Unitarian Universalism Meets the Afterlife, Now

A sermon given by Joanne Giannino

June 9, 2002 at First Parish Church UU, Bridgewater, Massachusetts

 

Good morning. What a pleasure and a privilege to be with you all this morning. I’m so grateful to be part of this community and have this lovely place to be together. To share our joys and concerns. To learn and grow. To explore our ideas and values and ask questions. To be nudged on our individual and collective spiritual journeys.

Our interim minister Dick Fewkes thought it would be good if I shared with you a little about what I’ve been up to this year. As most of you know I had been the DRE here for seven years when I decided last year to leave my position and return to school to pursue theological studies and perhaps the UU ministry. It’s been a great year. I really enjoyed my classes and feel the move was a good one for me. I enjoyed the rigorous study and I got A- in each of the three classes I took earning a 3.67 grade point average. I intend to continue studies this fall, do a two-year internship the following year that will help me discern a particular ministry and hopefully graduate in 2006. I’ll keep you posted. I am grateful for your support and encouragement always. It is here at First Parish where I got my start on this wonderful journey.

Early in the fall I was invited to lead a service some time during this church year and agreed to lead this morning’s. I was happy to be asked yet a little nervous to put together an entire service while in school, especially for you my church family. A week later I was driving to school up route 128 enjoying the swaying trees on the hillside along the highway when I was suddenly gripped with the realization that someday I wouldn’t be here enjoying the trees and fall breeze. I would die. Well, where will I be if I’m not here? My mind wanted to know. And, who will I be if I’m not me?

Thankfully my mind couldn’t hold onto this too threatening stream of thought for too long and I was back to driving. The subject was gone, but not completely. Almost immediately I thought what a great topic to explore in a worship service. Where will we be – where do we go when we die? Is there an afterlife? Who will we be if we are not…? And since we have limited time here, what shall we do with our time?

So for the next nine months I listened for death and dying advice everywhere. In music, in novels, in theology, in books, in conversations, in t.v. shows. I recalled childhood stories and lessons – hence this morning’s prelude, from the musicale Carousel, which I watched as a child with my Dad. Some of you remember that one, where the young tough guy dies too soon, leaving his wife pregnant and alone; and his daughter years later needs his help, which she gets through the magic of heavenly intervention. For me the story has a sustaining message of connection even after death.

I started hearing advice about death, dying and living in rock music. At first, I think, I was trying to make light of dying. If I made what I was raised to believe (in living a good life to get to heaven) funny maybe my fear would subside. Essentially I’d avoid the topic by making it a joke, something that I couldn’t possibly believe anymore. That’s when the song Last Kiss came to me and I asked our very talented and entertaining Male Bonding Band if they would be part of today’s exploration. In the song he tells of his love for his dying girlfriend and that he’s got to be good, so he can to heaven to be with her. I’ve got to be good, so I can be with my baby…Can it be that clear?

The Afterlife Boutique, wonderfully performed by Sally and Jenny, surfaced around that time too. It was a half-serious attempt to learn about what others believe and agree to and became a fun way to explore my emerging sense of what Unitarian Universalism brought to my questions? What happens when we die? No one knows, though some believe and have experience to make them believe certain scenarios. Pushed though, even the most ardent faiths believe death is a mystery. So, in the end, isn’t it the way we live today that matters. My comfort then became to imagine that death didn’t matter so much, that living here and now, mattered.

U2’s song Walk On brought me back to the raw emotion of the reality of dying. The heartbreak of having to leave the only place we’ve every known, the difficulty in letting go. The song is pulling us away from life as we desperately hold on. Some day we will pack our bags for a place where no one has been before. We will someday have to leave it all behind, all we’ve created, all that we’ve loved. Within the imploring of those words, is there also a challenge to really live now to love to risk? I listened to this song over and over. I got it. Someday, I will have to leave, we all will. Thank you Dawn for your dance this morning.

So what are we left with to ease any fear we may have of our total annihilation in death and to answer the question about how to live?

In the opening reading, Kabir tells us…

 

            Jump into experience while you are alive.

            Think and think while you are alive.

            If you don’t break your ropes while you are alive,

            do you think ghosts will do it after?

 

Can I expect to be braver, more loving, and more patient in the next life, if there is one? No, way. So do it now. We’ve got to jump in, invite the guest – our connection with the mystery – answer the longing…and that aliveness will flow…

My friend and colleague, Rev. Bob Miller, who was our interim minister back in 1994-1996, said in his book Say Your Unitarian Universalism: “Our religion is an aid in the quest not a picture at the end of the road.” That’s a pretty clear image of how we are different from the creedal faiths. So what does UUism offer us when we are afraid, unsure, and wonder about dying, and when we seek a guide to living? It doesn’t say look to the future, it will be good then. It says be here now with your fears and your questions. Our seven principles and purposes and sources tell us:

 

Everyone is important

            Treat everyone fairly

            Learn and grow together

            Everyone has their own path

            Everyone deserves a vote

            Work for peace and justice

            We are all connected

 

            And more, our sources tell us that there are resources for the journey, ancient religious traditions, prophets and sages, history, your own experience, the democratic process, the creative process. It continues to amaze me how much is revealed through engagement with the arts…even rock and roll. Our communal worship, what we are doing today, is another resource for the journey: a place to explore our questions, think, feel and wonder. Another tool is spiritual practice: daily ritual, prayer, meditation, writing, music making, improv, walking some practice that keeps you in touch with your developing divine self.  Through the practice of reflection we develop the specifics that lead us to live the only life we know now, this one.

This poem was given to me the other day. A friend thought it said best what I had been looking for over these last nine months. It is called Close of Life from Wisdom from the Ninja Village of the Cold Moon by Stephen K. Hayes:

 

It is said that the warrior becomes invincible

by learning to live with his own death.

This is a misinterpretation

of a great and important lesson.

 

Our death is with us ever-present

on our journey through life.

 

Death is not to be feared

but happily accepted

as a loving messenger who reminds us of

the priceless potential

of all our todays.

 

There is a game you can play with death

in order to more fully know life.

Pretend that you have the knowledge

that you will meet your death

one week hence.

Use the pretended urgency

to give vitality to your hours.

Share all your secrets in your final days.

Express all your love.

Work through your desires.

Provide for those who will remain

when you are gone.

Carry out this pretence every day

and whether indeed you meet your death or not

you will have won a lifetime rich

in pleasure,

growth and wisdom,

and service.

 

In this manner

when inevitability of death descends upon you

whether by way of the blade or the cold wind,

your body will be satisfied with memories of

warmth and meaning

and your spirit will be content

with the joy of its lessons.

 

You have been provided with a death

so that you may realize

the startling significance of why

you are here as a human being

and not as a cooking pot.

 

AGAIN,

You have been provided with a death

so that you may realize

the startling significance of why

you are here as a human being

and not as a cooking pot.

 

AGAIN,

you are here as a human being

and not as a cooking pot.

 

So, though we may go through a process where we deny death or make it a joke, there is a way to make it useful, to honor it and let it lead us to live with “principle and purpose.” Live this life, this mysterious, wonderful, precious life. Ask your questions, feel your fears, share your secrets, get up and dance, and love, get angry, be sad, grieve, and make a difference in your world.

You are not a cooking pot.

Take the gift of human life, really accept it and share it with intention, intensity, with love. Maybe death is that gift that leads us to make life worth while. Death may come at the end of our lives but it is also present with us for the journey urging us on, to live, live, live.

 

Amen.