I'm a UU
because I like being offended. I enjoy the learning experience that
comes from sermons that strike nerves with me, fellow members who
have very different answers and questions than I do, and folks who
know little about UU who think they have it all figured out.
I get a kick out of
holding the complex and somewhat contradictory concept of being
intolerant of intolerance. You know you're a UU at heart when you
understand that. And I love being able to be myself here...and to be
accepted and loved for that.
I'd like to tell you that
I had a long and arduous road to get to our church. I'd like to say
that the UU church came to me after a spiritual awakening. I'd like
to say that I'm a religious refugee struggling for answers. But I
can't say any of those things. Although I was born to an
Irish/Italian Catholic family, we were not very pious and only
occasionally attended Mass. My wife and I had a civil marriage, and
although we later had our vows blessed in the Catholic Church, we
were intermittent worshipers. By the way, an intermittent worshiper
is not much different from an intermittent wiper, where you can never
get the intermittance to align just right with the need.
Looking back, it seems
likely that we never felt like we belonged to the various churches
that we attended. Nothing really fit. The truth is that we weren't
looking for answers because we didn't know what the questions were.
I heard many wonderful messages during the years from many excellent
priests and pastors. But they were all too certain for what I've
always felt was an uncertain world.
This
reminds me of something Somerset Maugham
once wrote:
"Sometimes,
people hit upon a place to which they mysteriously feel that they
belong. Here is the home they sought, and they will settle amid
scenes that they have never seen before, among people they have never
known, as though they were familiar to them from their birth. Here,
at last, do they find rest."
And then I stumbled into
a UU church. And you really do have to stumble into one because
there's almost no such thing as an evangelical UU. And I knew that I
had "hit upon a place to which" I "mysteriously felt
that I belonged." And it felt right. Everyone struggling to
find answers and questions were welcomed. There is no dogma, but
faith overflows. A church where you'll find no Saints and plenty of
humans.
The Nottingham UU church
was also a serendipitous finding. Kelli and I had belonged to the
Concord UU church, but, you know, for pragmatic UU members, driving
45 minutes during snow storms to attend church was not reasonable.
Heck, driving 45 minutes in nice weather to attend church was not
reasonable.
Then we saw a flyer for
an event at the Nottingham church. We came to the event and then to
a service. Again, I felt like I belonged and welcomed. And what a
wonderful group of people to belong with. And this is very powerful,
because religion is far too big a job for any one person. It takes a
team and we use that teamwork to amplify our voices in song and in
our efforts to make our community a more just place for all people.
The great systems thinker, Peter Senge once wrote of this experience:
"When
you ask people about what it is like being part of a great team, what
is most striking is the meaningfulness of the experience. People talk
about being part of something larger than themselves, of being
connected, of being generative. It become quite clear that, for many,
their experiences as part of truly great teams stand out as singular
periods of life lived to the fullest. Some spend the rest of their
lives looking for ways to recapture that spirit."
That's
what keeps me coming back. This sense of being connected and
generative and weaving a common fabric of life. I
hope to never let this collective spirit escape me so that I don't
have to search for it again.
