Dan Harper | Sermons

  • A Place To Call Home

    This sermon was preached by Rev. Dan Harper at First Unitarian Church in New Bedford. As usual, the sermon below is a reading text. The actual sermon as preached contained ad libs, interjections, and other improvisation. Sermon copyright (c) 2005 Daniel Harper.

    Readings

    I have one short reading this morning, by the Japanese Zen Buddhist monk and poet, Ryokan.

    Though travels
    take me to
    a different stopping place each night
    the dream I dream is always
    that same one of home.

    Sermon

    I want to speak with you this morning about what it means to call a place home. No doubt I got interested in the topic of home because Imy partner and I have just moved for the third time in three years. But it was just by chance that last week I came across the poem by Ryokan:

    Though travels
    take me to
    a different stopping place each night
    the dream I dream is always
    that same one of home.

    To dream of a place we can call home:–

    Even if you live all your life in the same place, it can seem as if you have a different stopping place each night; even if you travel continuously, each place you stay can feel like home.

    Scientists who study the earliest human beings, and the earlier humanlike beings, speculate that our ancestors moved from place to place depending on the availability of food and water. In this place that we call home, the south coast of Massachusetts, the indigenous peoples that lived here before Europeans arrived spent winters in upland hunting grounds, moved to fertile ground to plant beans and corn and squashes, spent summers by the sea to fish and gather shellfish, moved back to their fields at harvest time, and ended the circle of the year by returning to the hunting grounds. Home for them might have meant the length of a river and the watershed it drained; or an annual round of fields and hunting grounds where ancestors got their food, places that would change slowly as the fertility of the soil waxed and waned or game animals moved in and out. Today we tend to think of home as a room or an apartment, or a small plot of ground in the city with a house, or a slightly larger plot of land in suburbia with a house. But home is more than a building, more than a house lot. When we call a place “home,” we mean something more complicated than that.

    Ryokan, in his poem, says that when he is traveling with a different stopping place each night, the dream he dreams is always the dream of home. Some people try to tell us that we should be at home wherever we are, because wherever you are, there you are. Or that we should be at home in our own skins. Or that we should feel at home wherever we are. I have never been satisfied with any of these sayings, any more than I am staisfied by saying home is a few rooms where I sleep and watch television. You can be sure that Ryokan was not dreaming of a television set.

    In common useage when we say “home,” oftentimes we are referring to a room or an apartment or a house where we go to sleep at night — after having watched some television of course. But if you really think about it, your home is more than that room or apartment or house. It’s not enough to have a room or three. If you walk through any suburban neighborhood you can see the houses where people try to make it enough: those are the houses with the rooms lit by the blue glow of a television set or video game. Televisions are marvelous inventions, and I do enjoy watching reruns of “Will and Grace” while I’m at home. I like having my familiar desk and dishes and chairs, too, but while all these thigns might make a place feel homelike, they aren’t home. Maybe we have to look farther afield to discover what home means.

    A job or a workplace are often another place that becomes a sort of home to us. Work need not be paid employment. Henry Thoreau writes: “For many years I was self-appointed inspector of snowstorms and rain-storms, and did my duty faithfully; suveyor, if not of highways, then of forest paths and all across-lot routes….” I have done some of that work at times when I had insufficient paid employment; like Thoreau I have found that “my townsmen would not after all admit me into the list of town officers, nor make my place a sinecure with a moderate allowance.” But work is work whether you are paid for it or not.

    Work is the way you contribute to the grand working of the cosmos. Work offers a second place in our lives. Even if you work at home, the work you do can make your house or apartment feel like a different place. Work also brings us into contact with a different set of people. You have a circle of family, housemates, neighbors, and friends that come and go in your house or apartment; and you often have a different circle of acquaintances, co-workers, customers, and friends that come in go in your world of work. Although it’s never quite that simple, since if you work in a family business or stay at home to raise children, you might see much the same circle of people at home and at work.

    The place you live and the place you work are both parts of the place you call home. I am convinced we human beings need at least one more place in our lives. Two years ago, we were living in Oakland, California, and there was a Starbucks coffee shop a few blocks away from us. A group of men gathered there each evening, sitting outside when the weather was fine, and talking for hours in some language I did not recognize — a friend of ours said they were Eritrean. Personally, I’m not a big fan of Starbucks coffee shops, but that Starbucks in Oakland offered another place in the lives of those Eritrean men. I have no idea what they actually talked about; but for a price of mediocre coffee they could go and sit for hours at a time, reconnecting with old friends or striking up conversations with a new acquaintance.

    Not that I think that going to a Starbucks coffee shop is going to make your life complete. We do need that place where we can go and have informal conversations with people outside the inner circle of family or housemates, conversations that stretch beyond the limits of the workplace. Those informal conversations take place at Starbucks, or at the mall, or on the edge of the soccer field while you’re watching kids play soccer, but those informal conversations are not quite enough.

    In the times of our ancient, prehistoric ancestors, I like to imagine that we had still another place:– sitting in a circle around a fire at night. Sitting around that fire in the evening, we (or rather our ancestors) had time to talk with friends and family and neighbors. And that was also where we told the stories about where we came from, and who we are, and what the meaning of life might be. That was where we sang the old songs and chants together. It’s where children learned how to be adults by watching adults who were not their parents. It’s where we dreamed dreams and where we sometimes managed to share the great mysteries of being — not necessarily where we encountered the great mysteries of being, but where we shared those mysteries with others.

    Unlike our ancient, prehistoric ancestors, we rarely sit around communal fires any more. But I believe our congregation fills much the same place in our lives today. Our congregation is, or should be, a place where we can sing the old songs (and maybe some new ones too), and ask the big questions about life, the universe, and everything; and share together something of the mysteries of life.

    So you can see, in spite of the way we commonly use the word “home,” that home is more than, or should be more than, just some rooms in a building with a television set. Yes, we need a safe place to lay our heads at night, yes we need food and clothing besides, and maybe in the crazy postmodern age we need to watch “Will and Grace” before going to bed at night. Adding a workplace helps complete the picture of what a home is: we also need to contribute to the workings of the cosmos, however we may do that. And we need places where we can have those informal conversations with other people. But we also need that place by the ancestral fire, to hear the stories of olden times, to tell our own stories, to help nurture the children, to explore the great mysteries of the cosmos.

    I want to point out something about these places that make up home, and it’s going to sound pretty obvious, but still needs to be pointed out. You can live in a room by yourself (and maybe a television set). You can work by yourself. But the ancestral fire has to have other people sitting around it. When you come to the proverbial ancestral fire to hear the stories of olden times, there pretty much has to be someone else there to tell the stories. When it’s time for you to tell your own story it really helps if there’s someone there to listen to you. When you face the great mysteries of life and death, you need to share those with other people.

    Or to put it another way, when you explore the great mysteries of the cosmos you ahve to do it in conversation with, in partnership with, other human beings. You can’t do it alone. Our culture values the loners, the cranky individualists, the characters like John Wayne who seem to be totally self-sufficient. But the myth of the loner, the myth of John Wayne, is just fiction. The reality is that those who try to be totally self-sufficient wind up being less than fully human. We need other people in order to be fully ourselves.

    So it is that we have our homes, the place where we lay our heads at night; and we have our work, where we have a hand in the workings of the cosmos; and we have a place around the ancestral fire. That’s why I keep going to church — because without that place around the ancestral fire, I don’t really have a place to call home.

  • The Oath

    The sermon and story below delivered by Rev. Dan Harper to First Unitarian in New Bedford. As usual, the texts below are reading texts. The actual sermon and story as delievered contained ad libs, interjections, and other improvisation. Sermon and story copyright (c) 2005 Daniel Harper.

    Story

    This is a story from the Islamic tradition. You probably already know that in order to be considered a Muslim — that is, someone who follows the religion of Islam — you must do five things. First, you must confess that there is no God but Allah whose prophet is Mohammed; second, you must pray five times a day; third, you must fast during the month of Ramadan; fourth, if you possibly can, you must make the journey to Mecca, the center of Islam; and fifth, you must give money to the poor. Our story today is about giving money to the poor. The Sufi master and dervish, Sheik Nasir el-Din Shah, told this story.

    *****

    Once there was a man who was very troubled in his mind. He faced such great troubles in his life that he could see no way out — oh, his problems were so great that I dare not tell you what they were. If you heard all his problems, you would be desperately sad for a month.

    And yet his troubles kept growing worse. It got so bad, his friends gave up on him, his servants moved out, he had no one to talk to but his cat. In desperation, the man swore that if he ever found a way out of his troubles, he would sell his house, and give all the money he gained from selling his house to the poor people who lived in his city.

    Soon thereafter, his troubles miraculously came to an end! Within two or three days, everything was fine once again. He sighed with relief. Once again, he could enjoy living in his beautiful house — and then he remembered. He had sworn that if he ever got out of his troubles, he would sell his beautiful house, and give all the money to the poor.

    He realized he did not want to sell his house. Why, if he sold his house, and gave away all that money, he would have so little money left, he would have to live in a much smaller house. That would be most unpleasant! But he swore he would sell his house. But there was no reason for him to give away so much money; far better that he keep the money for himself.

    So he told people they could buy his house for one piece of silver. However, his cat must continue to live in the house — everyone knows that cats don’t like to move — and the cat was such a valuable cat, he must sell it for no less than ten thousand pieces of silver.

    A rich merchant bought the house for one piece of silver, and also bought the cat for ten thousand pieces of silver. The man gave all the money he gained from the sale of his house to the poor — which was only one piece of silver. But the money from the sale of the cat — ten thousand pieces of silver — that money, the man kept.

    *****

    Sheik Nasir el-Din Shah did not say what happened to the man afterwards. But Sheik Nasir el-Din Shah did say that many people are just like the man who sold his house for one piece of silver. Many people resolve to do the right thing, but then they change things around in their minds to make it easier, and make it be to their advantage. Nasir el-Din Shah said that until we can stop doing this, we will not learn anything at all.

    This is a hard story to listen to. Even today, we know we should give money away, but instead we go and spend that money at the mall. I know this is something I have a problem with — how about you?

    Source: Tales of the Dervishes, Idries Shah, Dutton, 1967.

    Readings

    from the final chapter of “Walden” by Henry David Thoreau

    “…if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. He will put some things behind, will pass an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws will begin to establish themselves around and within him; or the old laws be expanded, and interpreted in his favor in a more liberal sense, and he will live with the license of a higher order of beings. In proportion as he simplifies his life, the laws of the universe will appear less complex, and solitude will not be solitude, nor poverty poverty, nor weakness weakness. If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.”

    from the Koran, 49.11-12

    “Believers, avoid immoderate suspicion, for in some cases suspicion is a crime. Do not spy on one another, nor backbite one another. Would any of you like to eat the flesh of his dead brother? Surely you would loathe it….”

    Sermon

    Earlier, we heard a story about a man who sold his house — and who also sold his cat. I was trying to figure out how many dollars that cat was worth. The man sold the cat for ten thousand pieces of silver, and if each piece of silver weighed one ounce, at recent market prices for silver that cat was worth seventy thousand three hundred and fifty dollars. The house, on the other hand, was worth seven dollars and four cents (rounding up to the nearest dollar) — which also means the man’s promise was worth essentially nothing.

    What are promises worth? What does it mean to make a promise? I’ve been thinking about promises this week, because right after this worship service the voting members of this congregation will decide whether or not to call me as the settled minister here. If this congregation — if you — decide to call me, we will be making promises to each other. So we have to figure out what our promises are worth, and what it means to make promises to each other, and how to live up to our promises.

    We start by recognizing that Unitarian Universalist congregations are based on promises. We do not have a creed or a doctrine — you do not have to believe certain things in order to be a part of this congregation, as is true with many Christian congregations. We do not have a set of laws or religious rules that you have to follow to be a part of this congregation — as is the case with many Jewish congregations. Instead, Unitarian Universalist congregations make promises. The technical term for the promises we make to each other is “covenant.”

    Rebecca Parker, currently the president of one our Unitarian Universalist theological schools, traces our modern idea of covenants goes back more than four hundred and fifty years. She writes:

    “In 1550, Robert Browne, inspired by the Reformation, drew on the Biblical image of promise making between God and people to propose a revolution in church life. Churches should come into being, he said, as a covenant among persons. Not through common assent to a doctrine, or through sacraments administered by priests hierarchically arrayed and apostolically descended. Instead, people should join themselves by a mutual agreement to walk together, to keep [Jesus’s] commandments, to choose their ministers and teachers, to put forth and debate questions to learn the truth, and to welcome the voice of protest, complaint, and dissent.”

    That’s where we get our idea of covenant. You may have noticed that we still like to ask questions and debate the answers. And we still join ourselves together by mutual agreement to walk together, to choose our ministers and teachers, and to keep the commandments to love others as we love ourselves.

    A good number of Unitarian Universalist congregations have written covenants explicitly stating the promises the people of the congregation make to one another. The first church covenant written here in New England was written in Salem in 1629, the oldest church founded on the soil of New England, which is still a Unitarian church (and coincidentally, the church where my parents got married). The original covenant of the Salem church said this:

    “We Covenant with the Lord and one with an other; and doe bynd our selves in the presence of God, to walke together in all his waies, according as he is pleased to reveale himself unto us in his Blessed word of truth.”

    The Salem church still uses a version of this covenant today, and they say it together each week during their worship service. In this covenant, the congregation makes promises about how they will treat each other: they promise to bind themselves together, and walk together in the “ways of God”; they make promises about searching for truth by figuring out together how God is pleased to reveal Godsself. This may not be a covenant you would like to be a part of, but that’s part of the point — you know exactly what the Salem Unitarian church stands for.

    Not every Unitarian Universalist congregation has such a clear covenant that everyone says together each week during the worship service. As you probably noticed, we have an affirmation and a doxology, but we do not say a covenant together.

    Yet if you read the Annual Report of this congregation, you will see that on page 6, your Board Chair, Evelyn Gifun, writes, “We need to have… a congregational covenant that will express how we will interact with each other so that we can all feel valued and respected.” Thus at least one person in this congregation senses the need for an explicit covenant.

    I have discovered over the years that most Unitarian Universalist congregations do have covenants, either explicit or implicit. You just have to poke around and generally you will uncover one. I went poking around in the church office, and found a card titled “Application for membership,” which says this:

    “The First Unitarian Church in New Bedford:

    “– Assumes that members will strive toward high ethical and moral standards in their personal lives and in the community;

    “– Leaves members free to formulate their religious beliefs according to their individual needs, conscience, and degree of maturity;

    “– Works for the understanding and promotion of a religion of love, assuming a spirit of cooperation and tolerance toward other religious groups;

    “– Cooperates and contributes to the Unitarian Universalist Association, but is not controlled by any denominational authority nor committed to any system of theological belief;

    “I hereby make application for membership, promising to make a reasonable effort to attend and support this church and the ideals for which it stands.”

    This may be an application for membership, but to me it sounds like a covenant. This little card tells us what the church stands for, and asks us if we are willing to promise to uphold what the church stands for. Like most covenants, it asks us to stand by the other people in the church, and at the same time it asks us to align ourselves with something higher than ourselves. It tells us that there is no creed or doctrine we have to believe in, and it tells us that there is no higher authority than ourselves. It tells us that we are free to question and debate religion over the course of our lives. Perhaps most importantly, it tells us ours is a religion which grows out of love, flowering in a spirit of cooperation.

    Because it is an application for membership, it perhaps doesn’t quite sound like a covenant. But if I said this —

    “We, the members and friends of First Untiarian of New Bedford, strive toward high ethical and moral standards in our personal lives and in the community;

    “We leave ourselves free to formulate our religious beliefs according to our individual needs, conscience, and degree of maturity;

    “We work for the understanding and promotion of a religion of love, assuming a spirit of cooperation and tolerance towards other religious groups;

    “We cooperate with and contribute to the Unitarian Universalist Association, but we are not controlled by any denominational authority; nor are we committed to any system of theological belief;

    “And we promise to attend and support this church and this ideals for which it stands.”

    If I put it that way, it begins to sound more like a covenant. You may disagree that this represents a covenant. Yet even so, I still believe this congregation already has some kind of a covenant — covenants are a part of who we are as religious liberals, as Unitarian Universalists — and that we need to let the light of day shine on that covenant, whatever it may be, so that it may grow, and blossom, and set fruit.

    Covenants are crucially important: Evelyn Gifun says so in her annual report; and the second reading this morning tells what can happen if we don’t make covenantal promises to value and respect one anotehr. The author of the Koran says to “avoid immoderate suspicion… do not spy on one another, nor backbite one another.” That is what we try to avoid with a covenant — we make promises to one another so we don’t have to always suspect one another, so we don’t have to waste time spying on one another, so we can stop backbiting.

    Fazlur Rahman, a liberal Islamic theologian, says this passage of the Koran grows out of the firm belief that all human beings are essentially equal. And — this passage tells us that we human beings all too often forget value and respect each other — all too often, we treat each other badly, we are suspicious of each other, we engage in backbiting.

    Backbiting destroys the promises we make to each other, just as the man in the story destroyed his promise by selling his cat for far too much money. Did you ever think of the literal meaning of “backbiting”? I love how the Koran puts it: “Would any of you like to eat the flesh of his dead brother? Surely you would loathe it.” Yuck! Cannibalism! You bet I would loathe it! And, boy, does that image help remind me to keep the covenantal promise of radical human equality.

    If you call me as your settled minister, we will be making such promises to one another. Above all, we will promise to value each other and respect each other. Above all, we will promise to devote ourselves to something larger than ourselves, devote ourselves to this and other ideals.

    Furthermore, in this congregation we will promise to strive towards high ethical and moral standards in our personal lives, and in the community — that’s all of us, you and me. We will promise to leave each other free to develop our religious beliefs according to need, conscience, and level of maturity. We will promise to work for the understanding and promotion of a religion of love. We will promise to contribute to and cooperate with the larger Unitarian Universalist movement, but we will assume primary authority over ourselves. We will promise to avoid the limits of any one system of theological belief; and to attend church; and to support this church, and support the ideals for which this church stands.

    If we advance confidently in the direction of this, our dream, we will meet with success as yet undreamed of — we will put old things behind us, to find that our old covenant will be expanded, interpreted in our favor with yet more liberality. There will be the universal in what we do; with our covenant, with our promises to each other, we grow, and touch the eternal oneness of all life, and it yields to our touch, itself changing and growing. If we keep our promises truly, the universe changes for the better.

  • Why Not Us?

    This sermon was preached by Rev. Dan Harper to First Unitarian in New Bedford. As usual, the sermon below is a reading text. The actual sermon as preached contained ad libs, interjections, and other improvisation. Sermon and story copyright (c) 2005 Daniel Harper.

    Story

    If you’re a Unitarian Universalist kid, sometimes it can be hard to explain what a Unitarian Universalist is. Maybe you’re at school, and one of your friends says, “Do you go to a church or a synagogue, or anything?” And you say yes, you go to a church, and they say, “Which one?” and you say you’re a Unitarian Universalist, and they say, “What’s a Unitarian Universalist? What do you believe?”

    What do you say then?

    Adults have this problem, too. This is the way I imagine it for adults: you’re in one of the office buildings in downtown Providence, and you get on the elevator with someon who says, “I heard you say that you’re a Untiarian Unviersalist. What do you Unitarian Universalists believe, anyway?” And the doors close and the elevator starts to go down, and how do you explain Unitarian Universalism in ten seconds?

    Now sometimes I take the easy way out, and I don’t really explain when someone asks me, “What do Unitarian Universalists believe, anyway?” It’s kind of hard to explain what a Unitarian Universalist is, so I might just say, “Well, we can believe anything we want” — which isn’t true, but it’s the easy way out. Or I might say, “You know, Unitarian Universalist — it’s the big stone church just a few blocks up from the whaling muesum” — which doesn’t say what Unitarian Universalism is at all! — but it’s easier than trying to explain our religion.

    Well, you adults are on your own, but I have some ideas for what kids can say.

    If you’re a little kid, and someone asks you what a Unitarian Universalist is, you could say, “I’m a Unitarian Universalist, a church where people have open minds, loving hearts, and hands that are ready to help.” To help you remember, there are even little hand motions that go with it [show]. Now you try it with me: “I’m a Unitarian Universalist, a church where people have open minds, loving hearts, and hands that are ready to help.”

    If you’re a slightly older kid, I have a little saying that can help you remember what it means to be a Unitarian Unviersalist. It goes like this: “It’s a blessing we are born, and it matters what we do. What we know about God is a piece of the truth. We let the beauty we love, be what we do, And we don’t have to do it alone.”

    It’s a blessing we are born — that means each and every person is important — and it matters what we do. What we know about God is a piece of the truth — and one of the things some people know about God is that God doesn’t exist. We let the beauty we love, be what we do — in other words, we try to live a good life. And we don’t have to do it alone.

    Here, try saying it with me: It’s a blessing we are born, and it matters what we do. What we know about God is a piece of the truth. Let the beauty we love, be what we do. And we don’t ahve to do it alone.

    Now if you’re in middle school or high school, I recommend a different approach. When someone asks you, “What do Unitarian Unviersalists believe, anyway?” you can say, “We believe in asking good questions.” — then you turn it around on them, and ask, “And what do you believe?” And then everything they say, you can respond with another question — so if your friends says, for example, “I believe that Jesus is my lord and savior,” you then ask politely, “What do you mean by lord and savior?” It’s a great way to learn what your friends really believe about religion. And it’s a pretty accurate way of showing how we Unitarian Universalists ask each other lots of hard questions. Be warned, though — asking all those questions can be extremely annoying — if you’re not careful, you can really annoy your friends.

    One more time: little kids can say, “I’m a Unitarian Universalist, a church where people have open minds, loving hearts, and hands that are ready to help.” Older kids can say something like this: “It’s a blessing we are born, and it matters what we do. What we know about God is a piece of the truth. We let the beauty we love, be what we do, And we don’t have to do it alone.” And if you’re in middle school or high school, you can try saying: “We believe in asking good questions. And what do you believe?”

    Readings

    According to some people, it was Unitarian Julia Ward Howe who started Mother’s Day. Our first reading this morning is her original 1870 “Mother’s Day Proclamation.” I have to admit, it is not at all what I had expected, but here it is….

    “Arise then…women of this day! Arise, all women who have hearts! Whether your baptism be of water or of tears! Say firmly: ‘We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies, our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage, for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience. We, the women of one country, will be too tender of those of another country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.’

    “From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with our own. It says: ‘Disarm! Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.’ Blood does not wipe our dishonor, nor violence indicate possession. As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel. Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead. Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means whereby the great human family can live in peace… Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar, but of God — In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask that a general congress of women without limit of nationality, may be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient and the earliest period consistent with its objects, to promote the alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable settlement of international questions, the great and general interests of peace.”

    The second reading this morning is very short, and it comes from the Christian scripture attributed to the author named Matthew:

    “You are the light of the world…. No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house.” [Matthew 5.14-15, New Revised Standard Version]

    Sermon

    That original Mother’s Day Proclamation by Julia Ward Howe really surprised me. My idea of Mother’s Day is that it is a day when we honor mothers. The stereotypical Mother’s Day celebration is that the kids get up early, overcook some eggs, burn some toast, and then bring breakfast in bed to their mom.

    And I know Mother’s Day has changed quite a bit just over the past few years. On the front page of Thursday’s Chicago Tribune, there was a story at the bottom of the page with the headline, “Nothing says “Love ya, Mom’ like a little Botox.” Here’s a little excerpt from the article: “Flowers, cards, and candy may not cut it this Mother’s Day — especially with hipper moms. ‘Moms themselves are changing,’ said Schuyler Brown, director of trendspotting for advertising agency Euro RSCG in New York…. ‘[Candy,] who needs it? I don’t put it in my house,’ said Zoe Mascio, a 48-year old mother and Botox fan in chicago. ‘And flowers, they die.’”

    Botox for Mother’s Day — who knew? Now remember, this is from the Chicago Tribune, and Chicago has the reputation of being ten years or so behind the trends of coastal cities like New York and Los Angeles.

    And the article goes on to report that total spending for Mother’s Day is expected to top $11 billion dollars this year. Average Mother’s Day spending has more than doubled this year, and the average person will spend US$104.63 this year. The six most popular categories of gifts for Mother’s Day: special meals, jewelry, flowers, gift certificates, clothing, and consumer electronics. Special meals alone are expected to total $2.2 billion dollars. Burnt toast and overcooked eggs are a little behind the times, I guess.

    But while I may be surprised by the total amount of spending on Mother’s Day this year, this is pretty much the Mother’s Day I expect. We are supposed to take care of mothers on Mother’s Day — pamper them, feed them special meals, buy them jewelry and dozen red roses and maybe some Botox, if that’s what they want.

    Julia Ward Howe had a surprisingly different idea for Mother’s Day. By the time she wrote her Mother’s Day proclamation, she had become involved in the Women’s Suffrage movement, working to gain women the right to vote. She had also become concerned at how vicious the Franco-Prussian War had gotten, and she began to think of ways to promote an international peace movement.

    “Arise, then, women of this day!” says Julia Ward Howe. “As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil at the summons of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a great and earnest day of counsel. Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead. Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means whereby the great human family can live in peace…”

    Julia Ward Howe had undergone a real change in her character over her life. Born into a life of ease and comfort, she chose to marry Samuel Gridley Howe, a reformer who helped found the New England Institute of the Blind and other worthy causes. Samuel Gridley Howe wanted a wife who would help him in his reform work. When Julia published poems and articles, her husband was furious — he thought she was wasting her time, time that should be spent on their home and on his projects. But Julia found it difficult to tolerate her husband’s viewpoint, and she almost divorced him — it was only his threat to keep custody of her two youngest children that convinced her to stay in the marriage. She later said remaining in her marriage was one of the greatest sacrifices of her life.

    Throughout her difficult marriage, one of the things that kept her going was her church. She belonged to Theodore Parker’s huge Unitarian church in Boston, until Parker’s death in 1860. It was there that she got involved in the anti-slavery movement. After Theodore Parker died, she switched over to the Chruch of the Disciples, the Unitarian church led by James Freeman Clarke. It was Clarke who suggested to Julia that she write better lyrics to the tune of “John Brown’s Body,” which resulted in her most famous work — “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.”

    I can’t help but believe that Julia Ward Howe was influenced by Theodore Parker. Theodore Parker was a Unitarian minister who fought tirelessly against slavery, even to the point of carrying a loaded pistol with him into the pulpit when threatened by violence from pro-slavery forces. Theodore Parker really lived his religious values in his day-to-day life — and he seems to have gotten those in his congregation to do the same.

    I’m not trying to talk anyone out of buying flowers, candy, or Botox for their mother this Mother’s Day. I’m not trying to talk anyone out of spending their full fair share of $104.63 on mom today. Because you know what, the advertisers are right — your mom is worth it.

    But in addition to honoring our mothers, it’s not a bad idea to remember the original purpose of Mother’s Day as Julia Ward Howe imagined it. Julia Ward Howe imagined a day when mothers would use their influence to change the world. Using a Biblical passage that I suspect she would ahve liked, I would say she imagined a day when mothers would step forth as the light of the world, when women would stop hiding their light under a bushel basket and shine their light from a lampstand where the whole world could see it.

    That’s not a bad path for all of us to follow. How often do we forget to live out our faith, because we are too busy spending the average amount of money that every Aemrican spends on consumer goods these days? How often do we neglect to live out our faith in the world, just because we get caught up in the daily tasks that sap our strength and convince us that we are not worthy of doing something grand?

    Theodore Parker was one of the great Unitarian ministers. He was a brilliant preacher by all reports, as well as a brilliant scholar. He was so good, his church had to meet in the Boston Music Hall, in order to accomodate the more than one thousdan people who worshipped each week. But I think there’s another reason his church grew so big. He seems to have inspired people in his congregation to live out their faith in the rest of their lives. Like Julia Ward Howe, Unitarians from Theodore Parker’s church lived out their faith in their daily lives. To these people, Unitarianism wasn’t just an exclusive clubhouse where they went once a week to see their firneds and make themselves feel good, Unitarianism was a life-changing faith — a world-changing faith.

    You may or may not agree with the way Julia Ward Howe lived out her Unitarian faith — you may or may not agree with Julia Ward Howe’s original Mother’s Day Proclamation. But instead of thinking about whether you agree with the specifics of what she has to say, perhaps you might think about it this way. Which do you prefer — Julia Ward Howe’s original idea for Mother’s Day, where mothers are supposed to be empowered to make the world a better place — or do you prefer what Mother’s Day has become, which is a day where Americans will spend a grand total of eleven billion dollars? — with the truly admirable goal of pleasing your own mother, but without really changing the world to make things better for all mothers everywhere.

    We can go to the mall and buy more stuff for our mothers — or we can do that, and try to make a difference in the world. We can see religion as a consumer commodity and our church as a place where we go to get our needs met and where we pay fees for services rendered — or we can take our religious principles out to a world that desparately needs them.

    You know, we can make a difference in the world. Why not? Why not us?

    Julia Ward Howe lived out her Unitarian religion in the world. Why not us? Why not live out our Unitarian Universalist faith in the wider community? Julia Ward Howe could have stayed a pampered socialite — could have bowed to the pressure of her husband and simply been his helpmate — could have stopped when she wrote “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” and rested on her laurels — could have been just a plain mom who let her children take care of her and treat her nicely. But she didn’t. She worked for women’s right to vote, she worked to abolish slavery — as if she didn’t have enough to do, what with raising five children, and holding together a difficult marriage!

    Now Julia Ward Howe was an exceptional woman, and there aren’t many of us who could raise five children and do everything she did. I know I couldn’t! But Julia Ward Howe makes me believe I could do what she did. To use a trendy word, she empowers me to try to live out my faith.

    We could all try that together. We all know this church, First Unitarian of New Bedford, has to grow or die. We are not going to grow if all we do is the religious equivalent of buying $104.63 worth of flowers and candy for our mothers. We have to take the next step, and work alongside our mothers to live our faith, to change the world, so that the beauty we love becomes what we do.

    So — why not us? We could do this. Think about it.

    And in the mean time, if you’re planning on celebrating Mother’s Day, with flowers or candy or special meals or even Botox — may this be a wonderful day for you.