointing out the window, “See those hills? At night, I look out and watch the lights of cars weave down the same road that me and my friends traveled hundreds of times before.” He said that now that he’s lost his best friends, he’s scared of getting close to anyone. At the end of our conversation, I asked him if he’d like to pray. He said, “No not now, but pray for me this evening.” “What do you want me to pray for?” He said, “Pray for all the lost souls—and think of me.” Pray for all the lost souls. At times, I can’t do that without thinking of myself. 

Being lost is a natural state of the soul. It is a part of the human journey to lose our way. “Midway into life's journey,” Dante begins the Divine Comedy, “I found myself within a shadowed forest, for I had lost the path that does not stray.” The experience of being lost is so common in contemporary American culture that encourages us to indulge our petty desires at the cost of losing sight of our true selves.

This month, our theme is liberation. What does it mean to take a path of liberation? This is a foundational religious question. For many Buddhists it has to do with letting go of attachment, recognizing how following our grasping nature, our base desires, leads to bondage while practicing mindfulness and cultivating greater awareness of what really are steps toward liberation. For many Christians, liberation has to do with giving oneself over to the will of God, to replace one’s self-centered consciousness with a god or christ consciousness that guides our actions.

I’ve been grappling with Thomas Merton, the late Christian mystic and maverick Catholic priest, who embodied and articulated a profound perspective about spiritual freedom that blends these Buddhist and Christian understanding of liberation. One of his great insights is the title of his book from which I took today’s reading, No Man Is an Island. “There is something in the very nature of my freedom, he says, that inclines me to love, to do good, to dedicate myself to others. I have an instinct that tells me that I am less free when I am living for myself alone. The reason for this is that I cannot be completely independent. Since I am not self-sufficient I depend on someone else for my fulfillment. My freedom is not fully free when left to itself. It becomes so when it is brought into the right relation with the freedom of another.”

I think Merton would say, “Modern life has become full of distractions to the point that it is all one great distraction from who we really are and what we are here to do.” It matters, and sometimes matters profoundly if we hew to a path of loving with courage.

I recently gathered with a couple colleagues. We meet intermittently to support one another. One of us had started therapy and another one of us asked how it was going, “Terrible,” he said, “you know how therapy cuts you down, makes you face what you’re scared of, Well, right now I’m confused, disoriented, and exhausted.” The first colleague responded “That’s wonderful!” We all laughed, aware that real growth often requires hitting a wall and a slog of discomfort to learn how to really love with courage.

Two and a half years ago, Antoinette Tuff faced a seemingly untenable situation. You may have heard about it. She was sitting at the reception desk at an Atlanta elementary school when a young man walked in with an AK-47 and 500 rounds of ammunition. No one got hurt because she talked to the man like a fellow human being and he heard her, and what’s wild is that she was on the line with 911 and everything she said was recorded. The police chief in Atlanta said there’s no question that this could have been another Newtown CT. But it wasn’t thanks to her. 

During the first half of the conversation, Ms Tuff is speaking both to the 911 dispatcher and to the gunman by her side, conveying his demands and his questions. He tells her that he intends to kill dozens of people. He also acknowledges that he’s mentally unstable, off his medication, and has nothing to live for.  Ms Tuff an African American women in her mid 40s addresses this 20 year old white man as sir, and talks to him matter of factly, respectfully, as if she was speaking to a teacher. In the second half of the conversation, she begins speaking to him more affectionately, “sir” becomes “baby.” “What’s your name Baby?” Michael. Michael Hill. She responds, “My mother was a Hill!” She also calls him sweety and sweetheart. She says, I know. We all go through something in life. I almost committed suicide myself last year when my husband left me, but I didn’t and look at me now. It’s gonna be all right, baby. You’re gonna be all right. They’re not gonna shoot you. 

By now she has got Michael to lie down and lay his gun aside, assuring him that she will stay standing so that the police will know that he hadn’t hurt her. She kept saying, You’ll be alright. I love you. Her love literally disarmed Michael Hill. My colleague Victoria Safford, from whom I first learned about this incident, notes that in the days that followed, a talk show psychologist praised Ms Tuff, telling CNN that she had deployed excellent instrumental strategy and an exemplary negotiating style. All this may be true, but she herself had a different explanation and it involved no strategy at all, and it was certainly not about her style. She said what got her through was the teaching of her church to “anchor on the Lord in tough times.” She anchored on the Lord. 

Safford asks, What could that mean for us? What does that mean? The love she talks about sounds a lot like Universalism, like standing on the side of love, but how are we to talk about it? Anchor on the Lord probably may sound a little to religious to you, or way too religious; too old-fashioned, too theistic, too Christian. Safford asks, “So what would you call it, standing up in what Ms. Tuff called “tough times?” What do you call that courage, that radical love, radical empathy, radical grace? What holds your moral roots in place? What holds you to your highest aspiration, your deepest truth, your calling your longing, your conviction?”

These are questions about the nature of freedom, the courage to love, the courage to enter into commitments with others for the sake of lifting up all of our lives. When we love with courage we open up the space where true freedom beckons. Whether we call that which beckons God or not is beside the point, what matters is that we as human beings have the capacity to live freely and dedicate ourselves to what is good.

But contemporary American culture has so many lures to lose the path that does not stray. As Merton says: “It often happens that an individual’s true self is literally buried in the subconscious, and never has a chance to express itself except in symbolic protest against the tyranny of a malformed conscience that insists on remaining immature.” 

A path of liberation calls us to grow our soul and cultivate our conscience. I said earlier that being lost is a natural state of the soul, it is also a necessary state on the path of spiritual maturity. When we grow, we must leave behind certain routines or ways of seeing the world, and before we fully mature into a new ways, we must confront ambiguity, disorientation, uncertainty. It is at just these times we become all the more aware of our fears. Our anxieties ramp up. Like many of you, I think I must measure up in some way. I must achieve some level of measurable success. And I lose sight of what is truly of value. Merton reminds us to not depend on the hope of results but more and more to concentrate on the value, the rightness, the truth of our work, to struggle less and less for an idea and more and more for specific people. For in the end, it is the reality of personal relationship that saves everything.

Ms Tuff said she was praying through the entire encounter with Michael Hill, that when she heard the recording afterwards, she couldn’t believe how calm she was, that she hardly even recognized her own voice. Safford says she chalked it up to praying, praying for sufficient love, love large enough to hold Michael, to see the other person in the room, whatever the circumstance, not as a deranged gunman nor even as a threat, but ever and always as a humang being, someone with a story and struggle, just like her, and also a child of God, a person full of his own worth and dignity. 

When I returned to visit Josh at San Francisco General Hospital, he was gone. The nurses told me his operation had gone well, but that another patient had died, leaving his eight year old son, and his son was there in the hospital wailing, the nurses unsure what to do in that horrible moment. Josh had heard the commotion, came out of his room and gave his teddy bear to the young boy. The young boy stopped crying and just clutched the teddy bear and hugged Josh. After an extended hug with the child, Josh left the hospital with more than relief from headaches. He left knowing he could still give of himself and connect with other human beings. 

In this life, pain is unavoidable. Misery is a choice. And compassion is a choice. Committing to learn to love, and love with courage is a choice. In the end, it is the reality of personal relationships that saves everything.

Blessed be. Amen. 

Flint Humanitarian Crisis Brings Us Together in Compassion and Community

“We pray for the babies whose bodies have been poisoned by lead,” said Rev. Marshall Hatch as he led a prayer circle in Flint with a group of volunteers who had transported 16,000 bottles of fresh water to help alleviate the suffering of children, families and entire communities whose drinking water is contaminated by lead. When he prayed for the babies, tears welled up, as we were reminded that so many children have been needlessly poisoned. How can this neglect of a community happen in the United States, such a wealthy nation? 

In January, the governor of Michigan declared a state of emergency in the City of Flint and Genesee County because of elevated levels of lead found in its general water supply, which left thousands of residents exposed to toxic pollution of their drinking water. Rev. Ira Acree of Greater St. John’s Bible Church in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago declared, “Flint is a crime scene.”

Rev. Acree also specifically asked at the annual meeting of the Community of Congregations for our congregations to consider joining the Water for Life Campaign of the Leader’s Network. The Leader’s Network is a clergy-led gathering of community leaders addressing the needs of the West Side of Chicago. They also engage in humanitarian work, when crises like Flint emerge. They have a history of responding to disasters that affect underserved populations. 

Rev. Hatch, pastor of New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church in North Lawndale, along with Rev. Acree and leaders from six other churches in Chicago’s West Side, had gathered funding and supplies to help the stricken population. I was invited to travel with them since my own congregation agreed to participate. We took up our own emergency collection. 

Rev. Cy Fields, Senior Pastor of New Landmark Missionary Baptist Church in East Garfield Park, advised me that a truck had been donated by World Vision of Chicago (a national program that helps meet basic needs of young people, such responding to disasters, feeding the hungry and offering learning opportunities.) World Vision’s generosity, however, was outmatched by those who had donated water, so we had to find another truck.  

I was in charge of negotiating with the truck rentals, and ended up with a 24-foot rig, which I drove to New Mount Pilgrim, where the first truck was nearly loaded and the press had already gathered. After packing up the water, two trucks set off on a bumpy and adventure-filled drive to Michigan.  Our fellow truck driver was pulled over by the highway patrol, who told him that his truck was 10,000 pounds over weight. They inspected the truck and confirmed this was a humanitarian mission, and let him continue. 

In late afternoon, we pulled into the lot of Flint’s Antioch Missionary Baptist Church. We created a line of volunteers who stacked the gallons of water in the Church’s garage, then ended up making a trip to a Sam’s Club where we bought more truckloads of water. 

We learned how many people in Flint haven’t ever had it easy and this crisis was just one more challenge to survive. Volunteers told us about having to bathe only with cold water because hot water has a higher lead content. Stories of parents learning that their children have high lead levels in their blood were the most sobering. 

According to the U.S. Census, more than 40 percent of Flint’s population is living in poverty, making it the second most poverty-stricken city in the nation for its size.  The City itself has faced multiple financial crises that finally put it into emergency receivership. In an attempt to save money, the city council voted in 2013 to purchase water from the Karegnondi Water Authority (KWA) rather than from the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department.  The KWA project was not expected to be completed until the end of 2016, so the city decided to rely on its backup, the Flint River, which had been polluted with debris from the auto plants.

After a long day, the women from the Antioch Missionary Baptist church made dinner for the 16 of us including fried pork chops and fried corn on the cob. None of us from Chicago had fried eaten fried corn on the cob before.  Rev. Fields and I hadn’t eaten all day, and this meal tasted so incredibly good.  

We ended the day after dinner with a prayer by Rev. Hatch. He prayed for those in power to ensure that the citizens will get the medical attention they so badly need, and a healthy water system as soon as humanly possible. Our local churches have been generous, but we are still committed to a $4,000 contribution to the development of two reverse osmosis filtration systems to be built amidst the underserved population of Flint. Clean, uncontaminated water will be made available free of charge to anyone who needs it.

If you want to help with this project, you can donate directly to Woodside Church at woodsidechurch.net. This is a joined United Church of Christ and American Baptist church in Flint. 

Love with Courage,

Alan

Building Bridges between Oak Park and the West Side of Chicago

I’m inspired by what has transpired among the Community of Congregations these past two years. We have prioritized cultivating relationships with people of faith on the West Side of Chicago. Rev. Sally Iberg deserves our collective gratitude for presiding the past two years. The conversations at our Annual Meeting with clergy leaders in Austin and West Garfield Park were a blossoming of our collective work. 

At our Annual Meeting, Rev. Cy Fields expressed appreciation for our mutual interest in building bridges between the Community of Congregations and The Leader’s Network of Chicago’s West Side. Rev. Dr. Acree invited us to participate in the immediately critical project to transport water to Flint Michigan and flag this humanitarian crisis. Rev. Dr. Hatch described the acute differences between police interactions on either side of Austin Boulevard and the need for reform in Chicago that respects the dignity of all people.

I love their call to see us together as “West-Siders.” We are neighbors after all. While we may want to ignore the many social challenges to our east, there is tremendous love, wisdom, and hope among the people, especially people of faith. These pastors are just three of the thoughtful, dedicated human beings with whom we can cultivate relationships. 

I am embarrassed that I served here at Unity Temple for eight years before cultivating relationships beyond Austin Boulevard. There’s a tremendous cultural pull to turn away from our neighbors to the east and focus on what is familiar. 

Four and a half years ago, I and members of my congregation at Unity Temple began breaking through this invisible but very real emotional barrier. We’ve come to know many good people, some of whom have very different life experience--and all of whom share similar life commitments. 

When we cultivate honest relationships, we are better together. We can identify what common interests we have and how we can all grow together as we work toward common ends. For example, after getting to know several men in their 30s and 40s and learning how they received long prison sentences for non-violent crimes, their stories inspired me to join them in restorative justice efforts. In one campaign with a coalition of people of faith, we successfully advocated for legislation for felons convicted of nonviolent crimes to seal their records four years after doing their time. It didn’t make the news but it affected many lives. However, many challenges remain: the need for economic opportunity is essential; good education is critical; the opportunities for mentoring children and adults abound.

I don’t know exactly what we, as the Community of Congregations, will “do” in the coming year, but I believe we need to begin with relationship building. I look forward to focusing on activities that provide us the opportunity to engage our West Side neighbors, allowing us to listen to one another about our hopes and passions, our fears and dreams.

Might your congregation want to build a relationship with another in the West Side?Rabbi Max Weiss and Oak Park Temple hosted Pastor Marshall Hatch and his choir from Mt Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church at a Friday evening worship service. There’s a relationship in formation here. 

I’d love to hear how other congregations are creating relationships with others. Are there youth groups that get together? Choirs? What community service or social justice work is being supported and informed by bridges of faith communities?

May we rise to the challenges and opportunities before us, engaging the vision of the Community of Congregations. May we discover the gifts of building bridges with Chicago’s West Side and deepening in relationship. 

Rev. Alan Taylor is the Senior Minister at Unity Temple Unitarian Universalist Congregation and the newly installed president of Community of Congregations