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You may recall that the song Les Tacy just played, “The Entertainer” was the title piece to the 1981 movie “Ragtime.”  It was based on a novel, with the same name, by E.L. Doctorow.  The movie and book were named after the musical genre that was popular during the first two decades of the 1900’s.

The Ragtime story focuses on a wealthy New York family who are not named.  They are simply “Father, Mother, Mother’s Younger Brother, and little boy.”

Father earns his wealth owning a fireworks and flag factory.  Like many rich men of the time, he has lots of idle time and gets bored.  So he joins the first expedition to the North Pole. 

While he is gone for many months, Mother experiences independence for the first time.  She becomes a suffragette and advocate for women’s rights.  After finding an abandoned African-American baby, Mother adopts the child.  The child’s mother Sarah eventually finds her way to the house and Mother rescues her too.  Later still, the baby’s father, Coalhouse Walker, begins to live in Mother’s house.  Coalhouse is an accomplished pianist who earns a living playing ragtime music in fancy New York nightclubs.

Mother’s younger Brother is an expert in explosives and fireworks.  He manages the family business.  He too becomes bored and begins an affair with Evelyn Nesibit, who was a real life American chorus girl with a salacious reputation.

Miss Nesbit meanwhile takes an immigrant single father named Tateh under her protective wings.  He is an accomplished artist who supports himself by working in a large factory.  He is caught up in a worker’s strike, meets the real life progressive activist Emma Goldman, and becomes a socialist.  Tateh realizes the promise of supposed American equal opportunity – is a myth.

Coalhouse Walker gets caught in the major drama of the story.  While driving to work in his Model T Ford, he is stopped and humiliated by a racist fire crew and its Chief Conklin.  They demand a huge sum of money to allow him to proceed.   They are upset a black man owns a car.  Coalhouse refuses to pay and the fire crew then dumps human excrement into the car and finally burn it. 

Coalhouse pursues legal action against the fire chief in an attempt to get his car and, more importantly, his dignity back.  His efforts are blocked by a legal system that is prejudiced against African-Americans. 

Coalhouse then begins vigilante attacks on New York firehouses.  He threatens to continue them until his car is restored and Chief Conklin is punished.  He escalates his attacks by recruiting other disaffected blacks and whites to join him.  Younger Brother is one of them who, with his expertise in explosives, helps Coalhouse build bombs.  The gang takes over, and threatens to explode, the famous J.P. Morgan Library with its valuable collection of books and art.  The real life Booker T. Washington negotiates punishment for Chief Conklin in return for the safe escape of Coalhouse’s volunteers.  When Coalhouse surrenders after his men are safe, he is shot and killed by police.

Into these interwoven story lines, Father returns from his adventure.  He’s shocked to find profound changes in his family.  Mother is now a feminist who adopted a black child, its mother and it’s outlaw father.  The manager of his factory, Younger Brother, is not only having an affair with the scandalous Evelyn Nesbit, he has also joined Coalhouse as a bomber. 

Father is deeply shaken by these changes.  In despair and to flee from changes he cannot understand, Father embarks on the ship Lusitania headed to Europe.  He dies when the ship, as students of history know, is sunk by German U-Boats.  After his death, Mother meets, falls in love with, and marries Tateh, the immigrant father.  The story ends as Mother and Tateh settle down to raise their three very diverse children.  Mother and Father are thus symbols of change in America and how to deal with it.  Fight against it and sit on the wrong side of history, or embrace it and find peace.

The novel Ragtime has been acclaimed by numerous critics as one of the hundred best books of the twentieth century.   Importantly, the book’s themes highlight the profound changes in the lives of Mother and Father AND those in the United States and world.  Human culture, economies and social structures were all upended by industrialization.

The Industrial era, most historians agree, spanned from the 1850’s to the conclusion of World War Two.  It was followed by the post-Industrial era lasting until approximately the 1990’s.  After that, began the period in which we now find ourselves – that of the Digital Age with its own major economic and social changes.

The Industrial era, however, reached its inflection point during the first decades of the 1900’s – precisely when ragtime music was most popular.  Industrialization created massive dislocations in society.  Cities grew to be very large as people moved from rural areas to work in newly built factories.  Those factories needed lots of cheap labor to run their machines.  That encouraged the immigration of millions of poor farmers from most of Europe.

Factories needed huge amounts of coal and oil to fuel their machines.  That created opportunities for a few businessmen to build large monopolies like Standard Oil, New York Central Railroad, and US Steel.  Great wealth became concentrated in the hands of a few.  An educated, managerial class of professionals was needed to run the factories and large businesses.  They became a new middle class.  Those who worked in the factories, coal mines and steel mills – the uneducated rural poor, immigrants, women and children – they were the new lower class.  They worked long hours, toiled in unsafe conditions and were paid minimal wages.

I relate the Ragtime novel’s story, and the history of Industrialization, as my introduction to a larger point.  Economic, technological and social change can be shocking and disruptive, but they have happened throughout human history.  I assert that societies and people must learn to adapt to change, and help minimize its worst effects.

As a symbol of the early twentieth century and its many changes, ragtime music is one of America’s contributions to the world.  As a musical genre, it was known for unique syncopation and upbeat energy.  Melodic accents and harmonic sounds come between major beats in the music.  A pianists left hand plays the beat while the right hand plays the syncopated, rhythmic melody.  This “ragged” sound gave the music its name.

It was a radically new musical genre that many say was a modern update to Mozart’s minuets and Brahms’ waltzes.  It influenced later classical music – that of of 20th century composers like Debussy, Ravel, and Stravinsky.  It’s no coincidence that the music is a symbol for change.  People around the world reacted to industrialization changes in multiple ways.  The Russian Bolshevik revolution of 1917 was one reaction.  Colonialism and rampant greed in Europe was another – one that led to World War One as nations competed against each other for control of natural resources. 

In the US, progressives like Teddy Roosevelt enacted their own solutions to industrialization and its negative changes.  Labor unions, the right to strike, child labor laws and minimum wages were their solutions.   Added to those, constitutional rights of free speech and the right to assemble helped American women create positive change for themselves – by gaining the right to vote in 1920.  American institutions of democracy and built-in checks on forces of power helped this nation deal with the profound changes.

It goes without saying that we are today witnessing cultural, economic and social upheavals similar to those caused by the Industrial revolution.  Today’s changes, however, have been caused by the so-called Digital Revolution in what many sociologists believe is the single fastest and most profound economic shift in history.  People of every nation are struggling with how to answer such change.  Do we embrace current dislocations and innovations – those of globalization, immigration, the demand for minority rights, and new technology in the form of computers?  Or, do we react like Father in the Ragtime story – with disbelief, shock, anger and retreat?  In other words, is the answer to widespread economic, social and technological change one that accepts change and tries to soften its blows?  Something we call progressivism?   Or is the answer to deny change, retreat to the past, and embrace a conservative response emblematic of that name – to conserve what was once had?

Regardless of political reasons why it is essential to accept change, I believe it is a spiritual one as well.  Ragtime music and Ragtime the story both implicitly endorse that.  Ragtime music was, and is popular because of its radical newness in sound – one that is almost robotic.  Scott Joplin, ragtime’s foremost composer, said it was intentionally written to mimic piano music rolls – what were an early prototype of digital computer cards.  It’s acceptance and popularity helped spawn ragtime’s musical offspring- jazz, R&B, and rock and roll.  In other words, much like industrialization and the changes it caused were eventually blended into a new economic and social culture, so too was ragtime.

Change, as a basic fact of life, is thus not something we can ignore.  All around us, change happens constantly.  All forms of life mature, grow old and eventually die – consistent with the fact that nothing in the universe stays the same.  Physical laws of entropy and thermodynamics confirm this.  Since change is a fundamental law of existence, then it holds true for human society as well.  To ignore or fight against change is a Don Quixote like effort – useless. 

Spiritually, change is also a fact of life.  All religions have used change to encourage new ways to understand life and the universe. Judaism began as a way to change human behavior through religious rules of morality.  Jesus radically changed that idea by saying rules of behavior have merit, but values of compassion and equality supersede them.  The Buddha and Mohammad taught the same.  Virtually all forms of spirituality were and are change reactions intended to further human decency.

Progressivism in the early 20th century, symbolized by ragtime music, was also a way to initiate positive change in human behavior.  And so it is today.  A common definition of progressivism, however, says nothing about politics.  Instead, progressivism is defined as “a philosophy based on the idea of Progress, which asserts that advancements in science, technology, economic development, and social organization are vital to the improvement of the human condition.”  Underlying that definition is the spiritual notion that our purpose for living is to improve the condition of all humanity such that the world becomes a better and more humane place.

When I say GNH is spiritually progressive, I mean the same – that we embrace change as a means to improve ourselves and the world.  In fact, we are each called to be change agents – people who work to change themselves so that they can then work to change the world.

But humans being human often reject change out of fear.  The act of becoming something different is not easy, physically or mentally.  With change, we move into unknown territory, where life is unfamiliar and seemingly unsafe. 

Church congregations, for instance, are notoriously averse to change.  Both myself, and some of you, are not immune to that response.  We like our traditions – our rituals, hymns, committees, and policies we’ve used for many years.  Adopting new ideas for how we worship, sing or govern ourselves – such things are scary.  I still lament that some of the former Gathering members, who chose not to continue with the merged congregation, did so because they did not want to change.   A new congregation, in a new location, with some new practices, those were unsettling.

Certain segments in our nation are reacting strongly to the social and economic change they see.  Attitudes against LGBT rights, globalization, immigration, Black Lives Matter, global warming, and new forms of technology have manifested themselves in a conservative response.  Such people say, “Let’s ignore these sweeping forces for change.  Let’s stay the same or retreat backwards.  Let’s refuse to educate ourselves and evolve.”

But as much as it is easy to wag our finger at others who resist change, we must look within ourselves and how we also resist change.  I resist change in my life – that I’m getting older, that I am having new health problems, that the patterns of my life and work evolve, that forms of social media like Facebook or Twitter can be useful.  At times I can sound like a grumpy old man who sits on his porch and yells at kids in the street who make too much noise!  Take a chill pill Doug and move with the onward flow of progress!

I therefore try to encourage evolutionary change here and in myself by allowing things to move forward gradually.  I believe a progressive attitude in politics, spirituality, economics and society can help us change in ways that is balanced.  Progressivism is neither revolutionary nor ultra-conservative.  It accepts change but it also tries to manage it in ways that are compassionate to those hurt by it.  Progressivism echoes Martin Luther King’s belief that the arc of moral history is a long one, with many temporary backward steps, but it always bends toward justice.

With that hopeful thought, my encouragement for us is to listen to the implied message of ragtime music.  Change is a universal fact.  It is a force for good.  Change in us, in life, in human institutions, or in technology may be frightening, but it will ultimately be for good if we take time to adapt.  We can act like angry white men in any area of change – with technology, at church, with our jobs, families, health, foods, sexualities, and lifestyles – or we can act like Mother in the Ragtime story – an open minded, compassionate woman who heard the new syncopated call of ‘The Entertainer’ and boldly moved into a better future.           

     

(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

 

Last Sunday, as a part of my July message series entitled “Summer Songs for Fun and Inspiration”, I examined the folk song “This Land is Your Land” by Woody Guthrie.  During the talkback time, several interpretations of Guthrie’s lyrics were offered.  It’s often difficult to perfectly know an artist’s intentions.  People have different thoughts about what a piece of art, music or writing means.  And… that is as it should be.  Almost any great piece of art speaks with many ideas.

That is true for the song I highlight today – George Gershwin’s song ‘Summertime’ from the operetta ‘Porgy and Bess.’  From its first release in1935, the operetta has been controversial.  It’s been most criticized because it portrays the lives of African-Americans – but it was written and composed by white men.  From today’s perspective, Gershwin and the librettists Dubose Heyward and Ira Gershwin appropriated – or stole – black culture which they did not “own” or even understand.  They profited handsomely from that.

Of added concern is that the story of ‘Porgy and Bess’ is seen by many to stereotype African-Americans with racist characteristics.  The story is one of murder, misogyny, promiscuity and abandonment – actions all too easily applied by bigots to blacks – but which are, in truth, evident in all cultures.  Duke Ellington, for one, decried the operetta and said people must “debunk Gershwin’s lampblack Negroisms.”

Another critic of the song ‘Summertime’ says that it is not what it seems to be – a tender lullaby from a mother to her newborn child.  Instead, this critic says it depicts a black woman nursing and singing to a white child she has been hired – or enslaved – to care for.  Lyrics such as “your daddy’s rich and your momma’s good looking” do not describe most African-Americans at that time.  Very, very, very few black men of the 1920’s were wealthy and the standard for female beauty was to be white.  In other words, this critic believes the song highlights how black women were routinely forced, through enslavement or economic necessity, to nurture white babies at the expense of their own. 

The operetta’s apologists, however, say that Gershwin researched and appreciated African-American culture.  As a liberal Jewish man of his time, Gershwin portrayed in “Porgy and Bess” a unique slice of America – that of its black citizens.   Indeed, he said that his operetta was an addition to the American melting pot.  Much like jazz is an expression of black cultural vibrancy, it is also an expression of American energy and freshness.  Gershwin said that ‘Porgy and Bess’ should be interpreted the same.  As he said, the operetta is both black and white – a piece that portrays the American experience as opposed to just the black experience.

Today’s commentators are also as divided about how to interpret the operetta.  Some say it is racist and unworthy of attention.  Harry Belafonte refused to appear in it even as many other African-Americans from Maya Angelou, to Sammy Davis Jr. to Sidney Poitier did appear in it.  Others, like Leontyne Price and Ella Fitzgerald recorded beautiful and popular renditions of the song ‘Summertime.’

Some commentators argue ‘Porgy and Bess’ and its signature song are period pieces that must be understood from the perspective of the time when written.  Much like we better understand historic anti-semitism from Wagner’s opera The Ring Cycle, the same holds true for ‘Porgy and Bess.’  Jim Crow racism and the response of blacks and whites to its oppressions are better understood, some say, because of the operetta.

Just as I hope is the case with each message I offer, however, what we discuss and learn here is to find spiritual meaning.  We do that not just for the sake of acquiring knowledge, but to seek universal truths that help build peace and compassion in ourselves and in the world.   That makes this place different from a classroom or civic organization.  To that end, I believe the song ‘Summertime’ reminds us to respect the dignity of others and their unique cultures.  Their foods, clothing and art forms are not ours to take and use as we wish.  To do so is to disrespect our black sisters and brothers. 

The song also reminds us that we must adopt an attitude of humility when considering the subject of racism.  We must listen to African-Americans and their thoughts, feelings and suggested solutions to the subject instead of offering our ideas for a solution.  To do that reinforces attitudes of white supremacy.   Our white ears must open, while our white mouths must shut.

That is clearly not what Gershwin did since the song ‘Summertime’ was essentially stolen by him – something he admitted doing.  Its melody, key and lyrics were based largely on the slave spiritual “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.”  Indeed, Gershwin said that when he heard some blacks sing the word “sometimes” he heard them instead pronounce “summertime”.  Like “Motherless Child”, “Summertime” was written in a minor key and was intended to be a lament – like many African-American spirituals – a song that sings of hope in the face of despair.

Frederick Douglas, the famed African-American abolitionist and former slave, said of slave spiritual songs that they “breathed the prayer and complaint of souls overflowing with the bitterest anguish. They depressed my spirits and filled my heart with ineffable sadness.  Like tears, they were a relief to aching hearts.”  Indeed, it’s clear that most black spirituals were a way to release emotions slaves and later African-Americans under Jim Crow could not otherwise freely express – ones of hope, deep sorrow, or even ecstatic joy.

Despite misappropriating the song ‘Summertime’ and then profiting from it, Gershwin was able to capture the black spiritual style and even historic black emotions in the song.   It is for that reason ‘Summertime’ remains both popular and yet also controversial.  It’s melody and its themes still resonate with many people, including African.-Americans.  Like other black spirituals, the song is loving and tender but in a deeply sad way.  It’s as if the singer’s assurance that all is well for the newborn baby is more a wish than a fact.  Was life so easy and good for the characters in the operetta?  The story is one of tragedy, anguish and abandonment.  The child is eventually deserted by both its mother and father.  How can that be good?  Even more, life in 1930’s America for African-Americans, especially in the South, was hardly languid and easygoing.  Lynchings still occurred.  Jim Crow was in full force.  The nation was in the midst of a Depression.   

Since Gershwin confessed that he based the song ‘Summertime’ on the African-American spiritual ‘Sometimes I Fell Like a Motherless Child’, it’s evident he intended his song to have a downbeat melody to contrast with its positive lyrics.  Indeed, the accusation that ‘Summertime’ was written to be the lament of a black woman forced to nurture a white child is well taken.  In that case, the positive lyrics are not inconsistent with the sad melody.  The white child was born into a life of privilege and happiness while the black woman, who sings the lullaby, her life is one of servitude and misery.  How could her singing be anything but downbeat and sad?

Another interpretation of the song’s lyrics is that they are an ironic lament of a black mother to her own black child.  The words that all is well – the cotton is high, the fish are jumping and the living is easy – those can be seen as bitter and even sarcastic.  Here’s my beloved child, the woman sings, born into a life with little happiness.  I’ll reassure my baby that all is well, even though I know that’s not true.  But one day, dear child, you will rise up and fly high into the sky! 

        Such a symbolic flight might be your escape to a better life up North, or your passing into a heavenly afterlife.  Those kinds of hopeful lyrics are characteristic of other African-American spirituals – ones that sing of escape and freedom, or of a merciful death and a heaven that awaits. 

‘Summertime’s lyrics, in this regard, match with those of ‘Motherless Child’ – lyrics for which you can find on an insert in your programs.  In a life where children and adults are often orphans, their parents having been sold to other owners or, under Jim Crow, their parents having abandoned children for economic necessity, feelings of loneliness and separation must have been strong.  Even more, ‘Motherless Child’s lyrics might also symbolize separation from Africa and one’s homeland, or perhaps from one’s eternal home – heaven.  Those good places are a long way off – separated by a vast ocean, or separated by many difficult and sad years of life ahead.

Both songs, I believe, sing of heartache no matter one’s interpretation of them.  Even so, the troubling fact remains that ‘Summertime’ is essentially a stolen song.  Gershwin, I’m sure, did not believe he was stealing.  He likely thought he was honoring black life and black spirituals by modeling his song so closely on. ‘Motherless Child’.  But that attitude was nevertheless symptomatic of many white liberals of the time.  He might think he honored African-Americans and their culture, but in reality he was using and profiting from it – much like slave holders once used and profited from African bodies.

Indeed, Gershwin’s cultural misappropriation of black culture and musical styles removed them from their historical contexts.  The tragedy and turmoil depicted in ‘Porgy and Bess’ cannot be separated from a history of black slavery and oppression.  Many African-Americans of the 1930’s were direct descendants of former slaves.  The lingering physical, emotional and economic impact of slavery on their lives was significant.  Indeed, Gershwin’s research for his operetta was done in “gullah” areas of North Carolina – the swampy, mosquito infested land near the coast.  It was into those areas that blacks were relegated.  With few or no schools, terrible land for farming and no infrastructure such as paved roads and electricity, African-Americans had little prospect to advance.  Crime, drinking and promiscuity were natural outlets for frustration and hopelessness.

Gershwin took that lifestyle and then dramatized it as typical of all African-Americans.  He removed it from the historical contexts I just described.  Produced for mostly white audiences in the U.S. and Europe, the operetta offered a false understanding of black culture.  White audiences could and did judge ‘Porgy and Bess’s depictions of crime, illiteracy and abandonment as emblematic of dysfunction in all blacks.  

It’s doubtful white audiences, as they watched the operetta, thought of the negative legacies of slavery, or of the negative effects of Jim Crow, or even of the reasons I discussed earlier why it’s signature song ‘Summertime’ is so sad.  Indeed, some whites might incorrectly assume its lyrics that daddy is rich, the cotton is high and life is easy are literally true for African-Americans.

It’s because of these reasons, and many others, that cultural appropriation is immoral.  It’s why whites must be very careful when using black art and music.  What is our purpose for using it?  Is it to better empathize with and thus understand black pain?  Or is it to steal something seemingly exotic to make whites appear more enlightened or cool?  Or perhaps we want to peer into other cultures simply out of curiosity – to judge, demean and ridicule?

Cultural appropriation also reminds us that the era of white supremacy must end.  With it must come, I believe, an overall attitude of humility.  For me, my spirituality says that in any conversation or dialogue, I must listen and learn more than suggest and opine.  This is particularly so in matters of race.  Such is the practice of empathy which I frequently encourage.  I must discern and understand the emotions and feelings of African-Americans – to hear not just their words, but their deeper and more heartfelt pain or anger.  In that regard, I believe my role in helping to solve racism is to allow African-Americans to tell me what I can or should do.  Simply by extending them leadership, I help end white supremacy.       

As I said earlier, Gershwin was white and liberal.  He sincerely believed he honored blacks with his operetta, and by employing them as singers and actors in it.  The song ‘Summertime’ does capture the lament and style of black spirituals and, for that reason, it’s been adopted by many African-Americans as a song that is now theirs.  Gershwin culturally misappropriated it – and they have taken it back.   Nevertheless, for me, ‘Summertime’ will always have an asterisk appended to it….that being it was written and composed by white men.   For this reason, I personally find the song “Sometimes I Fell Like a Motherless Child” – and all other African-American spirituals – to be more honest, true and accurate.  I want to hear black voices, their hurt and their ideas on how to realize full equality and justice.

(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

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The song “This Land is Your Land” was once seriously considered as our official national anthem.  For many people, its lyrics about the vast sweep of American land seem to extol what has long defined the nation.  Citizens and immigrants alike often see our wide and open land as a symbol of American freedom and opportunity.

That patriotic idea was not, however, what Woody Guthrie, the song’s writer, wanted to convey.  He composed the song in 1940 in response to Irving Berlin’s hugely popular “God Bless America” released a year earlier.  Widely played on radio stations and sung by Kate Smith, “God Bless America” sang of ideals that Guthrie did not believe were practiced – those of brotherhood and goodness.

Instead, Guthrie used the symbol of American land as one of social equality and economic fairness.  Open and abundant, our land had once been freely available for everybody –  citizens, immigrants and former slaves.

By the time Guthrie wrote the song, however, he believed America had changed and become selfish and overly greedy.  His song “This Land is Your Land” instead promotes a communal ideal of sharing.  Land, the defining symbol of America, should be owned by everyone who lived and worked upon it.  Indeed, Guthrie was an avowed socialist and belonged to the communist party.

His views were shaped by experiences of his youth and young adulthood.  Born to a well-off father who lost everything, Guthrie came of age during the Great Depression.  Later, after marrying and having three children, Guthrie was unable to support his family.  With no job and living in the midst of the dustbowl drought, Guthrie left his family in Oklahoma and ventured to California where he hoped to find a promised of land of opportunity. 

Instead, Guthrie was shocked to find California divided between the haves and the have-nots.  Tens of thousands of desperate Okies and Arkies, like him, had moved there.  But they were met with derision and discrimination.  There was great wealth in California, as in the rest of the nation, but it was walled off for the rich only.

Fortunately, Guthrie had skills as a songwriter and singer.  During his journey to California, he sang in the campgrounds of dustbowl refugees, became well known and, after arriving in Los Angeles, was hired by a local radio station.  It’s there that his fame spread. Guthrie’s simple folk music addressed the struggles and dreams of farmworkers, immigrants, and dustbowl refugees – all who’d been impoverished by the Depression.

Guthrie hated money and saw how the love of it destroyed both his father and the nation.  Property ought to be owned by everyone in a utopian society where everyone works and takes care of each other.   In that light, we can better understand his lyrics: “this land is your land, this land is our land, from California to the New York Island.”  America does not belong to the Rockefellers, Hearsts, Trumps and big businesses.  It belongs to everyone.

This month of July, I intend to use the theme of summer music to examine a few songs and some deeper ideas within them.  For today, the subject of economic justice, as expressed in Guthrie’s song, is more than a question of government and politics.  It’s a spiritual concern.  If every person is a member of the one human family and deserving of equal dignity, then every person deserves the right to live free from poverty.  Every world religion believes this.  We are spiritually called to be our sister’s – and our brother’s – keeper.

Large portions of the Old Testament teach that Jews are to be generous – particularly to the poor.  Greed is considered a sin and ancient Israel is said to have been conquered because it had become arrogant and uncaring to those who were in need.  Concern for the poor was considered the highest of ethics by the Jewish prophets Jeremiah and Isaiah, writers in the Old Testament.  A society is not moral unless it helps the least of its citizens.

And Jesus, perhaps more than any other prophet in history, was an advocate for the poor.  He taught that those who do not feed the hungry or shelter the homeless are not followers of him.  In other words, they are not Christians.  The first churches, formed only a few years after his death, were models of socialist communalism.  Home churches were not simply groups who met for worship, they were small communities who followed Jesus’ teachings by sharing resources with one another to insure the well-being of all.

Muslims are likewise commanded to be compassionate to the poor.  Any Muslim who does not give liberally to help them is not a true Muslim.  Indeed, charity is a requirement for Muslims to go to paradise.

Economic justice has always been a spiritual concern because it addresses what many religions see as humanity’s root sin – that being egotism.  We are selfish from the moment we are born many religions believe.  All our worst misdeeds – greed, arrogance, murder, theft, and warfare – come from egotism.  To be spiritual is to believe in the opposites of selfishness – cooperation, sharing and concern for others.  One of the main purposes for spirituality, therefore, is to encourage and help foster economic justice.

1930’s America brought that concern to the forefront.  Western economies had essentially failed.   Millions of people were laid off work.  Businesses and banks failed.  Wealth became even more concentrated in the hands of a few.  The Great Depression seemed to prove that capitalism is unworkable since it promotes greed, corruption and leads to economic collapse.

It was in this context that Woody Guthrie composed “This Land is Your Land.’   Numerous artists and writers joined Guthrie in condemning America’s capitalist system.  They did so on political grounds and their solution was to replace it with socialism and communism.  Upton Sinclair, in his book “Oil!” laid bare the immorality of both American individualism and American religion.   Individualism encourages a dog-eat-dog, survival of the fittest mentality, Sinclair implies.  The weak and poor should be allowed to die because they hold back society.   The other pillar of American culture, religion, was seen by Sinclair as a perversion of Jesus’ original teachings since it mostly promotes salvation and a better afterlife instead of improving life right now. 

And those ideas against American individualism and religion are clearly evident in Guthrie’s lyrics.   A big high wall with the words “Private Property” on one side – with the other side blank – was Guthrie’s image for two possible American economies – a capitalist system that benefits the few, or a socialist system that benefits everyone. 

The lyrics “In the shadow of the steeple, near the relief office” stand hungry people, were intended by Guthrie to condemn religious hypocrisy.  Economic justice is a Christian ethic and yet it often went unpracticed.

The 1930’s were thus a crisis point in America.  While events and conditions of that era cannot be fully compared to what exists now – a crisis for capitalism is once again, in my opinion, looming on the horizon.  The 2008 Great Recession fostered a sensitivity to economic inequality but many of those left behind by our economy have turned to demagogues and far-right politics as a solution.  There is a sense that the wealthy control our institutions of power and they must be taken down. Unless our nation finds a middle, balanced way to address job dislocations and increased poverty caused by globalization and technology, there will be a radical revolution, of either the right or left, at some point in our future. 

A possible solution, in my opinion, lies in looking to what was put forward in the 1930’s.  Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal polices were framed not to attack the premise of capitalism but to instead prevent its worst excesses.  That effort was not only political, it was rooted in spirituality.  Into that debate came one of history’s great theologians – Reinhold Neibuhr.  He is widely admired today as a father of progressive spirituality.  Fairness for all humanity was seen by Niebuhr as a moral and divine requirement.  God, in his view, did not create the universe to be enjoyed by a few.  She implored humans to be fruitful and multiply – thus offering the good of creation to as many people as possible.  She also gave humans the freedom to act as they wish – thus emphasizing that liberty and individualism can also be spiritually good. 

But humanity often chooses the sin of pride and selfishness instead of adopting God’s generosity ethic.  Sins of greed have ruined her creative intentions, Niebuhr believed.  We must re-learn and re-adopt her original purpose for all humankind.   Niebuhr’s book Moral Man, Immoral Society, published in 1932, encourages this spiritual view of society and bridges the divide between communism  – which Niebuhr came to detest – and capitalism, which he thought was often equally wrong.

He noted, however, that capitalism, in its best form, initiates a positive work ethic to better oneself and provide for one’s family.  That ambition is motivated by greed but it can cause positive outcomes – people gain confidence and skills that enable them to help launch their children on similar paths.  Individual greed can also create opportunities and jobs for others.

Niebuhr compared greed to what Saint Ignatius, the medieval philosopher, called passion.  Humans are born with selfish passions for pleasure, power and wealth.   These are so-called original sins.  Ignatius and Niebuhr promote what they called temperance as an answer to those passions.  Instead of trying to banish passions – as a socialist or communist society might, or instead of allowing them uncontrolled freedom – as in capitalism, religion and governments should work to instead balance our worst instincts.

In other words, passions are not evil by themselves.  It is the excess of passion that is evil.  Sexual desire, for instance, is a good and creative force when it is tempered.  Greed is a similarly good and creative force when it is likewise tempered.  Greed to amass hoards of money and property, at the expense of others and beyond what one needs, is a form of uncontrolled passion.  That is what must be restrained.

Niebuhr based his argument firmly in the teachings of Jesus.  The Bible does not condemn wealth.  Instead, it echoes an important teaching of Paul in one of his Biblical letters.  It is the love of money –  the excessive passion for money – that is the root of all evil.

Jesus also taught that ethic with his admonishment to a rich young ruler.  Go and give all your money to the poor if you wish to be a moral person, Jesus told him.  By itself, that verse promotes socialism.  Instead, the very next verse indicates that Jesus issued the command for that man only – because he knew the rich young ruler loved his money.

Niebuhr praised Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal because he saw them as expressions of pragmatic spirituality.  Such pragmatism accepts human nature for what it is – but within a context of balance.   In other words, such spirituality has empathy for our flaws – like our propensity to think only of ourselves.  But in that empathy we are asked to find balance by limiting selfishness and encouraging generosity.

Niebuhr wrote in his book Moral Man, Immoral Society that the primary purpose of any government is to “rationally direct the irrational impulses of people.”  Those are exactly his views about how we should practice spirituality.  Yes, humans have irrational or sinful impulses, but spirituality is designed to rationally and morally counteract them.

All of this brings us back to Guthrie’s song “This Land is Your Land.”  A reasonable perspective of the song realizes that Guthrie’s choice of individualism and selfishness – versus collectivism and selflessness – is too limiting.  It says we only have two choices.  But why can’t we choose a mix of the two?   Interestingly, the Dalai Lama echoes that suggestion in the Book of Joy that we recently read.  We can be “selfishly unselfish” he said.  In other words, we cannot help others unless we first insure our needs are met.

That also echoes the universal Golden Rule.  It is taught by all world religions and says that we should treat others at least equal to how we wish to be treated.  Implicit in that ethic is that taking care of ourselves, to a reasonable extent, is not bad.  The crucial point is that we take care of all others equal to what we want.

That well states what I believe is a spiritual approach to economic injustice.  Limiting human freedom with a socialist economy that hinders the ability to work hard and achieve a level of wealth needed for one’s basic happiness, that is not a moral option.  Liberty is denied and innovation suffers.

But equal to that is the mistake of a purely capitalist system which allows human passions of greed and egotism to go unchecked.  Massive inequalities happen such that a few prosper beyond what they need – while millions of fellow humans suffer.  A solution is to find balance between the two extremes – an approach encouraged by Jesus, the Buddha, Niebuhr, the Dalai Lama and many others.

“This Land is Your Land” simply and beautifully expresses a moral case for economic justice.  But it’s version of only two possible Americas is lacking.  We need an spirit based economy rooted in justice……..that is also pragmatic enough to empower our individualistic – and, yes, greed based impulses – for the equal benefit of everyone.

(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

Most of you know that I’ve spent the past few weeks with my family in California as we watched my father slowly, and often in pain, slip away.  My dad suffered a stroke that we were told was not only survivable but one from which he could recover most of his abilities.  Unrelated complications to his treatment, however, began to occur.  After he was l placed on a ventilator and began having seizures, my siblings and I made the emotionally difficult decision to end life support and his suffering.  Very quickly he crossed the line separating living from dying.

A Palliative care team with a doctor, nurse and social worker surrounded him and us.  Everything possible was done to minimize evidence of medical intervention.

After the ventilator was removed, his breathing quickly changed.  We gathered around him, held his hand and poured out our love and assurance that he would soon be comfortable.  We told him we were ok, that he’d been a good dad, and that we would take care of our mom.  Within an hour of our decision, he breathed his last.  He went quickly and peacefully.

Since he passed, the time he was in the hospital, and his death, seem unreal to me and like a bad dream.  I haven’t felt myself and still don’t.  Did I really witness him go through that?  Is he really gone?

These past few weeks I’ve spent lots of time thinking about death and, more importantly, about living.  I’ve concluded that at the end, it’s vitally important that one is fully at peace – physically and mentally.  Indeed, I realize even more than I did before that dying should emerge from the shadows in which our culture often keeps it.  We do our best not to think about death even though it is as fundamental to life as is birth and growing up.   We fight mightily against death – devising expensive and often painful procedures to hold it off – even though such interventions often prevent or delay its gentle and natural occurrence. 

Much like birth is a joyous introduction, death should be a gentle conclusion.  The dying of a loved one ought to end for us much like we finish a good book.  Yes, there are no more pages to turn.  Yes, we put the book up on a bookshelf.  But the lessons, the memories, the joy, the entertainment, the values, the inspiration we gained from someone’s life – they all continue.  We don’t fear a book’s finale, nor are we depressed when it arrives.  For every beginning, for every story, there must always be an end.  Unfortunately, that’s not how we often think about death.

Another lesson I’ve learned from time at the edge of my dad’s life is that how we die is determined by how we live.  Leonardo da Vinci once said that as happy sleep comes at the end of a fulfilling day, a happy death comes at the end of a meaning filled life.

My dad’s final days, however, were not very happy.  Doctors fought hard to save him and he went through a lot of pain and suffering as a result.  In retrospect, it all seems so needless.  Much of that is because my dad avoided the topic of dying when he was well.  As a doctor, he was strangely quiet when faced with a terminal patient.  He was otherwise an outwardly confident and boisterous man.  But death frightened him, and so he did not talk about it.  When death suddenly loomed for him, we did not know what he wanted – to fight hard against the dying of the light, or to go gently into the good night.

Fortunately, however, my dad must have evolved his thoughts about dying within the last few months.  This last March he told me that he could not make the decision to end my mom’s life when she becomes terminal.  After 59 years with her, that decision would be too hard for him, he said.  Such a statement revealed how much he loved her – something which he rarely revealed.  But the important thing for me was that dad finally talked about death.  He was thinking about it.

Two days after his stroke my dad told my brother that when a person’s time is up, it is simply up.  That matter of fact assertion is further proof to me that dad had evolved.  No longer were thoughts of dying to be avoided. 

Later still, only hours before he was placed on a ventilator, he looked intently at me and said, “Let’s end this.  I don’t want to be a burden to my family.”  While my siblings and I later debated those words and if he was able to understand what he said, they were added evidence my dad stood at the edge of life and thought not of himself or his fears, but of my mom, me and my siblings.  Dying would not only be a relief to him, but he wanted us to be relieved as well.  His words helped us later understand that he was  was at peace about dying.  When we reluctantly realized he’d had enough, we were able to lovingly give him his last wish.

What I’ve learned, though, is that we need to make our wishes about dying clearly known before we reach that edge.  I’ve also learned that in order to die well, we need to evolve throughout life to reconcile relationships and be at peace with others.  Fortunately, my dad did that.

He and I had a complicated relationship.  I know I am not the son my dad would have preferred.  I’m not macho, a so-called jock, a man’s man.  I’m introspective and often quiet.  My dad was the exact opposite – often speaking with a loud, boisterous voice.  He usually filled a room with his presence.  He liked the rough and tumble sports of football and basketball – and he was good at them.   As a doctor, he was the epitome of a surgeon – self-confident and a bit arrogant.    I once playfully teased him with a joke – “What’s the difference between God and a surgeon? ……God knows he’s not a surgeon.”

When I came out as gay eleven years ago, dad was clearly disappointed.  I had confirmed his lifelong fears about me.  He had often made fun of gay men – affecting a limp wrist or telling vulgar stories about them.  Those hurt me and their memories can still sting.

I think in many ways his attitudes toward me led me to deny who I am when I was younger.  I wanted to be the kind of man my dad could admire.  My inability to accept that I was gay, however, was not all his fault.  At some point in life we must take responsibility for ourselves and not blame others. 

Even so, I used to be angry with my dad.  At one point many years ago, I broke off my relationship with him and told him he could not see my daughters.  If he thought it amusing to regularly make fun of me, then he could not enjoy his granddaughters.  That was a cruel and immature response on my part.  I regret it a lot.  But it led my dad to appear at my door three months later.  He came in, fumbled for words, and apologized.  I immediately accepted his apology and offered my own.  Just before departing, he turned to me and with a catch in his voice, told me for the only time in my life, that he loved me.  I value that memory a lot.

        My dad showed other evidence of evolving several years ago.  He began to listen to my thoughts and opinions.  He showed me new respect.  Perhaps my courage to come out impressed him.  Still later, he was kind and welcoming toward Keith.  Last September when Keith and I visited my parents in California. I was impressed at how open and communicative my dad was with Keith.  He fully accepted him as a part of our family and thereby, I think, he fully accepted me.

As my dad evolved, I evolved too.  One thing I’ve learned is to let go of past hurts and forgive those who have hurt me – especially family members.  I mentally made my own peace about dad several years ago.  I’ve always loved him but I evolved to be able to also like him simply for who he was. 

It’s a truth that has stood the test of time – when all is said and done and one nears the end of life, it’s family whom we want nearby.  Forgiveness, empathy and old fashioned love triumphing over hurt and past wounds are what helps insure that at the most sensitive time in life, families are united.

As I said earlier, in order to die well, one must be explicit in telling others what your wishes are for when you are seriously ill or near death.  Some want to fight their illness no matter what.  Others value quality of life versus quantity of life.  If quality of life will be severely compromised, some people often want all treatment to stop.

Living Wills are helpful but they are limited in scope and written for when a person is clearly beyond hope of recovery.  Experts indicate one should consider preparing instead a statement of five end of life wishes.  I’ve listed those on the back of your programs along with the website.  Who do you want to make health care decisions for you when you can’t?  What kinds of medical treatments do you want, or not want, if you are severely ill?  How comfortable do you want to be when you are very sick?  Medications are used to keep people comfortable but they can compromise treatments.  How do you want people to treat you near the end of life?  What do you want your loved ones to know when you are near death?

These are questions I wish my father had answered when he was well.  They would have made the decisions my sibling nags and I made  easier.

One of the seven Unitarian Universalist principles states that every person should be treated with dignity.  For me, that must include dignity at the end of life.  Medical science has many tools available to keep people alive, and the first instinct of most health professionals is to do exactly that.  Their mindset is guided by our culture which insists that death should be avoided at all costs.  But a compassionate approach to life should also include a compassionate approach to death.  I believe most people value quality of life over quantity of life.  We must insure that each person has a reasonable quality of life – and when quality is greatly reduced or cannot be recovered, natural death ought to be encouraged.

Approximately ten years ago the World Health Organization endorsed what is called Palliative Care for the very sick and dying.   It is, “an approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering.”  This is done by addressing the physical, emotional and spiritual needs of a patient during the end of life process.

Fortunately, such a Palliative Care team works at the hospital in which my father was treated.  They were simply wonderful.

The most important lesson that was reinforced for me, however, is what I said earlier.  How we die will almost entirely be determined by how we have lived.  Make your end of life wishes very clear, write them down and communicate them to whomever you’ve asked to represent you.  Find in your heart the ability to make peace with yourself and all family members and friends.  Forgiveness is a gift not to an offender, but to yourself.  We should each exit life full of love for everyone – whether or not they have hurt us in the past.

Our sense of well-being when we die will also be determined by a sense that death is not our true end.  No matter what one believes, or doesn’t believe about a literal afterlife, we live onward in the things we do now.  How much love have we put into the world?  How have the lives of others – and of future generations – been improved because we lived?  What are the legacies of service and generosity we leave behind that will echo long into the future?

My dad volunteered with Operation Smile, an organization that sends surgeons to repair cleft lips and palates in children free of charge. I accompanied him on one of those trips about fifteen years ago and I helped facilitate my dad’s surgery on one 11 year old boy.  He was very shy, very reserved and timid.  His father told me other kids teased him about his different appearance.  My dad’s surgery on the boy was successful and when I returned to Belize a year later, the boy had markedly changed in personality.  He was happy, more talkative and clearly more confident.

I thought of that boy in the past few weeks – a boy who is now a man, perhaps married and raising children of his own.  My dad impacted that boy’s life in a significant way but he also indirectly affected the lives of that boy’s future wife, or husband, and his children.  Echoes of my dad’s generosity and compassion thus extend outward in many ways.  Those affected will never know my dad’s name but he nevertheless lives onward.  That’s one of his resurrections.  That is one of his after-lifes.

I deeply pray that each of us, when our time comes, will go gently into that good night – knowing we move into eternity at peace with our life legacy, at peace with death and how we die, and most importantly at peace and in love with everyone.

(c) Rev. Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

I made a vow many years ago not to devote Sunday services to celebrate Mother’s or Father’s Day.  There are simply too many good people who are not parents.  But, in keeping with my message topic for today on the eight pillars of joy, one of which is humor, I offer these quotes on motherhood and life from the late, great humorist Erma Bombeck.

According to Erma, the only reason most busy moms take up jogging is so that they can hear heavy breathing again.

Her theory on housework is, if the item doesn’t multiply, smell, catch fire, or block the refrigerator door, let it be. No one else cares. Why should you?

We should always seize the moment by remembering all those women on the ‘Titanic’ who waved off the dessert cart.

Know the difference between success and fame.  Success is Mother Teresa.  Fame is Madonna.

I wonder why when our babies cutely giggle, they belong to daddy, but when they have a sagging diaper that smells like a landfill, “They want their mommy.”

For years I suggested to my husband that we take separate vacations.  But when we did, the kids kept finding us.

Always spend at least one Mother’s Day with your potential Mother-in-Law.  If your potential husband gives his mom a gift certificate for a flu shot, dump him.

I don’t think women outlive men.  It only seems longer to women.

When your mother asks, ‘Do you want a piece of advice?’ it is a mere formality. It doesn’t matter if you answer yes or no. You’re going to get it anyway.

My message theme this month has been “Our search for well-being” and I’ve used the Book of Joy, by the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu, as a primary resource for three messages.  The first was on the nature of joy.  Last week’s was on obstacles to joy and today’s message topic will be on the eight pillars of joy. 

One of those pillars, or keys to lasting contentment, is to encourage in ourselves a strong sense of humor.    Echoing Erma Bombeck’s statement that “she who laughs…..lasts”, the Book of Joy tells us that humor is a primary way to diffuse sadness.  It’s a gift we share with others just as it is a gift to our attitudes.  A healthy sense of humor, a playful or slightly goofy demeanor do not mean we cruelly mock others.  Humor helps create joy by gently teasing one another or by pointing out the amusing ironies of life – much like Erma Bombeck did.

Both the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu modeled that attitude by having fun with each other and, as they say in the book, always smiling.  Those who smile a lot give evidence of their inner peace and joy.  Their smiles and laughter are contagious.  Everyone enjoys being around an upbeat, funny and joyful person.

I quoted Erma Bombeck as an introduction to my message in hopes  it initiates some humor and joy.  But as with many things, any joy created from a few funny lines will be temporary.  We need, as the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu say, ways to build not just occasional happiness, but ways to build an enduring sense of well-being.  As the book says, such a demeanor is one that is not shaken in times of trouble.  Joyful people remain peaceful no matter their circumstances. 

After defining what they mean by joy, which Is a perpetual state of mind and not mere happiness – which can come and go, and after sharing the several obstacles to joy, the two men share in the final portion of the book the 8 pillars, or ways to build, lasting joy.  I will list list them in what I believe is their order of importance.

The root of all forms of suffering, I believe, is too much preoccupation with the self.  Most religions and forms of spirituality agree.   At some point in life, people acquire the misguided belief that the only way to be happy is to look out for number one.  Life is viewed through a prism of “me” – what I need, what I want, what affects me for good or bad.  The cure for that condition, according to the Book of Joy, is to think less of the self and more about others.  What do others need, what do they want, what affects them for good or bad?  That “others oriented” thinking leads directly to one of the 8 pillars of joy – humility.

An ego driven attitude causes separation between people, the Book of Joy says.  Self-centered people think their needs or thoughts are superior to others.  Life becomes a competition to get what each person wants.  By adopting humility in our hearts and minds, we no longer feel the need to compete or feel superior.  We are content with what we have and who we are.  Engaging with one another equally is how humble people live.

Such people derive their joy from seeing other people are content.  They praise others more than they seek recognition for themselves.  And numerous studies show such humility is good for relationships.  Couples that thrive are ones where the partners regularly affirm the other.

The Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu also encourage a sense of perspective for building contentment.  One should figuratively look at the forest, and not the tree – they say.  Too often, we focus on one event that causes us to suffer, without seeing the bigger picture – that a time of pain is a minor thing in the totality of our lives and that it is only one small bit of hurt in a world awash with terrible suffering.  A sense of perspective is a pillar of joy that I believe follows directly from humility.

I love Desmond Tutu’s praise for those who remain positive and not cynical.  He shared the example of how people deal with a car salesman.  Someone without perspective sees a car salesman as an enemy.  The negotiation will be tough and one must fight to win. If we humble ourselves to the point where we have a broader perspective, we will empathize with the needs of the salesman.  We will see the potential loss of some money as a minor thing compared to remaining peaceful and content.  Our needs are not the primary factor for us.

With a better sense of perspective, we gain an attitude of acceptance – one of the other 8 pillars of joy.  When we learn to accept the flow of life as something natural and not to be fought, we enhance our sense of well-being.  Perspective allows us to recognize the things that we can change, and those we cannot.  Acceptance then asks us to let go of things over which we have no control – whether a storm will ravage our homes, or someone will hurt us for no reason.  This attitude is much like drifting down a river.  We cannot control when placid times occur nor when challenging rapids happen.  We might try to steer ourselves toward calmer waters but overall, life is something we learn to take as it comes – embracing change and challenges as good things – ones that help us grow and learn.

Emerging from acceptance comes another means to acquire contentment.  We must learn to quickly and easily forgive.  If we accept that everybody suffers, we’ll recognize that we are all fragile and flawed creatures.  Others will inevitably offend me from time to time.   And I will inevitably offend others.  In the same way that I hope for mercy when I cause hurt, I must be willing to offer the same.  Such is the Golden Rule at work. 

Forgiveness will also come when I understand why I suffer.  It’s my mind that causes me to feel wounded by thoughts that I’ve been hurt, my sense of self has been belittled or, I’m entitled to be angry when someone criticizes me.  Those thoughts are what cause me to suffer far more than the original offense.  When I let go of those thoughts by forgiving the offender, I help myself.  Anger is a poison to MY soul.  Learning to forgive is the cure.

Gratitude and generosity are two additional pillars to joy.  I believe they are closely linked.  If we are not grateful, I don’t think we can be truly generous.  When we find some sense of humility, we recognize all that we have in life.  We become aware of the gift of life, of our relative good health, of the blessing that family, friends, shelter and food are.

In response, we will then instinctively want to pay forward some of our abundance by giving away time, treasure and talent.  Generosity is also a logical outcome of humility.  When we give, we demonstrate that our focus is not on ourselves, but on the well-being of others.  In the process, we find satisfaction from giving and prove numerous studies that indicate money can indeed buy happiness – when we give it away to help others.

The capstone to all of the 8 pillars of joy is compassion.  It is the product resulting from each pillar.  Indeed, according to the Book of Joy we will never be content unless our default way of thinking, speaking and acting is wrapped in compassion.  Every interaction we have with others – no matter the situation – ought to be with a desire for empathy and compassion.  Suffering is a fact of life and it is our purpose both to feel sympathy for the hurting and then act on ways to comfort and help them.

There have been, as the Dalai Lama notes, thousands of books written about how to find happiness.  It is the life motivator for every person.  But the irony presented by the Book of Joy is that well-being does not come  by seeking happiness for oneself.  It comes by seeking it for others.  When we do that, we strangely benefit.  That fact speaks to our human nature.  Despite many cultural prompts that tell us to be selfish, something deep inside our DNA directs us to help and soothe someone else.  And doing so fills us with satisfaction.  That is not a logical result from self-sacrifice but it is true.  We are hard-wired to be most content when we think of others.

Such a truth is found in people of history we identify as being most at peace with life and with other people.  Such are people known for their compassion and humility – people of history like the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu, Martin Luther King, Jr., Jesus, Anne Frank, Mohammad, Mother Teresa, the Buddha, Clara Barton, Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, St. Francis and others.

Reality tells us there are countless persons just like them – some who are a part of this congregation – people whose very presence is profoundly peaceful and compassionate.  Such are winsome people to whom others are naturally drawn and want to be like. 

A spirituality for our lives and, indeed, for our eternities, is to be a person of genuine and lasting joy.  As the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu demonstrate, people of joy build legacies of kindness.  They do compassionate things in small ways – all the time.  A smile here, a gesture there, an anonymous gift, a random act of kindness, a selfless attitude – these are the building blocks of a life that has impact.  At a time when it seems the happiest person is someone who brags the most, surrounds himself with gold and luxury, and thinks only of how wonderful he is, lessons from the Book of Joy emphatically say otherwise.

Today, on Mother’s Day and with my message on what creates true joy, I think of my mom as perhaps you do too.  My mom  was and is far from perfect.  A simple woman who is now slowly moving toward death in an Alzheimer’s facility, my mom nevertheless has given a lot in her life.  Daughter, wife, mother, long-time volunteer at Hospice of Cincinnati, compassionate – and very content – resident in a dementia home, her life was and is defined by how she has cared for others and not just herself.  That’s an example set by many moms, dads and good friends, and one I aspire to copy.

       I thank you for listening.

 

(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

I have spoken before about my admiration for Victor Frankl, the holocaust survivor and author of the book Man’s Search for Meaning.  His theory for how to find inner peace is to discover one’s purpose for living.  We all can have a life purpose, Frankl believes, but it must be found and then developed.

Frankl relates his experiences in a Nazi concentration camp where it goes without saying that he and millions of others suffered horrible conditions.  As a student of Sigmund Freud, Frankl was forced to leave behind his greatest achievement in life, an almost finished book on logotherapy which is his theory that we are most fulfilled through finding life meaning.

Frankl realized in the concentration camp, however, that his suffering gave him the perfect opportunity to test his logotherapy theory.  In the midst of relentless hardship, could he find some meaning for his condition and thereby gain inner peace?  Were there others that did the same?

Frankl concluded that by focusing on things greater than himself, and not on his misery, he was able to find peace, compassion and even strength.  For him, that meant focusing on two things that gave him meaning.  First, he endeavored to reflect repeatedly on the great love of his life – his wife who had already been killed.  His reflections were not on her loss, but on the love and mystical connection he had with her.  He was able to sense her presence and feel as if he could hold her hand and speak to her.  The joy he felt in focusing on her – and the meaning love for her gave him – helped him greatly.

Frankl did the same with his life work on logotherapy.  He spent hours recalling all of the research he had done and the conclusions he’d made.  He endlessly pondered those and arrived at new ideas such that he was able to mentally continue his work. 

By focusing on his wife and his work, and the meaning that each gave him, this enabled Frankl to survive and even find some joy.  As he wrote in his book about the concentration camp, “People forget that often it is just such an exceptionally difficult external situation which gives man the opportunity to grow spiritually beyond himself.”  Meaning, he believed, comes when we transcend ourselves to instead think about others.

Frankl noted that it was not Nazi against Jew, but rather simply people against people.  He saw guards exhibit great compassion toward the Jewish captives just as he witnessed brutality by some Jews toward fellow inmates.  Those who were at peace, who defined the best in humanity, were those who helped others.  They were kind, shared their meagre food rations and lifted up the spirits of others.  Such people found satisfaction not in feeling sorry for themselves, but in love and compassion for fellow inmates and guards.

And that simple concept is the basic premise of the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu in their Book of Joy.   Compassion for others is the foundation for overcoming obstacles to joy – which is my topic for today.  Indeed, that is the stated purpose for their discussion and book – to offer specific ways people can overcome suffering, fear, anger or envy that prevents a deep contentment with life no matter one’s circumstances – a state of mind they call “joy”.

Fittingly, the Dalai Lama concluded the discussion about obstacles to joy by jokingly saying he hopes to go to hell instead of heaven.  In hell, he said, he will still be content because there are people whom he can help!   That comment highlights what the book tells us is the key to finding joy.  Life is not about us and our needs.  We were not born, we are not the products of millions of years of evolutionary development, just to seek pleasure and suck up resources.  We live for a purpose to help others and help make the world better because we lived.  We must discover our answer to the single most common spiritual question people ask: why am I here? 

How we answer that question will not only guide us in how we live, it will determine our quality of life.  As both the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu agree, life is about loving others at least as much as we love ourselves.  It all boils down to the Golden Rule shared by every world religion.  The meaning of life, and the way to overcome obstacles to joy, is to think less of self and more about the other.

That is a simple prescription, but it is not simple to achieve.  Thinking less of self and more about the other, according to the Book of Joy, is an attitude and way of living that develops slowly and with dedicated intention.  We can’t expect to immediately and perfectly be compassionate in all we do.  We must strengthen our compassion muscles, so to speak, by continually reminding ourselves – and meditating – to step away from thoughts and emotions about the self.

For every obstacle to joy that the two men discuss, the bottom line solution is always the same: find empathy for others.  When we are anxious or stressed, that is almost always caused by fears for personal well-being.  But the cure to those fears is to instead think of others – how they suffer and the compassion one feels for them.  When our boss is too demanding, our partner has a few imperfections, someone pulls out in front of us, or we feel overwhelmed by the busy-ness of life, we can step away from the anxiety those circumstances cause by cognitively reframing our thinking.  We might compassionately think: “My boss has life challenges too and I must think of ways to help her.”  “My partner is not perfect because of past hurts he experienced.  I must love him all the more.”  “The person who cut me off in traffic is probably rushing to the hospital or a similar emergency.  I must think compassionately toward him.”  The irony of stress is that it leads us to think and worry about ourselves – which leads to even more anxiety.  We can step out of that vicious cycle by thinking of others.

The same is true when we are angry.  We need to ask ourselves, why are we so upset?  In almost every case it is because we feel offended or challenged.  To feel hurt by another is a natural response, but the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu ask us to turn our anger into compassion for the one who hurt us.  As it is with stress, anger is a poison to our minds and bodies.  Anger causes more anger.  Why would we not want to feel a positive emotion instead? 

Dispelling anger was the amazing example set by Desmond Tutu and black South Africans when they held reconciliation councils after the end of apartheid.  Tutu asked white oppressors to publicly and truthfully confess the full extent of their past hateful actions.  By doing so, he helped initiate feelings of forgiveness toward the whites that allowed black people to move past their anger – feelings that could not continue if they hoped to heal.  Honest confession and contrition by some of the whites allowed them to unburden themselves and develop love and respect for blacks.  Both groups purposefully sacrificed their needs for the sake of reconciliation and peace.

We can do the same with jealousy and envy.  Such feelings are again caused by selfish desires and a feeling we deserve what others have.  It is a difficult task to undertake, but the antidote for envy is to develop joy for another’s well-being.  When someone drives by in a beautiful new car, the answer to jealousy is to instead be happy for what the other person does have.

Sadness is another obstacle to joy.  Much like suffering is the pathway to growth, sadness is an emotion that directly leads to compassion.  “We don’t really get close to others if our relationship is made up of unending hunky-dory-ness,” Desmond Tutu says.  “It is sadness and grief that knit us together.” 

This is best exemplified at funerals.  We find in shared grief with others an intimacy that is comforting.  We also find, I believe, greater appreciation for the one who was lost.  That is why I encourage people not to be afraid of mourning – if it is focused on remembering the deceased individual and the blessings they gave.  That is what Victor Frankl did.  He could have sunk into despair over his wife’s horrible death, but he instead continually meditated on his abiding love for her.

The greatest fear and cause of suffering most people have, according to the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu, is the fear of illness and death.  I’ve been sadly honored to officiate at many funerals.   One was for a former member of the Gathering, Mary Jo Campbell, who also attended here and whose funeral was held in this sanctuary.  She suffered from Type I diabetes.  She’d already had a kidney transplant but that was failing and she was left with no options for getting better.  In the months before she died, she began talking with me about death and remembering the good things in her life.  She had once been a minister so she and I formed a close friendship. 

Mary Jo faced death matter of factly.  “It’s my time,” she told me.  “I’ve had a really good life.”   Several months before she passed, she performed the marriage ceremony for her son and his new wife.  She asked me to attend so a current minister could legally sign the marriage certificate.

A month before she died, the couple gave birth to Mary Jo’s first grandchild.  She was once again thrilled.  She was failing quickly but she told me one day that performing the marriage ceremony and meeting her first grandchild reinforced the satisfaction she felt about life.  She spent years joyfully serving and thinking of others – and she died doing the same.

Unfortunately, we think the pathway to joy is to pursue pleasure and thus eliminate pain.  But the Book of Joy tells us it is paradoxically the opposite.   Contentment comes by looking past our pain.  Suffering is all in the mind.  It’s we who tell ourselves “poor me” or “he makes me so angry”, or “why can’t I have a bigger house and take exciting vacations?”  That whining voice in the head only makes one hurt even more.  We must tell that voice to shut up and replace it with one emanating from our better selves – “I’m blessed to have all that I do.”  “I want to help those who suffer.”  “I love my partner and friends – despite their few flaws.”  “I forgive those who have deeply hurt me.  I will hope the best for them.”  Let us fill our hearts and minds with compassion and love.  By doing so, we will create an attitude of peace and joy toward life, and toward the entire one human family.

(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

 

 

Eight months after the 2011 tsunami that devastated Japan and killed over ten-thousand people, the Dalai Lama travelled to one of the most ravaged towns.  He visited one temple that had miraculously been spared ruin.  Hundreds of people gathered to see him.  He was greeted at the Temple gates by three children who were orphaned by the disaster.  Lined up in the Temple were hundreds of boxes of victim’s cremation ashes.  The town had brought them to be blessed by the Dalai Lama.

When he personally greeted those in the assembled crowd, many of them sobbed uncontrollably.  “Bless these victims, bless us” they cried.  The Dalai Lama was deeply moved.  All around him was human tragedy on a massive scale.  As he often does, he held the faces of many in his hands while he looked into their eyes.  “Please,” he asked, “help everyone else and work hard.  That is the best offering you can make to the dead.”  As he turned to walk back to the altar, tears were in his eyes.

This great man of peace and wisdom was himself struggling with grief.  It is likely he related to their pain.  At age 23, only days after ascending to be spiritual and civil leader of six-million Tibetans, the Dalai Lama was forced into exile to stop the killing of his people by mainland Chinese invaders.  He left behind close friends and even his small dog – one he cherished.  Two days later, he heard they had all been killed.  In the fifty-nine years since, he’s never been able to return to his beloved Tibet.

In times of suffering, the Japanese often turn to one of their most revered poets – Issa – who lived and wrote in the 18th century.  Issa’s life story is almost mythic in the extent of suffering.  His mother died when he was two.  Later in life, his first son, a daughter and then his father all died in a typhoid epidemic.  Still later, his one-year old daughter died, he became partially paralyzed and then his wife died in childbirth.  He remarried but his house was destroyed in a fire.  That wife soon became pregnant and all signs pointed to a healthy birth – but Issa died a month before his last child was born.

Issa’s most famous haiku poems compare life to droplets of dew.  Appearing as sparkling jewels that dot a morning landscape, dew drops nevertheless quickly vanish with a rising sun.  Life is like that, he implies.  There are great bursts of beauty and happiness, but then all is over.  We disappear into vapor.  In a poem entitled “On the Death of a Child”, Issa wrote, “Dew Evaporates, And all our world is dew…so dear, so fresh, so fleeting.” 

Issa captured a common Japanese mindset toward pain.  Outwardly stoic, many Japanese bottle up their grief until it is too much and they pour it out.  Instead of finding ways to understand and be at peace with what befalls them, the Japanese suffer like all people.  We perceive tragedies all around us, we realize we are not immune, and we spend life working to avoid hurt or putting bandaids on our fears.  In the end, we die without ever understanding what brings lasting joy.

As many of you know, Buddhism identifies four noble truths which are its foundational beliefs and designed to address the pattern of human existence.  The first of Buddhist noble truths is that tragedy is a fact of life.  Whether it be physical or emotional injury from acts of nature, or the hurt caused by other people, nobody can escape the unfortunate circumstances of life.  They happen to everyone and we are fools if we think otherwise.

The second noble truth is that humans suffer because, in an effort to avoid the inevitability of tragedy, they put their trust in things that do not last.  We desire houses that will protect us or make us happy because they are large and well decorated.  We seek foods that please our palates and offer momentary pleasure.  We do the same with alcohol, drugs, cars, clothing, cell phones and romantic relationships.  We somehow think we can acquire happiness and thus inoculate ourselves from the inevitability of the first noble truth. 

But this second noble truth is what causes us to truly suffer.  It’s our minds and not our circumstances that makes us feel sad, anxious or fearful.  Consuming a good meal or glass of wine may grant us momentary happiness, but their pleasurable effects are fleeting.  The same with a big house, expensive car or sex.  As soon as we get it, we usually want something better or we find the toll such things cause in terms of anxiety – we have to maintain a house and worry about whether it will be broken into, cars break down and need repair, they get scratches and are even destroyed.  We eat food, have a drink or engage in sex – the pleasures of life – but we soon want more only to find what we once desired brings us instead frustration, worry and more desire.  We want, we get, but then we want even more.  We embark on an endless cycle of pursuing happiness because we never discover the keys to satisfaction with life itself.

Our desire for things that don’t last is thus the cause of most suffering, Buddhists believe.   The third noble truth of Buddhism, however, offers us those keys to finding contentment. We can eliminate our desires by meditating on and practicing what is permanent and universally good – peace, compassion and generosity.  This third truth logically follows from the first two.  Most importantly, it is the way to find lasting, soul deep satisfaction.  Pleasing our physical selves is the way to instant gratification – but long term misery.  Pleasing our essential humanity, our inner selves, offers us the possibility of infinite joy.

And that concept, finding lasting joy, is the theme for this message and my next two.  As I’ve announced over the past month, I’ll use as the touchstone for these messages The Book of Joy by the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.  If you have not read the book, that’s perfectly fine.  I hope there will be insights you gain and thoughts you can share.  If you did read the book, I trust you will offer your own interpretation of its primary points.

While it might seem odd that a Buddhist monk and a Christian Archbishop could agree on something as significant as lasting joy, they do.  And that speaks to the broad agreements most forms of spirituality have.  It also speaks to our Unitarian Universalist belief that people take different paths to find ultimate Truth – be that nirvana, Allah, Yahweh, Christ, Brahmin, the unifying scientific theory of the universe, or whatever.  Many paths, as we say, all heading toward the same One goal.

What I related earlier about the beliefs of Buddhism are remarkably similar to those of Christianity and, for that matter, to Judaism and Islam.  Dysfunction in the world, these religions believe, comes from selfishness.  Our inclinations often lead us to think only of our wants.  But when we focus on that which is greater than ourselves – on the essentials of good in the world like love, compassion, peace and gratitude – we approach the ultimate Truth we all seek.  For Christians, that is understanding the heart of God and the example of Jesus; for Buddhists its nirvana, for Pantheists and Pagans, it’s oneness with all creation.

As Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama relate in their book, focusing on things that last is how we can find lasting joy.  It’s not found in the material things of this world but in the mystical satisfaction of letting go of self and experiencing communion with other people, with nature, and with a deep love for all.

In the first section of the Book of Joy, one that is labeled “the Nature of Joy”, Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama quickly find common ground about the definition of joy.  It’s not being happy they agree, which is fleeting.  Joy is a kind of contentment, satisfaction and peaceful way of life that exists whether we are happy or in pain.  It’s an overarching demeanor that continually defines how we talk and act.  Desmond Tutu compared it to the kind of deep joy mothers often find after childbirth.  Emerging from a cloud of suffering comes a deep wellspring of love for the newborn and satisfaction in nurture and compassion for the child.  In some ironic way, suffering is the springboard to real joy – not the momentary happiness at first seeing and holding the infant, but in the contented moments of caring for and serving another human being.  If we think about it, raising a child is one of the great sacrifices a human makes.  Parents discover lasting treasure in the act of pouring their lives into another.  Others discover it in similar ways through serving family, friend or stranger.

The Dalai Lama agreed with the Archbishop on that essential truth.  Throughout life we experience pain, but real joy comes in making sense of it through compassion, service and letting go of self.  The Dalai Lama dismissed the trials of his own life because, he said, he realized people around the world hurt too.  Such knowledge that others are in pain is the means by which we move past it.  We become united with all human pain.  Our hearts open wide with compassion for others.  We are driven to love, serve and give.  No longer is life about me, my small pains and the pitiful plans I lay to prevent them.  Life is about the well-being of all humanity.  It’s about you, my love for you, and the ways you hurt that I might help alleviate.  Life is about meeting the purpose for which I was born – to make the world better because I exist.  And when I do that, as the Archbishop says, God smiles. 

       We should ponder that a moment.  Whatever we believe God to be, she smiles at our goodness and compassion toward others. And we smile too.  Joy is found in that simple but profound experience.

This universal truth about the sacrificial pathway to joy does not mean, both men agree, on total self-denial.  We must, the Dalai Lama says, take care of ourselves without doing so selfishly.  Compassion, he relates, will not fill his stomach.  But when we do eat, we must do so without attachment and selfish desire.  Christians believe much the same.  We are incapable of serving others if our basic needs are not first met.  That’s a small symbolic needle to thread but it’s a task we each must practice.  When do I have enough?  When should my attentions turn away from me and toward another?  When I’m offended or hurt by another, how can that incident become not about my hurt feelings, but about empathy and compassion for the offender?  As the Dalai Lama says on page 47 in the book, “Too much self-centered thinking is the source of suffering.  A compassionate concern for others’ well-being is the source of happiness.”

To enable compassionate thinking and a reduced focus on the self, the Dalai Lama and the Archbishop agree we must train our minds.  Joy is a state of being that we learn to achieve.  We can undertake mediation,  reflection or prayer to turn our minds to thoughts of gratitude – for being loved, finding our life purpose, or for having opportunities to give and serve.  We consciously humble ourselves so that in any of our thinking, we do not think of the self – such as: Why am I in pain?   Why have my feelings been hurt by another?  What pleasures can I find?  How much money can I earn?  Etc. etc. 

Instead, through letting go of our egos, through thinking about others and ways that they hurt, we train our attitude to be outwardly focused.  We don’t, to paraphrase John F. Kennedy, ask what the world can give us.  We ask instead what we can give the world.  We simplify our lives and our needs as much as possible.  We encounter a stranger on the street and we wish them a good day.  We don’t judge and try to improve someone and their flaws.  We don’t think we are better then they, or that they unfairly have more than us.  We empathize with them, try to understand the why behind their flaws, and then we simply love them.

I don’t believe it is a coincidence that the Book of Joy was written by two men of color.  Indeed, the Dali Lama and Desmond Tutu have personally suffered extreme oppression because of their skin color.  They have also responded with what Desmond Tutu calls righteous anger – the kind that does not focus on the self but is angered in behalf of others.  Their call to us is that real joy is found not in a cocoon of indifference, or focus on the self, but in advancing compassion and service to others.  This congregation and the UUA in general can live out that teaching in how we respond to inequality and discrimination against all people – especial those of color.  That’s a way to build a lasting legacy and in the process create inner satisfaction in the knowledge we served the interests of others.  To do that will require deep introspection on how you and I are not only part of the problem but can be part of the solution – through humility, listening and kindness.

Quite simply, joy comes from how we exist in quiet, humble simplicity, in generous gratitude, and in sacrificial serving.  Only by pouring out ourselves into others do we ironically pour into ourselves – and thereby find the source of all truth, goodness and joyful well-being.

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(c) Doug Slagle, Minister to the Gathering at Northern Hills, All Rights Reserved

 

Professor Randy Pausch, of Carnegie Mellon University, wrote a book in 2008 entitled “Last Lecture.”  He had recently been diagnosed with metastatic pancreatic cancer and was given, at the most, six months to live.  It’s a tradition at Carnegie Mellon to have professors, at the end of their career, deliver a final lecture to students and colleagues.  Randy’s last lecture was so moving, so upbeat, and so full of wisdom, that the YouTube video of it went viral.  Millions around the world watched it.  He then turned it into a book which was published after he died.

In his remarkable lecture, Professor Paush apologized for not being morose and depressed, given his condition.  “If that disappoints you,” he laughingly said, “I’m sorry.”  His lecture is full of life lessons that had served him well.  To be lucky in life, he said, is simply matching hard work with opportunity.  We are all dealt a symbolic hand of cards in life.  Some get a lot of aces.  Others get too many deuces.  But the success and well-being we find in life, he said, does not depend on the cards we are given, but in how we play them.

Professor Paush was a big advocate of positive thinking.  Whining and complaining are not practices he endorsed.  Indeed, he believed that if people spent the time and energy they use to complain about a problem to instead figure out a solution, they’d be surprised at how much they could accomplish.

After he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, he and his wife resolved to enjoy one day at a time and not think about the future.  What helped him be positive throughout his life was to regularly practice a gratitude ritual – one where he spent a focused hour reflecting on the good in his life.  As he said, everybody – no matter how seemingly bad their circumstances – still have countless things for which to be grateful.

For me, Professor Paush’s thoughts and practices are appropriate ones for Unitarian Universalists on Easter Sunday.  Many of us, me included, don’t quite know what to do with this holiday.  It’s an explicitly Christian one that has mostly avoided becoming secularized like Christmas.  People all around us celebrate Easter and yet its central idea, that Jesus was miraculously resurrected from death, does not resonate with those who honor human reason and  ideals of compassion and charity over ancient religious stories.

But as a story or myth, Easter offers an important lesson much like Randy Paush’s last lecture.  From the horror and shock of Jesus’ crucifixion comes the unexpected surprise of Easter morning.  Life triumphs over death.  Morning light breaks the darkest of nights.  Good overcomes evil.  Ultimately, joy emerges from the depths of sorrow.

Indeed, Professor Paush’s terminal condition at age 47 was like all of our conditions – only sped up.  We are each, if we think about it, dying.  We just don’t know when.  And we are each, in the meantime, experiencing challenges, heartaches and disappointments.  To use Jesus’ story as an analogy, we too suffer the beatings and tortures of life.  And ultimately, our Cross awaits us.

But Easter offers us something surprising.  Paush’s “Last Lecture” book says the same.  In the midst of dying, there is renewal, life abundant and a type of resurrection.  There is work to be done, families to raise, people to love, charity to extend, gratitude to be shown and, most of all, joy to celebrate.  It might seem that life is a series of so-called Good Friday periods of suffering, but we are wrong.  Living is about Easter attitudes of changing ourselves, contentment and gratefulness.

My message series this month has been on the topic of rituals that define us.  As regularly practiced actions, rituals are full of symbolic meaning.  They are markers for major life events like a baby dedication, a graduation, marriage or memorial service.  They are weekly practices we do here – to honor our heritage, unity, and commitment to serve others.  Rituals can also be fun practices like family meals, a ridiculous family dance created by yours truly, or our regular social events.  They are also holiday practices we do at Christmas or, today, for Easter.  Rituals are not unthinking routines with little meaning.  Rituals, instead, define our beliefs and who we are.

For today’s purposes, rituals define us in how we live.  Do we endeavor to be like Randy Pausch – people who understand what it means to really live?   Are we Easter people – those who pluck something good out of bad, who persevere in spite of challenge, who continually renew themselves in order to become better?

To be spiritual, in my mind, is to explore the great questions of life. Why are we here?  What purpose do we serve?  How can we somehow make a difference in the world and thereby symbolically live forever?  And all world religions therefore practice rituals that provide their answers to those spiritual questions.  Christians ritually practice communion in which they symbolically express the ideal that with sacrifice and service comes greatness.  The Jewish people annually celebrate Passover rituals of a Seder meal in which justice and hope are remembered.  L’chaim – to life – is more than just a Jewish exclamation.  It captures the joy Jews feel at the abundance one has – love, life and good cheer.   Muslims practice the ritual of Ramadan fasting to purify their hearts and minds as a way to inspire personal renewal.  Buddhists do the same with their ritual of mindful meditation.  Hindus practice ritual samskaras throughout their lives honoring birth, coming of age, marriage, illness and death.

What links each of these many spiritual rituals is their affirmation of life renewal.  Today’s Easter holiday is no different.  Christians celebrate it in memory of Jesus’ resurrection.  We celebrate it in it’s broader meaning – one that can apply to everyone.  No matter the pain one might feel, no matter the challenges faced, there is hope and joy in the morning.

Too often we get stuck in what some psychologists call a negative mental loop.  For instance, someone might complain: life is so unfair – my boss does not recognize my abilities, I don’t make enough money, my dog doesn’t like me, wah-wah-wah.  He or she then becomes sad and upset.  Work and relationships suffer, and a repeat of the same negative thought loop occurs.

But a daily ritual to give thanks for the good one has, the Sunday rituals we practice here to symbolize commitment to unity, compassion and  truth, or a seasonal rituals to celebrate the renewal of nature, these are life enriching and life defining practices.  They remind us that life is not about us, our desires, and negative thinking. 

Life is instead about acts of kindness and service to others.  It’s about building a better world for future generations, and it’s about deep love for those in our midst – friends and family who support us, children in whom we pour ourselves, or the partner who holds us and lies by our side.

I understand the complexity of mental health.  For some, it is not about changing the way one thinks, but about serious chemical imbalances in the brain – things not easily corrected.  For the rest of us, however, the solution to our problems is not external, but internal.  The solution is in having a type of Easter mentality – that we can transform the inevitable pains of life into something meaningful and good.  It’s living as if we are like Randy Paush – or Jesus for that matter – people who exult in every moment of life even as they are dying.

Will we spend the finite time we have to complain, be angry, unforgiving, selfish, and small-minded?  Or will we build legacies of goodness – empowering and encouraging others, giving generously, loving lavishly, and laughing out loud at whatever comes our way?  As Professor Pausch asked in his last lecture, are we an Eeyore, or are we a Tigger?

Martin Seligman, a famous psychologist and author of many books on positive thinking (and, by the way, a frequent collaborator with our own Tom Lottman) says in his most recent book “Flourish”, that psychology is incorrectly focused on addressing the negative.  In other words, it is usually concerned with ways to eliminate depression, anger, or anxiety.  It is reactive instead of proactive.

Psychology, he writes, ought be more about fostering overall well-being and emotional health.  The goal should be to encourage living at peace with ourselves and others.  Are we fulfilled, engaged, and in mutually supportive relationships at home, work and play?

To find that all encompassing life satisfaction and thereby renew ourselves, Seligman says we should undertake personal rituals to 1) identify our individual strengths, 2) find the good in life, and 3) feel gratitude. 

In order to know our strengths, Seligman’s first suggestion, we should  remember and then write about a time in life when we literally flourished – when work, love and play all went well.  What were the successful things we did during that time?  What did we specifically do at work that made us feel fulfilled?  What about in our love lives – were we especially giving, attentive and romantic?  How did we play and recreate during that time?  What acts of kindness did we undertake that made us feel good?

Once we remember and identify our strengths – the things that help us feel like we are flourishing, we can better re-introduce them into our lives now – and thereby renew ourselves.

Second, Seligman says we can find the good in life by ritually every evening writing down three things that happened to us that day which went really well.  What task did we successfully accomplish?  What sense of intimacy and empathy did we build with another person?  What episode made us smile and feel enriched?

By keeping such a diary, ritually writing in it and ritually reading past entries, we’ll foster contentment in our minds and souls.  We will have no need to obsess over disappointments because we will have adopted a positive mindset.  No matter how bad things may be for any of us, there are good things in our each of our days.  Just getting up in the morning is a good thing.  Seeing the sunshine, laughing at a funny TV show, or eating a food we enjoy – these are small but rewarding joys.  We need to daily remember them and write them down to remind us in the future. 

Finally, Seligman suggests we regularly – as a type of ritual – practice an act of gratitude.  We might not only thank someone, but then we should specifically tell them how and what they did that prompted our thanks – they cooked a particularly delicious meal, made us laugh with a good joke or showed us love with an action or gift.  We could, as Randy Pausch did, ritually reflect on life’s blessings – no matter how small or trivial.  Finally, I try to pay forward the good that I have been given.  Basic gratitude prompts us to recognize all that we have.  True gratitude guides us share our blessings with others.

Even thought celebrating Easter can also be a life renewing ritual, I don’t believe its story is literally true.  Indeed, from what I’ve studied about early Christians, many of them (like the Gnostics) did not believe Jesus’ resurrection to be fact.  Its story was for them much like a fable – one intended to inspire.  My hope is that instead of rejecting this holiday as  based on fiction, we will embrace Easter for its symbolism that reminds us about renewal, hope and the triumph of good.

I hesitate to say this, but there is much more beauty in pain than we realize.  It’s an ironic truth, but adversity can build in us the kind of character, humility and gentleness that transforms us into ironically powerful people.  That power comes not from any strength we find, but in our ability to figuratively resurrect ourselves.

       Personally, I am blessed beyond merit.  I have two beautiful and compassionate daughters, a man I love, parents and siblings who care for me, a job that deeply fulfills me – and all of you whom I count as dear friends.  I must honor and remember those blessings by becoming an Easter person – someone full of hope, gratitude and joy.  I hope you will join me in that endeavor.