service. In ascending order, the stairs read:
Prepare,
Repent,
Believe,
Redemption,
Salvation, Praise. Do Justice, Love Mercy, Walk
Humbly, and Eternal Life. Pretty heavy stuff for
Unitarian Universalists, but all of them good
religious ideas which transcend the borders of
faiths or denominations. The top step, Eternal
Life is especially challenging to those of us who
don’t truly believe there is an afterlife, so I
thought I’d better explore it a bit before we start
our climb.
Stairway To Paradise?
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Sermon Offered by
Rev. Dr. Marjorie C. Skwire, Minister Emerita
West Shore Unitarian Universalist Church
Rocky River, Ohio
Reading
Mother to Son
by Langston Hughes
Some years ago my son Dan discovered an
interesting gift for my birthday, one that could
be repeated year after year. He loves to prowl
through old book stores, which are in great
abundance in Maine, where he lives. He
presented me with this small book, from which I
quoted earlier, dated l848, entitled Historical
Sketches and Incidents Illustrative of the
Establishment and Progress of Universalism, in
the State of New York, Second Series by S. R.
Smith. It now lives on a bookshelf with about a
dozen similar titles, all offering a fascinating
glimpse into the early days of Unitarianism and
Universalism. I’ve enjoyed digging into them,
and it’s possible that some of you may even
remember my referring to them over the past
years. When I wanted to understand how
Unitarians and Universalists historically had
thought about Eternal Life, the pinnacle of our
staircase, I immediately reached for those small,
dusty books. And I found what I was looking
for. In the 1850’s, when Universalists were
involved in polemic disputations with orthodox
Christians, they were careful to spell out just
how their beliefs differed from those of
orthodoxy. In The Universalist Book of
Reference from 1854 I learned that the phrase
Eternal Life is found 29 times in the New
Testament and once in the Old Testament. After
quoting each of the passages, the author, Rev. E.
E. Guild, concludes that “not one of the scripture
writers has ever defined these phrases to signify
a life to be enjoyed in a future state of
existence…The words eternal and everlasting
are applied to this life, not to express the
duration of it, but to express the quality of it.”
(280) Of course, he then launches into an
involved theological explanation of his
statement, but I was stuck on the original idea.
As a modern day Unitarian Universalist, I could
buy into that.
Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor -Bare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's,
And turnin' corners,
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on the steps
'Cause you finds it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall now -For I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
Sermon - Part 1
Today we’re going climb the stairs at the Bailey
Island Union Church in Maine, near where the
Skwire family spends its summers. I’ve walked
past these stairs for years, watching them
gradually deteriorate, wondering about them.
This tiny church was built in l885, but I have no
idea if the words on the steps have been there all
that time. I was pleased to note this summer that
church members were repairing the steps along
with a general sprucing up of the church.
Services are still held there, and in July we
watched a wedding party recess down those
steps. I’ve always told myself that someday I
should do a sermon about them; I guess the time
has come. So let’s climb up the stairs together
and see where they take us. Let’s start by
looking at the picture on the front of the order of
1
So the top step, our goal, is to achieve a life in
the here and now that is a life of quality, rather
than one that lasts into an unknown future. A
noble goal. The steps leading up to Eternal Life
will help us to understand what that life of
quality is about. There are three natural
groupings in the lower steps, groupings of three
concepts each. So we’ll climb just a few steps at
a time, but I warn you it “ain’t no crystal stair.”
There are tacks and splinters, or rather loose
stones and wobbly railings, to contend with.
to come by, and is different for each of us,
depending on our knowledge and life
experience. Repentance requires a change of
heart or mind, something which can happen only
inside an individual. Keep in mind the words of
the mother in Langston Hughes poem: “…don’t
you turn back. Don’t you set down on the steps
‘cause you finds it’s kinder hard.” Not only is
life no crystal stair, neither is there an escalator
to whisk us smoothly to the top.
The next step exhorts us to “BELIEVE.” But in
what? As Unitarian Universalists we have no
creeds to delineate the specifics of a required
belief system. We do have our Principles and
Purposes, those ideas which we covenant to
affirm and promote, and they are wonderfully
inclusive statements outlining our faith. If you
are not familiar with them you can find them
near the beginning of the grey hymnal in your
pew. But we are not required to subscribe to
them individually, and each one is broad enough
to allow for a multitude of interpretations. I
think this step asks for a more personal kind of
belief, in keeping with the personal nature of the
first two steps. Believe in yourself, believe in
the goodness of life, the bounty of nature, the
generosity of the spirit. Believe that you can
make a difference. The results of this recent
election have provided an unprecedented
opportunity for young people of color to believe
that someday they might be President of the
United States. Our beliefs are based on what we
see and know to be true. And it is true that an
African American can be President.
The first three steps are personal, things which
require self-examination. “PREPARE” says to
me “get ready, open up to life and its
experiences, allow yourself to be changed if
change is what’s necessary.” For some of you it
may have a connotation of cleansing or
purifying. Maybe the best definition is “clean
up your act!” The important thing is that it
requires something of us individually to take that
step, something no one else can do for us. We
are the ones who determine what that something
is. In more traditional faiths, there are ritual
paths to follow to achieve “a clean heart” and “a
right spirit.” So pause a moment on this step.
Take a deep breath and find the quiet spot within
you. Gently move the unwanted ideas which are
troubling you to one side, and open yourself to
life. Prepare.
Once we’ve prepared ourselves, the next step
asks us to “REPENT.” I don’t know what that
makes you think of, but what instantly springs to
my mind is the multitude of New Yorker style
cartoons featuring an old man in Biblical type
robes, carrying a sign that says “Repent. The
end of the world is coming.” The cartoon
character is inevitably more concerned with
others’ repentance than his own. As far as I’m
concerned that’s exactly the opposite of what
repentance implies. Repentance is genuine,
personal, regret or self-reproach for that which
we have done which has harmed others. It’s a
step which must be taken individually. When
groups step forward to apologize for wrongs of a
past generation, I am always uneasy. It takes
very little to say, we made a mistake 150 years
ago, because we all know we weren’t actual
participants in the mistreatment of slaves or
Native Americans. In fact the apology serves
only to lay blame on a former generation.
Genuine repentance stems from the heart, is hard
These first three steps are perhaps the hardest.
They are the most personally demanding. But
don’t rest too long on that third step. There is
much more to come.
Reading
“At Last”
by Rachel Naomi Remen
from Kitchen Table Wisdom
Two days before my mother’s eightieth birthday
I asked her how she wanted to spend the day. “I
want to climb to the top of the Statue of
Liberty,” she replied. “Isn’t there an elevator?”
My mother looked at me. “I want to climb the
stairs,” she said.
2
We’ve now reached the middle section of the
stairway, the theological section. If you hadn’t
figured it out already, I’ll tell you. This is not a
Unitarian Universalist Church. Here we are
presented with orthodox terminology, and the
challenge of finding meaning for ourselves.
“REDEMPTION” is a word seldom used in our
churches. Most UUs don’t find much meaning
in the concept of Jesus as Redeemer, one who
purchased our lives through his death. Such an
interpretation presupposes that humans are by
nature sinful, alienated beings who are in need
of the redemptive act of another, i.e., Jesus. But
I can step confidently here if I think of
redemption in another context. All over New
England there are places called Redemption
Centers. I always remark that they do look a bit
like storefront churches, but their purpose is to
give you a nickel back for every water bottle and
soda can which you have purchased, the price of
which includes that extra nickel. So when you
do your weekly shopping, one of your stops is
the Redemption Center. There you will be
refunded or given back that which is already
yours.
Redemption in this context means
restoring to you what is yours, if you so choose..
You hand over the bottle or can, and the center
hands over a nickel. If you choose not to
redeem your bottles and cans, then no
redemption, no cash. In our individual lives this
concept of redemption is important because it
involves personal choice, because it does not
subject humans to the burden of sin, and because
it is an equal transaction, nickel for nickel. To
be redeemed, in my theology, means to share
equally with all other humans the responsibility
for our world and our existence. We redeem one
another through our actions in the world. I think
redemption is a step we can confidently take.
She had lived in New York City for almost
eighty years but she had never had this
experience. She clearly remembered her first
view of the “Liberty” when she had sailed into
the New York harbor from Russia. She had
been five years old then. Now, of course, she
had a severe heart condition, and there were 342
steps to the top. Undaunted, I realized we could
do it three or four steps at a time, resting in
between. We would take her nitroglycerin and
simply allow all day. When I proposed this to
Mom she was delighted.
During the six hour ascent, I had many
misgivings. How had I gotten into this crazy
thing, climbing the Statue of Liberty with an
eighty-year-old woman with severe heart
disease? But it was her wish and so we
continued, a few steps at a time. She may have
had angina but she also had an iron will. I think
half of New York must have passed us on those
stairs.
Finally, unbelievably, we were six or seven steps
from the top. As we stood there taking what
must have been our three-hundredth time-out,
my mother eyed the last few steps between her
and her goal with resentment. “Why,” she said,
“couldn’t we have done these first?
In thinking of this story now, I remember all the
times I too have resented the climb, the amount
of living needed to gain the precious
understanding to know how to live well. And
how important it is in the struggle for freedom
from the old ways not to be limited by style or
self-expectations or to worry about what others
may think. To be willing to do the really
important things any way you can, even three
steps at a time.
“SALVATION”
is
usually
regarded
theologically as the goal of redemption.
Salvation is found in many places and at many
times in our lives. I remember a study done
some years ago comparing Unitarian
Universalist values to the values of other
denominational groups. There were, of course,
many differences, but the greatest was in the
value of salvation. Most other denominations
ranked it first out of a dozen or more values.
UU’s ranked it dead last. We discussed this in
our ministers’ group, and as we did we grew in
our understanding of what salvation could mean
Sermon - Part 2
I love that reading. I feel as if I’ve climbed
every step of the way with Rachel Remen and
her mother. Fortunately, I made the climb up
the Statue of Liberty when I was young enough
to do it without stopping. I won’t feel the need
to do it again before I die.
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for us. One minister spoke of receiving news
that week that the tumor in her brain was not
malignant and that it was operable. This, she
said, felt like salvation to her. She had felt
doomed and now she was saved. So many of us
have had similar experiences, when something
unexpected and good has fallen into our laps just
when we were at our lowest point. For many the
12 Step programs have spelled salvation. For
others a church, a medication, a therapist, a good
friend, a spouse meant salvation in their lives.
Salvation as we know it is not being rescued
from sinfulness, but discovering a new fullness
in our lives, being restored to that which had
been, finding the essence of our being. It may
be as dramatic as a good, unexpected diagnosis,
or it may be as small as finding our way through
a difficult situation. So even if this is an
especially difficult step for you, I hope you’ll
find the courage to join me as we move upward.
we are asked to consider how we relate to
others, to consider what we can do to make life
better for our neighbors, for our planet and for
generations to come. No small task, but for
some of you this may feel like the most familiar
part of our climb. This is something we know
about and try to live out in our daily lives. For
many it is the sum total of their religion. But
that does not make it easy, and we’re likely to be
gasping for breath as we scale these three steps
and reach for the top.
So here we are. Finally, we’ve reached “Eternal
Life,” the reward for our long climb. Or is it? If
this is truly the stairway to paradise, then we’ve
accomplished our life’s work and we can rest
forever in the embrace of the universe. But the
eternal life our Universalist ancestors envisioned
is much more demanding. Remember it’s not
the duration, but rather the quality, which makes
it eternal.
In that view, we have been
participating in Eternal Life throughout the
length of our climb, and the top step acts merely
as a description of our living, rather than its
goal. The important thing for me is that this is
not the end of a journey; it is the journey itself,
which is timeless.
This next step, “PRAISE” is easier. It is the
foundation of a religious life. We praise that
which we regard as having worth. Do you know
that the word worship has as its most basic
meaning “considering things of worth.” When
we praise we are recognizing and celebrating all
that has worth in our lives. For many, God is
the only recipient of praise, recognizing that all
blessings flow from God.
For others,
considering things of worth has a broader range.
They marvel at the world in each grain of sand
and in the vast, unfolding universe. But all of us
are moved to wonder, to celebrate, to praise.
If I remember correctly, Albert Einstein taught
us about the conservation of matter. Nothing, he
said, is ever lost. Solids may change to gasses,
liquids to solids, but the sum total of matter is
the same as when the universe began. So, too,
are our lives both endless and changing. Even
death can only change the state of our bodily
mass. It cannot prevent the influence which we
each have on others, the deeds we have done or
not done, the beauty we have created and
enjoyed. These continue on, incorporated into
the minds and bodies of those who follow us.
These are our Eternal Life.
And now we come to the last three steps. I
admit I chuckled aloud when I read the words of
Rachel Nemen’s mother as she finally neared the
top steps of the Statue of Liberty. “Why,” she
said, “couldn’t we have done these first?”
Indeed! The next three steps are the well-known
words of the Hebrew prophet Micah—all that
God requires of us: “DO JUSTICE,” “LOVE
MERCY,” “WALK HUMBLY.” But, in fact,
there is good reason to save these for the end of
the journey. If we had not prepared ourselves
along the way, these top steps could be
meaningless. Remember that the first three
steps were personal, basically telling us to get
our own house in order before moving on. The
second trio of steps put our journey in a wider
context, but now, here, nearly at the top, where
we have a broad view of the world around us,
4