All Hallows' Eve 2024: A Message from the Trees

I paused on the path in the park, stock-still, listening and looking for birds betwixt and between the boughs and billowing leaves overhead as others strolled, strode, sauntered, and cycled by. 

I was caught off-guard in that moment, mesmerized by the magnificent and miraculously munificent display of majesty—a matinée made for me?—when I mused to myself:

Ah, an elegant death.

Maybe what I meant, as the leaves languidly fell in larger and larger numbers around me, was an elegant dying. 

I imagined the trees, aware of their leaves' senescence, slowly sloughing them off in an ancient autumnal "Rite of Shedding," free from shame or any sour, sullen sadness. Perhaps with a pinch of pride.

And then I thought, "Who the fuck wants to die, proudly or otherwise?"

Well. 

Alas, I know that some do; I dare not judge. I might, however, quiver with wonder. I have indeed learned that there can be no living without dying. We who live and die are all sacred, hallowed by our even being to begin with. Are we not holy?

I marvel that I can yet be moved to this quintessential asking of questions. 

Seeking Sanctuary

In my experience, when people are asked why they became Unitarian Universalists, or why they remain Unitarian Universalists, one of the reasons most often cited is community.  We seek groups of people who are like-minded, or who have similar values, with whom we can connect and to which we might belong. It’s a perfectly human desire, and Unitarian Universalist congregations provide that home that many of us need, especially when we feel that we would not be comfortable or would not be wholly accepted in any other of the spheres we inhabit in our lives.

When I first became a UU, now half my life ago, I, too, sought community. I sought a place where I could be me – a black, gay, young man, raised a Christian but seeking…something. I sought a place where I could pose questions about God, where I could ask “why?” without fear of reprisal, where I could confidently assert “I don’t believe that!” without fear of rejection. And I believe I found that place.

But community is noisy. Community is different people coming together with all their joys and all their hurts, their assuredness and their confusion. Community of the people by the people and for the people is an exercise in controlled chaos at times. Community means serving on committees, task forces, councils and boards in the interest of perpetuating said community. Community is busy, and loud, and satisfying, and depleting, and beautiful, and replenishing, and rough. Community is competing wants and needs seeking resolution. Community is strength and community is effacement. Community is multivalent – as many different things as the people within it, and much more.

And although community is very important to me, it has never been my primary reason for joining or remaining a member of a church. My answers to that question about becoming a UU usually sound like “exploring my spirituality” or “cultivating my theology”. My answers about remaining a UU usually sound similar, with the added component of a deep love for this faith I found all those years ago. Having benefitted from community for so long, I have come to a place in my life where what I need more even than the community I found is sanctuary.

Seder table set on the chancel in the sanctuary of the First Unitarian Church of Baltimore (Universalist & Unitarian), April 2010

Sanctuary is stillness. Sanctuary is safe vulnerability; sanctuary is comfort. Sanctuary is holiness, set apart from the mundane. Sanctuary is oneness of breath, oneness of purpose, oneness of intention. Sanctuary is showing up, sitting in a pew, and being nourished. Sanctuary is allowing others to do the hard raucous work of community, for a time. Sanctuary is self-care. Sanctuary is Sabbath rest - the opportunity just to be and not to do. Sanctuary is the quiet harmony of everything which is nothing which is within everything and nothing. Sanctuary is wholeness. Sanctuary is peace.

Community and sanctuary are not of necessity at odds with one another; they can both exist in the same space and at the same time. Somehow. One of the things I’ve discovered while exploring my spirituality and cultivating my theology, all within the framework of my UU community, is that God more often than not resides in the mystery of paradox. Sanctuary means being able to find an answer to “why?” and being able to say “I do believe this” without fear of reprisal or rejection.

Sanctuary is quiet silence. Today I seek the quiet.


#UULent reflection for Day 3: Quiet 

Meditation On Prayer

What is prayer?

Is prayer the corpus of statements, learned by rote in my childhood, spoken to a God up in heaven and in the name of Jesus and by the medium of the Holy Spirit?

Is prayer the emptying of my mind, so that I might become the receptacle of wisdoms passed down by sages across time, understood through the lens of my experience and made incarnate in my life through decisions I make and actions I take?

Is prayer sitting in a field on a warm day, soaking up the sun, smelling the blossoming flowers, tracking the flight of a shimmering hummingbird, and perhaps writing an inspired haiku? Or dancing with abandon, or shedding a tear in the theater, or a standing ovation after a grand symphony? How about reading a good book and reflecting on the themes it presents, and their potential impact on my life?

Is prayer being in a living sanctuary, surrounded by the inhale-exhale sing-shout of a community of people seeking to understand, or to be loved, or to make a difference?

Or is prayer the realization that I am not the center of the universe, the acme of space, the pinnacle of time, and that I am one small speck in the stream of all-that-is-was-and-will-be? Is prayer the contemplation of the significance of this reality? The striving to understand my brief role in the grand scheme of the drama of existence?

Is prayer silence? Is it speaking? Is it listening? Is it communication, back and forth? Is it an activity? Is it an experience? Is it a question, an answer, a method, a cause, a result?

Is this a prayer?

Amen.

Time for Wonder

When I started working in DC, I decided to use my 90- to 120-minute journey (each way) as productively as I could. I would have so much time available for reading, writing, and meditation. At first, being a newly minted commuter, I tried hard to pay attention to my surroundings, and landmarks. Everything was fresh and new to me, and because I have to make two connections, I wanted to avoid missing an unfamiliar stop...or getting on the metro in the wrong direction! There wasn't much time for else as I learned my new routine, but I did allow myself to listen to the radio or to podcasts as I traveled.

As my commute became routine, I relaxed a bit and started to just gaze out of the window as my train sped along from Baltimore toward Washington, stopping from time to time to load more passengers - very few passengers de-train between the two terminuses. Termini? Anyway, there are a surprising number of beautiful things to see on this stretch of land between the two cities. There are several marshes, in fact...and early on I discovered a flock of large, white waterfowl - I never know the difference between a crane, stork, heron - hanging out somewhere near BWI airport. Whatever the name of the bird, it was a beautiful sight to behold. Nature, glorious nature. And in my witnessing these birds, I felt connection. I felt the presence of the divine, pervading and imbuing all existence. They gave me joy, these simple moments of wonder, that lasted for entire days.

Since those early days, as my travel became rote and I became less concerned about missed connections and the like, I began to do puzzles found in the free papers given out in DC-area metro stations. Sudoku. Crosswords. Ken Ken. I also began to read more. Finished several books. Started studying Hebrew. All good, useful, enjoyable things. Never wrote much, though. I get too caught up trying to think of something to write about, and end up writing nothing, inspiration or no.

But I had stopped being in awe. I stopped noticing most sunrises. I belatedly noticed one day that those white birds must have flown south to warmer climes. I no longer composed ephemeral haiku in my mind about other people I observed along the way. I stopped floating in divine wonder, and became insular...focused on getting from point A to point B as quickly (i.e. distractedly) as possible.
But then this morning, the sky was on fire with sunrise. I almost missed it, playing on this phone! But something nudged me to look up and away from what my partner calls a "glowing rectangle" (I, like many of my co-commuters, have several such devices), and my eye saw red.

And I wondered, was in awe.

And I wrote.

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