Channing Memorial Church
Unitarian Universalist
Ellicott city, Maryland
The Reverend Susan LaMar, Minister
February 13, 2005

 A Caring Congregation

            There are many, many, things that contribute to a thriving and vital church community. Worship together is one of them. A strong and active, stimulating and deep religious education program is another. Those are the things that show most visibly – probably the things that people first think of when they think about church. But there are less visible things that create a church body – less visible activities that go on among church members to provide fertilizer for both growth and commitment. Growth in care and compassion, commitment to care and compassion.

            Today’s services – ours here in the sanctuary and the one the children are having across the hall – are focusing on the second of our seven Unitarian Universalist principles – the third in our series this year . This second principle is that “We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Associations covenant to affirm and promote justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.” The piece of it that I will be exploring today is “compassion” – how we can and do show compassion for one another in our religious community. And I will be speaking also of how the compassion and care that we bring to and grow here among one another is practice for that which we bring to and grow in our relationships with the wider community and world. I have mentioned several times this year this whole idea of the church as a way to practice – to rehearse -the values we claim to cherish and develop the strength to take them beyond our small community.

            I thought about preaching on this because of a conversation Cindy Williams and I had a month or so ago. Cindy is chair of our “Caring Committee” which is a group of church members and friends who are available to help or to find help for you – church members and friends – when it is needed. Sometimes it is just a matter of sending a card – acknowledgment from your church of a life passage. Sometimes the help is much more concrete – providing meals during an illness; helping with childcare through a crisis, providing a ride to medical appointments . . . there are any number of possibilities. It is basic hand-to-hand, human-to-human assistance

            Cindy mentioned to me that very few requests have been coming in lately. So together we decided that it might be time to lift up this vital part of church life. Time to remind all of us that this is something we do – as a natural part of our life together.

            You know, this whole idea of providing help is an interesting one in all Unitarian Universalist churches. It is another one of those things that we individualists struggle with. Not the giving part. We’re great at that. I think sometimes that a big part of our self-image has to do with being the ones who give help. Giving comes easily.

            Our own William Ellery Channing gives us a clue about this kind of giving. I particularly like his attitude about giving. Early in his spiritual development – while he was at Harvard, and remember he graduated from Harvard when he was only eighteen – early in his development he developed a theory of “disinterestedness.” What he meant by this was complete selflessness . . . complete lack of self-interest in one’s giving forth in compassion. One does not give because one expects anything in return. One gives because of an innate moral sense about right and wrong. But this idea would have flown in the face of two things for him: his upbringing as a Calvinist where doing right – giving, for example --  might, or might not,  indicate that one was a member of the elect predestined for heaven. Or, second, it would have gone against the prevalent thinking of his time that virtue was self-interest. If something makes life better for me it must be the right thing to do.

            If we give disinterestedly, we give forth with no expectation of anything in return.

            And therein lies a potential problem. It is hard for us to receive disinterestedly. It is really hard for many of us to acknowledge that we might actually need help. Oh no -- not me, we say. I can get through this all by myself. That will show the world what good character I have. How strong and self-sufficient I am.

Only wimps ask for help, we think. Asking for help is a sign of weakness, we suspect. And we often couch all of this in the guise of being kind to others – that not asking for help is kind of a backhanded way of being the caretaker for others. “I don’t want to bother anyone,” we say. “I don’t want to put them out of their way.”

And then when we make it through – if we make it through – we get to be very self-congratulatory.

            In my own case, I definitely got the message from my family growing up that needing help was a character flaw. A few years ago my sister, who is single and living in California, far away from any family (but with a wide circle of close friends), needed a serious operation. Our mother told her that she would come out to be with her during the surgery and during the recuperation period. I don’t know what my sister said, but I do remember my mother saying, in bewilderment, “I don’t understand why K --- seems so surprised that I would come out and take care of her when she needs it.” And I remember thinking, (although I don’t think I said it out loud) that I understood it completely . . . we were raised to be totally self sufficient. I don’t think my parents meant for us to take it quite so literally and to such an extreme, but somehow that was the message. Asking for help even seemed like a character flaw.

            I think that as Unitarian Universalists we also tend to think that in order to ask for help it has to be a life-and-death situation. Of course I’d ask for help if someone in the family died, we think. But this situation I am in is nothing like that. This situation is just that the whole family has the flu – adults and kids alike --  someone’s taking off on a business trip and we don’t have any milk in the house, and the oven just went on the fritz – and somebody’s costume for the school play needs to be sewn, and the transmission fell out of the car and the washing machine just overflowed . . . and oh if only someone would just bring me a bowl of cheerios so I don’t have to get it myself. Wouldn’t it be nice if someone brought over some macaroni and cheese and took a basket of dirty laundry and brought it back the next day all washed and folded? Yeah. . . you know it really would!

            I actually think that this is a class issue for us. Most of us in this congregation – most Unitarian Universalists -- are upper-middle and even upper class financially. (Have you ever noticed that no one ever identifies themselves as upper class?) We have very wide, strong and thick boundaries. A large portion of us live in free-standing single-family homes – wide boundaries between ourselves and our neighbors. We are separated physically from our extended families. We also are able to pay for services that help us – we may have housekeepers coming in; we pay for child care when needed. The kind of free-wheeling help that occurs in some neighborhoods may not occur in ours. (It also may – neighbors do in fact help one another out a lot.)

            But I found myself feeling almost a little jealous of the kind of community described in the paper the other week. It was an article about people living in a former motel – certainly not an ideal living situation, but the only one they could afford. And because of the proximity to one another, there was a lot of helping going on just in the natural course of life. People could see each other. They could see a need right before their eyes . . . could hear coughing in the room next door. There is a natural sharing that occurs in situations like that, or in neighborhoods where homes are close together. I’ve lived in a neighborhood like that – a very poor neighborhood, where we depended on one another. Perhaps it can happen in a way that seems more natural in that kind of a community . . . where help is offered without having to be asked for --- or even just provided without being asked for. No big, spatial boundaries keeping the people separate. Just someone showing up with a bowl of soup.

            Perhaps it is harder in a church community, where we live in different neighborhoods and communities, and probably do not see each other daily. We may barely know each other, except for sitting near each other on Sunday morning. So it is hard to pick up the phone and call a complete stranger to say – “I think I need some help.” But it is what we are here for. When we come to a church, we come with our whole lives, just as they are . . . sometimes needing help, sometimes giving it.

            I have had to wrestle with this idea of being open to receiving help in my life. It presented what for me was a difficult paradox. If we think that asking for help for ourselves is a character flaw, and yet we are willing to give help to those who we think need it, does that mean that we believe that all those people who need help have flawed characters? That’s the question that several years ago stopped me cold. Because if that was the case, then my offer of help might be coming from a feeling of contempt rather than compassion. From disdain rather than kindness. From a sense that I as a giver am a little – maybe even a lot – more blessed than they as a receiver. Or worse – that I am the one doing the blessing.

            As that horrifying thought occurred to me – that I might believe on some level that receivers of help have somehow flawed characters, I realized there was some serious spiritual work for me to do about that. I didn’t think I really believed that . . .  and even now I don’t think I ever really believed that . . . but it sure did seem to be the logical extension of my thought process.

            So I sure did have some reflection to do. Where, in my theology, would God be? Would God be with the giver – blessing that person “more” with the things to give and the desire and wherewithal to give it? Or would God be with the receiver, blessing that person with the help needed at a moment in time?

            Well, I don’t think that God is a being or an entity that takes sides. So it occurred to me, that in my theology God is in the point of the transaction between the giver and the receiver. Within that relationship is where generosity – giving – and gratitude – receiving, come together. So that the more giving and receiving there is in the world, the more God there is in the world. And I figured out that I believe that over the course of a lifetime, each individual human perhaps ought to strive for a balance between being a giver and a receiver. That keeps plenty of freshness to the God that is ever being created inside those transactions.

            This practice that we get caring for one another is perhaps one of the best ways of evangelizing there is. After a while it will begin to show. It will show not in an ostentatious way – not showy or flamboyant, looking for credit. It will show in the natural course of life. One colleague tells the story of two parishioners who were visiting another one in the hospital. . . They simply went and sat, keeping him company. As so often happens in hospital rooms, the roommate took notice and asked them who they were. Are you his brothers? No. Are you his coworkers? No. Well, who are you? We’re from his church. Really? Well, why are you here? To save his soul? To bless him? To hear his confession? What? No, we’re just here to keep him company. Wow, said the roommate. Your church does that? I wish I had a church that did that.

Well come on down!

            And you know what? In Unitarian Universalist theology, “keeping company” is the saving of a soul. We don’t call it that – and the definition of salvation is quite different from some – usually we’re not talking about salvation after death. . . it has to do with our souls as they are embodied right here on earth . . .  but that’s what it is. Compassion and companionship. Occurring at the intersection of giving and receiving.

What is your theology of giving and receiving of this nature? This person to person compassion and companionship? Or if you prefer a different language, what is your philosophy of giving and receiving, compassion and companionship? Or . . . a humanist formulation of the question . . . how does giving and receiving further the cause of humanity?  Which . . . giving or receiving . . . is harder for you? Why? How will you overcome that difficulty? If both are easy for you, can you articulate to others why, so that they might benefit from your theology or philosophy?

            Think about all of this this week, and beyond. This caring we do for one another here helps us create a habit of looking outward beyond ourselves. It rehearses us for engaging with communities beyond our own. We gain practice looking and living  outward, rather than inward. We prepare ourselves, I would suggest for moving even beyond Channing’s “disinterestedness” toward an even more powerful interest in the good of others.

            May you be blessed with compassion and love, and graced with the ability to receive it.