October 16, 2005
Rev. Dr. Frank Carpenter,
D.Min.
St. John's Unitarian Universalist Church, Cincinnati, OH
As children
of an awesome blue planet, sailing amidst the stars, we gather rejoicing in
orange leaves and
May we
be grateful that our homes are safe, not shaken by shifting of tectonic plates.
As we dwell amongst forces and powers greater than ourselves, may we
be grateful for the bonds of fellowship that bring us together.
May we listen to the adventures and trials of our friends shared this
morning, knowing that they our own stories, our own hopes and dreams.
In the
quietness of this hour let us recall that we do not exist alone but live for
one another, remembering those who came before us making our dreams possible,
and dedicated to those who come after us, seeking greater hopes.
Bound
as one, let us be still…
Peace
be with you. Amen.
Beautiful
summer days have changed into beautiful autumn days.
The long hot days of summer, green and growing, have turned to chill
nights; hints of color appear among green leaves.
Mother
Nature has much preoccupied us these past summer months.
But has it all been beautiful? What a year this has been. It seems to have started the day after Christmas
with the terrible Tsunamis spreading out from
Then a
week ago the devastating earthquake, with the death toll so far at 38,000
in
What
a list! Nature is beautiful, yet it is awesome. With all these tragedies there has been an outpouring
of relief, an outpouring that reveals how connected we human beings feel to
one another during times of crises. We
here at
There
are always some who might argue that they are not part of something greater
than they themselves. They are not
part of some metaphysical entity called humanity. That may be true; their rejection of humanity
may leave them alone. Yet, they would
not stand on a beach as a great wave roared ashore. Mother Nature teachers us through both beautiful
summer days and natural catastrophes that we are part of something greater
whether we choose it or not, part of nature, part of the interdependent web
of all existence as we say in our UU principles.
Yet often
times we go about our lives denying we are part of something greater.
Sometimes we intentionally act as if we are not part of something greater. Sometimes we are just thoroughly self-centered. I had a friend in college who took pride in
telling the story that one time a beggar put out his hand asking for a few
coins, and instead my friend put out his cigarette in the man’s hand. I would like to believe he made the story up.
But it is a story that reveals our rejection of connection, it reveals
selfishness, self-centeredness. I alone am the center of the universe. It’s all about me, not about you. There is nothing
greater than I am, and I am certainly not part of something larger!
Selfishness,
self-centeredness has long been considered the great bane of the human race.
Selfishness has been an important description of sin.
Remember sin? What is sin? More
to the point, what is Original Sin? The
old doctrine of Original Sin placed selfishness at the core of human nature.
Calvinists argued that no human being, at least no unredeemed human
being was capable of a truly selfless, altruist act.
Unless touched by Christ, human nature acts selfishly, unable to determine
the difference between right and wrong. Right
behavior is placing your own needs and agendas second to the greater purpose
of which we are a part.
That we
human beings are by nature capable of fully altruistic acts was part of our
liberal revolt against traditional theology. The Scots economist Adam Smith had his own revolt
against Original Sin. He proclaimed
that if everybody acted according to their rational self-interest, an invisible
hand would make things come out just fine.
Such is capitalism; capitalism, an ideology built on selfishness.
Today
we refer more to narcissism than selfishness. Narcissism takes its name from Greek mythology,
which tells that Narcissus was one of the most beautiful men ever created. One day Narcissus caught a glimpse of himself
in a pool and fell in love with himself. He
was unable to free himself from admiring himself, and it is said he still
gazes on his image in the waters of the river
Whether
it is John Calvin’s or Sigmund Freud’s account, we are constantly absorbed
with ourselves. If we care about anyone
it is usually ourselves first of all. As Aristotle put it: luck is when the guy next
to you gets hit with the arrow. Twenty-five
hundred years after him, our narcissism hasn’t changed and this is still a
workable definition of luck.
We see
this in young children, in King Baby as Carl Jung calls the infant.
If you have siblings, you well know a child cannot allow himself to
be second-best or devalued, much less left out.
“You gave him the biggest piece of candy!”
“You gave him more juice.”
A child
has trouble admitting -- perhaps a child shouldn’t acknowledge -- that she
is part of something larger. No, the
child is in charge. As Dad knows, as Mom knows, it’s not about Mom, it’s not
about Dad. And in a young child this is expected, healthy. But in an adult?
But we
adults too like to think that we are at the center of the universe.
It’s all about me. More accurately, we may have learned it’s not
about me, so we say, it’s about “us.” There
is a self-centered patriotism that says our nation right or wrong.
This is not a love of country that can accept that other people love
their countries too. No, it’s about us.
We see
self-centeredness emerge even at the most abstract levels.
Consider evolution. The great student of evolution, Steven Jay Gould,
wrote many articles trying to convince people evolution is not about us.
How easy it is to think that all that primordial slime had nothing
better in mind 3 billion years ago than to produce the human race.
Even the great Charles Darwin waffles on this one.
At times he speaks of evolution as the way one species changes into
another. At other points he slips and suggests that the
human species is the pinnacle of evolution.
The Copernican Revolution was that the earth is not at the center of
the universe. Now we know the sun isn't,
our galaxy isn't and more than likely there is no center of the universe anyway.
And it’s really all about you?
We're
part of something greater than ourselves. One of the most threatening forms of self-centeredness
is racism, when skin color becomes the definition of who is at the center
of the universe. Are white people closer
to God? Who sits at the right hand of the Almighty? White or black?
Michael
Eric Dyson is the author of “Is Bill Cosby Right?”
He was expected to be a speaker at the Millions More March yesterday.
A few weeks ago he spoke at the Unvarnished Truth Awards in
Dyson
said:
There
are so many people who suffer, who don't have our education. They don't have
our bank accounts. They don't have our sense of leisure and luxury. And if
you and I can't see beyond our own myopic, narcissistic self-preoccupation
to help somebody else, to open up our minds, so we can open up our hearts,
so we can open up our lives, and God knows our pocketbooks [then what will
happen?]
…
you and I are on the same ship. In fact, we travel in the same plane. You
might be in first class eating filet mignon; I’m eating peanuts back in row
55. We're on the same boat. Don't cut a hole in the boat to suck water out,
to sink the Titanic. And if you're on the plane, being in first class ain't
going to stop you from going down with the rest of us. When there is turbulence,
there is turbulence everywhere. Everybody be shaking. And if that plane goes
down, you might die first in first class. Yes, some of us are in first class,
but the plane is in trouble! What will you do to speak to the pilot, to tell
the pilot to tell the control center that we've got to change directions unless
the turbulence leads us to our own death? That's the truth we've got to tell.
That's the courage we've got to muster, and that's the beauty of soul we must
reveal to one another in the quietness of our own individual lives. [LINK]
So we
have as our daily task, as a fundamental, basic spiritual disciple to accept
our self-centeredness, move on and be part of something larger than ourselves.
That’s the only way we won’t end up blowing each and everyone to kingdom
come. Asking ourselves each day, what calls to us, what is greater than us?
Having
spoken against narcissism, I don’t want you to go away saying that, well,
Rev. Carpenter, he believes in Original Sin. President Grover Cleveland once returned home
from church. He was asked what the
preacher spoke about that day. The
laconic President said, “Sin.” And
what did he say about it?
I don’t
want you to go away thinking that. It’s more complicated that that. Narcissism has its place. You can’t be healthy if you can’t be selfish. Going back to evolution again, through countless
ages, the organism has had to protect its own integrity; it had is own physiochemical
identity and was dedicated to preserving it. This is one of the main problems in organ transplants:
the organism protects itself against foreign matter, even if it is a new heart.
Narcissism may be a problem, but it is natural. We come by our selfishness, at least in healthy
forms, the same way we come by autumn leaves and hurricanes. It’s part of nature.
The problem
comes when we think we can get though life by being one or the other, either
just selfish or only altruist. To everything there is a season, a time to every
purpose under heaven: a time to be selfish and a time to be altruistic. If
you do not get enough sleep at night, you won’t be much help to anybody. When the flight attendant gives emergency instructions
before your plane takes off, they instruct people to put their oxygen masks
on themselves, before they place it on someone dependent on them, such as
a child. To take care of others, you need to take care of yourself. And if
you don’t know how to take care of yourself, do you know how to take care
of someone else?
Daily
life is a balancing of concern for oneself and for others. We are a part of something greater than we are.
Part of our task is to take care of what we have been given, and the
other part is to join with others in taking care of where we are.
As Milton Mayeroff said in our reading this morning, a person “can
never be at home in the world through dominating, or explaining, or appreciating,
but through caring and being cared for.”
In his
POWER OF MYTH Joseph Campbell tells a powerful story.
In
One day,
two policemen were driving up the Pali road when they saw, just beyond the
railing that keeps the cars from rolling over, a young man preparing to jump.
The police car stopped, and the policeman on the right jumped out to grab
the man but caught him just as he jumped, and he was himself being pulled
over when the second cop arrived in time and pulled them both back.
Later,
a newspaper reporter asked him, “Why didn’t you let go?
You would have been killed.” And his answer was “I couldn’t let go. If I had let that young man go, I couldn’t have
lived another day of my life.”
We are
part of something greater than ourselves.