"Community Life"

Any Sunday I’m not in church in Santa Monica,

wherever I might happen to be,

I’m always thinking about 

what you are doing here.

A lifetime of church going,

compounded by being a minister,

has permanently conditioned me.

I don’t really feel at home anywhere on a Sunday morning

except in church,

preferably here,

but sometimes almost anywhere else will do.

 

This Easter Sunday David and I roamed around Singapore

until we found the English-speaking service

at the Anglican church there.

The rituals were confusing 

and we were hot and out of place,

but it still felt right to be there.

I remembered that on Easter two years earlier,

in Rome on a similar study leave,

we had huddled with the throngs outside St. Peter’s

just to be part of the church action.

When I asked,

"I wonder what they’re doing in Santa Monica right now,"

I realized of course that it wasn’t time for church at home

and you were all probably fast asleep.

I did not expect to learn much 

about Unitarian Universalism on this trip.

In Bali, where we spent most of our time,

nearly everyone practices a local form of Hinduism

that is quite different from the Indian religion

I studied in school.

There are no Unitarian Universalist churches there,

which to be honest was one of the reasons 

why we went –

looking for something totally different,

a fresh perspective on everything.

 

On the surface, 

we Unitarian Universalists have practically nothing in common 

with the Balinese.

Elaborate, colorful rituals dominate Balinese life.

Every village – even a village as small as three hundred people –

has three temples.

The temples require ceremonies.

The people always seem to be preparing for,

celebrating,

or cleaning up after a ceremony.

They make us look drab 

and ritually deprived. 

 

Despite these contrasts,

interesting similarities did emerge.

Before long, I could see how 

we share certain distinctive values.

The Balinese practice religious tolerance

and welcome outsiders into their ceremonies and culture.

As one young man explained to us,

the Balinese believe that people have many different ideas of God,

and that all are equally valid.

What draws people together in religious community

is ritual and relationship, 

not dogma.

 

The rituals require tremendous skill –

the offerings alone are works of art –

and belong to a rich culture

in which everyone is an artist.

After a while the outsider can see

  that this religious activity –

as exotic as it may appear,

is actually inseparable from daily life.

Even the most traditional rituals 

contain quirky modern elements

We attended one ceremony with a young family

who brought the usual carefully assembled offerings of food,

along with a small woven tray containing a cell phone.

I had the honor of making that offering,

which was returned with its contents

after the temple priest had blessed it.

 

Balinese religion is much like ours

in the sense that it is about 

the way they live from day to day.

It is about food and art and family and work.

It is about having a place to go. 

But most of all,

it is about community.

Rituals weave people together in a symbolic activity

to show –

consciously and unconsciously –

that community is life.

 

I found myself thinking about our church quite often there,

perhaps because we visited so many temples.

Sometimes I thought,

"I wonder what they are doing now."

Most of the time, 

I just thought about 

the meaning of our community 

and how different life would be for me –

for any of us –

without it.

 

The Balinese cannot imagine life without community.

I questioned our guides quite closely 

about village customs and governance.

Each village governs itself

and anyone living there can participate –

even foreigners, if they are interested.

 

They make their decisions by consensus.

Sometimes it takes a long time to make a decision.

Since every village must have three temples,

their building meetings would probably be long

even by Unitarian Universalist standards.

Fortunately for them 

temple designs are according to strict tradition –

few decisions ever need to be made.

Another village tradition concerns belonging.

In Bali, you can never leave your village.

You can move away,

go to work in Jakarta or San Francisco.

But the village still considers you to be a member –

a non-participating member –

but spiritually, 

very much present.

 

This way of looking at membership is essential

because when you die,

your body must go back to your village.

"You cannot quit your village,"

one Balinese man told me,

"because then you would have no one to cremate you."

Cremation is the single most important

and essential ritual in Hindu life.

It takes a village to have one.

 

Your community remains your home forever.

It is life and it is also death.

Its scope is limitless;

its gate is always open.

 

By our standards of voluntary association,

this is a level of community

that comes close to a nearly suffocating inescapability.

Perhaps it does for some Balinese as well –

we didn’t meet them;

they are probably in Jakarta

or San Francisco.

And yet there is a sense of acceptance,

of being held and protected 

that is very compelling and –

in more ways than one –

very hard to leave behind.

 

Every style of community is different.

But it springs from the same human need

to affiliate with others

because life is not the same without it.

In the Jewish story I told earlier for our meditation,

the rabbi teaches that night is over and day begins

when one human being can look into the face of another

and say, 

"This is my brother; 

this is my sister."

This kind of daylight is life itself.

Life asks us to acknowledge the reality 

of our kinship with one another. 

 

Here in this community,

whatever our individual needs or social skills or marital status,

affirming our kinship is central to our faith.

Even if all you want or need to do

is come and sit in this sanctuary with other people 

on a Sunday morning,

you are participating in community.

We are all different in the sense 

that some of us need 

to spend a lot of time together,

others of us not so much.

Membership embraces a diverse array of behaviors,

but its meaning is universal.

We need each other to live.

 

Scientist E.O. Wilson has written frequently

about life and human nature.

In his most recent book, 

"The Future of Life,"

he writes about the human need for community.

"Each of us finds a comfortable position,"

Wilson observes,

"somewhere along the continuum 

that ranges from complete withdrawal and self-absorption

at one end

to full civic engagement and reciprocity at the other.

The position is never fixed.

We fret, 

vacillate,

and steer our lives 

through the riptide of countervailing instincts

that press from both ends of the continuum.

The uncertainty we feel is not a curse.

It is not a confusion on the road out of Eden.

It is just the human condition.

We are intelligent mammals, 

fitted by evolution – By God, if you prefer –

to pursue personal ends through cooperation."

 

The four naughty boys in the Balinese children’s story

learned early in life

that strength comes from standing together.

Like the bundle of wood their father holds,

they cannot break if they are joined to one another.

But as Wilson has pointed out,

there is no one fixed way to be together:

throughout our lives,

we constantly adjust how close and how far 

we need to be from one another.

There are many ways to connect and to belong.

Even when we are far away.

 

In our world, 

church members do move away,

and others join us.

Whatever time we have together

is precious and helps us to grow strong.

These hours we are gathered together

stand for something that cannot change,

even if we move far away.

Wherever we go,

we are still connected to one another.

 

When I am far away, 

my wondering what you are all doing here

is not so much an inability to stop thinking about work –

I have no trouble doing that! –

but a way of remembering 

how important you are to me – to my life.

This community we gather together each Sunday –

and convene in smaller groups throughout the week –

carries a power that is greater 

than any of us can know on our own.

We are the bundle of wood.

We are woven together

in the web of creation.

We are the home we make together,

because we are life itself.

Reference used to prepare this sermon:The Future of Life, by Edward O. Wilson (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2002).