Voices of God
Rev. Craig M. Nowak
Sermon given at Brookfield Unitarian Universalist Church
June 8, 2014
It is late afternoon in early spring. I’m sitting at my desk, books scattered around me, with a notepad and pen in hand. I pause for a moment to look at the world around me. Gazing out the window I see trees full leaves of green rustling gently against a blue, sun filled sky, and on the rippled surface of the pond behind my house; a pair of swans glide gently across the water. Yes, it is a beautiful day and I can’t help but savor the beauty and wonder of my surroundings.
I gaze up into the cloudless sky and my thoughts turn now to another place, separated by land and sea, a place not so picturesque, but a place whose landscape is marred by the ravages of war. Of course, I don’t know what Afghanistan or Iraq looks like except from images I’ve seen on television, in magazines or in the newspaper over the last twelve or so years. From what I’ve seen I can’t imagine living for an hour let alone days, weeks, months or years in either place. And surely I can’t image dying there.
But it’s easy fighting wars from home. If images on the television disturb us we can change the channel. When guilt or shame overcomes us, we remind ourselves we’re at war with terrorists and mutter “God Bless America” lest anyone question our patriotism. Never is a war so just as the one we don’t have to fight ourselves. With the exception of war protestors and a few others, it seems in this new century when our nation engages in war, most Americans tend to treat it much the same way as background music played in department stores and supermarkets; we know it’s there, but we largely ignore it, after all what can we do about it anyway?
Recently our nation observed Memorial Day and our president commemorated D-Day, both annual reminders that for some, war is not a an occasional irritant to our comfortable lives, but a constant reality and threat to life itself. On Memorial Day we are asked to remember and honor our war dead. But how do we remember and honor those who have lost their lives in service to our nation?
We’re fairly good at the remembering part...there’s a holiday, (albeit co-opted by corporate opportunists with sales on everything from cars to clothing)...and there’s parades, and public ceremonies including some infused with politics, prayer or both.
On the honoring part, we’re not doing so well. Just look at what awaits so many who actually do return form war...
Poverty, high levels of unemployment, untreated or poorly treated drug and alcohol addiction, lack of access to mental health services and inconceivably and shamefully slow processing of medical and disability claims. Not to mention bickering, idealogical partisans in government of both major parties who behave more like reality show stars beholden to moneyed sponsors rather than public servants elected to promote the public good. But for those who lost their lives, perhaps the greatest insult is that we continue generation after generation, to send men and women to war, that wretched invention of humankind which Thomas Mann called, “…a cowardly escape from the problems of peace.”
The way I see it the only way to honor those we have trained to kill and die for us, is to learn to honor life.
Now, what does this mean? Let’s turn to the reading from Genesis. The story of Abraham and Isaac is more than it appears on the surface. Surely, taken literally it’s a pretty awful story, I mean, how insecure and/or sadistic is this God who would test a man’s loyalty by commanding him to sacrifice his son? But herein lies a clue.
To whom or what are we loyal?
In the myth, Abraham is informed by two competing voices or forces, if you like, within his own psyche. One force calls for loyalty to the past, to the traditional way of doing things, the way of the blood sacrifice and blind obedience to established, often outside authority. Obedience to this force is learned but deeply ingrained so as to seem “natural”, it is recognized by some as the voice of God. The other force calls Abraham to break with the past, to open up to a new way of relating to the world and others, this is the same force that compelled Jesus to teach love of one’s enemies ---- the voice that informed the Prophet Muhammad’s words, “Do not hate one another…” ---- and the inner stirring that compelled Buddha to teach love as the only cure for hatred. Obedience to this voice is more difficult. It contradicts conventional wisdom; it too is learned, but has to be pursued and practiced over time. This is the higher call to honor life. And it too is recognized, by some, as the voice of God.
Which voice do you identify with?
The problem for humankind says Rabbi Howard Cooper, is “that we have identified with the force that tempts Abraham to offer up his child, rather than internalizing Abraham’s new understanding that “God” is the energy that makes possible the transformation of what has always been into what ought to be.” Indeed, too many sincere people of faith or even no religious affiliation at all identify with the force that tempts us to sacrifice life rather than save it. We have largely been taught to obey external, established authority masquerading as fixed reality and to be wary of that still, small voice inside despite the psalmist’s invitation to, “Be still and know that I am God!”
The lesson of the Biblical tale is no less diminished today; indeed it is one that is urgently needed. For despite all our progress as a species, our dreams of peace, the ultimate means of honoring life, go woefully unfulfilled. Decade after decade we continue to identify with, and answer the call of, a lesser god and with that choice we sacrifice our hopes and dreams. The late William Sloane Coffin noted, “…the inexpressible sadness of every era is that each time the dream [of peace] revives, it dies...” And so the cycle continues, wars - cultural; political; ideological; and religious- each laying waste to the hopes and dreams of humankind. War is indeed a cowardly escape from the work of peace and it leads us furthest from the call to honor life. “The warhorse is a vain hope for victory, and by its great might it cannot save.”, words from Psalm 33.
It is far easier to continue our habitual identification with the voice of a god (small g) that allows us to sacrifice life rather than save it because it fools us into denying responsibility for our actions as so commonly expressed in the resignation, “I’m only human.” But this is precisely the point! We are human and the call to honor life is a uniquely human calling. Animals and plants are not called to wrestle with such questions, but by virtue of our humanity, the voice of god we choose to identify with can either save us or destroy us.
Perhaps we are uncomfortable with the notion that that which some call God does not lie outside ourselves, issuing dictates as we go through life. Perhaps we’d rather be directed and not have to deal with a God, dwelling within that challenges us to move from what has always been to what ought to be.
In painted depictions of the story of Abraham and Isaac, an angel is often placed in the sky calling out and sometimes even grabbing onto upon Abraham so he will not plunge his dagger into Isaac. That angel represents not an outside force, but the workings of our interior life, the place within us of insight and reflection. It is a visual depiction of what Rabbi Howard Cooper calls, “Abraham’s new understanding [of] “God” [as] the energy that makes possible the transformation of what has always been into what ought to be.”
If we’re paying even the slightest attention, war and other tragedies provide an opening for this new understanding to be heard. The images that disturb us most, the people and events that haunt our memory do so because we know the god we too often identify with, regardless of our stated theology, is the god that demands life be sacrificed rather than saved. Whenever we hear that voice and it disturbs us, that is our Time of Trial, our Day of Judgment. But, it is also our opportunity for renewal, to unlearn our old ways and learn to honor life.
We must, each of us, find the courage to trust the voice of our highest aspirations, the voice that rejects the old ways, the voice that lifts us toward a new vision and frees us from the devastating bonds of our own making.
We must do no less than turn away for good from the god that demands the sacrifice of our children so that we may fully open our hearts and minds to that which calls us beyond ourselves and toward the very mystery and wonder of life itself.
Another Memorial Day has come and gone and parades were held to remember our war dead. The task of honoring them remains. How might we honor those who have died that we might live?
For starters, stop killing one another. And I mean stop killing one another, physically, emotionally and spiritually, friend and foe alike. I’m talking about a sincere, renewed commitment to the hard work of peace.
Peace secured not with weapons but human compassion. Where human-created hunger and homelessness are eradicated… where the right to a living wage for workers is defended as passionately by politicians, pundits, and the electorate as a Fortune 500 CEO’s bonus; where all people have access to education, affordable healthcare, housing; clean air, and safe drinking water not because of how much money they have or who they know, but because of what they are, human beings.
Peace where no one is assaulted or killed by another in an act of aggression, vengeance, or hatred. Where our young people are neither the perpetrators or victims of yet another mass shooting. Peace where so -called entertainment glorifying the worst of human nature is seen as the mind numbing garbage it is. Peace where the morning paper doesn’t read like a review of dystopian literature, an endless account of human created misery.
Governments count the cost of war in dollars and cents. The true cost of war, of any violence, however, is not measured in dollars and cents but in the anguished tally of dreams lost and hope plundered.
As our nation and others wrestle with the tragic consequences of trying to escape the hard work of peace and the shrill chorus of partisan bickering plays on as appeals to conventional wisdom are made in the name of a lessor god, let us instead pledge to live that no life be endangered or sacrificed in vain Let us, listen, hear, and at long last answer the sober call to honor life.
Amen and Blessed Be
Rev. Craig M. Nowak
Sermon given at Brookfield Unitarian Universalist Church
June 8, 2014
It is late afternoon in early spring. I’m sitting at my desk, books scattered around me, with a notepad and pen in hand. I pause for a moment to look at the world around me. Gazing out the window I see trees full leaves of green rustling gently against a blue, sun filled sky, and on the rippled surface of the pond behind my house; a pair of swans glide gently across the water. Yes, it is a beautiful day and I can’t help but savor the beauty and wonder of my surroundings.
I gaze up into the cloudless sky and my thoughts turn now to another place, separated by land and sea, a place not so picturesque, but a place whose landscape is marred by the ravages of war. Of course, I don’t know what Afghanistan or Iraq looks like except from images I’ve seen on television, in magazines or in the newspaper over the last twelve or so years. From what I’ve seen I can’t imagine living for an hour let alone days, weeks, months or years in either place. And surely I can’t image dying there.
But it’s easy fighting wars from home. If images on the television disturb us we can change the channel. When guilt or shame overcomes us, we remind ourselves we’re at war with terrorists and mutter “God Bless America” lest anyone question our patriotism. Never is a war so just as the one we don’t have to fight ourselves. With the exception of war protestors and a few others, it seems in this new century when our nation engages in war, most Americans tend to treat it much the same way as background music played in department stores and supermarkets; we know it’s there, but we largely ignore it, after all what can we do about it anyway?
Recently our nation observed Memorial Day and our president commemorated D-Day, both annual reminders that for some, war is not a an occasional irritant to our comfortable lives, but a constant reality and threat to life itself. On Memorial Day we are asked to remember and honor our war dead. But how do we remember and honor those who have lost their lives in service to our nation?
We’re fairly good at the remembering part...there’s a holiday, (albeit co-opted by corporate opportunists with sales on everything from cars to clothing)...and there’s parades, and public ceremonies including some infused with politics, prayer or both.
On the honoring part, we’re not doing so well. Just look at what awaits so many who actually do return form war...
Poverty, high levels of unemployment, untreated or poorly treated drug and alcohol addiction, lack of access to mental health services and inconceivably and shamefully slow processing of medical and disability claims. Not to mention bickering, idealogical partisans in government of both major parties who behave more like reality show stars beholden to moneyed sponsors rather than public servants elected to promote the public good. But for those who lost their lives, perhaps the greatest insult is that we continue generation after generation, to send men and women to war, that wretched invention of humankind which Thomas Mann called, “…a cowardly escape from the problems of peace.”
The way I see it the only way to honor those we have trained to kill and die for us, is to learn to honor life.
Now, what does this mean? Let’s turn to the reading from Genesis. The story of Abraham and Isaac is more than it appears on the surface. Surely, taken literally it’s a pretty awful story, I mean, how insecure and/or sadistic is this God who would test a man’s loyalty by commanding him to sacrifice his son? But herein lies a clue.
To whom or what are we loyal?
In the myth, Abraham is informed by two competing voices or forces, if you like, within his own psyche. One force calls for loyalty to the past, to the traditional way of doing things, the way of the blood sacrifice and blind obedience to established, often outside authority. Obedience to this force is learned but deeply ingrained so as to seem “natural”, it is recognized by some as the voice of God. The other force calls Abraham to break with the past, to open up to a new way of relating to the world and others, this is the same force that compelled Jesus to teach love of one’s enemies ---- the voice that informed the Prophet Muhammad’s words, “Do not hate one another…” ---- and the inner stirring that compelled Buddha to teach love as the only cure for hatred. Obedience to this voice is more difficult. It contradicts conventional wisdom; it too is learned, but has to be pursued and practiced over time. This is the higher call to honor life. And it too is recognized, by some, as the voice of God.
Which voice do you identify with?
The problem for humankind says Rabbi Howard Cooper, is “that we have identified with the force that tempts Abraham to offer up his child, rather than internalizing Abraham’s new understanding that “God” is the energy that makes possible the transformation of what has always been into what ought to be.” Indeed, too many sincere people of faith or even no religious affiliation at all identify with the force that tempts us to sacrifice life rather than save it. We have largely been taught to obey external, established authority masquerading as fixed reality and to be wary of that still, small voice inside despite the psalmist’s invitation to, “Be still and know that I am God!”
The lesson of the Biblical tale is no less diminished today; indeed it is one that is urgently needed. For despite all our progress as a species, our dreams of peace, the ultimate means of honoring life, go woefully unfulfilled. Decade after decade we continue to identify with, and answer the call of, a lesser god and with that choice we sacrifice our hopes and dreams. The late William Sloane Coffin noted, “…the inexpressible sadness of every era is that each time the dream [of peace] revives, it dies...” And so the cycle continues, wars - cultural; political; ideological; and religious- each laying waste to the hopes and dreams of humankind. War is indeed a cowardly escape from the work of peace and it leads us furthest from the call to honor life. “The warhorse is a vain hope for victory, and by its great might it cannot save.”, words from Psalm 33.
It is far easier to continue our habitual identification with the voice of a god (small g) that allows us to sacrifice life rather than save it because it fools us into denying responsibility for our actions as so commonly expressed in the resignation, “I’m only human.” But this is precisely the point! We are human and the call to honor life is a uniquely human calling. Animals and plants are not called to wrestle with such questions, but by virtue of our humanity, the voice of god we choose to identify with can either save us or destroy us.
Perhaps we are uncomfortable with the notion that that which some call God does not lie outside ourselves, issuing dictates as we go through life. Perhaps we’d rather be directed and not have to deal with a God, dwelling within that challenges us to move from what has always been to what ought to be.
In painted depictions of the story of Abraham and Isaac, an angel is often placed in the sky calling out and sometimes even grabbing onto upon Abraham so he will not plunge his dagger into Isaac. That angel represents not an outside force, but the workings of our interior life, the place within us of insight and reflection. It is a visual depiction of what Rabbi Howard Cooper calls, “Abraham’s new understanding [of] “God” [as] the energy that makes possible the transformation of what has always been into what ought to be.”
If we’re paying even the slightest attention, war and other tragedies provide an opening for this new understanding to be heard. The images that disturb us most, the people and events that haunt our memory do so because we know the god we too often identify with, regardless of our stated theology, is the god that demands life be sacrificed rather than saved. Whenever we hear that voice and it disturbs us, that is our Time of Trial, our Day of Judgment. But, it is also our opportunity for renewal, to unlearn our old ways and learn to honor life.
We must, each of us, find the courage to trust the voice of our highest aspirations, the voice that rejects the old ways, the voice that lifts us toward a new vision and frees us from the devastating bonds of our own making.
We must do no less than turn away for good from the god that demands the sacrifice of our children so that we may fully open our hearts and minds to that which calls us beyond ourselves and toward the very mystery and wonder of life itself.
Another Memorial Day has come and gone and parades were held to remember our war dead. The task of honoring them remains. How might we honor those who have died that we might live?
For starters, stop killing one another. And I mean stop killing one another, physically, emotionally and spiritually, friend and foe alike. I’m talking about a sincere, renewed commitment to the hard work of peace.
Peace secured not with weapons but human compassion. Where human-created hunger and homelessness are eradicated… where the right to a living wage for workers is defended as passionately by politicians, pundits, and the electorate as a Fortune 500 CEO’s bonus; where all people have access to education, affordable healthcare, housing; clean air, and safe drinking water not because of how much money they have or who they know, but because of what they are, human beings.
Peace where no one is assaulted or killed by another in an act of aggression, vengeance, or hatred. Where our young people are neither the perpetrators or victims of yet another mass shooting. Peace where so -called entertainment glorifying the worst of human nature is seen as the mind numbing garbage it is. Peace where the morning paper doesn’t read like a review of dystopian literature, an endless account of human created misery.
Governments count the cost of war in dollars and cents. The true cost of war, of any violence, however, is not measured in dollars and cents but in the anguished tally of dreams lost and hope plundered.
As our nation and others wrestle with the tragic consequences of trying to escape the hard work of peace and the shrill chorus of partisan bickering plays on as appeals to conventional wisdom are made in the name of a lessor god, let us instead pledge to live that no life be endangered or sacrificed in vain Let us, listen, hear, and at long last answer the sober call to honor life.
Amen and Blessed Be
Proudly powered by Weebly