What's God Got To Do With It?
Sermon by Stephen D. Edington, September 26, 1999
Reading
(From As If God Were There, by Terry Sweetser)
I was seven years old when I had my first encounter with theology. My mother made a batch of fudge, placed in it the refrigerator, and decreed that it could not be sampled until after supper. I was not pleased. I contrived every scheme I could imagine to sneak some, but someone always seemed to be lurking in the kitchen.
At about four o'clock I got an unbelievable break. My mother and sister had to go to the store, leaving me alone for a little while. Mother must have been reading my mind because she gave me a warning on her way out: "Just because I am not here," she said, "don't think you are alone with the fudge. God is watching you."
The word "theology" means God study. As they drove off I was studying hard. It did not take me long to conclude that I was a seven year old atheist. Boy did that fudge taste good. Unfortunately, for me, mother counted the pieces, and the recount on her return showed a deficit of three. When asked how I could have brazenly taken the fudge in front of God, I said, "I don't believe in God." My ever practical Unitarian mother responded by administering my first spanking, (and saying): "It would be in your best interests to act as if God were there."
The personal God who could legislate justice and control the universe died for me that day, but a passionate interest in what people mean by the ides of God was born. I sense it is a passion most of us share. Unitarian Universalists really get worked up about God."
Sermon
Among the news stories that made their way onto the national scene this past summer was one out of Kansas. Around the middle of August the School Board of that State decided to remove the teaching of evolution from the curricula of its public schools. The move was a victory, of sorts, for creationists, i.e. those who believe that the world and its myriad life forms were brought into existence out of nothing (ex nihilo) by a single, intentional act of a Supreme Being. If this creationist perspective was to be kept out of science classes, then so the "reasoning" (so called) of the Kansas School Board went, neither would evolution be allowed to be taught. Evolution is "just a theory", after all, and if the creationists "theory" is to be disallowed then the same goes for the evolutionists. I call this "so called reasoning" because it completely misrepresents--if not abuses--the very use of the term "theory" in the scientific sense. To a scientist "theory" means the most logical conclusion to be drawn from all the available evidence. The reason the word theory is used is in order to maintain the scientific principle that more evidence could always come along that will cause the theory to be altered or refined in some matter; but it has never meant a pulled-out-of-the air guess that is just as good as any other guess.
But never mind all that. I can actually think of no greater example of preaching to the choir in a Unitarian Universalist Church than to defend the theory of evolution. Even the Pope, for that matter, has asserted that a good Catholic can accept evolution and still be a believing, practicing Catholic. If the Pope and I are in agreement on an issue there is not a whole lot of reason for me to belabor it here. My son attends a Catholic high school where evolution is taught in its science classes. This caused an odd thought to go through my mind: If the New Hampshire School Board were to issue a ruling like the one in Kansas (and there is nothing to indicate that there are going to do so) I'd be in the position of sending my son to a religious school so he could learn about evolution. It wouldn't surprise me if some Kansas parents are considering that alternative right now.
But there is a deeper concern beneath the usual arguments surrounding this issue that has to do with fundamental human question of how we find meaning in our lives. Ellen Goodman, one of my favorite columnists and commentators, identified it in one of her recent columns in the Boston Globe. She'd written an earlier piece decrying the Kansas ruling, and her subsequent column was about all the crank mail she received as a result. Because she took issue with the Kansas School Board, she reported, she was labeled an "agent of Satan" a "witless crone," and a "godless atheist." (Godless atheist--is there any other kind?) Ms. Goodman took it all in stride--she's been in the business a long time by now--but then went on to make a very cogent observation: "There is one way [she wrote] to make sense of the tenacious and sincere fight against teaching evolution in the schools. It is to understand that the anxiety about the origin of human life is really anxiety about the meaning of human life."
The anxiety Ms. Goodman identifies is quite real. It goes like this: If a Supreme Being did not deliberately and purposefully bring the universe and our world into existence, and did not deliberately and purposefully create and place human beings in the position within creation which we occupy, then life has no meaning at all. Without Special Creation by an Intentional Creator we are nothing more that the products of random chance, nobody is in charge, life and living have no purpose, and anything goes. Such a stance ignores the clearly obvious reality that millions of people accept the principle of evolution and still manage to find meaning and purpose and fulfillment in their lives--even given those times of emptiness and despair that I daresay all human beings experience on occasion. But this is not, apparently, an "obvious reality" to those who believe we were either purposefully created or we're adrift in a sea of meaninglessness.
I'll come back to this line of thought a little later. But I want to introduce now a second Globe article by another writer whose work I admire named Bella English. At first glance it may not seem directly related to the creation/evolution issue I've just addressed, but it does speak to the question which is also my sermon title for today. The title, in fact, of Ms. English's work is also "What's God Got To Do With It?" Bella English, by the way, is a Unitarian Universalist herself, and has a very good article in the latest issue of our denominational publication the UU World. The piece to which I refer appeared about two months ago in the Boston Globe Magazine and it, too, was about the relationship between religious belief and the creation of human life. In this case it had to do with of the crises of faith and the crises of religious belief that some women experience when they are unable to conceive a child.
Unfortunately I am going to have to give a rather superficial treatment to a richly complex piece of writing by Ms. English in order to get to where I eventually want to go with this subject. Be that as it may, the gist of her article was that for some women who felt a close, personal connection and relationship with a Supreme Being, their inability to conceive a child--whatever the reason for such may have been--had a devastating impact upon that relationship. To quote a bit from the article itself: "For some (women) a blocked relationship with God was the most painful effect of infertility ... (their) most emotional responses were aimed at God. (Some examples): ÔThis has created a terrible interruption with my intimate connection with God.' ÔIt seems that what God wants and I want are two separate things.' ÔAm I being punished, or doesn't God think I'll be a good parent?' ÔI have been so angry at God, horribly angry. I felt abandoned as I never had in my whole life.'"
I would not for one minute deny or diminish the very real and intense feelings behind such words as these, and the personal pain they reflect. This is something I, obviously, have never had to deal with personally; and my wife and I have been blessed with an offspring of our own. (It feels like a blessing most of the time anyway). I would hope that if a woman with these kinds of feelings were to seek my counsel, I could be as empathetic and supportive as possible. But while the feelings of frustration and pain and anger are real and understandable in such situations, and probably cut across a wide range of religious belief, in the instances cited by Ms. English they are also exacerbated, I would say, by certain assumptions about the nature of God. The assumption is that there is a Deity who can directly intervene in the machinations of human life and experience; and who can cause, or not cause, certain things--like conception--to occur. The assumption is that there is a God who consciously and purposefully has a person's well being in mind and is attending to it. These are usually very comforting and sustaining beliefs. But when something happens that undermines, or calls into questions such assumptions, a full blown crises of faith can occur.
I don't know if the women about whom Ms. English writes would consider themselves "creationists" with respect to the creation/evolution issue that I started out with today. I'm going to guess that the theory of evolution is probably no big deal for them. But I also see a common thread between the anxiety of the creationists, and the feelings of betrayal and loss of relationship with God that these women have expressed. The common thread is the conviction that there is a God who has something, if not everything, to do with human life and living; who gives meaning and value to our lives that we would not otherwise have without His/Her existence; and who can direct the course of the events that affect our lives. The creationist feels that if God did not create Life, all of Life, in one intentional act then Life itself has no meaning. The persons of whom Ms. English writes feel that their infertility has been intentionally willed by a Deity who's ways baffle, bewilder and anger them.
What might the response of a religious liberal be to such persons and their feelings? It could be to say, "Look, what's God got to do with it anyway? Life is life. You take what it gives you, make the most of it, and deal with its downside as best you can." There is a part of me, in fact, that harbors these very sentiments. There is a part of me that feels very impatient with persons who want and expect a "God" to be in charge, and/or give meaning to their lives. But there is another part of me that remembers, and still appreciates, a wise remark from the accounts of teachings of Jesus where he says to his disciples, "If someone asks you for bread, would you give them a stone?"
It's easy enough to dismiss the concerns of the creationists, and of those who feel betrayed in their religious beliefs for one reason or another, by saying that their real problem lies in their very arrested, and narrowly-focused concepts of God. That may well be true. I wouldn't argue the point. But to leave it at that is to offer only a stone. It also to leave unanswered this question: "What is the bread that we religious liberals offer?" What is our bread for those who are on their journeys of meaning? What is our bread if, or when, those journeys hit what may seem like a dead end on occasion? What is our bread for those who feel betrayed or wounded, at times, if not by God, then by the unfolding of Life itself? Or, to put it in a more up-beat way, what is our bread for those seeking to savor Life's joys and possibilities? This is the direction in which I would now like to turn our thoughts.
I want to return to Rev. Terry Sweetser's essay called "As If God Were There." It's the one, you will recall, which he begins with his little story about pilfering some fudge at age seven and invoking his seven-year-old style of atheism as the rationale for his act. It didn't work. A little later in this same piece he recounts the Old Testament story/legend of Moses' encounter with the burning bush. Here are some of Terry's words: "Picture it. Moses is tending his father-in-law's flock when all of a sudden he sees a burning bush and hears the Lord call his name. (Moses asks who is speaking)... The answer he receives is ÔI am who I am.' One line of scholarship translates this a little differently as, "I am the aliveness of reality, the breath of life in the world.' Now that's a helpful theology, for Moses as well as for us. (Moses) knew the value of life, and he believed there was something about life greater than himself..."
Rev. Sweetser then continues: "I suppose, by the official definition of things, I am an agnostic. I wonder about God. I admit, I do not use the word or symbol of God comfortably. Perhaps I half believe that the fundamentalists own the word-symbol. But when I hear the words that passed through Moses' mind, ÔI am the breath of life,' I know the possibility is there. When I call that God, I am a believer." My own theology is quite close to that of Rev. Sweetser's, which is no doubt why his words resonate so well with me.
Expanding upon Terry's thoughts, I have come to understanding that living a life of faith means not living with sureness or certainties. Instead, it means just the opposite. It means living with a degree of restlessness and uncertainty. It means living as if... as if there is meaning to be found in the act of living itself; as if we have the resources both within us and beyond us to meet the tests and the sometimes terrible challenges that are visited upon us; as if we have the ability to put the pieces of our lives back together when they have been broken. Living by faith mean living as if life is worth the journey, as if there is a transforming life spirit and life force within us and available to us; as if, there is a breath of life in this world of which we can partake; as if, in other words, God were there.
Listen to these words by James Carroll, yet another Globe writer who also weighed in on the Kansas School Board decision a few weeks ago. Mr. Carroll is, I believe, a former priest who writes from a liberal Catholic perspective, and he had this to say at the conclusion of his column: "Both the religious impulse and the scientific impulse are related. Both are at home with the inevitable experience of uncertainty, which, for faith, compels a restless desire to be with God, and for science drives the mind further into what it does not know."
That's an interesting insight on Mr. Carroll's part. The scientific impulse, or drive, and the religious impulse are related--maybe even identical. They both involve a reaching out for, and towards, that which is beyond us and which we will never finally and fully grasp. The person on the scientific quest and the person on the journey of religion and spirit both travel with uncertainty and restlessness, but also with the faith and the trust that the journey is worth the making. The physicist and cosmologist, Dr. Stephen Hawking, has stated that the ultimate goal of scientific inquiry is what he calls the attainment of a "Grand Unification Theory." The Grand Unification Theory, to put it colloquially, is the final understanding of how the whole she-bang works. It is the all encompassing theory of what makes life and the universe tick, and mesh, from the most minute sub-atomic particle to the outermost galaxies, and everything else in between. Hawking also has a metaphor for the Grand Unification Theory. He says that when we come to it we will, in his words, "know the Mind of God." Now, ultimately there may well be no such thing as a Grand Unification Theory; and ultimately there may be no such thing as the "Mind of God." But the scientist pursues his/her quest as if such a Theory were there; and the religious journey maker pursues his/her path as if God were there.
I realize that such an approach to the question of God does not and cannot constitute bread for everyone. I love listening to Aaron Copeland's arrangement of "At the River" which our choir offered for us earlier. I appreciate it for its poetic and aesthetic value. I happened to grow up in a religious community where I was taught to believe in a very real God who sat on a very real throne, and around which I would one day really "gather with the saints." It was a very comforting, and a very powerful kind of faith. I wouldn't want to take that kind of faith away from anyone who feels nurtured and comforted and assured by it. But in my own life-journey such bread eventually became, for me, a stone; something, that is, which I could no longer swallow.
But I still needed--and need--bread, just as we all do. I continue to need hope and joy and adventure, as well as comfort and assurance, and at least some measure of inner peace. For me the real act of faith came when I chose to let go of the desire for certainty in all things, and chose to trust instead that in the flow or process of living itself the things I most needed would indeed come. It was a choice to live not knowing if God were there or had anything to do with it, but as if such could be the case. To be sure there are times when I lose faith; times, that is, when I fall out of relationship with life, when very little makes sense; when the evidence of our human capacity for evil and for inhumanity diminishes the faith in life I wish to maintain. At such times I take a measure of strength in some words by Albert Camus who once said, "In the midst of winter I discovered that there was within me an invincible spring." Camus was an avowed atheist, but that is as powerful a statement of faith as I believe I've heard. Part of what it means to live by faith is to believe that you can return to life and to its wholeness again after feeling personally broken or separated from its goodness, its promise, and its possibilities.
What we offer here may not be bread for everyone. One of the reasons we have such a mix and variety of religious communities within our larger culture is precisely because what is bread for some is a stone for others, and vice versa. But I remain convinced that there is bread here for those for whom the search for God, or Truth or Meaning, or whatever term one chooses to use, is an ongoing quest for the refreshing breath of life rather than a clinging to supposed certainties.
I want to leave you today with some thoughts by Rev. Rosemary Bray McNatt. She's a very gifted and insightful African-American woman who has recently come into our UU ministry. Hear her words: "Most of the great Western theologians agree at least on this: God is beyond naming or full understanding, yet we human beings are called to make the attempt. It is the free faith of Unitarian Universalism that makes my attempts worthwhile. Because of this faith, I can be confident that my search for the Divine is structured, not by static institutions or individuals, but by the God who continues to call me and whom I continue to question. Because of this powerful freedom to believe--and to doubt--I live in trust, believing all manner of things will be well."
Let us give thanks then for the lives we have; for the times when life blesses us and for when it challenges us. Let us be thankful for the ways in which we find the holy in the midst of the ordinary, and the sacred in the midst of the mundane. May we have the faith to believe that this will continue to be so.
Copyright © 1999 by the Unitarian-Universalist Church of Nashua NH. All rights reserved.
