January 2, 2005

Rev. Henry Ticknor
Unitarian Universalist Church of the Shenandoah Valley

Out with the Old, In with the New ( A Happy New Year....)

A happy new year to one and all. In many ways today marks the end of this year’s holiday season even though the twelve days of the Christmas celebration last until the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6.

This morning’s sermon was slow in arriving. Now I can’t blame the postal service, or Fed-Ex for this, nor can I blame any kind of post-Christmas melt-down as Nancy and the girls and I had a wonderful Christmas and a wonderful couple of days visiting in North Carolina.

Normally, I begin to prepare my sermons on Tuesday and Wednesday by mentally sifting through my ideas, so that by Thursday I am ready to finish whatever reading or research needs to be done. Usually, by Friday mornings when I sit down at my computer, I am ready to put my words on paper. But this week the process simply didn’t work, and it’s quite unnerving when the words don’t come.

I think the reason has its roots in the tsunami disaster. As each day brings news of greater and greater loss of life and the newspapers print those surreal photos that depict disappearance of entire towns and villages, it has become more and more difficult to understand the magnitude of it all.

It’s so hard to imagine what the conditions in parts of India, Thailand and Sri Lanka must really be like. In fact, it’s so hard that our general response has been to continue on as usual bringing in the New Year.

Unlike 9/11, people aren’t glued to their TV’s. Rather, folks are wishing one another happy new year as if nothing terrible has just happened. Perhaps the distance from the United States makes it all seem unreal.

Perhaps as a nation we are so focused on Iraq that there’s not much room in our national consciousness for another disaster. It’s hard to know the reasons for this response and no doubt they are many and complicated.

But just as I was beginning to doubt that I would have anything to say an article in the Washington Post nudged me out of my doldrums. It didn’t take long for someone to explore the religious implications of this disaster.

Jose Antonio Vargas, a Post staff writer, wrote in an article titled “Seeking the Hand of God in the Waters,” and here I am going to cite this article at some length:

The giant waves generated by the earthquake made no attempt to differentiate between the religions of the victims. Hindus were swept away in India; Muslims were carried off in Indonesia; Buddhists in Thailand, Jews and Christians were not spared either.

Here was a mindless natural event, which destroyed everything in its path. A non-scientific belief system, especially one that is based on any kind of divine order, has some explaining to do. What God sanctions an earthquake? What God protects against it? Why did the quake strike these places and these people and not others?

The barrage of images, stories, and statistics about the tsunami in South Asia can be deeply disturbing and provoke heartfelt inquiries.

What can I do to help?
Where can my contribution be most effective?
How can I protect myself from being overwhelmed or numbed by the magnitude of this tragedy?

These questions flow from our instinct to help, from the discomfort we feel while the media bombards us with ever rising death tolls. They flow from our desire for our contributions to be promptly distributed and effectively used, and lastly from our common humanity that is in danger of being overloaded with each story of a brother and sister playing on the beach one moment and ripped from their parents' arms the next…not to be seen again.

It is exactly for times such as this that I think that our Unitarian Universalist principles serve us so well. We are open to the teachings of science and technology that encourage us to understand the rupture of the great tectonic plates under the ocean that generated tremors through the ocean floor. We are able to comprehend the physics that created walls of water crossing vast oceans at 500 miles per hour.

So, too, we are open to the transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures that move us to honor and respect all the peoples of this world. Our Universalist heritage teaches us that however we define the holy—all people regardless of religion—deserve to be cared for and provided with the basic necessities of life.

And so for me, one way to begin to find meaning in the events of this past week is to try and understand both the natural science that conspired in a series of catastrophic events to bring death and destruction to so many; and the abiding power of the human spirit that enables people to have hope in the forces that create and uphold life.

For some these forces are religious—prayer and meditation—for others these forces are embodied by the aide groups that are already bringing some modicum of relief from overwhelming suffering.

And if we are called, as I believe we are, to respond to suffering with love; then I believe each of us is called to respond by loving the people of the world as ourselves; to treat those in need as we ourselves would wish to be treated. For indeed, we are all connected within the interdependent web of all existence.

At times like this we need to affirm our common humanity, and to help one another know that we can make a difference. History, as we know, is seldom made by individuals, but rather by the collective response of a loving community.

A contribution to the relief effort, no matter how small can make a huge difference. The median income of most Americans is $37,000 as compared to $930 in Sri Lanka, $530 in India. A gift of $100 could represent one fifth of a family’s annual income.

So, pray if you are able, for relief from misery, pain and suffering.

Donate funds, if you are able, to organizations such as the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, the International Red Cross, UNICEF, the World Health Organization, the American Friends Service Committee, Doctors without Boarders and the Islamic Relief fund.

Give blood if you are able. Confront the forces of prejudice and ignorance, whenever you can. Love the earth, and take care of it whenever you can.

We must work to uphold the dignity and worth of all the survivors—not just the English speaking survivors whose stories are moving and dramatic—but the faceless and nameless who have bourn more than their share of this tragedy.

The realization of just how fragile this life can be requires of us imaginative compassion and solidarity with all the victims. In times such as these I find these words adapted from Hebrew scripture to be a comfort:

So let us walk together in the days and weeks ahead giving of our treasure and our talent as best as we are able.