First Parish of Watertown

Christmas Eve 2007

Opening Words

Annie Dillard , An American Childhood

Late at night on Christmas Eve, my mother carried us each to our high bedroom, and darkened the room, and opened the window, and held us awed in the freezing stillness, saying - - and we could hear the edge of tear in her voice -- “Do you hear them? Do you hear the bells, the little bells, on Santa’s sleigh?” We marveled and drowsed, smelling the piercingly cold night and the sweetness of Mother’s warm neck, hearing in her voice so much pent emotion, feeling the familiar strength in the crook of her arms, and looking out over the silent streetlights and chilled stars over the rooftops of the town. “Very faint, and far away - can you hear them coming?” And we could hear them coming, very faint and far away, the bells on the flying sleigh.


Christmas Eve Remembered

Like Annie Dillard, Christmas Eve was always a magical time for me growing up. My father was the story teller in our family, and because five years separated me from my other three siblings, I was the happy recipient of his sole attention long after my brothers and sister stopped wondering about when Santa would arrive at our house. I have never listened so intently in all my life. Dad would speak about Santa readying his sleigh, and I would picture a mountain of toys, and reindeer stomping with their hooves while breathing streamers of frosty air. What I waited for of course was that moment when he would visit my family. Behind our house was a huge pasture, with darkness covering the woods beyond, and moonlight reflected on the fir trees half way across the expanse of field. It snowed more then, or at least that’s my memory, (kind of like this year), and so the field always literally glistened in the moonlight as the whipped cream mounds of snows curved up and down below my window and out on the back lawn. But I never expected Santa to appear while I was looking out the window on this scenery below. I had the impression that if you looked, Santa would instantly disappear from sight. And so I could only imagine this sleek red sleigh, gliding across the snow covered field with tinkling bells, and quietly snorting reindeer with the merry driver planning his next stop of countless visits to boys and girls all over the world. This was the scene in my mind’s eye. All I could do was lay there after my father had recounted the tale of Santa’s annual return to our rural home. My ears strained and strained to just hear some inkling that this was the moment when he went by. My ears were so tense and my eyes so squinted. I would lay and listen. Lay and listen. Do you hear the sound beyond quiet? (pause - close your eyes and listen)

Finally, I would pass off to sleep, only to awaken to the wonder of Christmas morn, and the question, did he come? Even though Santa always did come with toys and candy that made me happy, it was that magic of the night before that I remember best. The night is that holy time, full of wonder and mystery. The star that signaled Jesus’ birth was seen at night. On another dark, cold night something special was about to occur. Maybe it was the same way the three kings or the shepherds felt as they approached the stable. It was that glorious anticipation, the sheer excitement that something incredibly great was gong to happen. Of course, eventually my dad stopped coming into my room with his wondrous tale of an overloaded sleigh gliding by my window. But I still dream about magical moments. I still wait in wonder and listen in anticipation. And I hear the hints of something wondrous happening - of human caring, of love come to flesh. This night let us remember, just as Jesus’ two parents hovered over him and dreamed dreams of what his future might be on this holy night. Nine months of anticipation to give birth to new hope and joy. I remember a story of wonder from one I loved, and I give thanks that there are those in our lives who help us dream dreams, who give us encouragement, and affirm us, who give us hope, and prepare us for the miracles that can come into our lives. They are the bearers of faith and joy. Those who wrap the gifts and hang the lights anticipate the labors of the season. Those who light the candles and remember in silence those who have gone before anticipate the quiet of the season. Those who hold the hand of another (as I invite you to do now), anticipate some difficult trial of life, and bring healing to lonely and grieving hearts. All are the bearers of hope that something wonderful is about to occur. Who knows what it may be? The story comes back to me on Christmas eve - anything can happen, and the excitement is not that it does, but in the believing that it is possible. May we believe in a future where wars cease, and we care for the earth, where we care for each other, and anticipate with great wonder the future we have together.

Meditation

So many beautiful images cross our minds as we prepare to celebrate this holiday. The greens in our homes reminding us the sun will return, and light, and growth will come again, even in seasons of darkness and pain. Gifts under the tree and stockings hung with joy reminding us that sometimes we need to wait, be patient for promises still to come, and in time new opportunities, new relationships will occur in our lives. Singing together, carols raised in joy, lifting our voices together in common harmony reflecting the connections we make touching hearts and minds and souls. All these preparations have brought us to this night. Now we listen expectantly for the sounds that will herald the coming of this new day - the bells of joy, the carols of praise, the flickering candles of dreams, the loving words we speak to those who need our care. May the dreary and the cold be overthrown by the place in our hearts waiting birth. Let the promise of finding that which is lost guide us to heal wounds of misunderstanding or regret. Grant us peace with the world and peace in our lives. O sweet sounds of the season, flow over us and in us - Bells of new life and love, bells of gratitude, bells of peace. (RING) Amen.

“Counting on Custom” by Mark W. Harris

First Parish of Watertown - December 9, 2007


Opening Words (responsive) “Fearful Joy” by R. Tagore #612

Is it beyond thee to be glad with the gladness of this rhythm? To be tossed and lost and broken in the whirl of this fearful joy?

All things rush on, they stop not, they look not behind, no power can hold them
back, they rush on.

Keeping step with that restless, rapid music, season’s come dancing and pass away.

Colors, tunes, and perfumes pour in endless cascades in the abounding joy that
scatters and gives up and dies every moment.

Readings - “An Appeal to End Slavery” by Lydia Maria Child

“The ladies who remove from the free states into the slaveholding ones almost invariably write that the sight of slavery was at first exceedingly painful; but that they soon become habituated to it; and after a while, they are very apt to vindicate the system, upon the ground that it is extremely convenient to have such submissive servants. This reason was actually given by a lady of my acquaintance, who is considered an unusually fervent Christian. Yet Christianity expressively teaches us to love our neighbors as ourselves. This shows how dangerous it is, for even the best of us, to become accustomed to what is wrong.”


from The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne
(Holgrave speaking)
“ . . . we shall live to see the day, I trust," went on the artist, "when no man shall build his house for posterity. Why should he? He might just as reasonably order a durable suit of clothes, --leather, . . . . or whatever else lasts longest, --so that his great-grandchildren should have the benefit of them, and cut precisely the same figure in the world that he himself does. If each generation were allowed and expected to build its own houses, that single change, comparatively unimportant in itself, would imply almost every reform which society is now suffering for. I doubt whether even our public edifices--our capitols, state-houses, court-houses, city-hall, and churches,--ought to be built of such permanent materials as stone or brick. It were better that they should crumble to ruin once in twenty years, or thereabouts, as a hint to the people to examine into and reform the institutions which they symbolize."


"How you hate everything old!" said Phoebe in dismay. "It makes me dizzy to think of such a shifting world!"

"I certainly love nothing mouldy," answered Holgrave. "Now, this old Pyncheon House! Is it a wholesome place to live in, with its black shingles, and the green moss that shows how damp they are? --its dark, low-studded rooms--its grime and sordidness, which are the crystallization on its walls of the human breath, that has been drawn and exhaled here in discontent and anguish? The house ought to be purified with fire,--purified till only its ashes remain!"

"Then why do you live in it?" asked Phoebe, a little piqued.

"Oh, I am pursuing my studies here; not in books, however," replied Holgrave. "The house, in my view, is expressive of that odious and abominable Past, with all its bad influences, against which I have just been declaiming. I dwell in it for a while, that I may know the better how to hate it.”

Sermon - Counting on Custom”

This is the season of custom and tradition. Every family seemingly has a tree in the living room, gifts encased in shiny paper and bow tied, a wreath on the door, an advent calendar, a menorah, chocolate coins, and stockings hung by the chimney with care. We believe it has always been this way, and always will be. But it is not so. Did you know that here in New England the residents did not celebrate Christmas for a longer period of time than we have since celebrated the holiday? From the founding date of this congregation in 1630 until the middle of the nineteenth century, there was no regular custom of celebrating on December 25, and for part of that time it was illegal to do so. While Puritans celebrated fast days and thanksgivings, Christmas was just another work day. For more than 200 years schools were in session, markets bustled, and courts were conducting business as usual. You can probably guess one of the reasons the Puritans failed to celebrate Christmas. In their native England the holiday was marked by revelry and debauchery, whereas they preferred repentance and fasting as expressions of religious longing. But there was also a scholarly reason. There was no evidence either Biblical or historical that Jesus was born on December 25. They knew the ancients had appropriated winter solstice so the converted pagans could transition right in to celebrating Christmas. Plus the fact that Anglicans celebrated it, was reason alone to forego the holiday. So we see even our most revered traditions and customs may not be so traditional or customary as we believe them to be.

While customs may not be as old as we think they are, we can also see that customs change. These same Puritans outlawed sexual intercourse on Sunday. How would they know the act had occurred without hidden cameras or guilt ridden confessions? Their medical knowledge was not exactly as modern as ours, and they held the belief that a child is born on the same day as he/she is conceived. Once the birthday signaled that the parents apparently had sex on the Lord’s Day, pastors frequently refused to baptize the newborn babies who were conceived in sin. Our neighboring parish in Sudbury had a minister who would never perform such baptisms, that is until a certain terrible Sunday when his own wife gave birth to twins. Customs change. Sometimes with a little reality check.

It may be useful for us to learn that the customs we have long held to be true, and have followed faithfully are wrong. Sometimes we learn this with a little shame or humiliation, as did the Rev. Israel Loring. Other times it can be worse. Nathaniel Philbrick in his book Mayflower tells us that the English soldiers during King Philip’s War had the military custom of marching in ranked order, or what the natives described as “kept in a heap together.” This left them easy marks for attackers, whereas if they were spread out, they would not be as likely to be hit. They also kept to the same roads and byways so as not to get lost or ambushed, but these customs of traveling in heaps and in predictable fashion left them even more vulnerable to attack than they would otherwise be. Benjamin Church, one of the English military leaders learned from the Sakonnet tribe that warriors should never leave a swamp the same way as they had entered it. If you came out the same way you went in, then you were asking to walk into an ambush. Sometimes our very lives can depend upon doing things in a different way rather than keeping with custom or tradition. This tactic even appears in one of the Gospel stories of Jesus’ birth. Matthew has the wise men warned in a dream to go back to their own country by another way to cleverly avoid the bloodlust plottings of King Herod.

We learn that customs can prove to be wrong or woefully ineffective, and we adapt and change to fit our present needs. We sometimes think that in the Unitarian Universalist tradition we have an intended religious method of rejecting custom and tradition. We have often been the religious faith whose followers have examined time worn customs and found them wanting, meaningless or lifeless, filled with words or practices that to us are archaic or absurd or irrational. To those who followed the scriptural truths of the Bible we said use your reason to follow the truth as you understand it. This search for truth led Emerson and our Transcendentalist ancestors to wonder why we should not have an original relationship to the universe. “Why should not we have a poetry and philosophy of insight and not of tradition, and a religion by revelation to us, and not the history of theirs?” Emerson refused to follow custom in matters of religion, and so left his ministry with a sermonic farewell called “The Lord’s Supper,” where he said the custom of serving communion was not consistent with the true spirit of Christianity. It was outmoded and meaningless, and Jesus never intended it to be instituted for all time. To him the service seemed “imposed by authority,” and did “not stand upon the basis of a voluntary act.” Human beings, he believed “ more easily transmit a form than a virtue.” He wanted the expression of the love or the compassion behind the form, thus rendering the form meaningless, which it was to him.

The Transcendentalists, despite their differences, all agreed on this seeming rejection of tradition and custom. George Ripley, the founder of Brook Farm, declared that the soul must enjoy “absolute independence and right to interpret the meaning of life, untrammeled by traditions and conventions.” Even Nathaniel Hawthorne, who was known for perceiving a much gloomier sense of human nature than his Brook Farm friends, presents us a character in Holgrave in The House of the Seven Gables who said that “in this age, more than ever before, the moss-grown and rotten Past is to be torn down, and lifeless institutions to be thrust out of the way, and their dead corpses buried, and everything to begin anew.” (164). He tells us in the passage I read today that he dwells in his house of the past, so that he can learn how to hate it even more. There we have an extreme obsession about tradition. While it is true that those who find meaning in the liberal religious path often prefer to be open about the possibility of new truths unfolding rather than worshipping old customs and traditions that have lost their meaning, we still find that we must create customs and traditions anew because the repetitive nature of a song, some words that we hold in common, a familiar place of gathering, or even faces that we have known all work to provide us with some sense of continuity and strength in a world that is constantly changing, giving us difficult emotional, intellectual and social challenges to resolve or endure. Human life is so vulnerable, and so subject to accident or calamity that some customary forms of religious expression and some traditions give a measure of continuity and meaning to the shifting sands of our lives. We don’t understand ourselves unless we understand our history, and we somtimes reject it before we have understood it.

Most of us would agree that Unitarian Universalists are often looking to use whatever customs and traditions we celebrate to live lives free of dead forms and words that we associate with traditional religious institutions. Still there are a number of unspoken or unrecognized customs that invariably keep us from a deeper sense of religious feeling. Some would say there is a custom of over reliance on the spoken word, and not enough of a tradition of silence in our worship services or in our lives. Some would say there is an over emphasis on trying to be all things to all people religiously. This is especially complicated at this time of year. We have solstice services, and we may try to celebrate Hanukkah, not necessarily because the story is especially meaningful to us but because we feel like we have to recognize everyone. Yet for all our apparent inclusivity the hymnal contains 35 hymns devoted to the Christmas season, far more than any other. Do we become Christian for a few weeks, and then return to our otherwise more typical rejection of tradition? It is complicated in the diverse religious world that we are trying to affirm and embrace. Those with Jewish, Christian and pagan customs all want to feel affirmed.

All of the recent civil unrest in Burma reminded me of a very well known essay by George Orwell called “Shooting an Elephant.” Orwell was once a civil servant in Burma, and he writes that he came to best understand imperialism in the context of an incident when an elephant went berserk. Two thousand people followed him with the expectation that he, as the white man in charge, would have to shoot the elephant, even though he did not want to. He had the total pressure of these two thousands faces goading him on to enact the role of enforcer. He had no choice. It was what was expected of him. Otherwise, he said, they would have laughed at him. He felt forced to follow a custom he did not want to. Orwell makes the astute observation that when the white man in this context becomes the tyrant, it is his own freedom that he destroys. He says, “A sahib has got to act like a sahib; he has got to appear resolute, to know his own mind and do definite things. He cannot quaver or appear weak, or else all is lost. He could not go away having done nothing.

One problem with customs is that they force us into roles we don’t want, and it is hard to maintain our independence from them. As a minister the customs of the position are imposed on all of us and sometimes it is a struggle to maintain one’s sense of personal integrity trying to make everyone happy. One can feel these customary expectations from ourselves and family members, too. It is hard to change family traditions at the holidays when others expect you to do certain things year after year. This is true even in congregations like ours where we think we are not hidebound by expectations. We soon become aware that certain traditions that were once new have become ritualized year after year; the pageant, bringing out the silver, the water service, or even how the room is arranged, and perhaps the minister can begin to feel like this must be done, or the congregation expects that it will be done, but there is little conversation about whether it continues to be meaningful or not and to whom it is meaningful. Unitarian Universalists who are famous for rejecting customary religious forms can become slaves to their new forms, which may appear in a variety of guises.

While we may count on customs and traditions to give us the shape of our church worship schedule or even the pattern of our holidays at home, we may discover there are some customs we no longer wish to continue. Cooking that dinner or buying those presents may make us feel like the imperialist celebrator who has lost his/her freedom, and we may impose this imperialism on ourselves. UUs may have eliminated Christmas communion, but we may want to ask ourselves which customs have become just as oppressive, simply because we have always done them, or somebody has the expectation that they will be done, and we may be afraid to say that we are tired, or don’t want to do that any longer.

If customs can haunt us when we let them control our life or our holidays, they become even more problematic if we fail to see them at all. I think this happens in two ways. This sermon topic grew from the Lydia Maria Child reading you heard this morning. I assigned this to my history class over at Andover Newton. Reading it again reminded me of the power of what we grow accustomed to, and how it can control our lives even when it may be as evil as slavery was. Child as you may remember was a member of this congregation, sister of Convers Francis, and the author of the Thanksgiving song, “Over the river and through the wood.” She also lost a successful career as author, children’s magazine editor, and cookbook maven when she published an abolitionist work in 1833. She saw with her own eyes that those who seemingly have strong ethical standards can be lulled into accepting a cultural standard that belies their values. We are comfortable with warm houses and clothes, and food, and our customary lives of plenty make it difficult for us to see, as Jacob Riis, once said, how the other half lives. These women found it convenient to have submissive servants acceding to their every wish. It seemed good and comfortable. Why not grow accustomed to living in the lap of luxury? Customary cars and vacations and other things about life we have come to expect and want mean we can easily forget that we might even want to love our neighbors. Why should we care about them when we have it all?

So it is easy to be hypnotized by what we grow accustomed to. Once upon a time the prophet Isaiah said, “See the former things have come to pass, and new things I now declare; before they spring forth, I tell you of them. Sing to the Lord a new song.” (Isaiah 42:9-10a) This was a declaration that a new world of justice was possible. Perhaps our own ancestors used to to speak of new gifts of the spirit. But now it is merely gifts or new toys. We also get used to the injustices of the society. Last week I delivered bread to the local food pantry. Deb Kaup told me she had helped forty families the last day they were open. We see homelessness or food pantry statistics going up and and up, and we speak as though it were a success because it is larger numbers. This is an issue I have spoken of before, but the fact remains when I was younger no one even knew this term homeless. It didn’t exist. And now we act like it is normal to have all these homeless people. We have grown accustomed to things we should never be accustomed to. Look across the political landscape from the working poor to the homeless, to breakdown of the separation of church and state. The custom was once a wall of separation between church and state; the way America is suppose to be by custom, tradition and law. Now we have merged faith and politics so much we exhale them in the same breath. Ask Mitt Romney.

Finally there are those customary things we simply fail to see. Now homelessness and poverty may be evils we have grown accustomed to, and other customs may be traditions we follow that we wish we didn’t, but we also must be aware of a third custom; the ones we don’t see. Some of these may be very obvious once you think about it. Often we have seen our place or our environment as it is for so long, we forget how it could be, or better yet, how it might feel to a stranger. These are the customs we have that we must be most aware of. In the newsletter I gave the example of not knowing where the front door is if you happen to be wandering around the parking lot. One of my goals here this year is a simple sign that says where to enter, maybe where the office is, or where the bathrooms are. Strangers don’t know where to go or what to do unless we tell them. This final custom is that we can easily forget what it is like to be in someone else’s shoes because we get so accustomed to our own. We have people arriving in wheelchairs with no place to park. If we grow accustomed to parking the way we like, and taking the chair we like, then we still don’t really see what the neighbor needs. Customs are something we get comfortable with, and perhaps makes our way here more easy. It looks and feels the same, and so we become more and more comfortable. But the more and more comfortable we feel, the more we grow accustomed to seeing how it is for us, and the less we see how it will be for someone other than us, how it will be for those who will become the First Parish of Watertown, 25 or 50 years from now when we are gone. We get accustomed to space, to chairs, to paint jobs, and change comes hard.

Yet the truth is, the light will go out on the customs we hold dear, even in our own time, when they no longer hold deep truths for us or we discover something we did not see before. We hold festivals of light and create customs in the darkest time of the year. We know the dark is ever present waiting to invade our lives. We need the light. We need our customs. But sometimes we also need to let the lights go out. We create new customs to reflect our truths. We let go so that others can find their way, and become part of the community. And that is why we light new lights. We are caught in between. The light goes out, and then we light the candle again. That is where we must live in religious community. Holding up the light of love we create and the traditions we find meaningful. All we can do is light the candle and give thanks that we are here, standing together in love, in community as a sheltering body against the dying of the light.



Closing Words - from Lynn Ungar (adapted)

Here in the last
gentle light past sunset
At the end of the week,
in the last days of the year
it is hard not to grasp
after the receding light
It is hard not to wonder
what is left - two candles burning -
Insufficient light to plant
or cook or paint the kitchen
Anything purposeful, that might
claim some conviction of the future.

There is so little we create
A few lines that take on life,
a bookcase that stands steady
There is so little that remains,
and always wanting
I could hand out quarters
on the street all day
and no one would be
saved or safe or whole.

Outside, the street lamps
are blinking on into a false
pink phosphorescent cheer
and we are sitting silent
in the wake of the candles’
first flare. I am watching you
looking at the candles
or the darkness in between them.

This is the blessing that we
have kindled - this particular dark
This space between two poles
which we, who are not angels,
can inhabit. If you stand facing me
this is what you will find
The gap between us where
our common lives take shape
The space between us that
we reach into for love.

Outside, the royal blue is deepening
to black. The stars begin to form
their million-year-old light
into constellations which we,
in our demand for form and story
have decreed. And you and I
are caught between the candles
where we cannot help but live,
in the close and infinite abundance
held between the kindling
and dying of the light.

Praised, be Thou, Eternal God,
who has sanctified us with
thy commandments, and required
of us the kindling of lights.