About Our Religious Society

October 10, 1965
Plainfield

Sermon Series: WHERE I NOW STAND
About Our Religious Society

All that I said about the integrity of individual belief would be deficient and ambiguous if I failed to come to grips with the reality that individuals encounter individuals and their honest convictions may collide rather than coincide. What then?

Last week I affirmed that the universe is dynamic, that man emerged through the process we call evolution because living organisms could adapt to ever-changing conditions. Today's part of this series is an attempt to deepen the meaning of individual integrity of belief by recognizing that no individual lives a solitary existence. We live in a social order – there is no other option except to extinguish life. How can individual integrity be retained and an effective social order maintained?

The institutions of society change much more slowly than an individual adjusts to new conditions. The necessity of "continued struggle to maintain a balance between change and order has been faced by all civilizations." (Moody Prior, PBK address.)

In an essay found in Leonard Duhl's THE URBAN CONDITION, (p. l4ff) John R. Seeley, then Chairman of the Department of Sociology of York University, believes two dominant themes have been major motifs characterizing Western history. "One theme virtually asserts that if each before his own door sweeps, the village will be clean; the other, that if the village institutes a proper sanitation service, each one will be clean – at least as far as his dooryard, and probably beyond. In dogmatic form these views are asserted not simply in terms of 'if, but in terms of 'if and only if' – i.e., a way becomes THE WAY. One formula runs roughly: good persons (or 'mature' or 'productive' or whatever new word for 'good' you want) make a good society, which inevitably makes a good physical ordering – or if not, it does not matter since virtue is its own sufficient reward. The other, obviously: a good physical ordering leads toward a great society, which produces (or educes) good persons – or if not, it does not matter since a good external order is a, perhaps, sufficient good in itself."

It might be possible to speak in general terms about the contradiction implicit in these two ways of life pulsing in our Western culture, but the context today is our kind of religious society – governed by the members in congregational meeting, using constitutional by-laws as the basic instrument for proper procedures. I am not asserting that such a religious society can be a proper model for the infinitely larger and more complex institutions of government, but I am saying that from the experience of the democratic religious society clues will be present and some wisdom gained which should give us. some insight into the crucial matter of whether or not self-government is an authentic hope or cruel delusion.

Without qualifying a single word said about the integrity of individual religious belief, I believe this, too – freedom even in the most democratically organized society is limited. My individual rights are limited by your individual rights. If we walk together, talk together, act together, we must accept common rules or laws which do place limits on our individualities. If we do not accept such limitations, in one way or another, society will impose them. The alternatives are anarchy and violence. Anarchy and violence always have the consequence of immediate destruction of the values which define freedom.

Therefore, we need the ordered society, because to grow properly in wisdom and righteousness, we must talk together, walk together and act together. A religious society of persons who voluntarily have subscribed to a constitutional instrument is necessary for our growth in freedom, our corporate wisdom and our effective application of the truths we believe.

There are many ways of affirming the values of a religious society such as ours. Let me suggest today – setting, structure, body, quality.

1. I believe the religious society to be the orderly setting of free expression for the congregation. When one wishes to temper metal, one exposes it to heat and pressure. There is no better way to discover whether one's ideas and convictions have been sufficiently tested than by exposure to facts and opinions expressed by someone else who may appraise issues differently.

There are many ways our Unitarian Universalist religion represents for us what religion is and does, but one of the distinctions we should never disavow is a respect for the growing edge of ideas. In no better way can ideas mature than by refinement in the free market of "challenge and response."

Dr. Nelson Glueck, President of Hebrew Union College and eminent archeologist, has written DEITIES AND DOLPHINS: THE STORY OF THE NABATAEANS (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux). The Nabataean kingdom flourished commerically, artistically and agriculturally in the Near East, from about 200 B.C. to 200 A.D., and was a crossroad of Mediterranean culture. Today, were it not for the excavations of the archeologist, we would know almost nothing of this vigorous kingdom.

According to Dr. Glueck, the Nabataeans did not persist and failed to influence history significantly because "they lacked the indestructible ideas of Greek philosophy, Roman law and Hebrew religion." The worship of the Nabataeans "was almost entirely limited to supplication for food and fortune in this world and the hereafter. It carried with it even in the midst of a brilliant period of efflorescence the irresistible causes of disintegration and disappearance." (See Saturday Review, p. 22, 9/4/65.)

The lesson seems clear; without a free market in ideas, any organization is headed for despotism or oblivion, irrespective of other virtues and assets. The religious society is no exception.

Not only is the free pulpit a necessary plank in the platform, but also the free pew. In the coffee hour, in the pulpit when the minister vacates it, in the committee work and in the program meetings, our religious society must not falter in expressing ideas and convictions and must not build any walls, psychological or organizational, that will shut out the creative rhythm of differing opinions expressed openly and with affection. The most important setting is, of course, the society in official meeting, but without a prevailing climate of openness whenever we gather informally, then there will be difficulty maintaining free expression and good will amid the formalities of "Robert's Rules of Order."

2. I believe the democratic religious society to be a structure of discernment. When there is no discrimination between the important and the trivial, the enduring and the transient, all the traffic in ideas is like unto the chaff which the wind blows away.
The eminent historian, Henry Steele Commager, (in article "Historian Looks at Political Morality," Saturday Review, 7/10/65) noted, "The students of my college celebrate Lord Jeffrey Amherst on all ceremonial occasions, but few of them remember that Lord Amherst's solution to the Indian problem was to send them blankets infected with smallpox." One might call this celebration without discernment.

That was illustration, for I have no desire to single out one institution where values were not clearly perceived, for there are no exceptions to the rule that every society needs more acute perception as well as free expression.

What do persons value most? What issues deserve priority in attention and decision? Does the leadership, whether the professional leadership or the elected lay leadership, correctly interpret the members' convictions and their dominant feelings about change and the order of change?

Dr. Dexter Perkins, famous Rochesterian, historian, one-time Moderator of the A.U.A., in his brief historical study, THE NEW AGE OF FRANKLIN ROOSEVELT, (p. 110) wrote about the sense of peril Americans felt in the late 1930's about the collapse of the European democracies. There was increasing feeling in the U.S. that vigorous action was necessary, even at the risk of war. According to Dr. Perkins, William Allen White, long-time Republican, admonished President Roosevelt, "As an old friend, let me tell you that you may not be able to lead the American people unless you catch up with them."

There is a legend, probably unhistorical, but pertinent, about the agitated man in a revolution, anxiously asking spectators, "where did the crowd go? I am their leader."

Persons gathered in religious society, or any society, must perceive as well as express and must evaluate as well as expostulate. The method and consequence of such an appraising process is just as essential to the moral growth of a society as it is to an individual. I believe it our obligation to increase the ways we may perceive and evaluate the ideas and issues which stake a claim on our interest.

3. Next I believe that the effective range of our religious society reaches beyond expression and discernment. At its best the Unitarian Universalist religious society is a body of decision and a proper instrument of change.

In Sophocles' immortal drama, ANTIGONE, Creon, the dictator, says, "I guard the city's greatness." In our kind of society, the leadership we do not want is a dictator to guard any greatness we may have or to which we aspire. The body of decision is the members gathered. They must guard the tradition and innovate the necessary changes to keep purpose alive and action effective. The most difficult and responsible task of the membership is to maintain the balance between what has been and what should be.

In a famous line, the Rev. Mr. Thwackum in TOM JONES asserted, "When I mention religion, I mean the Christian religion; and not only the Christian religion, but the Protestant religion; and not only the Protestant religion, but the Church of England." Such narrow parochialism is not for us, but temptations facing us, while not as obvious, may be enticing. For example, John Haynes Holmes wrote in his autobiography, I SPEAK FOR MYSELF, an impression of his first pastorate, Third Unitarian Church of Dorchester, Massachusetts, that it was "exactly like its neighbors, adapted to traditions rather than prospects."

Last week I suggested to you that "each of us is a seeker of religious truth – we should feel committed to a perpetual process of searching out better expressions of faith which embody both deeper perception and a broader embrace of the new knowledge constantly flowing from the sciences and the humanities." This statement is just as relevant to our group ways as well as to our individual integrity. One of my colleagues (Wallace Fiske) once wrote, "some people fall out of church life for the same reason the little girl fell out of bed – she went to sleep too near the place she got in."

In professing to be a body of decision and the proper instrument of change, a vital virtue of our religious society is not only that it is the way of group religious life most consistent with a free faith, but also it is an immediate and practical test of the democratic ways we profess. At its best, our religious society is an integrated community whose members assert, listen, consult, strive for authentic concensus and then express the will of the members by vote.

Isaiah, most poetic of the Hebrew prophets of old, had appropriate words: "Behold, I create new heavens and a new earth: and the former things shall not be remembered, nor come to mind. But be ye glad and rejoice forever in that which I create...."

Note that Isaiah challenges persons to rejoice in the things which are created, not which have been created. The past can neither be ignored nor erased; but vital to a Unitarianism and a Universalism which will carry both the better sanctions of the past and a confrontation of the present in a continuous reconstruction by interweaving old wisdom with new experience.

4. One thing more is needed. I believe our religious society, when it is at its best, possesses a quality of fellowship which laces together freedom, discernment and decision in good will and affection. Eddie Dunn, the Rochester radioman, told a story which may illustrate. A teacher, disturbed about noise and chatter in class, said, "I want the persons to stand on their feet who are responsible for doing all the talking and preventing the students from learning." There was a long pause, then one student stood up. Teacher: "At least there's one honest student among you. I'd like to hear what you have to say." "Well, teacher, I didn't think you should be standing there alone:, so I decided to join you."

We join each other as well as joining a society. A character, a quality of feeling, creates our fellowship as well as a proper set of by-laws. Josiah Royce, Harvard philosopher, whose teaching life overlapped the 19th and 20th Centuries, developed a theory about early Christianity which may possess an insight for later times and different conditions. Royce believed that an unappreciated emphasis of Paul and the other early Christians was loyalty to a community. Royce wrote, (PROBLEM OF CHRISTIANITY, p. 158), "But apart from Paul's religious faith, the perfectly human truth remains that loyalty (which is the love of a community) loyalty – the devotion of self to the cause of community – is the only cure for the natural warfare of the collective and individual will."

The difficulties of differing convictions should never be ignored. (In our kind of society we could not ignore them if we would.) We reject with loathing the involuntary extinction of the individual for the sake of a cause, even a good cause. Without feeling for others a society becomes a cold collectivity. In THE PALL, Albert Camus has his central character say, "Your success and happiness are forgiven you only if you generally consent to share them."

How shall I sum up what I believe about the society which is the framework for free expression, discernment, decision and a precious quality of fellowship? An old African proverb suggests a summary in six words, "No hand can wash itself properly."

In the beginning I spoke of two dominant and contradictory ideas: On the one hand, that "if each before his own door sweeps, the village will be clean." On the other, "that if the village institutes a proper sanitation service, each one will be clean, at least as far as his own dooryard."

Neither position deserves to be cherished as an ultimate and unshakeable foundation for beliefs. Life is never so simple as to permit easy dogmatisms or glib generalities.

Whenever the integrity of individual belief requires it, one must check out of a society, but this is an option persons should be reluctant to choose. When persons congregate in an open society with a constitutional instrument, and are dedicated both to discernment and character, no matter what else may happen, the opportunity always remains to cherish human dignity by supporting it in freedom and fellowship.