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Oct. 8, 2006
The meaning of membership
George Odell writes:
We need one another when we mourn and would be comforted.
We need one another when we are in trouble and afraid.
We need one another when we are in despair, in temptation, and
Need to be recalled to our best selves again.
We need one another when we would accomplish some great
Purpose, and cannot do it alone.
We need one another in the hour of success, when we look for
Someone to share our triumphs.
We need one another in the hour of defeat, when with encouragement
We might endure, and stand again.
We need one another when we come to die, and would have gentle
Hands prepare us for the journey.
All our lives we are in need, and others in need of us.
It is this need that brings us into community, seeking the feeling of belonging. Mary Caroline Richards expresses it another way “One of the truths of our time is this hunger deep in people all over the planet for coming into relationship with each other.” This hunger for relationship, this need for one another is what makes community possible.
Our congregation—the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Youngstown —is a community. It is an organic community—one shaped by every person who is a part of it, and it changes with every new person who joins. Invariably, this creates tension. Even when change is for the better, many of us resist it. It is far easier, far more comfortable to stay the same, to not have new people and new ideas change the system and norms of our community.
Two weeks ago, we held a greeter training event and shared stories of what our experience was the first time we visited the church. What we learned listening to others share is how easy it is to exclude people—unintentionally of course, because of our own habits. People shared how it is not worship, but coffee hour where we can be the most exclusive. In part, this is because people don't know our way of doing things—where to get coffee, what coffee mug to use, is there an order for getting food from the table, or just help yourself. These things, which may come easy to you if you have been here a while, are unknown to new people. And when we fail to show each other how things are done, or when we react when someone doesn't follow the unspoken ways things are done—we exclude.
What we came up with that evening was that we should think of coffee hour as inclusion hour. For it is a time not just to greet the people we have known for years, but to reach out and live our message of inclusion, inviting people on the margins into relationship and conversation, to help them feel at home. Living out the inclusive message of our principles—affirming the worth and dignity of all people, welcoming everyone regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, ethnicity and belief into our community—will change who we are, as each new person brings their own truths to the table.
Yet change is the process of life itself. Howard Thurman reminds us “Community cannot for long feed on itself; it can only flourish with the coming of others from beyond, their unknown and undiscovered brothers and sisters.” So community, if it is to flourish must have a way for new people to become a part of it.
In this church, we call this the path to membership. Everyone here today is somewhere on this path. If you are here for the first time, you are taking an initial step, just seeing who we are. Now sure, there might be some people who visit, who leave saying “No creed, no profession of faith—Christians, Jews, atheists and Buddhist all in church together—no way” and jump immediately off the path—but that is the rare exception. Most people who visit our church know something of who we are, know something of our liberal faith. If they do not come back, it may be because we, perhaps unknowingly, or perhaps because of fear about how we might be changed, excluded them.
Some of you have been attending for several weeks learning about who we are and discerning if this is a place that you want to belong, a place that will encourage your own growth. I know some of you are friends of the congregation. You are a part of the congregation, support the congregation, and find here a place for you and your family, but for different reasons feel most comfortable not making the step into membership. All of these are part of the spectrum of membership, and we welcome everyone along this path.
Becoming a Member of this congregation means making a commitment to the life and health of the congregation. It means putting yourself in, both feet so to speak, and helping to shape who we are and where we go as a church. It means taking ownership in the congregation.
Unitarian Universalist govern themselves by what is called congregational polity. It means that the members have the say in how the church is run. There is no higher body or official in charge. The members own the church, have fiscal responsibility for its affair and call their own minister. Becoming a member is not a decision to be taken lightly—it carries great responsibility.
How many of you have joined this church recently, say over the last year? You know my understanding of membership. Membership in our congregation has four pillars, four critical elements. The first is participating in worship. This is when we gather as a community, it is our public presence to the community, so it is important that we are all here to welcome each other and the community. The second is to join in the work of the congregation, participating on committees and giving of your time and service. The third is to pledge financially at a level that reflects your ability and commitment to the congregation. And fourth, to make a commitment to pursue your own spiritual growth. In addition, becoming a member of this congregation also connects one to our larger religious movement. These are the practical aspects of what it means to be a member. There are spiritual aspects as well.
Renee-Noelle Felice writes, “Membership is not something conferred upon one person by an already extant group of ‘others,' but a covenant among individuals to become something new.” When we welcome new members into the congregation, we are agreeing to be changed by their presence and the gifts, experiences and truths that they bring. I do not want to lightly pass over this—this is kind of scary. It is one thing to say, “if you like us, and are like us, then join us.” It is something quite different to say “Welcome. We covenant with you. We will join our gifts together and build something new—something that reflects what each of us brings.” This is hard to do. This is why it is easy for churches to stagnate, and grow smaller. If we define who our community is too rigidly, then only the few people who feel they fit in that mold will join. We allow no room for the transforming, life giving power that new people, our undiscovered brothers and sisters, bring.
Of course, we cannot define the boundaries of who we are too widely. We are Unitarian Universalists. We have a history and a tradition that informs who we are. We have shared values and beliefs (not creeds, of course). The principles and purposes ground us. In them, we affirm the worth and dignity of every person, the importance of justice, compassion and respect between people, an understanding of our place in the web of life and our responsibility to be good stewards of the earth. We celebrate a gratitude for religious pluralism, a commitment to freedom in religious belief and a liberal faith that believes that revelation is not closed, but continually revealing new insights to minds and hearts that are free and open.
With these shared values at our center, our responsibility as members is to live these values in our community, so that we can share them with the wider world. But before we take them out to the world, we need to learn how to live them with one another.
In the words I used for our meditation, Douglas Taylor describes what community brought to his life. He says, “Alone in the world, I was beset with frustration and anger at the world around me—so much injustice. I longed to make a difference. Alone in the world, I was beset with sorrow and hurt in my life—so much loss and emptiness, so little hope and understanding. Alone in the world, I was beset by confusion in my soul—so much busyness and pettiness, so little depth or connection. My soul cried out for meaning. Then I came into community, a religious community of love and hope. And together we changed the world, and together we made life sweeter, and together we saved my life.”
We all come (at times) with frustration, loss, emptiness, searching for meaning—looking to belong to a community of love and hope, a community which transforms lives and the world.
The spiritual meaning of membership is bringing ourselves to this community to find love and hope, sweetness and salvation, and then offering these to everyone who comes through our doors.
The Commission on Appraisal of the Unitarian Universalist Association likened this idea of community to sanctuary, “a place of order and tranquility, a retreat from the disharmony of the world.” 1 I liken it to the Beloved Community that Dr. Martin Luther King spoke of, a vision of all people sharing together in the wealth of the earth.
The challenge for us as members of this Unitarian Universalist church is to incarnate our values, to live our affirmation of the worth and dignity of all people, to make our community a reflection of our inclusive vision for humanity.
Diversity and inclusion are critical to who we are. 2 Diversity means there are a wide variety of voices to be heard. Inclusion means creating space for listening to these voices, for being open to a new awareness. It means having to share the deep and vulnerable parts of ourselves with others who are not quite like us, whose gender or race, physical characteristics, religious beliefs, or sexual preferences might even make us uncomfortable. And it means being open to the new sense of community that arises from this inclusive diversity (this listening and sharing).
We don't have to look outside ourselves for this diversity. If we look closely we already have all kinds of people in our church, rich and poor, black and white, gay and straight, Christian, Jew, Humanist and Pagan, yes even Democrat and Republican. But do we fully engage one another across diversity? Are we fully inclusive even among our membership? If we are not careful, our affirmations of the importance of diversity, can fall away as we separate ourselves according to our differences. This is no beloved community.
When the Commission on Appraisal spoke to Unitarian Universalists all over the country they found that even within our congregations, people feel excluded. One “out” transgender person explained, “We claim to be open, believe in universal salvation, yet we cringe when transgender people come into our congregations. When I sing that song, “I am singing for my life” I mean it. It's not safe to be transgender in this society.” If we live our affirmations of inclusion, our congregations can become sanctuaries of safety, places where everyone can find a home, a place to tend to their spiritual needs for love and hope.
Another person said, “It's hard for me to sit in our congregations. I feel so completely invisible, calling myself a member is problematic. I cannot be fully who I am in a congregation.” And another, “Until we achieve what the resolution on Racial and Cultural Diversity calls for, we will continue to give lip service to our desire to transform the world.” And someone else said, I continue to be a UU because religiously I cannot be anything else. I cannot do it, but there is a piece that is missing. When I need deep spiritual feeding, I go to the Spanish-speaking Catholic Church.”
“These are voices of Unitarian Universalists. They are telling stories that need to be heard. If we will but listen, their voices will help us all live deeper, more authentic, more creative lives.” 3
Being a member of this congregation means participating in transformation. It means being open to a new awareness that comes from reaching out and listening across difference, to hearing others stories, to sharing your own, and being changed by that sharing to a deeper and more authentic understanding of life and self. It also means participating in the transformation of the congregation toward the beloved community, where together we create a welcoming table that has room for all us, and room for all our unknown brothers and sisters yet to join us.
“A number of years ago, a young gay man was considering whether or not to join a congregation that had not yet affirmed same-sex marriage. After some time, he did apply for membership. ‘I realized,' he said, ‘that I could wait for ‘them' to do what I wanted them to do, or I could join, and help ‘us' to move forward.”
Yes we fail to live up to our best visions. So, yes, it is up to all of us to listen as others tell us where we fall short and to encourage one another to reach up again, to bend the community toward justice and inclusion.
In the words of Laura Cerwinske, “For those who dare to venture off the beaten path, into the unknown, the reward is worth the risk: community and sanctuary, a place to be creative, to seek meaning in life, to do the work of transformation that, at times, calls for descent into pain and chaos…a safe place to dance with the devil, to embrace lurking shadows on hallowed ground.”
1. Belonging: The Meaning of Membership . The Commission on Appraisal, Unitarian Universalist Association, ( Boston , UUA), 2001, p. 63.
2. Ibid, p. 68.
3. Ibid, p. 67.
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