Christmas gathering 15 December 2024 – an informal bring and share of matters to do with Christmas and hope

For our Christmas gathering this year we chose a less formal format.  After we had done the most important thing — switching on the heating of the Meeting House — we got our hot drinks to start with, instead of doing that at the end.

Then, settling down with our drinks and the chalice candle lit, Christmas music playing quietly in the background, in a circle we sat down to catch up and chat about what Christmas holds for us and our families.  As the session went on we gradually lit candles for issues on our minds and hearts.

We heard the pleasure in the voice of one of our number who is currently reading The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, of which it has been said that "It is a better world for having a book in it that chronicles so many tragedies in a tone that never deviates from hope.”  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Covenant_of_Water

After a while it seemed to be the time to play Do You Hear What I Hear?, sung by Bing Crosby.  Usually played at Christmas, Do You Hear What I Hear? was written in October 1962 by Gloria Shayne and Noël Regney during the height of the Cuban Missile Crisis.  During the Cuban Missile Crisis, the United States and the Soviet Union confronted each other over the placement of Soviet missiles in newly Communist Cuba. Do You Hear What I Hear? was written by Shayne and Regney as a plea for peace.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gloria_Shayne_Baker  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vs9FPx3_Slk

Then we had an intriguing discussion about the theodical teasers — philosophical puzzles about the nature of God given the presence of evil— set out by Lance Morrow.  In 1976, Morrow became a regular writer of Time magazine's back page essay. He won the National Magazine Award for his Time essays in 1981, and was a finalist for that award in 1991 (for that essay on the subject of evil).  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lance_Morrow. The three proposals that Morrow examines together in that essay on evil were remembered today as being “That God is all goodness”, “That God is all powerful”, and “Terrible things happen to people (both good and bad)”.  If our blog reader manages to work out a world view that makes sense of these three propositions and can hold them all at once together, perhaps they could write in to us and explain — because like elders before us, we were not able to make them all work at once.

Next we had a request for the poem by Emily Dickinson Hope is the thing with feathers which we heard read out first, before hearing it also set to music by Christopher Tin   https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/42889/hope-is-the-thing-with-feathers-314

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BGrLL3T0ozE

Following this we began to home in on what Christmas is all about.  To challenge our thinking, we heard a reading by Unitarian Universalist Minister Richard M Woodman (1930-2020) https://www.uua.org/files/2021-06/memorial_book_slt_ga_2021.pdf  The key to Christmas as described by Woodman was new to us, yet seemed to resonate strongly with us.

We beg the pardon of anyone imposed upon, as we set out in full below the Woodman piece that we heard.  (For full apology and an edit of this blogpost for rectification purposes, please email lucyunbox.ringwood@btinternet.com) 

“It is that season of the year again. That eminently impossible yet joyously wonderful season of Christmas. “Christmas impossible?” you ask. The supreme truth and message of Christmas is indeed its seeming objective impossibility.

“We live in a world gone mad. Each hour compiles new proof of strife and tension; of crime and misery; of wars seemingly inevitable; of hunger and cold; of hate and fear. 

“The living reality of our days is not peace on earth, goodwill to all. It is, rather, strife around us and everywhere despair. Such is the world we know too well. Yet it is wise for us to remember that such also is the world our forebears knew before us. Into such a world Christmas comes — as it has come for 2000 years — and into such a world the same spirit, by different names, has come to those of other faiths.

“We who view the Christmas story from a naturalistic perspective easily read the impossible into the attendant notice of miraculous events: chorus of angels, virgin birth and the strange star.  Yet isn’t the miracle only embroidered with these tales?  The impossible event is that in times of deepest despair, visions and inspirations of hope, of peace, of love come to all.

“The real Christmas is the message and miracle that people still hope! 

It is that they still keep alive the poetry of love and peace and goodwill, even when life seems to dim all prospect of such a vision. 

“The impossibility of Christmas is that it comes. 

“Its coming is more than an event on the calendar. Its coming is a revitalisation of the spirit – where people still hope, still see the visions of peace, love, and fellowship. The impossible becomes plausible and life takes on a dimension richer than the obvious.   

“Come, Christmas! 

“Let us warm our spirits by its eternal light. Let us live again in the hope better than we know. Perhaps in living awhile by that faith, we can more fully be what we would be, and can erase the darkness that seems to be.”

We then heard that wonderful metaphor for the spiritual journey and the pain that accompanies the acquiring of a whole new outlook — the poem The Journey of the Magi by T. S. Eliot https://poetryarchive.org/poem/journey-magi/ was read beautifully.  It never fails to impress.

Our last music was sing-along to a Unitarian poem by Rev Edmund Sears set to the tune Noël by Arthur Sullivan, It Came Upon the Midnight Clear https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It_Came_Upon_the_Midnight_Clear  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_U_Dzovu1XA  So many traditional Christians sing this carol year after year without knowing it comes from a minister to a dissenting congregation.

Coming to the end of our happy time together, we closed with an energetic, pulpit-style reading of Christmas Credo by Rev Cliff Reed, which sets out several points of belief in free verse (for full version see  https://www.unitarian.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/2002_Spirit_Time_Place.pdf  and scroll down to the image of page 68). We remembered the generations of Unitarians who had sat in that selfsame Meeting House since 1727 at the Christmas time of year, whom we hope might have shared Cliff Reed's viewpoint:

“I believe that there is light in darkness.

I believe there is truth in myth.

I believe that there is divinity in every birth........

“I believe we must admit that Herod is real ....... and can be defeated, that Scrooge can be healed .... that this is the meaning of Christmas.”

'Metaphor and Christianity' – #Unitarians associated with Ringwood gather in October 2024

In explaining why she had taken the topic ‘Metaphor’ as the topic for the gathering, our president for the day said, “When I was young I was chatting with my devout Church of England mother about Christianity.  ‘Well,’ my mother replied, ‘it's all metaphor, isn't it.’  There was no question mark at the end of her sentence.  This was a clear statement.  We were fairly open with each other about our respective religious beliefs, but for some reason we never followed up this snippet of conversation.  As the years have gone by I have often wondered about what she said, especially as now I seriously agree with her.”

The candle in our chalice was lit with these words, by Adyashanti :  "There’s only one guarantee that Jesus gave: if you can receive and awaken and embody what he is speaking about, then your life will never be the same again. Then you will realize that you’re already living in the Kin-dom of Heaven."

And then we were given a clear sense of what this fellowship in Ringwood is all about, using some words adapted from Stephen Lingwood :

"This is our delight:  We are in search.

We are in search of a coherent, whole set of stories, symbols, languages, and practices; that, taken together, offer a way of life.  A way of life that diagnoses a problem in the human condition  and offers a solution.

In other words, we are in search of something that gives coherence and meaning to human life.  We are in search of faith, a faith that could be experienced as good news.  We are trying to speak of paradise."

As this was a Zoom gathering, the hymns were able to be taken from a range of engaging video clips available publicly on YouTube.  Here are the links:

Lead Me, Guide Me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLpB-dE2DHM

Words and music by Doris M. Akers

Performed by Dr. Velma Willis and the Gospel Pioneer Reunion

Stand By Me

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v24qf16zP58

Words and music by Rev. Charles A. Tindley

Performed by Wyeth Duncan

There’s a spirit of love in this place

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mN7SEpcpkgg

Words and music by Mark A. Miller

Performed by Pine United Methodist Church, San Francisco CA

How like a Gentle Spirit

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_0UGz1Ts-w

Words (1987) by C. Eric Lincoln

Music (1941) by Alfred Morton Smith

Performed by Rev. Bill Bloom 

We’ll understand it better by and by

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fLzLJXETn0A

Words and music by Rev. Charles A. Tindley

Performed by Phillip Carter

There was also a poem made freely available online by the author:

Roger Robinson — Portable Paradise, read by the author.

https://poetryarchive.org/poem/a-portable-paradise/

The readings were firstly from the Bible, book of Mark chapter 7 verses 26-30 (in the translation version by Andy Gaus), and secondly, from the book by Howard Thurman Jesus and the Disinherited.

The readings both dealt with the incident, in the narrative about Jesus, in which Jesus is approached by a woman with different ancestral origins — from the region we would now name Syria.  Jesus initially declines to help her poorly child, but after an exchange with the woman, changes his mind.

Thurman points out that this incident is an occasion for a one-to-one encounter between Jesus and someone who has been racialised, in Jesus’ mind, as different from himself.  Potentially a test of Jesus' universal love-ethic which Thurman suggests, was, "A twofold demand upon him at all times: to love those of the household of Israel who became his enemies because they regarded him as a careless perverter of the truths of God; and to love those beyond the household of Israel — the Samaritan, the Gentile, and even the Roman oppressor…….

A person must love their neighbour directly, clearly, permitting no barriers between."

~~~~

Our president for the day reflected on these readings by firstly looking at the language in play and secondly generally agreeing with Howard Thurman, that Jesus was — as we would say these days — on a learning journey of his own.

The first point reflected upon was that the Syrophoenician woman cleverly uses language to shift Jesus’ point of view.  The woman plays on the difference between the feral street dogs who are really part of the town’s waste disposal system, and pet dogs that live closely with families.

“When Jesus first replies to the Syrophoenician woman (Mark 7:27), he is repeating what he said elsewhere (Matthew 7:6):  “Do not give what is holy to dogs; and do not throw your pearls before swine, or they will trample them underfoot”.  Jesus is initially rejecting her plea on grounds that she and he have different origins, different cultures, different ways of looking at things.  

“Where he starts from, is that he doesn’t want to give the deepest teaching to those who are undeserving — either because he thinks they won’t recognize it and will throw it away, or because he thinks they aren’t ready for it.  And in any case, he is entirely taken up with helping his own people.

“The woman’s reply is clever because, whilst holding onto the dog metaphor, she pivots it, to challenge him to look at things in a new way.  I have followed where others have been before, in reading that there is linguistic evidence of this.  At this exact point in the New Testament Greek there is used a linguistic diminutive.  

“Two words are used for dogs: Jesus uses one word, the usual, hard-nosed word, used for the feral scavenger dogs.  And the woman uses another, softer word, with a subtler meaning.

https://www.reddit.com/r/AncientGreek/comments/18uxhvq/larry_hurtado_vs_joel_marcus_on_the/?rdt=63838

"If the translator closely attends to this linguistic twist, and changes the emphasis to suit, the passage can be read:

“(Mark 7:27-28)

He said to her, “First let the children eat their fill, for it is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it out to the dogs.” But she answered him, “Sir, even the lapdogs under the table eat the children’s scraps.” 

“I think that what the woman is saying, is, “If you are going to categorise me and mine as different from you and yours, at least accept that our relationship can be more than you have declared.  We are neighbours.  Accepting we are different, we can still live closely together, like dog owners and their pets.  And in the same way, what is good for you is also good for us.  Just give us a little of it, won’t you?”

"I think Jesus is jolted by this appeal to reason, solidarity, and the love-ethic.  And so he acts to heal the child.”

And the reflection re-emphasised Thurman’s assertion that Jesus would need techniques he could use in extending his love-ethic across racialised divides.  Our president for the day repeated Thurman’s message: “The first step toward love is a common sharing of a sense of mutual worth and value.  This cannot be discovered in a vacuum or in a series of artificial or hypothetical relationships.  It has to be in a real situation, natural, free. …. What one discovers in even a single experience in which barriers have been removed may become useful in building an overall technique for loving one’s enemy.”

Hosting the Southern #Unitarian Association gathering on 1 June in the New Forest

Last Saturday, 1 June 2019, we were delighted to host the quarterly gathering of the Southern Unitarian Association.  At Burley Village Hall, nearby in the New Forest, we held a worship service and a drumming workshop for people who came from far and wide to be with us.  

The service was a flower communion, and it started with a Jewish anthem calling people to praise.  Everyone brought themselves to the circle of worship with a flower, which early on in the service was placed in a vase on the centre table.  We had words of gathering from Rev Andy Pakula and lit the Unitarian chalice candle while singing to a recorded chant by David Kent.  Our scripture for the day was from the Isha Upanishad v 1-6, speaking of the fullness of reality, the nearness of the ultimate reality, and the unity of reality.

We were reminded that our heritage as Unitarians means that we recognise there is no single, complete, entire, correct way to God.  The variety of the flowers in the centre was used as a metaphor for that.  And the meditation on the Names, shown elsewhere on this blog, was read aloud.

After some minutes of silence to listen to what was in our hearts, we had some readings.  The first was a piece by Rowan Williams on the need for stability, combined with the gifts of many different talents, if a church is to do the work of God.  The second was a poem (translator unknown) by Rainer Maria Rilke, suggesting the words God speaks to each of us as we are made.  We heard the song “Love, Serve and Remember” written and sung by John Astin, which is based on eastern teachings. (For more on John Astin and his associates see http://www.integrativearts.com )

We were invited to discuss with the person next to us our personal style of activism in the world, using the parable “Six Monks” (see here https://www.patheos.com/blogs/fieldnotesonliving/2019/04/29/the-six-monks/  )

Then we turned our minds to what the Southern Unitarian Association is - an association of congregations. So the SUA is nothing if there are no congregations.  We heard, responded to and reflected on the hopes, wishes and dreams for the SUA listed by those who were at the preceding SUA gathering.  And we were challenged by the following questions:

Why do we keep coming here?

Why do we keep going to our congregation’s gatherings

 and services?

Is it because we hope?

Is it because we get satisfaction? - if so, how and why

Is it because we get purpose?

Is it because we get clarity and order? - if so how and why

Is it a running away?

Is it a running towards?

Why do we keep coming?

Think about these questions yourself

Take them back to your congregations

Ask the same questions there

Only by sharing openly these big questions will we properly connect at a deeper level with each other

Only by sharing openly these big questions will we develop

 our congregations.

The worship closed with a meditation by Rev Tony McNeile, after which everyone collected a flower - a different flower - from the vase in the centre to take away with them.  We finished with a hymn from the green hymn book “Our Kindred Fellowships”.

Between the service and the drumming workshop there was a Climate Emergency lunch, all vegetable based, which was much enjoyed by all, whether or not they had previously eaten much vegan food.  Some of the food had been bought in from a vegan cafe in Christchurch https://www.goodintentionscafe.co.uk   There was also the opportunity to take a quiz online to assess one’s personal carbon footprint  https://footprint.wwf.org.uk/#/

The drumming workshop was led by Heike from Southbourne, and it fully lived up to its promise.  Getting absorbed in the rhythm, we found we really did stop using our thinking minds and instead went back to being creative in some unexpected ways.  Most enjoyable and thoroughly recommended. https://www.heikedrumshare.com

People felt they needed to express their appreciation for the day, so a collection was taken for the Ringwood Foodbank.