Dan Harper | Sermons

  • Ecological Spirituality and Our Congregation

    Sermon is copyright (c) 2022 Dan Harper. Delivered to First Parish in Cohasset. The sermon text may contain typographical errors. The sermon as preached included a significant amount of improvisation.

    This sermon is one in an occasional series where I attempt to relate one of the seven principles of the Unitarian Universalist Association to current events, and to our congregation.

    This week I thought I’d speak to you about the looming environmental disaster. The second reading this morning serves as an adequate reminder of the challenges we face, and I don’t think we need to rehearse the details of environmental disaster. I am sure most of us here this morning are all too aware of the problems we face. Nor do I want this to turn into one of those doom-and-gloom sermons. Instead, I’d like to reflect on what we might do as a religious community.

    And it seems to me that we need a spiritual response to environmental disaster. Technological fixes will be necessary. Changes to our neoliberal capitalist economic system may be in order. Yet it seems to me technological and political and economic fixes are necessary, but not sufficient, for addressing environmental disaster.

    This is not an original argument on my part. Back in 1966, historian Lynn White, Jr., presented an influential paper titled “The Historic Roots of Our Ecological Crisis.” White contended that our current ecological crisis began in the Western world when our culture made the transition from the Middle Ages to modernity. During the Enlightenment, the Western world began to draw a firm boundary between human beings on the one hand, and on the other hand all non-human organisms and rocks and soil and air and everything else. Furthermore, the Western worldview began to believe that we human beings are more important than anything else. And Westerners justified this new worldview with religion. For example, there’s a passage in the Hebrew Bible, Genesis 1:28, which reads: “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” [KJV] This was interpreted by many Westerners to mean that we humans were separate from the rest of Nature, and we could do whatever we want with everything else on earth. Even now, in our allegedly secular age, this religious worldview still dominates our thinking.

    We may not quote the Bible any more in our secularized world, but it is an unquestioned axiom for most Westerners that we human beings have dominion over the non-human world. We humans get to make all the decisions. We humans don’t really need to consider any non-human viewpoints. If we do consider non-human viewpoints, we do so at our sole discretion.

    This new Western worldview set up categories of binary opposites. We Westerners like to believe that there is humanity on the one hand, and Nature on the other hand. Nature is waiting to be tamed or subdued by humanity. Similarly, we tend to believe that mind and body are separate, with body waiting to be tamed by mind. And again, we Westerners believed for many centuries that man and woman were binary opposites, with women waiting to be tamed or subdued by men. Many people here in the United States still believe this about women. And we Westerners have believed for many centuries in a binary distinction between Civilization and Savagery, with Savages waiting to be tamed or subdued by civilized men (and I do mean men; in this worldview, it’s the men who do the subduing). So Westerners gave themselves permission to kill off the indigenous peoples of the United States, and to develop the brutal system of chattel slavery for people of African descent.

    Our post-medieval Western worldview tends to categorize everything into binary opposites: mind – body; man – woman; civilized – savage; humanity – everything else. For each of these binary opposites, one of the opposites is more powerful and has dominion over the other binary opposite. This worldview helps justify colonialism, sexism slavery, and so on. This worldview gives license to the more powerful of the binary opposites to dominate the Other.

    This remains the dominant worldview in the United States, and has real-world effects. Many people in our country still believe in the binary opposite of men and women, with the result that transgender people are discriminated against, women are no longer allowed to have abortions in many states, and women still earn less than men for the same work. Many people in our country still believe in the binary opposite of white-skinned people and non-white people, with the result that we can document significant differences in health and wealth among people simply on the basis of their skin color, and we also have a loud minority of white people who say that people of color should be ruled by white people. Many people in the United States still believe in the binary opposite of humanity versus the non-human world, with the result that it is considered perfectly acceptable to exploit the non-human world, as long as it benefits at least a few human beings.

    I suggest that this is a religious or spiritual problem. We Westerners think of religion in terms of belief, but religion and spirituality are really about worldviews. Thus it becomes a spiritual exercise to stop thinking that one binary opposite should subdue or dominate the other binary opposite. We need to figure out a different worldview. And we Unitarian Universalists are especially well placed to do this work. We’re already heretics. We already know how to reinterpret Western religion so that it becomes less destructive.

    Let’s return to that passage from the Hebrew Bible: “God blessed [the human beings], and God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.’” As Unitarian Universalists, we have already come up with alternative ways to interpret this passage from the Hebrew Bible.

    Our first reinterpretation of this Bible passage comes from feminism. As the second wave of feminism took hold within Unitarian Universalism, way back in the 1960s, we began to understand that “to have dominion” and “to subdue” are not the same thing as “to completely destroy.” As feminists, we would agree with Rosemary Radford Reuther, who in her book “Gaia and God: An Ecofeminist Theology of Earth Healing,” pointed out that the role of humans in this Bible passage is not that of “an owner who can do with it what he wills,” but rather that of a steward who is caring for the earth. We have not been given permission to cause some of God’s creations to go extinct.

    Henry David Thoreau came up with another way to rethink that old passage from the Hebrew Bible. In 1862, in his essay “Walking,” he said, “in Wildness is the preservation of the world.” It should be remembered that Thoreau was raised as a Unitarian. However, he became an ardent abolitionist, and he left Unitarianism in part because the minister of the Unitarian church in Concord, where he lived, was at best a lukewarm supporter of abolitionism. So you can see that Thoreau rejected the binary opposition of white people over black people, of free people over enslaved people. Similarly, he rejected the binary opposition between humanity and the non-human world. He acknowledged that human beings could indeed “fill the earth and subdue it.” But he felt that our preservation depended upon reserving parts of the world for wildness.

    Still a third interpretation of that old passage from the Hebrew Bible comes from theologian Bernard Loomer, a Presbyterian who joined the Berkeley, California, Unitarian Universalist church late in life. Loomer said that we misinterpret Jesus. Jesus was not God, but rather proclaimed the Kingdom of God. What Jesus meant by the Kingdom of God was precisely what Loomer termed the interdependent web of life. (Loomer, by the way, was the one who introduced Unitarian Universalists to the phrase “the interdependent Web of Life.”) In the Kingdom of God, not a sparrow falls but God knows about it; in the interdependent web of existence, all living beings are intimately connected, and not a one dies but that all are affected. We humans have dominion, but not in the sense of having power over other living beings. Instead, God told us humans that we have dominion, God was telling us that we power with, not power over, the non-human world.

    More recently, we Unitarian Universalists have been exploring yet another spiritual worldview. We have been listening carefully to other spiritual worldviews. In fact, we’re experiencing this in the musical selections that Mary Beth has chosen for us this morning. I would especially draw your attention to the offertory music, a piece by Navajo composer Connor Chee titled “Hózhó” (and I’m afraid I’m mutilating the pronunciation of this Navajo word). In the composer’s notes, printed in your order of service, Chee explains the concept of hózhó, or balance. By listening carefully and respectfully to his music and his explanation — by listening to his spiritual worldview — we can experience another understanding of how human beings could relate to the non-human world. We don’t want to be condescending or impose Western standards onto the Navajo worldview, nor do we want to try to coopt Chee’s spiritual worldview and try to take it over for ourselves. We remain who we are, but through this cross-cultural encounter we can learn and grow.

    So these are just some of the ways we Unitarian Universalists have already become aware of emerging worldviews, emerging spiritual outlooks. We need to shift our spiritual worldview, because the old Western religious worldview is what got us into this environmental mess. That old Western religious worldview showed us how to have absolute power over other humans and non-human beings. In these days of ecological crisis, we need to shift our focus slightly. An ecological worldview allows us to see, not how to have power over other beings, but how all beings are interconnected. The science of ecology expresses this in terms of systems theory, and interlocking feedback loops, and non-linear systems. Since all beings are connected, the harm we do to the least of those beings is harm done to the entire ecological system.

    And actually, ecospiritualities aren’t really all that new. There is an ecospirituality in what Jesus taught about the Kingdom of God, about loving one’s neighbor as oneself. There is an ecospirituality when the Dao de Jing says, “…in giving birth you do not possess it, in doing it you do not retain it, in leading it you employ no authority…” [10b, trans. Robert Eno]. There is an ecospirituality in the traditional Navajo concept of hozho, balance.

    That narrow old Western worldview is still dominant in our society. I find myself slipping into that old way of thinking. That’s one reason why we bring our children here, to nurture them with a different worldview. That’s one reason why we come here each week: to remind ourselves of other ways of being in the world, so we need not slip back into that old dominionist worldview. It might look like we’re just sitting in these pews, here in this two hundred and seventy five year old meeting house. Yet what we’re really doing here, week after week, is reminding each other of another way of being in the world. And when we leave here and go out into the world each week, we begin to reshape the worldview of rest of our society. What we do here affects the rest of the world, because we are all part of the interdependent web of life.

  • Education and Our Congregation

    Sermon is copyright (c) 2022 Dan Harper. Delivered to First Parish in Cohasset. The sermon text may contain typographical errors. The sermon as preached included a significant amount of improvisation.

    Reading: “For You O Democracy”

    Come, I will make the continent indissoluble,
    I will make the most splendid race the sun ever shone upon,
    I will make divine magnetic lands,
    With the love of comrades,
    With the life-long love of comrades.

    I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America, and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies,
    I will make inseparable cities with their arms about each other’s necks,
    By the love of comrades,
    By the [life-long] love of comrades.

    For you these from me, O Democracy, to serve you…!
    For you, for you I am trilling these songs.

    — Walt Whitman

    Sermon: “Education and Our Congregation”

    We Unitarian Universalists have our “seven principles,” a statement of values that our congregations agree to. These seven principles are not a creed, mind you; they’re a set of value statements. And one of those seven values statements talks about how we “affirm and promote” … “the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large.” I will make an even stronger statement than this. We do not just affirm and promote democratic process. I’m convinced our Unitarian Universalist congregations have an important role to play in maintaining a healthy democracy.

    Yet in spite of my firm conviction that our Unitarian Universalist congregations help maintain a healthy democracy, I find it difficult to explain how we do this. The role we play in maintaining a healthy democracy is not simple and straightforward; it is subtle and complex. This morning, I would like to speak with you about one of the more important ways we help maintain a healthy democracy. And that is that we train our young people — our children in teens — in the democratic process. Our religious education programs support healthy democracy. It may not be part of the explicit curriculum we teach, but democratic process is central to our implicit curriculum; it is woven into everything our young people do in our congregation.

    Our Unitarian Universalist religious education programs have four main goals. First, we aim have fun together and build community. Second, we want children to gain basic skills associated with liberal religion, such as public speaking, skills of cooperation, interpersonal skills, intrapersonal skills, basic group singing, and so on. Third, we aim to teach basic religious literacy. Fourth, we want to prepare young people to become Unitarian Universalists, if they choose to do so when they’re old enough to decide on their own.

    Now let me explain how each of these four educational goals helps teach young people how to participate in democracy.

    The first of our educational goals is to have fun and build community. On the surface, this is an entirely pragmatic goal. Religious education is but one of a great many options open to children and teens. If our programs are going to compete with sports, robotics, or video games, our programs had better be fun. But on a deeper level, we need children and teens to feel that they are a part of a community before we can reach some of the other goals. For example, when we offer Our Whole Lives comprehensive sexuality education classes, young people need to feel relatively safe talking with one another when it comes time to talk about difficult issues and to think about personal goals.

    This same principle applies to us adults. We can work more effectively together on committees if we first take the time to get to know one another. It’s easier to rely on one another for help during life’s adversities, if we’ve taken the time to get to know one another first. Then, too, when the inevitable conflict arise, it is easier to manage those conflict productively if we know one another first.

    For both adults and young people, we know the basic techniques of building community and having fun together. Eating together is a great way to have fun and build community. Before starting a Sunday school class, or a committee meeting, we take time to check in with one another, each person sharing something about what’s going on in their personal lives. Working together on a common project is actually one of the most effective ways to build community.

    This is true of society beyond our congregations, too. Out in California, I volunteered at a homeless shelter, and one of the other volunteers belonged to the local Christian evangelical church. We strongly disagreed with each other about things like abortion, homosexuality, and climate change, but our shared work at the homeless shelter meant we developed respect for each other. Once people have developed mutual respect through sharing work and fun, we are much less likely to demonize one another when we start debating polarizing political issues. Since demonizing others is destructive to democracy, then we can see how learning to build community helps strengthen democracy.

    The second goal for our religious education programs is to build the skills associated with liberal religion. Partly, we want to give young people skills to work together towards common goals. We want them to be able to serve on committees when they get older, so we teach them how to compromise, how to look for common ground, how to disagree respectfully, and so on. We want them to be able to communicate their ideas clearly and without being nervous, so we help them speak in small groups such as classes — and a key feature of our Coming of Age programs for grade 8 through 10 is helping young people to speak with ease and comfort in front of the entire congregation. We teach them interpersonal skills, skills like listening well to others, searching for common goals, being empathetic, and so on. We teach them intrapersonal skills, skills like learning how to identify one’s own feelings, learning where the core of one’s being is, moderating one’s own feelings.

    Our democracy would be stronger if more people learned these skills. Our democracy needs people who can aim for the highest ideals but who also know when and how to compromise. Our democracy needs people who know how to speak well in public, not to manipulate others, but to encourage people to work together. Our democracy needs people who have enough self-awareness to know what they feel and to know how to listen to the feelings of others.

    Another of the skills associated with liberal religion is group singing. Believe it or not, group singing can also serve to strengthen democracy. When we sing together, interesting physiological and psychological things happen to us. Group singing releases hormones that help moderate the amygdala. The amygdala, sometimes called the “lizard brain,” generates some of our most primitive and destructive emotions, so moderating the amygdala is a good thing. In addition, when we sing together, our breathing and our heart rates synchronize, and I believe this physiological response can help people of all ages learn empathy at a deep level.

    So all these skills associated with liberal religion, even group singing, can help young people build a strong democracy.

    On to the third educational goal: religious literacy. This is not an abstract academic educational goal. Several years ago, I attended a presentation by a doctoral candidate who was researching religious literacy. She found that good religious literacy programs in high school and middle school measurably reduce bullying. Her research supports what the American Academy of Religion says about religious il-literacy: “One of the most troubling and urgent consequences of religious illiteracy is that it often fuels prejudice and antagonism, thereby hindering efforts aimed at promoting respect for diversity, peaceful coexistence, and cooperative endeavors in local, national, and global arenas.” So says the American Academy of Religion in their religious literacy guidelines for grades K-12.

    You have to understand that for most people, religion has little to do with intellectual assent to doctrines or philosophical positions. Instead, religion has more in common with the expressive arts, with political life, with culture more generally. The big divide is not between religion and science, but between science and the arts and humanities. Just as the arts and humanities teach us how to have a deeper understanding of other human beings, so too does religious literacy.

    And thus we can conclude that learning religious literacy will help strengthen democracy.

    Finally, a brief mention of our fourth educational goal: we want to prepare children and teens to become Unitarian Universalists if they choose to do so when they’re old enough to decide on their own. Even this educational goal has a bearing on educating for democracy. Large democracies are made up of smaller groups with different priorities and values. In a healthy democracy, people in these smaller groups have a firm understanding of who they are. They have a nuanced understanding of their core values, and they know that they can choose these values freely. This is exactly the kind of self-knowledge that’s involved in helping young people decide if they are Unitarian Universalists. So even this fourth goal of ours strengthens democracy, by helping young people grow in self-knowledge and self-awareness.

    So we teach community building. We teach skills that happen to be useful in a democracy. We teach religious literacy, or cross-cultural understanding. We teach self-knowledge and self-awareness.

    All these educational goals teach things that lead to a healthy democracy. A healthy democracy needs people who are know how to build community with one another. A healthy democracy needs people who have skills like empathy, listening well to others, public speaking, and many of the skills that are associated with doing liberal religion. A healthy democracy needs people with skills in cross-cultural understanding. A healthy democracy needs people with self-knowledge and self-awareness.

    So you see, the ways in which we teach democratic process to our young people are sometimes subtle and often complex. Yet these are exactly the kinds of skills our young people need to learn. We live in a time when our democracy is in danger precisely because so many Americans lack the skills we teach. When we teach our children the things we teach, we are sending people out into the world who have the skills our country needs.

  • No Rehearsal Christmas Pageant, 2021

    An edited version of the Pageant enacted at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Palo Alto. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

    Opening words

    Excerpt from the poem “I’m not a religious person but” by Chen Chen.

    Chalice Lighting

    We stand at the turning of the year,
    Poised in a moment of stillness.
    The past spreads out behind,
    What is to come lies before us.
    The sun lies low in the sky,
    The days are brief and cold.
    Night enfolds in lingering time
    Our cares, our grief, our hopes.
    We await the return of light.
    [adapted from public domain material]

    Reading

    from A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
    read by 2 Narrators

    A: Christmas as we know it today is a nineteenth century invention. The reading this morning is from one of the chief inventors of Christmas, a Unitarian named Charles Dickens.

    B: “A merry Christmas, uncle! God save you!” cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge’s nephew, who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation he had of his approach.

    A: “Merry Christmas!” said Scrooge, “What right have you to be merry? You’re poor enough.”

    B: “Come, then,” returned Scrooge’s nephew gaily. “What right have you to be dismal? You’re rich enough.”

    A: Scrooge having no better answer ready on the spur of the moment, said, “Bah!” again; and followed it up with “Humbug.”

    B: “Don’t be cross, uncle!” said the nephew.

    A: “What else can I be,” said Scrooge indignantly, “when I live in such a world of fools as this? Merry Christmas! Out upon merry Christmas! What’s Christmas time to you but a time for finding yourself a year older, but not an hour richer? If I could work my will, every idiot who goes about with ‘Merry Christmas’ on his lips, should be boiled with his own pudding, and buried with a stake of holly through his heart!”

    B: “Uncle!” pleaded the nephew.

    A: “Nephew!” returned the uncle sternly, “keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine.”

    B: “I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time,” returned the nephew, “when it has come round, as a good time; a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time; the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!”

    The No-Rehearsal Christmas Pageant

    Narrated by 2 readers.

    The minimalist costumes were made out of cardstock. Click here for instructions and patterns. You should also make a large Star out of cardboard (most art stores can sell you shiny silver or gold cardboard). You’ll also want a supply of shiny gold pipe cleaners, from which people can make Angel halos (a simple circle that you put on your head — make a sample to show people as they come in).

    You’ll want to have someone pass out the animal headbands, sheep masks, shepherd’s head scarves, pipe cleaners, and Wise Person crowns as people come into the service. For those who pass out costumes, note the following: each person may choose ONE animal headband; AND they may choose a sheep mask OR a shepherd’s head scarf; AND they may take a Wise Person’s crown if they wish; AND they may choose to take a gold pipe cleaner from which to make an angel’s halo. So each person can take at most 4 items.

    Be sure the Narrators have one each of: animal headband; sheep mask; shepherd’s head scarf; Wise Person crown — so they can demonstrate how to put the costume on. The Narrators will also take Herod’s crown, the laurel leaves, and the Star.

    A: We are going to retell the old story of the miraculous birth of Jesus this morning, but we are going to give it our own slant. We’ll base our story on two early Christian stories of Jesus’s birth, the books of Matthew and Luke. We’ll make this a story of freedom and liberation. And since we are Universalists, ours is a story of hope for all people.

    B: Instead of just listening to or watching the story of the birth of Jesus, we are going to get inside it. At various points in the story, I will ask if some of you would be willing become one of the characters in the story. To make this a truly immersive theatre experience, everyone will remain in their seats. Children and adults who took costumes as you came in, you may put them on at the correct time (wait until we tell you to do so). [If you kept extra costumes to distribute during the pageant, mention this now.] And in a couple of cases, I will ask for specific volunteers to have very simple costumes.

    A: Now let’s begin. If you wish, close your eyes for a moment. Transport yourself to another time and another place. Imagine that a story is going to unfold before your very eyes, a brand-new story you’ve never heard before. Imagine that after years and years of hearing stories about women and men bowing down before powerful kings and emperors and dictators and tyrants, you finally hear a story in which three powerful wise people kneel down alongside some shepherds before one tiny, new-born child.

    Imagine that after years of hearing story after story telling of terrible wars, you are at last hearing the friendly story of a baby: the story of a humble carpenter and his wife, the baby that is born to them in a stable, shepherds in a star-lit field who go to see the new-born child, and peaceful animals who gather round in the stable where the baby lies in the cow’s feeding trough. Imagine that at last you are going to hear a story in which everyone is longing for peace on earth and good will to all persons, everywhere.

    Imagine that after years of hearing stories about the results of hatred and oppression and persecutions, you finally are hearing a story about the transforming power of love. Now slowly open your eyes. Listen and watch carefully. Let the story begin!

    B: To start the story, we need someone to be Caesar Augustus, Emperor of Rome. I’m going to bring Caesar the laurel leaf crown (you may keep the laurel leaves when we’re done).

    [Narrator brings cardstock Laurel Leaves to someone in the congregation. A good person to choose for Caesar is the board president or treasurer.]

    A: In those days, long, long ago, a decree went out from the Emperor, Caesar Augustus, saying: “All the world should be registered so they can pay taxes to me!”

    All the people were required to go to the town where they had been born to register. For some people, that meant a long journey. Joseph, a carpenter, had to go all the way from the town of Nazareth in Galilee, to Judea, to Bethlehem, the city of David. He went with Mary, the woman he was planning to marry, because she was expecting a child. They started on their long journey, traveling by day, and sometimes even by night, their road lit only by stars.

    B: If you look carefully, you’ll see an imaginary Mary and Joseph walking on their way to Nazareth. Since this a starlit night, could everyone else please hold up your hands like this [show], as if your hands are twinkling stars…

    A: Joseph and Mary knew it was not going to be an easy journey, because Mary was almost ready to have her baby. At least they had a donkey Mary could ride on. And at least the twinkling stars made the road seem friendly.

    B: Thank you for the stars. Now that Joseph and Mary are in Bethlehem, you can put your hands down.

    A: When Joseph and Mary got to Bethlehem, they discovered that there was no room at the inn. But the inn was the only place in town with comfortable beds. Mary and Joseph had to take shelter in a stable cut into the side of a hill. And they settled in to sleep there among the animals.

    B: Next we need some animals. If you received an animal ear headband as you came in this morning, you can put it on now, like this [demonstrate putting on a headband]. — [If you have extra headbands, you can say: “We have extras, so if you’d like one now, please raise your hand.” The other Narrator can distribute them.] — We’re going to have cows, mice, donkeys, bunnies, and chickens.

    A: The gentle animals welcomed Joseph and Mary into their stable. And that very night, the time came for Mary to give birth. It was a stable, so when the baby was born of course there was no cradle for Mary to lay her baby in. But one of the cows was kind enough to lend her feeding trough for a cradle, and Joseph and Mary laid their new baby there among the hay in the feeding trough.

    B: Now we need some shepherds. If you borrowed a shepherd’s head scarf as you came in, you can put it on now, like this [demonstrate]. We also need sheep for the shepherds to watch. If you took a sheep mask as you came in, you can hold it up now, like this [demonstrate holding the sheep’s mask in front of your face].

    A: In that region, there were shepherds who lived for months at a time out in the fields, watching over their flocks of sheep by night. They had to watch over their sheep because there were wolves in the hills that would gladly eat a sheep, if they could get one. Do I hear any Wolves out there in the wilderness?

    [Wait for someone in congregation to howl like a Wolf.]

    B: Now we need some Messengers from the God of the Israelites, also known as Angels of the Lord. If you made an angel halo from the gold pipe cleaners we passed out to people as they came in this morning, you can put your halo on now.

    A: On this night, as the shepherds stood watch in their fields, a messenger from God, also known as an angel, stood before them. This angel was truly magnificent, a being who was neither male nor female, and the glory of the God of the Israelites shone around the shepherds. Not surprisingly, when the shepherds saw a messenger from God, they were terrified. But the angel spoke gently, saying to them:

    “Do not be afraid, for I have appeared to bring you good news of great joy for all the people of Israel. To you is born this day in the city of David a savior, who is the messiah. This will be a sign to you: you will find a child wrapped in strips of cloth and lying in a cow’s feeding trough.”

    Then the angel who had spoken went on to say: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth let there be peace and goodwill among all people everywhere.”

    B: Now anyone who wants to be an angel, whether or not you have a halo, please stand up and become a whole host of angels. If you have a halo, put it on like this [demonstrate].

    A: And there was a whole host of angels singing and praising God, and the shepherds were amazed.

    B: Angels, you can sit down again. Now it’s time for a quick costume change, because we need shepherds, sheep, and friendly animals once again [demonstrate costume change — take off halo, put on one of the other costumes].

    A: Upon hearing the message from their God, and hearing the songs of the angel choir, the shepherds said to one another, “This is amazing! Let’s go up to Bethlehem and actually see the baby the angel told us about!” Being good shepherds who cared about their sheep, they brought the sheep along.

    So the shepherds went to Bethlehem with their sheep, and there they found Mary and Joseph and the new baby, just as that angel had told them. (Afterwards, the shepherds would tell everyone what the angel had said to them about Mary and Joseph’s new baby, and everyone who heard their story was amazed.)

    As for Mary, she already knew her baby was wonderful. But she listened carefully to what the shepherds said, and treasured all she heard in her heart.

    The shepherds and sheep gathered around the feeding trough admiring the baby. They praised their God for this wonder of new birth, and they prayed and hoped that what the angel said would come true — that there would be peace on earth and goodwill for all people, even for lowly shepherds.

    B: Now we need some Wise People, who are also royalty. If you’d like to be one of the Wise People, please put on a crown, like this [demonstrate].

    A: After Jesus was born in Bethlehem, three wise persons, who were kings and queens from the Far East, came to Jerusalem. As these three wise persons journeyed their long, slow journey to Bethlehem (actually, it took them 12 days to get there, which is why we talk about the twelve days of Christmas), they noticed that their way was lit by a large and bright star.

    B: We need someone to be King Herod. I’m going to bring Herod a crown (you may keep the crown when we’re done).

    [Narrator brings cardstock crown to someone in the congregation. It’s fun to give this to a board member or other well-known congregational leader.]

    A: First the wise persons went to visit King Herod and asked, “Where is the child who has been born king of the Jews? For we observed his star in the skies and we have come to praise him and bring him gifts.”

    The three wise persons learned from King Herod about a prophecy which had been spoken long ago, that the messiah would be born in Bethlehem. So the wise persons set out for Bethlehem, and as they walked, they saw ahead of them the star as they first had seen it in the Far East.

    B: Would someone be willing to hold up the star? (You may keep the star when we’re done.)

    [Narrator brings cardstock Star to a member of the congregation]

    A: The wise persons followed the star until it stopped over the stable where the newborn child was lying in the cow’s feeding trough.

    When the wise persons entered the stable and saw the new baby, they were overwhelmed with joy at this new life. They knelt down to worship him, and they opened their bags and brought out gifts of gold (because the crowns of kings were made of gold) and frankincense and myrrh (myrrh was what was put in the oil used to anoint kings).

    B: Now we are done. But please leave one of your costumes on, while we finish telling the story.

    A: Look around at this scene. It is a special night, with stars and angels and shepherds and wise persons and animals. And they are all admiring a special baby that has just been born. Why would all these people stand around for such a long time to admire a tiny new baby? There is only one reason I can think of — because the birth of a child always brings hope for the future. And for a people who lived under oppressive Roman rule, all the while longing for liberation, the birth of a child must have been fraught with extra meaning. Will this be the child who leads us to freedom? Will this be the child who breaks our bonds of slavery and establishes a reign of peace and righteousness?

    So it is in our world today. In a world that sometimes seems hopeless, we still look with hope to the future. Every time a baby is born, we hope that this child will be one of the ones who leads us to a world of righteousness. And every time we tell this Christmas story, it reminds us that we must go out and work for liberation and justice. We — you and I — are the ones who are responsible for making sure the world is a better place for all the babies that are born.