Call to Worship
We began this service with the sound of the shofar, which marks the coming of the holiest day of the year in the Jewish tradition, Yom Kippur, which begins at sundown this evening.
In the Jewish tradition, the High Holy Days begin first with Rosh Hashana, the new year. But before the year can really begin we are asked to mark this Day of Atonement, this day when we are one with our creator. It can seem like those days are somehow reversed but indeed it is important to note that before the new year can really commence, it is important to mark where we have been and the changes we need to make in our lives.
Words of Michael Strassfeld: “The new year calls on us to join in the struggle to transform ourselves. The shofar blasts are meant to arouse our slothful selves to the new possibilities that await us. Once conscious of the new year and what it offers, we are ready to look back at our past.”
In this service, may we make a space, in this gathering we call beloved, to name, to recognize, to search, to make amends, to begin, yet again, in love.
Come, now, and let us worship together.
Responsive Reading “Atonement Day”
Once more Atonement Day has come. All pretense gone, naked heart revealed to the hiding self.
We gather on holy ground, between the day that was and the one that must be.
We tremble. At what did we aim? How did we miss the mark? What did we take? What did we give? To what were we oblivious?
Last year’s confession came easily to the lips. Will this year’s come from deeper than the skin?
Say then: why are our paths strewn with promises like fallen leaves? Say then: when shall we lust for wisdom? Say now: love and truth shall meet; justice and peace shall embrace.
Make consistent our impulse for good; let us know the joy of following in your ways.
Sermon
Atonement. Repentance. Forgiveness. Reconciliation.
Those are some of the big religious words that mark Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year in the Jewish calendar that begins at sundown this evening. And I have to say those words have more resonance than usual for me this year. This year of so much. Of one thing after another. I don’t know about you but I have found the word apocalypse passing my lips more and more the last few weeks.
The pandemic. The daily reality of the number of cases and the number of deaths. The economic fallout from the pandemic. All the tents all around our city of people who are now houseless, especially downtown? Our broken political system. Rampant corruption including the response to the pandemic. The killing of George Floyd followed day after day after day of protests for black lives and for police accountability. Most recently the decision of the grand jury in Louisville Kentucky to not pursue charges in the Brionna Taylor killing. And then came the wildfires. And the smoke. And the impacts of global warming once again being so much in our face. And then last weekend the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg. And with it fears about what rights we might lose with a new conservative majority on the court. And did I mention the Proud Boys rally yesterday?
Truly I can’t remember a year like this in my lifetime. I have been asking myself, just what is next? Maybe you have as well. The New York Times columnist, Frank Bruni, asked yesterday, “And who the hell are we anymore?”[1] Yes, who we are, where are we going at this moment in history?
It all feels like so much and with it comes fear, uncertainty, anger, sadness and loss and all too often a sense of helplessness. Just what does all of this mean? It can feel is if there is some kind of reckoning taking place. That something, somehow, is coming to a head.
And, in the midst of it all, there also are, at times, little glimmers of hope in the midst of it all. Is all of this pointing to some much larger change? Some larger groundswell? Or is this just some early stage of something much worse? And underneath it all, just what is our responsibility, our call? How is it that we are to live?
No, these feel like perilous times indeed. Any sense of complacency that I have had as a person of privilege has been shaken up entirely these last months, and that may not be all bad. And it may be that that is why those words like atonement and repentance and forgiveness seem to have particular resonance this year. What is being asked of each of us in these perilous times?
On Yom Yippur we are asked to come face to face with our god, to take stock and to make amends. We are asked to get real with where we are. We are asked to take a look at our own actions—or lack of actions—to own them and to right our course. To take responsibility. To change. And just like this year has been a year unlike any other, it seems that the call of Yom Kippur is all the more important than it has ever been before.
As someone who has not come out of the Jewish tradition I have come to have great respect for this season, for this time. That’s because I have come to see just how hard change can be. That is certainly true in my own life and also true in our greater life together. Truth is it is so easy to get stuck in our patterns, in the ways that are familiar. Truth is that especially for those of us who live in relative comfort and privilege to just carry on with all of that comfort and privilege around us. Those patterns of comfort and privilege can make us oblivious to the needs of others, to the struggles of others.
Sometimes it is easy for what is the norm to just become that, the norm. We get stuck in how things are. We get stuck and maybe lose our imagination for how things might be different.
And maybe it is because of all that has been happening of late that this moment feels different. The pandemic shut things down but maybe also offered us a pause. And maybe in that pause we’ve been able to see things with some more perspective. Maybe some of us have been shaken out of that sense of complacency. Maybe, with so much under threat, maybe we’ve been reminded of just how precious and fragile life can be.
And maybe also to be more clear about all the ways that some things are just not right. That might be in our relationships that have not been right for a long time. That might be true in some of the larger systems in our culture that have not allowed any number of people to not experience their full humanity. It has maybe been a time to note some of the things we take for granted that we really can’t take for granted.
Over time it is easy to come to see the world and our individual lives in certain ways and sometimes those ways can blind us to the need for change. Making a turn when it comes to some of the core messages we have about ourselves and about the way the world is. And changing those messages, rewriting those scripts, that can take a lot of time and intention. Maybe some storylines have to be rewritten more than once before we are able to see ourselves as part of some new story.
So much of what is going on in our world right now is a call to look at our own lives but also what is happening in our country and in our world and how we are all part of that larger whole. Are we in right relationship with not only ourselves but with others? Part of the spiritual journey is a call that asks us to look at our individual lives and our individual roles, but we are also called to look at how we are all part of larger systems.
And when we talk about systems of oppression, that word, systems, is important. It is one thing for individuals to change, but we are all part of systems and systems have a way of moving towards and maintaining stasis. It is pretty clear that plenty of individuals have felt the call to change. But it is individuals together who can change those larger systems.
I’m talking to those of us who identify as white, here, in particular. In the last few years, and in the last few months especially, in the witness for black lives and in the witness for police accountability we have been offered an invitation to be newly woke, to be newly aware. What is the responsibility we bear for the collective sins of racism around us? What is the responsibility we need to name, to own? Those benefits of the privilege we have known, even if we have been unaware of that privilege?
It is easy to chafe at the notion of being called racist, of being complicit in this system we did not create but from which we have benefited. It asks us, I think, to acknowledge our role whether we’ve chosen it or not. But that naming, however uncomfortable it may be, is important. It might be, I hope, the beginning of our own examination. Truth is most of us may not have chosen it but like it or not it is something that has come to us with all of its privileges. But the other side of that privilege is responsibility and accountability. The other side of that privilege is a call to change course.
And it starts with that naming, I think, is the beginning. And it asks of us how are we asked to live differently. How do we see the world and who is the we we talk about? How is it we open our view, how is it we let go of our blinders? How is it that we shift from so much of the focus being on us as individuals to a new sense of we and how what affects each of us affects all of us?
One of the things about privilege is that when things get uncomfortable we can retreat back into that place of comfort. But you see until we can recognize not only that privilege but also all of us are hurt when anyone is hurt. All of us are harmed when people die at the hands of police. All of us are cut off from the fullness of life when any of us are denied that.
The call of Yom Kippur is a call to step back and to take stock, it is a call to get our individual and collective houses in order. It is a call to recognize that until we are all free none of us can really be free. That as we would have others do to us we would, we should be doing the same for others. It is a call to look at those places where we each have work to do. To look at those places where we struggle, to look at those places where do don’t live up to our own ideals, to look at those places that can hold us back again and again, as individuals and as communities.
When you break down the word Atonement you get at-one-ment. When do we make space to be at one with God? One with our truest selves, one with all beings? One with our source, our creator? How is it we come face to face with our fears, with all that is unjust, with the ways we have hurt others and the ways that we have been hurt too. And to look too, how it is we use our power, our agency, in the world?
I want to see hope for these times in all of this tumult, that somewhere in all of this there is also opportunity. We have before us, I want to believe, the possibility of real change. And to recognize the hope not only for us as individuals but to see how hope lives if we can see our struggles as part of some much larger struggle for justice.
Yesterday we had a workshop on what is called the 8th Principle of our faith. It is a call for our congregations and our larger Association to become intentionally anti-racist and intentionally multicultural. It is a call to make a shift from seeing ourselves primarily as individuals to seeing ourselves as part of a community where many communities are welcome. It is a call for all of us together to find spiritual wholeness.
Perhaps extraordinary times ask extraordinary things of us. Maybe this time of atonement, this time of being at one with what we hold most sacred, maybe it is in all of that where possibility lies as well.
Perhaps it is in times of tumult that we are asked to be courageous. It takes courage to call ourselves beyond the hurts that others may bring us, to take responsibility for the ways that we let others down, for the ways that we let ourselves down. It takes courage to know our truths and to live them. And it takes courage to know that we will inevitably let ourselves and others down. That none of us is prefect. And that part of community is knowing that there is space to bring our whole selves, warts and all.
It begins, I think, with being willing to look with an open heart about where we are and where we want to be. Martin Luther King said forgiveness is not just an occasional act. It is a permanent attitude[2], a way of being in the world that we cultivate, over and over again, day by day by day.
It can be easy in these times to feel lost, to feel alone. It is easy to feel off center, because there is so much right now that would call us away from that center, from that source.
What are the questions we should be asking in these days? Where are those places of comfort and discomfort we need to pay attention to? Where do we need to change? What are our fears? With whom are we in solidarity? And who is in solidarity with us?
We are asked over and over again to take the stuff of our lives and make meaning, to make life. These days our hurting world has a way of offering us plenty of opportunities to learn and to grow. But sometimes it feels like there is so much hurt we may not know where to begin. It may start by recognizing our own brokenness and our own capacity for healing is how we begin to heal the world.
I was stuck by a little story in the Washington Post yesterday. Writer Mark Shavin told the story of his 5-year-old daughter who had lot of questions about the world and her role in it. To get answers she sent her questions to a number of famous people, including the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg. She wrote:
Dear Justice Ginsburg,
My grandmother has the name Ruth, too. I call her Ruru. You are like King Soloman. You both decide stuff. He was the smartest king. One woman stole another woman’s baby. King Solomon knew whose baby it was. Are you in charge of all the people in the United States of America? Have you ever made a mistake?
Love. 5-year-old Naomi.
And this was Ginsberg’s reply:
Dear Naomi,
Thank you for your wonderful letter. Thinking about you, your words, and your drawing, I have been smiling all day.
I have two grandchildren. My grandson is named Paul, and my granddaughter is Clara. Paul is 10 and Clara is 6. They call me “Bubbie.”
In answer to your questions, I am not in charge of all the people in the United States, but I work hard to do my judging job well. And yes, I have made many mistakes, but I try to learn from them so that I will not make the same mistake twice.
Keep up the good work you are doing in school.
Every good wish to you, your parents, and your grandmother, Ruru,
Ruth Bader Ginsburg[3]
Perhaps that exchange from over 20 years ago spoke to me because, amid all the tumult of these times, amid all the rancor, that sometimes we need to get back to some basics. Perhaps before we do anything else we have to recognize what we might have in common, of our shared humanity. And then we have to be reminded to do our jobs, to take responsibility for what is ours to take. And finally, to see where there are bridges, to see how the lives of others intersect with our own lives.
The changing season is a time for us to be reminded that all of life flows together, that as the trees turn, as the days get cooler, as the light gets shorter, it is all part of some larger order of things and that they are all connected together and that we are connected with all of that life. That out of the brokenness of our lives comes new meaning and new life, that from fall and winter, spring eventually comes. We are reminded of the ways that we fall short, but also that before us always is the invitation to have a fresh start.
My hope right now? It is that extraordinary times might call forth extraordinary things from all of us. That that may happen in big ways, may, but also subtle ones. That it might be a time when we know courage, when it might be a time when we find hope, that it might be a time when we once again commit ourselves to love. Amen.
Responsive Reading “Our Hopes in Action”
O God of all generations, may the sense of your presence never leave us. Fill our souls with awe, and our hearts with love, that we may return to you in truth, and with all our being.
Make us whole; make us one with our own hearts; make us one with each other, at last to find ourselves at one with you.
May we help speed the day of reconciliation when poverty, prejudice and hatred no longer threaten to destroy us;
When violence, angry conflict and mistrust are forgotten evils; When our wealth is used to feed the hungry and heal the sick;
When we cherish the world and hold it in trust for our children’s children; When the weak become strong and the strong compassionate;
And that which has been commanded shall come to pass: justice shall roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.
All: The world moves through our choices, through what we do and what we leave undone. May we remember; may we have the strength to abide by our highest hopes in action.
Benediction
In these times of tumult, may we find the courage we need, may we find the strength we need, and may we know through it all that we are held in the embrace of the beloved. Amen.
[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/25/opinion/sunday/trump-election-supreme-court.html?searchResultPosition=1
[2] “Forgiveness” by Michael Henderson. Book Partners, 1999, pp143.
[3] https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2020/09/26/justice-ginsburg-rbg-letter-mistake-daughter-shavin/
Topics: Forgiveness