Channing Memorial Church
Unitarian Universalist
Ellicott City, Maryland
April 24, 2005

The Reverend Susan LaMar, Minister

An Open Christianity

 Three years ago, when I was an intern minister at First Church in Belmont, Massachusetts Unitarian Universalist, an interesting situation occurred in the Coming of Age program. One young woman in the class had been attending both the Unitarian Universalist church, with one parent and a Baptist Church with another parent. One day in the spring, as the class was preparing their personal credo statements about what they believed, this young woman raised her hand.

She wasn’t sure she wanted to do it, she said.  She wasn’t sure she wanted to stand before the congregation to speak of what she believed. “Why?”, asked Bev, the youth director. “Because,” said the young woman, “I don’t want people to laugh at me. I don’t want to hear snickers in the audience.”

“What makes you think there will be snickers in the congregation?” asked Bev, the youth director.

“Because,” said the young woman. “I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior, and I want to say that, and some people here think that is silly.”

            “Why do you want to be here, then?” asked one of her fellow students. “If you have accepted Jesus Christ as your personal lord and savior, why don’t you stay with the Baptists.”

“Because,” said the young woman. “I don’t want to have to.”

And with that one statement, that 14-year-old exhibited more spiritual maturity than most of us gain in a lifetime. Already, she knew that her belief system might change and shift over the years, as would the belief systems of those around her, and she wanted to be in a religious community that welcomed that.

            This morning’s sermon is the fourth in the series I am doing this year in which we are exploring some of the theologies and philosophies that make up the rich fabric of people in Unitarian Universalist Congregations. Last October I spoke about atheism. In January I spoke about one form of humanism. In March I spoke about theism.

This morning I’m going to talk about Unitarian Universalist Christianity – although my interpretation of it and my language for it would be very different from that young woman’s. Christianity is our taproot, you see . . . our deepest history. And yet for hundreds of years our version of it has been so completely different from most other versions as to render it almost unrecognizable to them. And yet we have continued along, saying, in effect: We think we are right. You may persecute us, and burn us at the stake, and label us heretics, but you are not getting rid of us. We reject your version, we say to others who claim the authority to define “Christian” in other ways, because reason tells us we are right. Ours would be a Christianity of faith, and progress, and devotion and love, as Reverend Hedge said, whose unshut gates shall exclude none that desire to enter. No creedal tests, just open doors.

What is it about the Unitarian and Universalist Christian taproot that is so different from other Christianities? It is very simple, and for centuries has been very heretical: Jesus Christ was fully human and only fully human. He was not God. There was something unique and special and world-changing about his teachings, indeed about his very character, but he was fully human. And, those of us who consider ourselves Christian would say, that exceptional humanity that he demonstrated is available to everyone equally, and it is always focused outwardly toward saving the world. This world.  The one we are living in right here and right now. Sometimes called the Kingdom of God, or the Commonwealth of God, or the beloved community. A world of open doors.

I’m going to talk this morning about this in three ways. I’m going to talk about it intellectually – offering you the category of theology that studies and reflects on who Jesus Christ was. Then I’m going to talk about what I consider to be one of his core teachings.  And third, since this is a church that prides itself on being spiritual, and many of you hunger for a way to take even our very intellectual teachings to a mystical level, I’m going to offer you a way to do that with even our very humanist version of Christianity. 

The category of theology that deals with who Jesus Christ was (or, arguably, is) is called Christology. Christ . . . . ology.  Study of, reflections about, conceptualization of Christ.

The Christology which became the dominant one, was a “high” Christology . . . that Jesus Christ was fully God as well as fully human. There was an identity of Jesus Christ with God, and that God somehow became flesh and came into the world as a human being. When the general public hears the word “Christian” there is likely some sense that that’s what it means. Those of you who were raised in some Christian sect probably were raised on language like that . . . those you who were raised in another religion probably had some sense that that was what Christians believed. I was raised Unitarian . . . and that’s what I thought Christian meant.

But over the centuries there were also . . . and I suppose still are also, a whole lot of other “Christologies.” I suppose the easiest way to conceptualize it is as different percentage mixes. At the highest end you have 100% God and 100% human. Then you could have 90% God, and 10% human; 80/20; 70/30; 50/50, until you have the “lowest” – 100% human only. All of those different percentage mixes were considered heresies . . . only the fully-God AND fully human formulation was accepted as orthodox – which just means right-thinking. Everybody else was labeled “unitarian” – which was a pejorative, a derogatory term. By whom, you may well ask? Who gets to decide what is right-thinking and what is wrong-thinking? Well, by those who set themselves up as having "power over” – the Church of Rome, the eastern orthodox churches, various Protestant leaders . . . .

So left out of all these various sects which held supposedly “orthodox” Christologies were those who had “low” Christologies. We set ourselves up as saying Jesus Christ is not God and we formed congregations around those Christologies. And believe me there are many different ones, even today. It is, indeed a big house, with many rooms. I have a friend who is the minister of – hang on to your seats -- a Trinitarian Universalist church. That is, to be sure, unusual, but that is the theology that that congregation has had for a couple of hundred years and they did not throw it away when merger happened in 1961. They rejected the authority of any other sect or denomination without rejecting the Trinitarian theology. There is Kings Chapel in Boston. . .  the first self-consciously Unitarian Church. They had been Anglican – the Church of England, but in 1785 rewrote the Book of Common prayer to take out any references to Trinity, yet they still view Jesus Christ as a mediator between humanity and God. There are many variations in between.

But here is the most important part. None of the churches have a creedal test about what your Christology must be. All are welcome here. We say to that young woman in the story I told at the beginning of the service: “You are welcome here.” We might say: You can have that Christology, but it is not mine. You are welcome here. We engage with one another about how our different Christologies or no Christology at all . . . helps us form the beloved Community, the commonwealth of God. All are welcome here who wish to walk together in the spirit of mutual love. And as we walk together, we listen to others journeys and speak of our own.

The reason for that open door, the unshut gate, the journey that keeps picking up new travelers, is our unitarian and universalist understanding of one of the core teachings that Jesus offered by word and deed. Radical hospitality. Jesus ate with everyone. He socialized with everyone. He refused to follow the “letter of the law.” He redefined family. It’s hard for us to recognize just how radical it was that he was going around eating and socializing with some of the folks he was. It was an era when the different religious and ethnic groups did not mingle. If you met someone at a well, you didn’t just take a drink of water from their cup if they were from a different group. Jesus did! If your dietary restrictions were rigid, and the next group’s dietary restrictions were rigid in a different way, you didn’t just sit down and share their lunch. But Jesus did. And his followers began to do the same, as when there were only a couple of loaves and fishes for hundreds of people. Everyone reached into their robes and bags and brought out what they were carrying and had planned to keep for themselves, and you know what? There was plenty to go around and some left over. Radical sharing. Radical hospitality.

Spiritual nourishment, like physical nourishment, can be shared. What do you have for lunch? What helps you get through the day? These are the questions, the forms of hospitality, that we offer one another. We listen carefully to the hunger of another and we offer what we can.

A friend in seminary who was struggling mightily with what religion she was said to me one evening, “I think I might be Unitarian Universalist, because from everything I have heard I love what you teach. But I need Jesus. God is just too big for me, too unfathomable. I need a human touch to help me on my journey.”

That statement by her helped me understand that there might, indeed, be people in my future congregations who need Jesus.

Another time, I was speaking of my own sense of God as being available to everyone, but that we have to reach for it. And my best friend, a Methodist, said to me, “You know, Susan, what you just said is the best description I’ve ever heard of what we Methodists call ‘prevenient grace’ – grace and love that are there just waiting for us. But we have to make a move in that direction.”

That is my vision of what this church is like. A place where we offer radical hospitality – sharing spiritual thoughts and practices that might be of help to one another on our journeys. A place where we are totally hospitable to one another as we walk along on our spiritual journeys. If we were raised in another tradition, and that tradition offers us comfort or challenge to face our lives, we might offer that to our neighbor. If we are struggling, looking for a path, we might listen more carefully to the next stranger who walks through the door. Anyone may offer a cup of cool water or a sandwich that will sustain us on our way.

I promised something for the mystics and transcendentalists among you. There is, you see, a totally different way to approach even the most “orthodox” of Christian theologies from a unitarian universalist perspective, if you hunger for the different realm, that spiritual realm. . That way, is to take a more orthodox Christian formulation into your prayer life, your meditation life, your contemplation, but bring your unitarian universalist sensibility to it.

When I first arrived here a year and a half ago I stayed at the Bon Secours Spiritual Center while Jack and I were selling and buying houses and preparing to move. I became well acquainted with a nun who was on retreat there, who had never heard of Unitarian Universalism. So over dinner one night, she asked that question we all dread, “what is Unitarian Universalist? Is it Christian?” So I replied, as I usually do, “That depends on how you define Christian.” She replied without hesitation, “You are Christian if you believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God.” To which I replied, “Well, then, I would ask you, who was Jesus, what is Christ, what is the nature of sonship, and what is God.”

After a moment of stunned silence, she said. “O-o-o-h-h-h-h!”

So here is how one might actually do that, as a spiritual practice. Suppose that statement – Jesus Christ is the Son of God -- were not a doctrine, but a koan. A puzzle, a riddle, that one contemplates. We usually hear that word – koan – in association with Buddhism, but it can be used to refer to the puzzling, mystical teachings of any religion. Koans can be solved, but their solutions may not follow rules of logic. The solution might be visual, or intuitive, or it may simply offer you an insight that you have not had before. It is a way to engage with a teaching so that the teaching claims you, in addition to you claiming the teachings.

            We’ll use as our koan the formulation of Christianity that my nun friend offered. “Jesus Christ is the son of God.” What are we to make of a statement like that?

            Well, let’s go to work with it. We’ll start with the last word in it. . . God . . . and work backwards.

            What is “God” – for you? What is “that which is of ultimate concern, ultimate importance, that which holds all that is good."

            Let’s say, for the purpose of this meditation, that God is Love. A perpetual turning toward, a blessing of goodness toward the world, doing its work among all of creation. Or perhaps God for you is justice – that state of being where there is no oppression, where all live in right relations with one another and creation.

            Then what would the “son of Love” look like? The daughter of Love? The offspring of Love? What would it be like? What would a personification of world-embracing love be? A personification of justice. How would it act? What would it teach? If it were operating in and through you, what would that mean?

            And what of the word “Christ” – the anointed one? What does that mean? Perhaps “divinity within humanity.” The capacity, fully developed, to not just feel love, but to be love, to feel and to be all of the divine attributes. The capacity, fully developed, to see clearly. The capacity, fully formed, to see the truth. The capacity, fully formed to forgive . . . to let go of that which has harmed or hurt. The capacity, fully developed, to live in just, right relations with others and with creation.

Who was Jesus? A simple peasant. Jewish. Living at a time when the Roman empire ruled his nation with an iron fist, persecuting his people. A student . . . perhaps an illiterate one, but a student none the less . . . of the teachings of his Hebrew tradition, and a deep thinker at that. A thinker who wrestled with the meanings of the teachings of his tradition for the actual life that he faced. Not a theoretical life. The actual life he and those around him were living. Corrupt Roman officials. Corrupt temple officials. Teachings that prescribed rigid adherence to ancient rules that seemed to work against the poor and the downtrodden. Rules that spoke of hospitality to the stranger but that worked to keep the stranger at bay by labeling them “unclean” – unfit for socializing with. A man who was able to see through the rules to the unvarnished truth.

And what happens when those images all flow together? A simple human with the capacity to see. Not so different from you, really. A simple human living in a world that is unjust. Not so different from the world you live in, really. A simple human who took the time to notice the truth in the world around him – no reason you can’t do the same thing, really. A simple human who felt a presence and an energy within and among all . . . a presence available to everyone, really. A simple human who spoke up even when the powers didn’t want to hear it, because that presence fed and sustained him. Different from you? Maybe. I don’t know. That is for you to decide.

And so, our taproot, our excommunicated Christianity, to use Hedge’s term, opens wide and flourishes and forms the “broad church.” No matter the philosophy or theology . . . atheist, humanist, theist, Christian . . . or others that we will explore together over the next few months and years, our broad church welcomes in many belief systems – but hospitality is the common center. Together, we all keep walking, and talking, and searching for that which gives our lives meaning. And walking, and talking, and puzzling through every koan that presents itself in our lives. And walking, and talking, and spreading hospitality beyond our borders, always in the spirit of mutual love.