Love is the Doctrine of this Church
Sermon by Steve Edington
February 11, 2007
In my return here last Sunday after a month away I seem to have missed an anniversary. I don't believe it was as serious as missing a wedding anniversary or a birthday but it's still one I should have caught. I was reminded of it in a full page article in last Monday's Telegraph which a lot of you probably read. February 3rd, a week ago Saturday marked 50 years since the Nashua Armory was destroyed by fire. The reason that's a significant date for us as well is that we did not go down with it. The Armory, as many of you know, was located at that time where our classroom and office wing is now, and where the White Wing School is housed. When I looked at the picture in last Monday's Telegraph, which I've seen many times, I realized once again just how close we came to not having this building we're in here this morning. You can, in the picture, see the fire fighters standing over there about where our pass-through link is now with their hoses trained on the smoke and flames as they were moving in this direction.
The article quoted our resident historian, Bob Sampson, as he recalled the Sunday (February 3rd came on a Sunday that year) morning when the fire broke out: "The fire drove us out of the church, where the intense heat of the burning building could be felt through the windows. Everyone watched from the street to see if we were going to lose our church. The fire department did a magnificent job of keeping the church from burning."
The main focus of the Telegraph article was about the ensuing controversy over where to build a new Armory once it was determined that the building was too far gone to be restored. That was pretty interesting, especially the part about the attempt to build a new one in Greeley Park. I was not aware of that. But that's another story. The piece that had to do with us, once our building was saved, was briefly mentioned in the article's last paragraph where it was noted that we, this church, bought the site, razed what was left of the old structure, and put up the building that is there today.
In musing on all this I thought about how a good number of churches seem to have a "fire story" somewhere in their larger, overall history: As in the fire back in 18 - or 19 - whenever, when we lost our building and had to pull together and put up a new one. We are certainly fortunate in that our fire story is about a fire that didn't cost us our building, and ended up giving us another one instead.
To play on this for just a bit longer, it was also last Monday that pictures ran in newspapers around the country, and on TV news programs, of a congregation in central Florida gathering for worship in the midst of the rubble of their church building which had been leveled by the severe storms and tornados that swept across that State's mid-section a couple of weeks ago. It was a terrible loss for those people - the members of that church, whose religious affiliation I do not know but for whom I feel sympathy. I know their minister now has the task of keeping up the spirits of his congregation... They will most likely pull themselves together and rebuild their church structure. And you can be sure that the story of the Tornado of 2007 that destroyed our church building will forever be a part of their story - just as the Fire of 1957 that didn't get us is a part of ours.
Church stories have been a life-long fascination of mine. Perhaps that's because I cannot recall a time in my life - going back to my very earliest memories - when I wasn't part of a church, or religious body, in some way. I've come to believe that in addition to all the various stated reasons people give for wanting to join up with a religious community, is that they also want or need to be a part of a larger story that they can connect with and feel participation in. In 1957, for example, I was 12 years old; I'd never heard of the Unitarians or the Universalists. There were Baptists, and then there was everybody else who were more or less lumped together. I would have also been hard put to find Nashua, New Hampshire on a map. But the story of the Fire of '57 that I opened up with today is one that has become a part of my own story. It's about me; not just me, of course; and not about me in any selfish or unduly possessive kind of way, I hope. But it's about me in the sense that it's part of the story of an institution that has become a very important part of my life - and I'm sure any number of you can say the same thing. We each take a portion of our personal identity from the groups, the organizations, the institutions we choose to become a part of, and in our so doing their story becomes a part of our own.
I think it's now time for me to issue a fair warning. The remainder of this sermon, and what I'll have to say next week with those with whom I'll be sharing that service, is meant to help launch our pledge drive for our 2007-2008 fiscal year. Maybe "warning" is not the best choice of words on my part since it may seem to suggest that my sub-text is "hold on to your wallets." The actual message I want to convey is really "open your wallets." I'm not going to get down to details of all that today, however. I'd like us instead to devote some thought to what is the common thread that runs through the stories that are told in those churches that stand in the liberal Free Church tradition as ours does.
Each of our churches - and I'm focusing now on those in liberal, free church, Unitarian or Universalist traditions - has its own unique story with certain events that get passed on from one generation to the next. But what is the larger theme, or the greater story, in which they are grounded? I'm going to suggest - for our purposes this morning anyway - that this greater theme can be captured in a few lines that are a part of a reading in our current hymnal; and that, with only slight variations, has appeared in several of the hymnals that have preceded the one we now use. The reading, number 471 in our current hymn book, begins with the words, "Love is the doctrine of this church."
Love is the doctrine of this church. What's that about anyway? It is not primarily about sentiment, especially the kind of sentiment that gets put on display as we approach Valentines Day this Wednesday. I mean, sure, go do the hearts and flowers and candy and all that - as I'll be doing myself - but that's not the love we're getting at here. The phrase "love is the doctrine of this church" actually has historical roots clear back in the time when the first churches in this country were being established right around these parts.
I'm indebted to the work and research of my UU ministerial colleague, the Rev. Alice Blair Wesley, for where I want to go next. Some 6-7 years ago she delivered a series of lectures in various churches around New England under the title of The Lay and Liberal Doctrine of the Church: The Spirit and the Promise of our Covenant. The first of those lectures had the same title as today's sermon topic - Love is the Doctrine of this Church. Alice gave it in the First Unitarian Church of Dedham, Mass. for reasons you'll soon see, even though I'll only be skimming the surface here of her very excellent work.
Rev. Wesley points out that by 1630 - not even 10 years after the Mayflower landed - there were some 20,000 colonists here already in the land they called New England. And once these colonists got their homes built, and at least the rudiments of towns in place, they began to form churches. Many of them had come here, in part anyway, to get away from the more repressive and hierarchical ecclesiastical structures and strictures they had been bound by in England. Now they wanted to form churches on their own terms and according to their own needs. They were devout Christians but were suspicious, as I say, of hierarchical structures erected in the name of Christianity.
So they began to create their churches not by first placing a structure in place, but by just talking among themselves. They held these little town gatherings, according to Rev. Wesley, to talk about the kind of churches they wanted and how they would be run. Someone apparently took minutes at these gatherings - like the ones being held in Dedham in 1637 - where it was recorded that there were weekly neighborhood meetings called "lovingly to discourse and consult together and prepare for spiritual communion in a church society...that we may become further acquainted with the spiritual tempers and gifts of one another." Out of these conversations churches were formed, and some of them, like the one in Dedham, eventually became Unitarian - and then Unitarian Universalist - churches. They got started by people who did "lovingly discourse and consult together." Rev. Wesley did a lot of digging through these kinds of records, and I want to do at least some justice to her research by reading, in her words, some of her findings:
"For any who might suppose our 17th century Free Church ancestors talked mostly about original sin, predestination, and hellfire, I am glad to tell you, not one of those topic is mentioned in the record of the founding of the Dedham Church. The document describes these discussions of 1637-38 (records) the talk, talk, talk they engaged in at each step of the way to the founding..." You have to love that "talk, talk, talk" business. There seem to be an historical precedent for our being a bunch of blabber-mouths.
Alice continues, "In these pages there is much use of the words reason, reasoned, reasoning...There is also repeated use of the words sweet, comfort, help and brotherly. But by far the most commonly used words in this written history are affection, embrace, love, loving, and lovingly. In the first 24 pages I counted 32 uses of the words affection and love. Why? Because then and now and for as long as human history lasts, when all is said and done, the integrity of the free church comes down to our loyalty to the spirit of love at work in the hearts and minds of the local members."
Love is the doctrine of this church, then, is not just pretty words on paper. It is rather a statement about a near 400 year heritage and story of the American free church; and to choose to join a church like this one is to become a part of that heritage and to become a part of that story.
Love is the doctrine of this church, to bring it closer to home, does not mean we all love each other equally, which is a bit hard to do in a congregation of some 350 members. It does not mean we'll all know one another equally and on the same level. It does not even mean that we all have to like one another equally, although I would hope that a good spirit of high respect and high regard for one another does exist amongst us - as I feel it does. Love is the doctrine of this church, however, does mean that there is a relationship here - a relationship that is being continually defined and redefined. It means that together we form a whole that is greater than the sum of our individual parts. It does mean that we have a bond of union within which we seek ways to be together with and for one another; and that we will work and strive together to advance the principles and values that define our liberal religious faith.
It is also this principle of Love is the doctrine of this church that helps distinguish for us what it mean to be a religious community rather than some of the other things we may tend to resemble in being the kind of religious community we are. Although what you hear from this pulpit may on occasion sound like a lecture, this room is not a lecture hall. While we have many good times socializing with one another, in a wide variety of ways, we are not a social club. While we enjoy a lot of good discussions and conversations among ourselves on any number of topics we're not a discussion society. The same kinds of things may happen around here as would happen in a lecture hall, or a social club, or a discussion society - and that is all well and good. We need to learn, to have fun, and to share ideas in this setting. We wouldn't really have a whole heckuva lot to do if we didn't do these things.
But what makes us a religious community is that such things as these, and many more, are grounded in a relationship which, as I say, is continually in process. If you can indulge me in a bit of spatial imagery for just a moment, I'd say ours is a relationship with a horizontal piece to it when it comes to how we seek to reach out to one another and have our lives touch in meaningful ways; and it has a vertical part to it as we seek out our relationship with that which we sense is greater than ourselves - our relationship with that larger Spirit of Life and Love and Sacredness that gathers us all in.
Well, if all that sounds a little too ethereal for your tastes, let me see if I can offer a more on-the-ground example of what I'm trying to say. Off and on over the past 7-8 years I've taught a spring semester continuing studies course at the University of Massachusetts at Lowell through their English Department on the Beat Generation writers. It runs one night a week for three hours for 14 weeks. The first one I did was in the spring of 1998. With some trepidation - having never done such a thing before - I prepared a syllabus, worked up my class presentations, figured out the assignments I would give, wrote up quizzes - all that stuff. And then I had a great time with around 15 students for the 14 weeks.
We got to our last session. I gave an abbreviated final exam that left some time for us to talk a bit about how the course had gone. And then I said good-night and good-bye to everyone and headed home. On the drive home I was surprised at how mixed - even contradictory - my feelings were. I felt a good sense of accomplishment and satisfaction that I'd pulled it off - and that I'd been able to pass along some of my knowledge and enthusiasm about a subject I'm, you know, rather big on. But along with all that was a kind of empty, and even depressed feeling. I realized that unless I should inadvertently run into any of them somewhere I'd most likely never see any of my class members again. We'd all had this good time, and then it just ended. Well, truth to tell, there have been a few students over the years that I'm just as glad not to see again - but you get the idea.
The point I'm making is that there was no relationship, or no connection there other than the one we needed to maintain for a short length of time, so those students could get a little closer to the degrees they were pursuing by way of night school. I completely understand and accept that. So as much as I enjoy my occasional forays into academia, I'm glad I am where I am here. After all, love is the doctrine of this classroom doesn't quite work (and its not supposed to work) in the way that love is the doctrine of this church does. As is the case in all relationships we tend to fall short of their ideal, but as we walk together here we try to uphold a relationship that is greater than the sum of all we do.
I'll close these thoughts today on a theme we'll work more on next Sunday. One hundred and eighty years ago a group of Nashuans got together in a home - now known as the Abbot/Spaulding House, just up the hill a ways from here. They wanted to form a free and liberal church in Nashua. Maybe their conversations about the church they wanted had some of the same flavor as those Alice Blair Wesley discovered as she delved into the history of what in time became the Dedham UU Church. However their conversations went, their outcome was the church we gather in here this morning. We're in the same building they moved into in June of 1827. We're still standing after all these years; and we're still a liberal religious community after all these years.
If you consider 25 years to be the time-span of a generation and then do a little math, we are the seventh generation to inherit what those who first worshipped on this spot began. The Seventh Generation is the theme of the Circle Dinners that will be held in various homes next Saturday night as a run-up to our pledge drive Sunday the next day. The Seventh Generation theme is of Native American origins as it comes from the Great Law of Peace of the Iroquois Confederacy which states, in part, "in our every deliberation we much consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations."
Those Nashuans - actually they were residents of Dunstable, as it was called then - who deliberated and conversed in Daniel Abbot's home made some decisions; and they gave of themselves, of their time, of their energies, of their devotion, and of their financial resources to support the decision they made. Seven generations later we are the impact of their decisions. When it comes to us now, we can do no less - and indeed we can do more - to both validate the decision those people made and keep this liberal religious community of hope and promise alive both for us and for at least another seven generations after us.
Love is the doctrine of this church. This is part of the covenant we make with one another. To be in covenant, means to walk together with shared values and shared ideals and with love and concern for one another. In the language of our closing hymn is to "run this race" guiding each other's feet as we go along.
Stephen D. Edington
February 11, 2007
