Unitarian Universalism promises that human beings are strong enough, smart enough, and good enough to save ourselves and the world we share.  How are we doing?

Unitarian Universalists often challenge themselves to come up with their “elevator speech.”

The challenge is to compose a memorable and attractive way to describe our faith to a stranger, and short enough that you could have the whole conversation within the space of an elevator ride.  You’ve only got a few minutes.  The stranger steps onto the elevator.  They notice your chalice pin, or your “Standing on the Side of Love” tee shirt.  And they asks, “What’s that?” 

OK, here’s your chance.  This person may be ready to embark on a spiritual journey that will transform their life.

So what do you say?

Unitarian Universalism is notoriously difficult to describe.  As soon as you mention words like church or faith, you’re off on the wrong track.  In our contemporary culture Evangelical Christianity has so perverted the picture of what being religious means that most people can’t imagine that any other form of faith is possible.  And in particular, using religious language, when you don’t have time for a deep discussion (for instance, between the rooftop bar and the lobby of the downtown Hilton) is guaranteed to turn off exactly the kinds of people who are the best fit for Unitarian Universalism.

Here’s what I say.  And I’ve never actually said this to anyone on an elevator.

Unitarian Universalists believe that human beings are good enough, smart enough, and strong enough to create healthy, joyful lives for ourselves and others and take care of the planet we share.

I’ll say that again

Unitarian Universalists believe that human beings are good enough, smart enough, and strong enough to create healthy, joyful lives for ourselves and others and take care of the planet we share.

Unitarian Universalism doesn’t preclude theism, I believe in God myself.  But Unitarian Universalism is a very Humanist faith.  We have deep faith in the power and ability of human beings to save ourselves by our own moral compass, our own logic and reason and our own natural power.

We are good enough.  Meaning that human beings can distinguish right from wrong.  We can recognize the right path, choose the right path, and follow the right path.  We are good enough, Unitarians believe.

And we are smart enough.  Recognizing the good, we can then apply our considerable intelligence to come up with a strategy that moves us toward the good.

And lastly, we are strong enough.  Having created a smart strategy that leads to the good, we have the power to do the work that gets us there.

Thus, through our human goodness, human smarts and human strength, we can save ourselves.  Salvation, in some religions is a gift bestowed (or not) by God.  And salvation happens somewhere else, not this world, not this life, but a place and time where God’s will is absolute.  Salvation for Unitarian Universalists is something we do for ourselves.

Here on the paths of every day — 
here on the common human way — 
is all the stuff the gods would take 
to build a heaven to mold and make 
new Edens.  Ours the task sublime 
to build eternity in time.

And Heaven, Eden, Salvation, looks for us not like clouds and robes and harps, Salvation is healthy, joyful lives, for ourselves and others; and a planet respected and protected, or, as the sixth and seventh principle of our faith describes Unitarian Universalist salvation:  “the goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all and respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.”

The hymn we sang before the sermon is a good summary of our Unitarian Universalist theology.  It’s a bit long for an elevator speech.  But if you’ve got somebody interested enough in Unitarian Universalism to stick around for a longer conversation, pretty soon they are likely to ask the inevitable follow-up questions.  This is where deliberately religious language comes in.  It gets a little more complicated from here, but that hymn is a pretty useful synopsis.

“So is it a church?” they ask.

“Well, we have churches,” you answer, “but church for us is not a building so much as people coming together to do the work of changing lives and healing the world.”

“So do you read the Bible?” they ask.

“Well, sometimes” you answer.  “But Unitarian Universalists find spiritual truths in any place where good and smart people have engaged with the big questions of existence.”

“What about Jesus?” they ask.

“Well, he’s a special guy” you answer.  “But not special in a supernatural way.  Just in the way that anybody who acts from love, teaches equality, and works for justice is special.”

But then here’s the key question, the question for the day, and the place where Unitarian Universalism really differs from other religions.  “Where is our paradise?”

Here’s the question where we really show our humanism.  Christians and Muslims place paradise in another world, after death.  The end of the rounds of reincarnation for Hindus and Buddhists is a seeing behind the veil of the material things of our world including the abandonment of personal identity.  But for Unitarian Universalists, paradise is an “earth [made] fair as heaven above” as the hymn says.  Paradise is a world we create for ourselves, right here, right now.  The hymn says, “in aspiration’s sight.”  We are good enough, smart enough and strong enough to “mold and make new Edens.”  And once we get it made, it will last.  The hymn says, “ten thousand years of right.”

OK then.

I have my doubts about whether the Christian view of Heavenly salvation really exists.  It’s probably best to be agnostic about issues like life after death, issues where no one can have any empirical knowledge.  But, here’s the thing, I can be pretty certain, because I do have empirical evidence, that Unitarian Universalist salvation doesn’t exist.

We have no heaven on earth, obviously.  In hundreds of years of Unitarian Universalism, we have not achieved a this-worldly salvation here and now.  A world community of peace, liberty and justice for all is still our goal, not our reality.  Our paradise is still in aspiration’s sight but not within our reach.

Does Unitarian Universalism offer only a hope of “ten thousand years of right?” but not a promise?  Is our goal realistic?  Is our hope only a false hope?

And then, to confound our faith even further, even if we grant that a world community of peace, liberty and justice for all, were possible (I suppose it is possible) does our salvation strategy, based on humans being good enough, smart enough, and strong enough, really give us what we need to get there?

Are human beings good enough?  Because empirically the evidence is that human beings are not all that good.  We are selfish.  We are fearful.  We abuse each other.  We tell lies about other people.  We hold secret meetings so we don’t have to include people we don’t want to hear from and so we can’t be held accountable for our actions.  We manipulate events so that we get our own way.  Folks like Milo Yianoppolous say outrageous things just to cause trouble and provoke reactions.  Folks like Steve Bannon are happy to trade on racial resentment, and fears of immigrants, in order to pursue their political goals.  Folks like Donald Trump promote conspiracy theories to foment distrust of people and institutions he views as threats to his own power.

So, no, we aren’t very good.  Are we good enough?

Are we smart enough?

We take a lot of pride in human intelligence.  But sometimes we’re not as wise as we think.  Sometimes we’re excited by ideas that sound great at first but then we don’t do the work of thinking them all the way through.  It’s a well known psychological principle, called the Dunning-Kruger effect, that people with the least ability are also the ones with the most confidence in their abilities.  The history of human smarts is that our technological advances are always a mix of good and bad.  Nuclear power is a blessing and a curse.  The rise of the internet, amazingly positive in opening up global communication and access to information, also gives us a world in which person-to-person connections are getting rarer and fake news is becoming hard to distinguish from real news.  

Are we strong enough?

Some problems are simply beyond our ability to solve.  That’s the truth.  Hurricanes in Texas and Puerto Rico.  Wildfires throughout California.  Ice shelves dropping off Antarctica and sea levels rising world wide.  Human beings have demonstrated we are strong enough to alter the world’s climate, but are we strong enough to reverse the natural processes we have put into motion?  Strong enough?

So if we haven’t achieved salvation in terms of world community and respect for the interdependent web, how are we doing on the other half of our salvation goal?  “World community with peace, liberty, and justice for all” means for all of us, individually, as well.  I summarize the goal of Unitarian Universalism as creating healthy, joyful lives for ourselves and others and taking care of the planet we share.  Our religious work is an earthly paradise, but also the business of saving souls, the goal of transforming people, one by one:  healthy, joyful lives for ourselves.

Are we good enough, smart enough, strong enough, to save ourselves?

Our activities of worship and fellowship and education and social justice, are for the purpose of transformation.  That’s why we’re here.  To be transformed.  We have a personal goal:  spiritual health and joyful lives.  Our worship is not just theater for entertainment.  Our fellowship is not just for friendship but a deliberate community, gathered for personal transformation.  We’re not just biding our time between Board meetings and book clubs.  We’re not here just to pass a few pleasant hours.  We are about salvation. We are here to move ourselves toward better health and more joy.

So, how are we doing?

Are lives actually being transformed?  Are people who arrive hurting, fearful, angry; healed, consoled, soothed?  Are people who arrive confused about right and wrong, blinded by materialism, slaves to their own pathologies, transformed by what we do here to lives of health and joy?  Are they?  Was anyone saved?

Are the strategies that we offer:  worship, fellowship, education and so on, actually effective in making transformation or do people sit through our religious programs week after week, year after year, staying pretty much stuck in exactly the narrow lives they’ve always lived?  Is the goal of transformation even possible?  Do fearful people ever really lose their fears?  Can selfish people open their hearts to include the needs and further the dreams of others?  Is there anything in our Unitarian Universalist faith that can heal the sick, clothe the naked, feed the spiritually hungry, release the prisoners who live in captivity to their own pathologies?

If we cannot answer a powerful “Yes” to that question, then our work here is called into question.  Not having a powerful “Yes” to that question throws us into a crisis of faith, a dark night of the soul.  Is anyone saved?

A few weeks ago the publishing house of the UUA, Skinner House Books published a book called, Testimony, edited by Meg Riley, who is the minister of our Church of the Larger Fellowship.  The subtitle of the book is, “The Transformative Power of Unitarian Universalism.”

The book is a collection of first person stories, told by people who felt their lives were saved in some way by our Unitarian Universalist faith.  People who found a home here, when they felt spiritually homeless.  People who found community here, when they felt alone.  People who found strength and purpose.  People who found inspiration in poetry and beauty.  People who were told, maybe for the first time, that they were a person of inherent worth and dignity, and believed it.  People saved from depression.  People saved from despair.  One story is titled “From the Cellblock to Seminary” and is exactly that.

It’s a moving collection of stories.  It is faith-affirming.  It is a little light in a dark night of the soul, if that’s where you are.

Meg Riley writes in her introduction:

…truthfully, I have no interest in a faith that isn’t saving people.  What’s the point?  I know, though, that this language horrifies some Unitarian Universalists.  So when we solicited stories for this anthology, we used a variety of words:  How did Unitarian Universalism transform you?  Heal you?  Change you?  Help you?  I am hungry for these stories … because every day I forget that healing and redemption is possible.  Every day I forget how strong love is.  Every day I sink into despair about this precious planet and the greed that is choking out life, and I begin to believe that there is no way forward.  Every day I need to know that I’m not alone in my struggle to return to love and to re-center myself in grace and decency.  Every day I need to know that I’m part of something much bigger than myself and that, whether or not we can save each other and the planet, my tiny acts of faith matter.

Meg Riley’s words are powerful.  That is our situation.  That is our truth.  That is our desperate need.  But eventually, her words end at the same place of agnosticism where I think we must end up, if we are honest, if we are to be, as I say so often, a reality based religion:

“Whether or not we can save each other and the planet, my tiny acts of faith matter.”

Meg Riley admits what I think we must admit after hundreds of years of this faith, perhaps we cannot save each other and the planet we share.  Perhaps our work for world community and real and lasting respect for the interdependent web will always be “in aspiration’s sight” but forever out of reach.  Every day new folks are added to the world community and each must be educated and enlisted into the work.  Someone is always just starting on the road to health and joy, and so our work never ends, can never end, will never end.

Perhaps we are not completely good, entirely smart, all strong.  Certainly no one is born that way.  And few if any of us reach those standards even by the end of life.  So then, are we forever damned?  No.  Forever in need, but not forever condemned.  Because perfection isn’t required for salvation.  Perfect goodness, wisdom and strength has never been the measure.  We must need only be, good enough, smart enough, strong enough.

We must be enough to do the work.  Even if the final goal is never reached, as Meg Riley says, our “tiny acts of faith matter” nonetheless.

Because surely some people are saved by this faith.  Some people are transformed.  Here’s a book of those stories.  There’s another collection of those stories perhaps right in this room.  We could tell a story like these of our own if we took the work of transforming ourselves seriously and devoted our time in church to reaching that goal.

Think of the thousands of people who have passed through this room.  Was anyone saved?  I’m certain some were.  A little better.  A little smarter.  A little stronger.  A person or two or twenty, who through tiny acts of faith won the salvation they required, who went out the same church door they came in, but and a little healthier, a little more joyful a little better prepared to join the movement of saving the world.

That is enough.