Universalism affirms that all creation is one. Ultimately, we will be together. But before we reach that goal, what responsibility do we have to hold on to those who would block our path or do us harm? When our invitation to love is refused, we must concede that for this stage of the journey some will walk separate paths.
Back in October, as part of our Founder’s Day celebrations, we had a party that included a silent auction. One of the items donated to be auctioned came from me. I offered to preach a sermon on any topic that the highest bidder wanted to hear me preach about. Eileen Watrous, was the highest bidder. And this is the Sunday that I had put aside for the auction winner.
A week or so after the auction, Eileen came to my office and we talked about the topic she would like me to think about. Eileen said that she would be interested in hearing my thoughts about a subject that is a common source of pain for a lot of us: the issue of persons in our lives who we are in a formal relationship with, someone like a family member, or perhaps a co-worker, but where the relationship is unhealthy for us. Staying in the relationship violates our health and joy; we’re disrespected, made small, hurt, or abused. But leaving the relationship also feels like a violation of ourselves; because we want to be good children, or good siblings, or good citizens. On one hand there are personal needs for self-fulfillment. On the other hand there are moral and social obligations and duty. So what do we do?
It’s a great subject for a sermon. I hear this kind of story quite often in my work. It troubles people. They can see the damage this kind of relationship does to them. They feel the pain. The suffer the consequences, yet they feel trapped. They know they’d be better off separating, if they could. But how can you separate from your mother, or a sibling, or from a job you depend on?
Adding to that conflict of forces pushing us into relationships and pulling us away from relationships, with discomfort in both directions, is the theological point that you’ve probably heard me preach about, which I intend to be comforting but which only adds to the emotional guilt in this situation.
We’re Universalists. We believe that everyone, eternally, will be in relationship with the whole. I keep telling you this every Sunday. Salvation is for everyone. No one is left out. The divine embrace includes all. We respect the interdependent web of all existence. Including, in those tangled strands of connections, those people you’d rather not be in relationship with.
To sever a relationship with a toxic person in your life may seem like the path of health, but how, Eileen wondered, and she asked me to wonder, how do I square that choice with my familial obligations, with my moral obligations, with my sense of self, as a strong and courageous person who can bear with much, as a good person who wants to love everyone and believes I should, and with my Universalist faith that teaches me that separation is ultimately impossible, anyway?
I said, in offering a sermon as an auction item, that I would preach on any subject that the auction winner wanted me to speak about, but I have also been working this worship year on a series of sermons touching on fundamentals of our faith and offering some final thoughts as I approach the end of my professional ministry. I got lucky when Eileen brought this subject to me, because it is both a subject that troubles a lot of people, and it also touches on a fundamental of our faith.
Universalism is truly challenging. It must trouble you, if you reckon sincerely with that end point that says you will be together with every soul that ever existed in the same happy ending. No greater reward for the best people that every lived. No retribution to the worst who caused such misery and horror to others.
And if that is where we will be, what does that faith ask of us now?
Must I really be in relationship with that person who shows no respect to me, must listen to that person who will not listen to me, love that person who shows no love to me? Does our goal of creating radically inclusive community demand including those bent on destroying our community?
In a spiritual community open to all, accepting of divergent beliefs, eager to learn from people whose life stories and opinions are different from ours, how can we say, “yes, but not you.” And when we decide someone must go because they are violating our faith principles, as we have, as we must, doesn’t it also violate our faith principles to tell them to leave?
Eileen came to my office with a relevant and provocative topic for a sermon.
She also came with a resource for me.
She had printed out, and left with me, a list of sentences with mostly good psychological and spiritual advice, related to the topic she wanted me to preach about.
The wisdom Eileen handed me is attributed to the actor Anthony Hopkins. But I suspect, in the ways of the internet, that few if any of these sentences were actually written by or said by Anthony Hopkins. We tend to assign admirable thoughts with admirable people. And anyway, it’s hard to prove that somebody didn’t say something. So let these sayings be from Anthony Hopkins if you like, I won’t argue. But, like the sayings of Jesus, if they are wise, they are wise regardless of who said them.
And, as is also true about the sayings attributed to Jesus, I don’t agree with all of them.
Hopkins’ advice, generally, is that we need to prioritize our own spiritual and psychological development and our relationships should be with those people that foster our development.
I agree. Self-development is difficult. It takes a literal life-time of work. We have one life, one chance. We need to make it our focus to live fully, to live healthfully, to live joyfully.
As we sang in our opening hymn:
Where my free spirit onward leads, well there shall be my way;
by my own light illumined I’ve journeyed night and day;
eternity is hard to ken and harder still is this:
a human life when truly seen is briefer than a kiss.
Healthy, life-giving relationships are a gift to our self-development and are necessary to our self-development because we are social creatures. Seek out friends, lovers, mentors, and guides. Find the people that want to know you, and encourage you, and praise you. And seek also the people who will be sensitive truth-tellers about the blind spots you don’t see, or the rough edges you won’t see. We don’t travel through life alone. We welcome the companions that want to walk with us, motivate us, even carry us for a time when we really need it.
As we said in our Opening Words
We bid you welcome, who come with weary spirit seeking rest.
who come with hope in your heart.
Who come with anticipation in your step, Who come proud and joyous,
Who come to probe and explore. Who come to learn.
But then Dick Gilbert says this, which maybe we shouldn’t entirely agree with:
Whoever you are, whatever you are, Wherever you are on your journey, We bid you welcome.
Whoever you are? Whatever you are?
Well maybe aspirationally. Ideally. Theologically. But practically there’s a danger in welcoming everyone, whoever, whatever, into our lives. And this is where Anthony Hopkins’ offers his wisdom.
He says, on one hand, “The most valuable thing you have in your life is your time and energy, as both are limited. The people and things you give your time and energy to will define your existence.”
Yes to that. And Yes to this:
“You deserve real friendships, true commitments, and complete love with healthy, prosperous people.”
Yes. And to do that, to get the life you deserve, Hopkins recommends protecting ourselves from folks who would tear us down, or hold us back. He says, “When you start fighting for a life with joy, interest and commitment, not everyone will be ready to follow you to that place. It doesn’t mean you have to change who you are, it means you have to let go of people who aren’t ready to be with you. If you are excluded, insulted, forgotten or ignored by the people you give your time to, you are not doing yourself a favor by continuing to offer them your energy and your life.”
I can say yes, to that, too.
But here my Yes comes with a caveat, or a quibble. Because here, Hopkins is approaching that inflexion point between the ideals of our faith, and the practicalities of our lives. It’s tough to find the balance, so I don’t fault Hopkins or whoever it was that wrote these aphorisms for not placing the fulcrum exactly where I would, but I find the list of aphorism is a little too quick to let go of the people that fail to serve our needs, and a little dismissive of our spiritual imperative not just to serve our own development but to serve others, also.
Here’s what I mean.
The first aphorism is this, “Let go of people who are not ready to love you.”
OK. I get that. But must everyone in our life love us? Is there no room for people who are merely sort of neutral toward me? I will quickly let go of haters or people who wish me harm. Good riddance. But between not being mean to me, and loving me, there’s a lot of ground, and most of humanity.
And the last half of that sentence is “who are not ready to love you.” But maybe they might be later. Maybe they just need time. Not that I have to win their affection is some way. But if I’m just over here, doing my thing, being myself, and they are over there doing their work, who knows what might develop? Love, perhaps, but only, here’s the thing, if I haven’t let go of them.
It’s that letting go, that bothers me, that troubles both my practical sense of how to build healthy relationships and communities, and my faith as a Universalist.
Letting go is necessary when holding on means staying attached to danger, to destruction, to real damage. Get out, if you’re in danger. Find the people and institutions that can shelter you if you’re unsafe. Toxic people to that degree exist. We should be wise and wary, and do what we must to protect ourselves, including to the point of getting away, cutting off contact, getting a restraining order.
But between the clearly dangerous people, and the unconditional lovers in our lives (God bless them) there are a spectrum of folks who demand a spectrum of responses, somewhere between letting go completely and embracing fully.
Hopkins’ sentences seem to put the “you’re not helpful to me” people in the same category as the “actively bad for me” people. And that’s a mistake.
Other people don’t exist solely to further your spiritual and psychological development. Your growth and development is important, and the stronger, healthier, more joyful you can be, the better for us all. But your strength and health and joy isn’t the only goal of the universe. Universalism teaches me that the goal is collective strength, health, and joy, for every part of the interdependent web.
Think of the people who went a little out of their way for you to be a little better now than you would have been. That teacher in the first grade. That coach. That neighbor. That friend. The stranger who picked you up. That person who missed an appointment while they sat with you. They didn’t have to do that. It wasn’t for their own health they did that, although I like to think it did benefit them in some way. The person who sent that card, or made that phone call. Maybe it was tough for them to know what to say, but they came through for you. Maybe there was something else they could have done that day that would have better served their own happiness, but they chose to serve you. Maybe you weren’t ready to love them, but they loved you anyway, and their example, and their patience, made all the difference.
Maybe, there is someone you could serve in that way, without abandoning your own path to strength, health, and joy, but without abandoning them, either.
When I got married the first time. Yes I am gay married and gay divorced and gay married again. But as my first husband and I were planning our wedding, we had to decide what to do about his mother. His mother had never fully accepted that her son was gay. She knew the truth. And she liked me, well enough. But a wedding confirmed her son’s sexuality in a way she had always resisted.
We wanted to honor her by including her in the ceremony but we weren’t sure how she would feel being asked. We raised the issue with the minister we were working with and he gave us the best advice I had ever heard on this issue. He said: “It’s your job to keep the door open. You can’t make her walk through it.”
Letting go feels like closing the door. Sometimes it’s right to close the door, and lock it, and throw away the key. But for a lot of folks who aren’t fully ready to love us, it’s OK for us to be here, and them to be there, and to keep the door open in between.
My favorite piece of advice in this list of twenty-two sentences Eileen shared with me is this one: “You are not responsible for saving anyone. You are not responsible for convincing them to do better. It is not your job to exist for people and give them your life!”
Amen.
It is not your job to save anyone else. Unitarians believe it is each person’s job to save themselves. You are good enough, smart enough, and strong enough. Others can assist, advise, encourage, cajole. But as a powerful person, you have to take the initiative. No one can force you to walk through that door.
Not even God. Universalists believe that God’s job is to love us, not to save us. God’s role is to never let go, no matter how toxic and mean and dangerous we are, but with infinite patience to hang on, and hang on, and hang on, until the end of eternity approaches and even the most recalcitrant sinner finally gives up and accepts the paradise that God hopes for us.
But, and here is my own piece of wisdom, that’s God’s job, not mine. And thank God for that because I haven’t got that much patience. I haven’t got eternity; I only have this life. And I haven’t the infinite love of God either, because I’m only human. Thank God an infinite love like that exists, because I want it to be so, yet I know I will never hit that mark. So I can forgive myself when I let slip from my love, persons who I know will nevertheless be catched by God.
Sometimes folks sit in my office and tell me about the troubling relationship they have with their mother, or their sister, or their brother-in-law, or sometimes the person in the congregation they just can’t work with, or whoever, and they say to me, “It’s not healthy for me to be around them. I get so angry. I feel so abused, or insulted, or mocked. I honestly want nothing to do with them, but she’s my mother, or my sister, or my boss. What should I do?”
It’s usually clear to me that they know exactly what to do. And what they want from me is not advice but permission.
I want to be careful not to trivialize the really dangerous situations that people sometimes find themselves in. Fortunately, there are people and institutions better equipped than I am to deal with gay teens running away from home, or abused spouses, or persons trapped by cultural bonds, or economic bonds, or physical dependencies. The horrors that persons inflict on each other are astounding.
But if what is keeping you attached to a bad relationship is merely guilt, it is within my ordained power to absolve you. That someone gave birth to you, does not create a debt that you must spend your lifetime repaying. The fact that you said, “I do” some happy June years ago, does not mean that you can’t say, “I don’t” now.
You have a spiritual obligation to love everyone, as best as you are able, but you don’t have an obligation to be in relationship with everyone. Every relationship, whether by blood, or geographic proximity, or friendship, or shared faith, or whatever, must be predicated on the same basis of mutual flourishing, and if not, you are always welcome to prioritize your own strength and health and joy and move in that direction. Invite them to go with you. If they don’t get up right away, leave the door open, they might follow you later.
And if they say no, go anyhow.