The sombre gathering in March 2022 - looking for hope in a darkened world #Ukraine

We gathered online in March in the first few days after Russia invaded Ukraine, when the general mood in the public space and in our own private spaces was dark, angry, fearful and unhopeful.  Light was hard to find.

The president for the day managed to capture this mood perfectly by choosing the topic “In the Shadow of the Cross”, and picking a path through some sections of scripture seldom mentioned in Unitarian gatherings.  This was not in order to persuade, or to divert people from their own hard-won positions, but in order to show the power of biblical literature to express deep currents of emotion experienced by humanity at stressful periods in history.  Tuning in to expressions of those personal experiences, experiences which outlast every shift in history, experiences which may be thought of as everlasting, as the same in every age, is valuable.  Especially when nothing that is being said in the media news cycle seems to touch our personal responses to what is going on all around, deep, dark and ugly.

The gathering started with the following words as we lit the candle in our chalice: 

"My soul is sorrowful, even unto death, stay awake and keep watch with me" (the book of Mark in the Bible, chapter 14 verse 34)

This is the call we answer tonight. 

There are people fearful, and we would be with them.

There are people grieving and we would be there.

There are people who must make choices we are currently spared, and whilst we dare not counsel we would have them know they are not alone tonight. 

In the darkness and the quiet we will be with them,

We will seek strength for and with them,

We will seek comfort for and with them,

And we will hope that each of us may rise to answer the call we alone can discern in our hearts.

The first reading was from the book of Psalms in the Bible, from Psalm 22, where the poet is in great anguish from the world, and sees and feels a gaping hole where they thought God would be to help them.  Nonetheless, the poet salvages scraps of trust from the Jewish faith that God is there, not far away.

The second reading was from the book of Luke in the Bible, chapter 26 verses 23-43.  This is the story about the man Jesus being executed in the vicious and cruel way that Romans treated their criminals — crucifixion —  and about the exchange between Jesus and two criminals also being crucified alongside him.

About the first reading, our president for the day said, “It is a powerful poem, a cry of anguish and perplexity.  I freely confess that I do not share many of the assumptions of the poet about how the world should work but that does not hold me back from entering into the experience of what is being voiced.  Just as I can read and resonate with a poem by Rudyard Kipling without sharing his views on Empire, or one by Gerard Manley Hopkins without being a Catholic, so too I can turn to the Psalms and find value without being obliged to a fixed world view. 

“Psalm 22 is not just a cry of pain, one amongst many voices raised in a world of suffering, it is the cry of pain of people of faith. The anguish of not just experiencing the horrors of fear, torment, and hunger, but doing so when everything you believe about the world says this shouldn’t be happening.  Where is the God who saves, why are bad things happening to people who have led good lives, what does this say about us and … whisper it … what does this say about the God we believe in?

“When beliefs meet realities, when what has been trusted to sustain through hardship weighs heavy instead, when there is true suffering in a world we want to call good, how do people of faith go on?”

The second reading was reflected upon as follows.  “Our second reading takes us to another familiar place, to another image of suffering.  In the story woven by the author we are presented with a man in extremis.  A man in whom, we have been told time and time again, no crime could be found.  A man we have seen doing little but be kind.  And yet here he is being publicly humiliated, and tortured to death.  Whatever else the author is trying to paint for us here, this is an image of unjust suffering, of a world not being how it ‘should’ be.  When we speak of the Shadow of the Cross it is this shadow, the shadow of innocent, undeserved, inexplicable suffering; a shadow that would dim the light of faith; a shadow made darker by that same light.

"Here we have a man of faith, an ‘Everyman of faith’ if you will, having everything he preached thrown back in his face, having his convictions about the world dashed, on the rocks of how the world actually is.  I cannot imagine the pain, the shame, or the anguish coursing through him in these moments.  Where was that other way of living in the world, the other ‘kingdom’, now?  People hadn’t repented, they hadn’t had that change of heart, and now Might was triumphing over Right.  Power, not Compassion, was having the last word.”

In the reading, Jesus is mocked by the Roman soldiers on execution duty, and by the Jewish leaders who had led him away to the Romans for becoming a trouble maker in the region.  One of the suffering criminals also mocks him, challenging Jesus to save himself and them, too.  But the second dying criminal, of all the people in the scene, takes a different standpoint.  

Our president went on, “We call him the ‘Good Thief’, but it was not for being good, nor for simple thievery, that Rome crucified.  Let us be under no illusion — this was a man who had lived by the sword, who had been wed to the logic of Might and Power.  Yet this was the man who, despite his own suffering, despite his own vulnerability, spoke up for our Everyman of faith; not because his words could change the world they lived in, but because it was right, because he felt compelled to do so.  A life governed by Might and Power, seemingly suddenly under a different law, a different kingdom.  Right and Compassion broke through. 

(extract from the reading) '...... he said, 'You got the same sentence as he did, but in our case we deserved it : we are paying for what we did.  But this man has done nothing wrong.' '

"How tenderly he then speaks: 'Jesus, remember me, when you come into your kingdom'.  He calls him by name, not by any of the mocking titles thrown at Jesus, not even by 'Teacher'; he calls him by name and asks to be remembered, the one who had repented, who had had that change of heart; and in that instant shows that the kingdom Jesus believed in, where it is Right and Compassion that governs our lives, is still at hand. 

“Beyond all looking for, or expectation, it turns out to be Jesus who is preached to on the Cross, who is shown that his faith was not misplaced.

“They both still suffered, they both still died: beliefs about a world where these things shouldn’t happen still met the realities of a world where they do.  Nothing made it all ok, but in that shadow, Jesus was not alone, and what he had lived for, and ultimately died on account of, was shown to hold true.  People can change, and against all the odds people do make choices answering the call of what is right and of compassion. There is bravery, there is kindness in the world, when those are the very things that seemingly should not be, but they are; and, every time we live in that way, we too are in Paradise, not because suffering ends, not because all our needs are met, but because this is the world our faith tells is meant to be.

“This is the world as we speak of it ‘in the beginning’.  I dearly hope there is someone on hand for me, for you, and for all those suffering tonight and in the time to come, who will say our name with kindness, and against all the odds make the world that ‘is meant to be’ present for a moment, for as long as it lasts.  More than that, I dearly hope for us all that we too will answer that call of Right and of Compassion that will enable us to bring Paradise to those we meet.”

A personal meditation on #Ukraine - March 2022

One of our group has supplied this personal point of view on the invasion of Ukraine and their personal reaction to it.  It was written as a 'note to self'.

Don’t be angry about Putin (or Johnson, or injustice anywhere) to the point of being miserable. That will just make you difficult to live with. 

We are made for co-operation — to operate with others — and co-operation is facilitated by acting for the other, acting out of compassion. Wiping each other’s tears. Being ‘leaning posts’.  Providing what is most needed in the action of mending.  We are made for the good that we can spread, and we feel fit and well if we act in line with that, our natural nature. 

What makes us well, strong, resilient, courageous, is to be who we really are.  And who we really are is that we are in relationship and we are made for goodness.  

So don’t give in to the shock, the cognitive dissonance, that suggests Putin’s actions break every common human rule.  This act of his is not a change to anything.

Don’t worry that you don’t understand why Putin has done what he’s done.  Don’t even think about his failures as a human being.  Don’t try to understand him as a person.

Don’t look over the garden fence, because you have, as the Desert Fathers and Mothers would say, a corpse already, in your own living room.  Try instead to understand your own person.

There will always be wickedness in the world. There will always be things that are suddenly, irretrievably, lost or broken. There will always be things that tempt you to outrage and smouldering misery. 

There will always be people who break the rules, for reasons you can’t understand; rule-breaking that makes you very angry.  You will never be able to fix that.

You will never be able to fix those people.

You can only fix yourself, by reframing what has happened, and what now lies before you, and by trusting the natural order of things for the rest. 

The only thing to do is to try to spread compassion, even in the face of oppression, violence, greed.  Work on your own compassion, and trust to God for the rest.

This is no appeasement.  And it is no easy task.  Being a light in darkness, or a vulnerable citadel on a hill, demands steadfastness and trust. 

The easier path is to falsely imagine that going in, guns blazing, will eliminate the problem.  It won’t, and it will introduce more problems. 

Seek inside yourself for your own source of natural compassion and act from that. We are meant for goodness.  We are wired for it.  Do not let Putin, or anyone else, move you away from the place in yourself that is the source of compassion.

Find a way to stay in your own natural compassion, and act from there. 

~~~~~~~

If none of that helps, and if you must, then think of things in terms of time, in terms of the long-term.  Things always come round in the end.

Do not go into Ukraine to kill.  Better that fewer people are killed now, fewer holes torn irreversibly in the human fabric; better that the current burden of pain, in all war’s forms, is shouldered by someone — even by those who didn’t deserve to have to shoulder it; better those things, than that you, over and above them, in your own life, and in the ripples coming from your life, increase the burden of anger and hate that the world has to carry. 

In the end, through people’s natural justice and natural compassion, things will be turned around.  No dictatorship can last forever.  Once people have decided to be free, nothing will prevent them from becoming free. 

~~~~~~~

Or if role models help you, there are these.

Gandhi, whose peacefulness freed India from the imperial British.  And Mandela, whose decades of incarceration changed him from a terrorist to a peacemaker. And the Dalai Lama, who under other circumstances would have been a peaceful leader of a small Himalayan nation; but who through the violent theft of his country became one whose compassion and wisdom illumines the entire world. 

You might even think of the figure of Jesus, in the oppression of Roman occupation.  The narrative of his silence and non-violence, in the face of certain and gruesome violence towards his person. The legend of his dying words of forgiveness.  

If persons can do this, can live from their place of compassion, while risking losing everything except their determination against violence, and can make a difference in the world, then so can you. 

An evening prayer for #Ukraine posted by one of the Ringwood Unitarians

"My soul is sorrowful, even unto death, stay awake and keep watch with me." (The Bible, book of Mark, chapter 14 verse 34).

This is the call we answer tonight. 

There are people fearful and we would be with them.

There are people grieving and we would be there.

There are people who must make choices we are currently spared; and while we dare not counsel, we would they know they are not alone tonight. 

In the darkness and the quiet we will be with them,

We will seek strength for and with them,

We will seek comfort for and with them,

And we will hope that each of us may rise, to answer the call we alone can discern in our hearts.

Amen

Rescuers working among the rubble of private houses in Zhytomy

(Ukraine Emergency Ministry press service/AFP)

Not alone - only those in thrall to self-sufficiency will deny this - February 2022 gathering of Unitarians associated with Ringwood

In February 2022, although the end of the local requirements to keep people safe from COVID19 was in sight, we continued to gather using Zoom.

After the usual ritual of lighting the candle in the chalice, the gathering involved the usual mixture of periods of silence, music via YouTube and other open online sources, readings,  prayer/meditation, and some reflective words by the person presiding for the day.

Also, as it was the start of our ninth year of gathering together, we included a discussion about membership, and mutually invited each other into relationship within the group for the next twelve months.  In this way we can make clear to each other and any other body that enquires, just who it is that is involved in making decisions to steer the group during the next twelve months.

In this time of our muster and our roll call,

May we remember that the task of a church is to serve the needs of people. 

The need to feel loved.

The need to connect with people.

The need to connect with ideas that come through people, through being with people.

The need to belong.

In contrast, although we do each need this from time to time, the ultimate aim of going to a church is not to find mending for ourselves, nor a sense of belonging for ourselves, nor to serve ourselves at all.

The aim of going into a church is to come out of church again,

But to come out - and re-enter the world - changed;

And hence to bring change to the world.

The readings were taken from the book of Job in the Bible (Job, chapter 33 verses 12-33), and ‘We Are One - A Manifesto for Humanity’, by Simenon Honoré.

Lucy, who was the gathering’s president, suggested that the first reading is part of a long, multi-sided Jewish theological debate in the Book of Job.  She said, “It’s not clear that the book is offering a single remedy, one answer, to the problems of life. The book overall seems to be like a set of differing possibilities, some of which conflict. 

"The reading we heard is ascribed to a speaker named Elihu, who is in conversation with Job.  Elihu starts out by saying that we all have times, when we have an impulse to do something, but something stops us.  We may have bad dreams about our plans, and fear stops us.  Or something strikes at our pride, hard enough to stop us in our tracks.  Or our plans make us ill.  Or if we acknowledge our bad intent to others, and say sorry, we will be mended.

“We may like to smile at the archaic poetic language of the Bible, but the image sticks:

even as we lie dying as a result of our bad behaviour, if only a single angel, out of the whole multitude of angels that there may be, speaks up for us, speaks up for the good that we have done in our life, then we will certainly be saved.

“The second reading talks about inner light, inner joy, which the writer says is there in everyone.  Not only this writer, but mystics throughout the ages have said the same.  I have heard these terms used too:  clarity, union, awakening, awareness, bliss, oblivion, enlightenment.

“What the writer is saying is that there is a state — a 'no thing' — that we might all find given to us if we make the right preparation; a state that transforms us interiorly, and also changes the way we relate to the world.

“Very importantly, all the mystics and prophets are clear on this: this indescribable state exists more fundamentally than our normal mode of being."

“So this state is not affected by any of our good luck or bad luck along the way; nor by any of the good deeds we do to connect ourselves with others and serve others; nor by our alienating deeds that disconnect us from others, and even from ourself.  This state is not, and cannot ever be, earned.  On the other side of the coin, no one can ever be dispossessed of this state (though we can be in our own personal desert, blocking our own way to reach it).

“This state is not under our control in any way, not in the sense that we can use the word ‘our’ in any usual way.  We did not make the universe, we did not set this way of being in place: we are inside this paradigm.

“We did not make the indescribable state of awakening, and we cannot be certain of attaining or experiencing this state in this life, though there are certain preparations that might make to help.  This state is unaffected by our lives in the world, though remaining accessible to us.  This is beyond our normal comprehension.

“Though our first reading sets it in some very different words, the essence of this concept runs the same through both readings:

“There is something — a ‘no thing’, a state — that is beyond.

“A joy, a light, a clarity that, using common language, we can only say is somehow ‘bigger’ than we are.  It is not to be bidden by us.  Not at our behest.  The writers of both our readings are certain: there is something beyond us that we simply cannot control.  

“Only a person deluded by the idea of self-sufficiency will deny this.  And the only thing to do, when we have recognized that, is to resign ourselves to it, or as Muslims say, to surrender ourselves to it.”