Everyday Miracles

Rev. Carol Allman-Morton

April 26, 2009

Second Parish in Hingham

Readings:

“The Peace of Wild Things”

by Wendel Berry

When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of the still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Our second reading this morning is from Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel. It is a series of excerpts from his 1944 essay titled “Faith”, written after Heschel was deported from Germany to Poland, and then managed to get out on a visa to teach at Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, Ohio during World War II.

“It seems as though we have arrived at a point in history, closest to instinct and remotest from ideals, where the self stands like a wall between God and [humankind]. It is the period of a divine eclipse. We sail the seas, we count the starts, we split the atom, but never ask: Is there nothing but a dead universe and our reckless curiosity?”….Reason is a necessary coefficient of faith. Faith without explanation by reason is mute and reason without faith is deaf. There can be a true symbiosis of reason and faith…..Faith does not spring out of nothing. It comes with the discovery of the holy dimension of our existence. Suddenly we become aware that our lips touch the veil that hangs before the Holy of Holies. Our faith is lit up for a time with the light from behind the veil. Faith opens our hearts for the entrance of the holy.”

Sermon:

Miracles are out of the order of every day life; they surprise us, inspire us, change us. I bet many of us are praying for a financial miracle right about now. Those hoping for or seeking a miracle are sometimes derided as not being proactive in taking action to make change… or are told that they are out of touch with reality. In worship we create and hold a container in which those present have an opportunity to interact with the holy. I think we experience miracles in a similar way. When we hold open the possibility that there could be radical change in our lives, that miracles could happen in the everyday, we hold the container for miracle. Miracles are also those events, that may be part of the day to day of life, but that are so special they help us to see the magic of simply being here on this earth and being a part of this community of beings who live here. These miracles are sunsets, buds bursting forth, births of children, the magic of living and dying a life awake to the power of experience and the holy in our lives.

How many of you know our very own Universalist miracle story of Thomas Potter and John Murray? Let’s try telling together. Okay let’s start with Thomas Potter. Where did he live? (Good Luck, NJ). What did he do for a living? (He was a farmer and “a prominent” member of the community. He hosted discussions on the new ideas about universalism and about 1760) What did he build? (he built a meetinghouse for a universalist preacher, that had not yet arrived. Wife tired of the whole town in their house) What did his neighbors say? (he was out of touch) How long did he wait? (For about 10 years.) Then who arrived? (John Murray)

Who was John Murray? (a Universalist Minister) Where did he come from? (England) Why was he coming to America? (wife and daughter dead, debtors prison, no prospects and theology not appreciated) Then what happened? (1770 The Hand in Hand on sandbar – Murray captain sent to get provisions, meets potter, asks about the church building,) and what offer does Potter make? (Preach at my church!) What does Murray say? (Only if the wind hasn’t changed, if we are still here I will.) What happens? (Stays to preach and minister there for 4 years)

Then what? (In 1774 Murray went to Gloucester and established first Universalist church in New England)

In this story, there are many places we see miracles happening. There is Potter’s inspiration and patience, the choice of the captain to send Murray to shore, the wind not changing, the fact that Murray was already a Universalist minister. There is a lot in this story. In the Bible, miracle stories are usually there to teach us something about the nature of God, people, or a moral lesson. These kinds of miracles are events like the burning bush, the Channukah lamp, the feeding of the 5000, the healing of sick people, and so on. The miracles of Jesus, as was the tale of Thomas Potter and John Murray, are often about faith, and openness to change. Potter had faith that a leader would come to his community that would open them up to a new understanding of God’s love. Murray, in the midst of his suffering and loss, was given a new chance at a life of meaning and importance.

Our historical Unitarian forebears had strong opinions on miracles. Rev. William Ellery Channing, the minister who claimed the slur of Unitarian as the name of his understanding of Christianity in 1819, felt miracles were vital to his faith. For a man who was focused on bringing reason to bear on the Bible, he was surprisingly open to the role of miracles in the church. Channing worried that his contemporary Theodore Parker, opened the door to question Biblical miracles. Channing spoke of Parker’s work in a letter to Elizabeth Peabody after reading Parker’s sermon “The Transient and Permanent in Christianity”. Channing wrote the miracles of Christ, “are so inwoven into all his teachings and acts, that in taking them away we have next to nothing left. Without miracles the historical Christ is gone. No such being is left us; and in losing him, how much is lost! Reduce Christianity to a set of abstract ideas, sever it from its teacher, and it ceases to be the ‘power of God unto salvation.’”[1] Channing felt we could not understand the historical Jesus without the miracle stories, and therefore, could not engage Unitarian Christianity without them. Without the miracles, the path of Jesus as a prophet and organizer of people, did make sense to Channing.

At the same time, Thomas Jefferson was at work on the project that would become the Jefferson Bible. Jefferson was never officially a Unitarian, but he was what one might call a Unitarian sympathizer and is quoted as saying in 1822 that "there is not a young man now living in the US who will not die an Unitarian."[2] Jefferson felt the opposite of Channing on the subject of miracles. In his estimation, miracles and supernatural moments in the Bible distracted from the moral teachings of Jesus, and this is what he felt was important in the New Testament. In 1820 he completed, The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth Extracted Textually from the Gospels in Greek, Latin, French and English, which offered textual parallels in these four languages of what Jefferson deemed the philosophy of Jesus. It was a compiling of the four Gospels into one continuous document, without miracles like the virgin birth and the resurrection.

So in our tradition, we have historical strains understanding miracles as ongoing in the present, miracles as part our theological past, and miracles as historical distractions from the core ideas of ethical living. Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel the great theologian and advocate of civil rights for all people, offered a way of holding this tension in our reading this morning. Heschel suggests regarding faith and reason, “Reason is a necessary coefficient of faith. Faith without explanation by reason is mute and reason without faith is deaf. There can be a true symbiosis of reason and faith”[3] This brings us back to the image of the container we can hold that allows us to engage with the world in a way that leaves open the possibility of miracle, change, beauty, and the holy, but at the same time, gives us a way to talk about our experience and to use reason to talk about our faith. When we hold that container, we see that miracles are also those events in everyday life, that are so special they help us to see the magic of simply being here on this earth and being a part of the community of beings who live here. Attention to miracle in the everyday helps us to be open to more radical change, to miracles like the birth of Univeralism in the United States.

In the fall one of the editors of Newsweek wrote a cover article on the silver lining of this global economic crisis we are living through.[4] He talked about how if we can get through this and change the way that we have been doing economics for the last 20+ years, we will come out stronger and with an economy that is based more in reality than fantasy. That may be all to the good, but here is where I see the potential for miracle out of this crisis. Our radically free market economy and the collateral damage that it allows says something about the moral and ethical stance of our country. We live in a country that has allowed the rich to get richer and the poor to get poorer for a long time. Our elected officials and those who have power by virtue of their wealth and influence have done the work of supporting a system that perpetuates these values.

We have a problem in this country in paying attention to our poor people. In this moment the veil pulled is back on how we treat our poor and the power we give the wealthy. You all know the statistics, that as of 2004 the top 10% of the population owned 71% of the wealth. That the wealthiest 1% own more than the bottom 90% combined.[5] As people of faith we have worked for social and economic justice. But we have had limited results. Social services to the poor have been getting less and less over time. But, here we are in a unique moment. In the past election year, the political powers that be shed light onto the fact that many in the middle class are in danger of becoming poor. The global economic crisis is shedding light on the inequities of resources. There are many ways that our government can respond to economic crisis. My prayer is that this will not be the time to cut even more services to the poor in order to balance budgets. Rather that this may be a time for us as a nation to stand up and name that the way we have been in economic community together is broken. That there needs to be a change in the values that dictate how we collectively spend our wealth. I am praying for a miracle. How do we hold ourselves open to an economic justice miracle? One way is to participate in government through voting and communicating with our leaders. The other is to take action. To seek to change the economic system of our country in ways that are in line with our understanding of justice, as a community of faith.

Thomas Potter did not just build a building for his Universalist minister and wait. He was meeting with Universalist thinkers and having discussion groups in his home, and then built the church to house these discussions, and he waited. John Murray in the depths of his despair did not abandon his Universalist faith of salvation for all. These men, though their faith, held open the possibility of miracle, and that is how their miracles happened.

Heschel, in the reading on faith we heard earlier said, “Faith does not spring out of nothing. It comes with the discovery of the holy dimension of our existence. Suddenly we become aware that our lips touch the veil that hangs before the Holy of Holies. Our faith is lit up for a time with the light from behind the veil. Faith opens our hearts for the entrance of the holy.” This is how close we are to the holy. When we open ourselves up to the possibility that God can be there in any moment, miracle is all around us.

In the next months and probably years, there is going to be global suffering as we as human beings deal with the fallout from this economic crisis. We can pray for and seek to enact miracles, such as a change in how we do economics and how we allow our government to treat classes of people. When we are suffering, it is all the more important for us to allow the holy into our lives, to help us to fill in the cracks. I love Wendell Berry, and his reading from earlier speaks to so strongly about this. He writes of his experience , “When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of the still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.” Miracles are all around us. They are in songbirds, the babbling of a brook, the smile of our children. Miracles are those moments that fill us with awe and help us to remember how close we are to the holy. Miracles help us to stay connected with creation and each other, when suffering might separate us. We are not alone, we are beloved, and we love. When we hold open the possibility that that miracles could happen in the everyday, we experience the holy in our lives.

Amen, so may it be.

[1] “Miracles”, The Life of William Ellery Channing, William Ellery Channing, AUA, 1880, p449

[2]Online Dictionary of UU Biography, “Thomas Jefferson”

[4] “There is a Silver Lining”, Fareed Zakaria, NEWSWEEK, Oct 20, 2008

[5] Figures from United for a Fair Economy, faireconomy.org.