"Wisdom from the World's Religions"

I have asked you to think with me about "The Sources of the Living Tradition." We welcome the 6th and 7th Grade class from Religious Education. They are studying "Neighboring Faiths," which is the subject of today's Source. You remember I used the analogy of a river. A river has many sources: melt-water from the snow pack; springs which gush out of the side of the hills, trickling brooks, all of which in their confluence make the river. Just so this "river" we call Unitarian Universalism has at least six "sources."

These Sources are important for several reasons. They support a primary understanding of our uncommon Unitarian Universalist denomination. In other words the Sources provide some institutional support. However, even more important, the Sources provide personal support.

We encourage each individual to a "free and responsible search for truth and meaning." However we do not expect that search to be wandering, hoping to find something. Rather we provide the Sources which are not maps, but are compass points. Perhaps another analogy will be helpful. We do not expect one another to build our individual "houses of faith" without materials. The Sources provide the materials which we can use as we individually build our religious understandings.

Today we turn our attention to the third source which says: "Wisdom from the world's religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life." The assumption is that we will not only learn wisdom but be inspired as we encounter
the various religions of the world. Put bluntly: religious globalization is wiser and more inspiring than religious isolation.

This Source was written several years ago. Globalization of religion has come home in a big way. For example, I read somewhere about a Methodist Church and a Islamic Mosque in Fremont which broke ground on the same day for adjacent buildings. Both groups had been looking for property, coming together to buy property and build their buildings. They named the new frontage road which enters their property, "Peace Terrace."

In San Diego I have learned to avoid a certain intersection on Friday evenings because there is a large Mosque near that intersection. Traffic is increased by people attending Friday evening prayers at the Mosque. I can remember when this kind of traffic problem was confined only to Saturday night Mass near Roman Catholic churches!

These young people who are studying "Neighboring Faiths" in Religious Education have a marvelous opportunity - one most of we adults never had - to learn about world religions close to home. Diane Eck's recent book is called "A New Religious America" but the sub-title tells the story: "How a 'Christian Country' Has Become the World's Most Religiously Diverse Nation." Diana Eck writes:

"Envisioning the new America in the twenty-first century requires an
imaginative leap. It means seeing the religious landscape of America,
from sea to shining sea, in all its beautiful complexity. Between the
white New England churches and the Crystal Cathedral of southern
California, we see the . . . Peace Pagoda amid maples in Massachusetts,
the mosque in the cornfields outside Toledo, the Hindu Temples
pitched atop the hills of Pittsburgh and Chicago, the old and new
Buddhist temples of Minneapolis. . . ." [Diana L. Eck, "A New Religious America," p.11.]

When this Source about world religions was written, the religions were, for the most part in some other part of the world. Now, as the young people are learning, "neighboring faiths" include world religions which are, quite literally, "neighbors."

The first Parliament of World Religions was held in 1893 in Chicago. There was a centennial celebration in 1993; and a few years later, another "parliament of world religions in South Africa, and in 2004 another "Parliament" met in Barcelona.

Betty and I have a young friend who attended the Parliament in South Africa. She said she went because of her "years of devotion to interfaith efforts which had to do with people from other faiths her parents drew into the circle of their family." Maggie and her parents were members of an American Baptist congregation I served in Elmira, New York. They were intentional about reaching across all of the barriers, race or religion or life-style, which separate people. Maggie says she learned very early: "The truth is far bigger than any of us can comprehend. We need all the help we can get from others, especially those different from us to get the bigger picture."

About five years ago there was an article in the "San Francisco Chronicle" which I believe was a review of a book with the intriguing title, "Weaving the Web: The Original Design and Ultimate Destiny of the World Wide Web by it sInventor." The inventor of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, used Unitarian Universalism as an analogy for his work. Here is a quotation from that "Chronicle" article:

". . . Unitarian (Universalists) accept the useful parts of philosophy from all
religions and wrap them not into one religion, but into an environment
in which people may think and discuss the spiritual aspects of life by
exploring all these different belief systems." [I am not sure about this citation. I
believe this was in the "San Francisco Chronicle" October 21 or 22, 1999.)

The key is that we Unitarian Universalists do not attempt to "wrap all the world religions into one religion." Wisdom and inspiration from world religions will be possible only if we do not attempt to create a religious amalgam of different faiths. Here is what I mean.

I make a very good potato-leak soup. The soup is delicious cold or hot, particularly when, after cooking I blend all the ingredients into a kind of "smoothie," the consistency of a milkshake, which conceals the individual ingredients. When I'm through there are no identifiable potatoes or leeks or butter or cream.

There will be neither wisdom nor inspiration if we do this kind of blending of world religions. So far as interfaith activity is concerned, we do much better if world religions are treated as a salad in which each ingredient is identifiable rather than a soup where ingredients lose their identity. There is wisdom from Buddhist meditation, but that wisdom and inspiration will be lost if the identifiable characteristics of Buddhism are lost.

One problem with blending world religions is that each religion grows out of a specific culture. Comparing the similarities of religious myths will be only partially helpful unless those myths are understood against their cultural heritage. I have an interesting book by Matthew Fox entitled "One River, Many Wells." Fox uses the analogy of an underground river which feeds many different wells in many different places. The underground river is the religious impulse of virtually all humanity. The many wells are the various ways different religions have expressed that religious impulse.

The problem with the book is that Fox has chosen four major themes: creation, divinity, human enlightenment and compassion, quoting various religious texts related to each theme. However the quotations do not reflect the culture from which they came. His book reminded me of one I saw somewhere which was a kind of "encyclopedia" of twenty-five hundred deities of world religions. This book did nothing more than list names of gods and goddesses. My sense is that we will gain wisdom and inspiration from world religions as we attempt to understand both the religion and the culture from which it came.

Also we need to balance both the particularity and universality in a kind of dialogue. Particularity provides a way for each religion to claim its particular cultural emphasis or belief system. Universality provides a way for us to discover the common elements in each, so that the particular elements may be brought into harmony.

I've mentioned a negative approach to world religions - namely blending. A positive approach is finding the harmony as we gain wisdom and inspiration from world religions. Harmony is significant. Perhaps the analogy of a symphony orchestra will be helpful. The harmony is created out of the particular sound of the different instruments, as each instrument plays its particular part. In the Reading for today, Mahatma Ghandi talks about this harmony which gives the various religions reality.

Ghandi also warns against making the symbol of any one religion into a fetish which claims superiority over other religions. Just imagine the cacophony if the various sections of the LA Philharmonic decided they were most important, and attempted to play louder than any other section!

Ghandi then uses a final analogy which we heard in the Story for today. Ghandi writes, "Religions are different roads converging to the same point. What does it matter that we take different roads, so long as we reach the same goal?" (Mahatma Gandhi, "All Men Are Brothers," p.59)

I can almost hear your cries, "Block that metaphor!" When I came to this point in writing, I realized how many different analogies I had used. You probably know this list better than I:

+ "neighbors" because the young people are studying "Neighboring Faiths;"
+ "blending" ingredients as in soup, rather than identifiable ingredients in a salad;
+ "underground river and many wells" from Matthew Fox;
+ Ghandi's harmony as in music and finally his idea of "roads" to a similar goal.

I promise, no more analogies; no more metaphors. I conclude with the acknowledgement that not everyone might be interested in either wisdom or inspiration from world religions. I mentioned Tim Berners-Lee who invented the World Wide Web and talked about our Unitarian Universalist practice of helping people discuss the spiritual aspects of life.

At about the same time - 1999 - another scientist, Steven Weinberg, expressed his concern about religion. He wrote, "One of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious." (Steven Weinberg, "A Designer Universe?" "The New York Review of Books," October 21, 1999, pp.46-48)

In her book about the new pluralism of religions in America, Diana Eck wrote, ". . . Even atheists have to rethink their worldviews in the context of a more complex religious reality. With multitheistic Hindus and nontheistic Buddhists in the picture, atheists may have to be more specific about what kind of 'god' they do not believe in." (op cit p. 9)

I am acknowledging not only the issue which some people may have with thinking there is wisdom or inspiration to be had from religion, but also acknowledging this topic is too broad for the final paragraphs of this sermon. The interface of science and religion is topic for another day. Suffice just now to point to the most recent issue of "Quest," the publication of the UU Church of the Larger Fellowship. The front page article in that publication is "Can Science and Religion Get Together?" On a sidebar next to that article is this quotation from Albert Einstein: "I assert that the cosmic religious experience is the strongest and the noblest driving force behind scientific research."

I have found some help dealing with the interface of science and religion in the writings of Huston Smith, philosopher and teacher of religion and in the work of Edward Wilson, scientist whose articles in "The Atlantic Monthly" a few years ago talked about a "consilience" or "jumping together" across disciplines which link science and the humanities.

The wisdom and inspiration we can gather from world religions does not pretend to be unscientific. I also believe that science which purports to have absolute truth is pseudo-science. In short, any claim to absolute knowledge, either by science or religion is dehumanizing. Jacob Bronowski said it best when he stood at Auschwitz:

". . . (This) was not done by gas. It was done by arrogance. It was done
by dogma. It was done by ignorance. When people believe they have
absolute knowledge, this is how they behave.
"Science is a very human form of knowledge. . . . Science is a tribute to
what we can know although we are fallible."

And then Bronowski concludes

"I owe it as a scientist . . . I owe it as a human being to the many members
of my family who died at Auschwitz, to stand here as a survivor and
a witness. We have to cure ourselves of the itch for absolute knowledge
and power." [Jacob Bronowski, "The Ascent of Man," pp. 370-374]

One piece of wisdom we can learn from world religions which will inspire us to be more fully human is the reminder from all religions that we know only partially; that we can learn from one another. Our neighbors with different religious expressions have something to teach us.

Salaam, Sholom, Amen and Blessed Be.