|
By Dr. Bruce T. Marshall
September 27, 2009
Reading:
A Jewish peasant boy once came to the big town with his father to
celebrate the High Holy Days. This boy did not know how to pray. He
could not read; he didn’t even know the letters of the alphabet. He
only saw that everyone was traveling to the synagogues to
participate in the holy prayers. He thought, "If everybody is going
there, I must go too!"
He arrived at the town synagogue with his father and watched the
congregants crying and singing together swaying to and fro. He
turned to his father and asked, "Father, what is this about?"
His father turned to him and said, "The Holy One—blessed be—sits
enthroned in the heavens and we pray all year long to Him. We
especially pray during these days when the whole world is being
judged and each person is being judged for the rest of the year."
The son responded, "Father, what am I to do since I do not know how
to pray?"
His father quickly said to him, "All you have to do is be quiet and
listen to the other Jews praying. That is enough for you."
"But Father, if I don't know what these people are saying how is
that going to effect God's decision? How is being silent going to
help me?"
His father blurted out, "Listen, you should be quiet so no one will
know you're an ignorant peasant!"
The son stood still for a few minutes as the congregation continued
praying and then the young boy stood up and spoke loudly.
"I am going to pray to God in the way I know best. I will whistle to
God as I whistle to my flock of sheep."
He began whistling the sweet calling as most shepherds know. His
father was enraged, but the boy continued whistling with all his
might, not caring what other people thought.
Now, it happened on this particular Rosh Hashanah, that all the
heavenly gates had been shut, but suddenly—because of this pure
whistling of the heart—the gates burst open. And the prayers of
Israel were finally heard.
Source: hasidicstories.com
What is a prayer? Perhaps it is offering what is in our heart to
whatever we find to be holy. A prayer may be said in words, or in a
song, or dance, in a work of art, in service to another, in
preparing food. Practicing one’s craft in the way one knows best is
a prayer. As is being faithful to an ideal that brings life to you
and to others. When you offer what’s best in yourself, purely, from
the heart, then this might be what opens the gates of heaven.
Sermon:
Have you ever wanted to start over? Put aside those bad decisions,
undo the things that did not turn out well, repeal the stupid
comments that have escaped from your mouth. Heal the wounds you
carry around with you and that still hurt.
Because after we’ve lived for a while, the regrets and the harsh
memories build up. They get in the way of our living. There’s a line
in a song that occurs to me from time to time, “An old man sleeps
with his conscience at night. A young kid sleeps with his dreams.”
When we find ourselves having more regrets than dreams, then it
seems to me we’re turning old—no matter how many years we have
lived.
So wouldn’t it be wonderful to wipe the slate clean, like a teacher
at the beginning of a new day? Get out that eraser, rub off all that
old stuff that clutters our lives so that we can start anew. Claim
the freedom to move on, follow possibilities, make new mistakes
rather than continually relive the old ones.
Sometimes, wouldn’t it be wonderful to start over?
●●●
Religious observances are created in response to human needs. They
offer ways of addressing dilemmas of the human condition and contain
the wisdom of generations. When I encounter a religious practice
that is puzzling to me, it usually helps to ask: what human need,
what part of my life does this seek to address?
Tonight at sundown is the beginning of the Jewish observance of Yom
Kippur, which continues until sundown tomorrow night. Yom Kippur is
the holiest day of the Jewish year, and it comes at the end of the
High Holy Days: the ten days between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.
The High Holy Days are also referred to as the Days of Awe, and they
deal with matters that are awesome: life and death, one’s standing
before God, before one’s fellow human beings, and before one’s own
conscience.
The High Holy Days begin with Rosh Hashanah: the Jewish New Year,
translated as the “head of the year.” On Rosh Hashanah it is said
that God opens the Book of Life, and each of us is evaluated. If you
are found to be among the righteous, your name is inscribed in the
book, indicating that you will have a good life during the coming
year. For the rest of us, there’s an opportunity to make amends—to
get our names into that Book of Life.
This is where the High Holy Days come in: the 10-day period between
Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This is a time of reflection,
introspection, when we consider our lives in the previous year. It’s
a time to identify the ways in which we have come up short, when our
actions might not have been completely honorable. It’s a time to
contemplate our sins.
It’s also a time to do something about our failings. Prayer,
repentance and acts of charity can all affect our fate in the coming
year. There is also the practice of forgiveness and reconciliation.
During the High Holy Days, you are advised to seek out any person
you might have wronged during the year and ask that person’s
forgiveness. The person from whom you seek forgiveness is then
obligated to grant it. He or she does not have the option of
refusing—or of saying, well, let me think about it. If someone seeks
your forgiveness, you grant it.
So during those ten days preceding Yom Kippur, you reflect upon your
life, identify those things that nag on your conscience, and make
amends with anyone you feel you have wronged. But on Yom Kippur the
focus changes. This is not between oneself and one’s conscience;
it’s not between oneself and other people. Now you appear before
God. With an attitude of humility and reverence, you present
yourself to God, seeking forgiveness and God’s blessings. This is
where the practice of fasting on Yom Kippur comes in: it’s an
expression of humility—a time of denying oneself pleasure—to focus
on the deeper things.
Yom Kippur is not a joyous holiday: it’s not Christmas; it’s not
Hanukkah. It is solemn, reverent and doesn’t seem like a whole lot
of fun. So we might ask, “What’s the point? I’ve already got plenty
of suffering and challenge in my life? Why put oneself through
this?”
The answer is found in what happens when the Yom Kippur fast ends—at
sundown. You gather for a meal to break the fast—and the food tastes
really good. And you are with family, maybe with friends also, and
you are reminded of the importance of these relationships. You begin
the new year, having been cleaned out—physically and emotionally
purged of things that have tormented you.
You start over.
●●●
I have a problem closing doors. I mean this quite literally: I open
a cabinet door, and I don’t close it. I pull open a drawer, and I
don’t close it either. I open another one, and then another. You can
tell when I’ve been in the kitchen—several doors and drawers are
left hanging open. It’s other doors too: outside doors, inside
doors, closet doors, the case that holds the TV stuff, the door to
the oven. And the refrigerator, oh my. I get up in the morning, and
the door is ajar, and the refrigerator has been working overtime all
night, trying to cool the whole house. Recently we had to buy a new
refrigerator (maybe I wore the old one out). This new one comes
equipped with an alarm that sounds when the door is left open too
long. It helps but doesn’t fix the problem. I still sometimes forget
to close it. (By the way, if you doubt what I’m saying, ask my wife.
She’ll verify it, maybe even add some details.)
I don’t know why I do this. It’s irritating to other people, and
it’s irritating to me. I mean, I don’t like walking into a room with
doors hanging open, and I’ve gotten my share of bruises from bumping
into doors that I’ve left ajar. Sometimes I try to justify the
practice to myself: If I close this door, I think, I’m just going to
have to open it again. But I don’t think that’s the real reason. I
just have a hard time closing things, accepting endings, putting
things behind me. It’s hard for me to admit when something is over,
and so it’s also hard to begin anew.
So I look to themes contained in observances like the High Holy Days
with something more than a professional interest. I wonder: what
might they tell me about bringing something to completion so that I
might move on, so that I might start over?
This morning I’m going to identify three principles—three things
that we find in ancient religious stories and observances. Three
things that might help when we seek to put the past behind us and
begin again.
●●●
There’s a Buddhist story that introduces a first principle.
This concerns two Buddhist monks, walking along a path, on a journey
together. They reach a point where the path encounters a river that
has swollen from recent rainfalls—the waters of the river are
churning over the path. And there in front of them, afraid to enter
the river and cross it, is a young woman. One of the monks, without
so much as a glance at her, enters the water and walks through to
the other side. The other monk, though: he picks up the woman,
carries her across, puts her down on the other side and then catches
up to the first monk.
The monks continue their journey, but now an uncomfortable silence
grows between them. Finally, the first monk can bear it no longer.
He says, “In the sacred vows we took as monks, we pledged never to
touch a woman. So how could you…how could you?” The second monk
replies, calmly—no doubt. He says, “I left the woman beside the
river. But you are still carrying her.”
Ah yes. How many of us are still carrying that woman: memories of
being wronged, hurt feelings, angry thoughts that should have left
by the side of the road ages ago? But here we are, still dragging
them along with us. It can be so difficult to let things go, even
when they no longer matter.
In Buddhism there is the principle of non-attachment. That is, you
conduct your life without getting attached to the various things
that come our way, seeking to grab on to us. You’re driving on the
Beltway and somebody cuts in front, causing you to swerve—you let it
go. You win an award for having done something wonderful—you let it
go. You encounter a period of financial challenge in your life. You
do what you can to address it, but you don’t let those challenges
become you. You don’t get attached.
We are cautioned not to carry all that accumulated stuff along the
path. Rather, you put those things down and leave them on the side
of the river and continue along the journey of your life. We let
them go.
●●●
A second principle: something else that can help free us from
afflictions that keep us mired in the past. This principle is
forgiveness. Forgiveness is a central theme of the Jewish High Holy
Days. Seeking forgiveness for our own transgressions. Offering
forgiveness for those who have transgressed against us.
Forgiveness is an important practice in many religious traditions.
In the Roman Catholic tradition, for example, there is the sacrament
of confession, in which the penitent speaks of wrongs he or she has
committed. The priest who hears the confession may assign certain
tasks to do in order to atone for the wrongs—usually prayers. And
then he offers absolution. The penitent is forgiven and returns to
life, no longer weighed down by whatever the sins that drove the
person to confession. He or she starts anew.
The Protestant tradition—which we inherit as Unitarian
Universalists—doesn’t offer much in the way of forgiveness. We’re
big on responsibility: we are responsible for who we are, for who we
become. And we’re bred with a certain stubborn pride which makes it
hard to admit our failings. So we don’t have much in the way of
rituals of forgiveness. We have to find forgiveness—and offer
forgiveness—on our own.
Some of us may partake in that secular version of the confessional
known as psychotherapy. In my experience, at least, therapy doesn’t
often provide answers to the problems that drive there in the first
place. What it does, when it works, is remove those problems of
their power. The problems are still there, but their power fades so
that they no longer dominate us. It’s kind of like what happens in
the practice of seeking and receiving forgiveness during the High
Holy Days, and kind of like what happens in the Catholic
confessional.
In lieu of therapy or formal rituals of forgiveness, we might simply
keep the need in mind. We are all human, we make mistakes, we have
regrets, we’re all in this boat together. Each of us sometimes needs
to forgive and each of us will sometime need to be forgiven. The
form in which forgiveness is offered and received doesn’t have to be
anything fancy. Just showing a little kindness and compassion can go
a long way.
One more thing about forgiveness. Sometimes we need to forgive each
other, sometimes we need to forgive ourselves. But you who else
needs forgiveness? God, that is, the forces of existence that
subject us to the storms of life which can be completely unfair. The
Jewish tradition suggests a more active relationship with God than
generally found in Christianity. It’s permitted to argue with God,
rage against God, ask, “What could You have been thinking?’ It
recognizes that sometimes we need to be able to forgive God.
There’s another song that appears in my head from time to time. It’s
by John Prine. Goes like this, “Father forgive us for what we must
do. You forgive us, we’ll forgive you. We’ll forgive each other
‘till we both turn blue. And we’ll whistle and go fishin’ in
heaven.” (That’s pretty much my whole sermon right there.)
●●●
So: two ways of approaching the challenge of putting things behind
us to that we can start again. One: Letting go. Two: Seeking and
offering forgiveness.
I’ll introduce a third principle by relating a conversation I had at
a meeting this past week with clergy of several denominations. It
was an informal discussion in which we were talking through various
issues before us. One of our number posed the question, do you live
mostly in the past, the present, or in the future? She went on to
say that she was future oriented. She didn’t think much about the
past—what was done was done. And even in the present moment, the
future was more real to her, the plans and possibilities that lie
ahead.
I had to think about that question for awhile. I like to look ahead,
to plan. I like to consider what might be. I am also intrigued by
the past. I love history. And the experiences of my childhood form a
baseline for what has happened in later life. But I am at my best, I
think, when I am present. Right here, right now.
I am a graduate of a course of study in spiritual direction, which
aims to help people explore and develop their spiritual lives. Among
the things I’ve learned as a spiritual director—or at least tried to
learn—is to be present. Just that: to be present to the person in
front of me, to be present to what’s happening in this moment, to be
present to myself. To let go of the past, to let go of the future,
to be right here/right now.
Because when I am able to do that, something happens. I am better
able to be of service to the person in front of me. But I am also
better able to appreciate the blessings of existence. And I am most
myself. There are these wonderful times when the past slips away,
the future slips away. And I am completely here, in this moment.
Those things that afflict me from my past, they drift away. The
anxieties about the future: they aren’t on my mind either. I’m here,
starting over, and the freshness of life returns.
Right here. Right now.
●●●
Starting over: putting the past behind and beginning again. Three
principles that have been helpful to me are (1) letting go of the
things I’m holding onto that keep me in their grip, (2) Forgiveness
of others, of self, and of God, (3) the practice of presence: being
fully here, right now. It strikes me that they go together; they’re
all expressions of the same basic attitude. Letting go, forgiveness,
the practice of presence.
One more thing. Throughout this sermon, I’ve been speaking of
“starting over” as a personal challenge, which it is. But
institutions face the same issues: companies, clubs, government
agencies, non-profit organizations and, yes, churches. From time to
time, if churches are to remain vital and faithful to their
missions, they have to start over. They have to let go of whatever
drags them down; they have to reinvent themselves.
And so too in this time of transition here at Davies. We enter a
period of reflection, introspection, thinking about who we have been
and who we still yearn to be. It’s a process that may involve
closing some doors, letting go of things that have afflicted us. It
will probably call for compassion and forgiveness, certainly
kindness as we recognize the human failings of us all, while also
celebrating the gifts that each has to bring. It will involve being
present, listening, honoring the contributions of each participant.
So that we can as a congregation, start over. In love. Finding our
own song—like that of the shepherd boy in the opening reading—the
pure music that expresses what’s in our heart and in our soul. So
that, as is represented in the Jewish tradition, the gates of heaven
may open.
|
