Results tagged “love” from Marilyn Sewell

About a year and a half ago, I was one depressed woman.  This was not a biological depression--this was a situational depression.  You see, I knew that I would soon be leaving my post as the Senior Minister of the First Unitarian Church of Portland, but I had no idea what form my relational life might take after I left the church. 

I knew that I wanted to write, and I needed to leave parish ministry in order to pursue that calling--but for 17 years my community, and most of the intimacy in my life, came from my relationship with my congregants.  I had always thought that some day I would meet a man who was right for me, and we would make a home together.  But the years went by, and although I had several promising relationships, no man turned out to be the one I could settle down with.  So I continued to give myself almost wholly to my work.  There was plenty of it, to distract me from my loneliness.

As time went on, and my retirement drew closer, I gave up the idea that I would ever be partnered.  (Hey, it hadn't happened in 17 years, had it?)  I tried to explore options that would give me companionship.  Maybe I would live in a four-plex with writers and/or social justice activists.  Maybe I would try to live communally.  Maybe I would leave Portland altogether and go somewhere else where there was a large, thriving UU church, and try to make new friends there.  I explored these options in some depth, traveling and talking to people, looking at various living situations.

And then life tossed me a surprise--I met a most amazing man!  OK, indulge me: he's handsome, wise, funny, affectionate, and has a deep and abiding sense of integrity.  He's also talented and strong and gives himself gladly to make his community a better place.  Our values are precisely the same.  Ditto our aesthetic sense.  Ditto our politics, etc., etc.  I know this is getting sickeningly sweet, but believe me, dear reader, it's all true! 

I don't mean to say it's all sweetness and light--misunderstandings occur, as in all relationships.  But these little instances can't touch the core--in other words, I can't imagine living without him, and he (miraculously) feels the same way about me.  So we're getting married on Sept. 6.

I know better than to do that "and then they lived happily ever after" thing--because I will continue to have to work on my stuff--you know, trying to be a kinder, gentler human being.  No person can do that for another.  And yet to be loved, and to love, while dealing with the vicissitudes of life--well, that's an amazing blessing.  A small miracle, I call it.

My fiance and I talk about loss even now, at the beginning.  Both of us are old enough to know that we won't live forever (the way all young people think they will), and that one of us will lose the other, at some point.  We know that.  And it makes every day we are given so very precious, so very sweet.  I walk in thankfulness.

Well, dear reader, I don't know how you are experiencing your life right now.  Maybe you're feeling a little, or a lot, desperate.  Maybe your cheer is just a show--maybe you're whistling in the dark, as they say.  Or maybe you've just fallen in love.  Or fallen ill.  Or fallen into incredibly good fortune.  Or become enlightened.  I don't know. 

But know this: you can expect only one thing in this world--you can expect that you will be surprised by life, over and over again.  So try to stay awake during your time here, and be prepared.  For whatever. 

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In my last reflection I commented on David Brooks' recent review (5/14) of Josua Wolf Shenk's essay "What Makes Us Happy," found in the current issue (June 2009) of the Atlantic.  Brooks says that the researcher, George Vaillant, discovered through his longitudinal study of the lives of Harvard men that "the only thing that really matters in life are (sic) your relationships to other people."  Brooks muses about Vaillant's life, a life lacking in warm relationship and intimacy, and concludes, "Even when we know something, it is hard to make it so."

I just read Shenk's article and found it fascinating.  It was one of those on which I used a magic marker copiously.  Shenk gives summaries of various case studies throughout the article, and he also from time to time reports interesting conclusions which Vaillant came to during his intensive study.  A few of these are the following:

". . . a glimpse of any one moment in a life can be deeply misleading.  A man at 20 who appears the model of altruism may turn out to be a kind of emotional prodigy--or he may be ducking . . . <a> kind of engagement with reality. . . ; on the other extreme, a man at 20 who appears impossibly wounded may turn out to be gestating toward maturity."

". . . mature adaptations are a real-life alchemy, a way of turning the dross of emotional crises, pain, and deprivation into the gold of human connection, accomplishment, and creativity."

He sites the seven major factors that predict healthy aging, both physically and psychologically: employing mature adaptations, education, stable marriage, not smoking, not abusing alcohol, some exercise, and healthy weight.

But at no place was Vaillant more powerful and articulate, says Shenk, than when he describes the significance of love and intimacy in our lives.  Vaillant was asked in an interview in March 2008, "What have you learned from the Grant Study men?"  Vaillant responded: "That the only thing that really matters in life are your relationships to other people."

Perhaps Vaillant was so keenly aware of the importance of relationship because his life has always been fraught with such difficulty in that arena.  So how is it that someone can know so much and yet find it so difficult to put into practice what he clearly understands?  Vaillant answers this question in a profound and moving statement in his book Adaptation to Life. Speaking of his male subjects not from a scientific, but more from a philosophical or even theological perspective, he writes: "Their lives were too human for science, too beautiful for numbers, too sad for diagnosis and too immortal for bound journals."

So yes, the process of learning to be fully human, the process of learning to love openly and deeply, is in the final analysis, a mystery.  We don't understand why we do what we do, or why we fail sometimes to become what we most earnestly desire to become. 

However, in my last reflection I did promise you an answer, and an answer I will give.  Love is the most powerful force that exists, and love can be taught.  It is best taught in the first 18 months of a child's life, and if a child is separated from mother during those years for any reason, or if a child is abused, or if a child is with parents who cannot for whatever reason nurture the child, then learning love later in life will prove difficult.  But except in the most profound cases of deprivation, it will not prove impossible. 

People who need to learn about love can do so by being with people who know how to love, in community and in intimate places in their lives.  Often helpers are needed--skilled psychotherapists for sure, spiritual advisors, massage therapists, yoga teachers, etc., etc.  A loving community is essential.  In the best of all worlds, the love-deprived person will be able at some point to enter into a long-term, intimate relationship with someone who is good at loving and who will love the person exactly as he or she is. 

Is there any guarantee?  In this world, there never is.  We just don't know.  But we can do our best to increase the odds.  We can love, and we can reach out for love.  In the end, we'll find that Vaillant is right--it's all that matters. 

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I was fascinated by David Brooks' editorial (NYTimes 5/12, A23) on an article entitled "What Makes Us Happy?" by Joshua Wolf Shenk, to be published in this next issue of the Atlantic.  In short, the article (now available on line) describes a longitudinal study done by one George Vaillant over a 42-year period on a group of 268 of the most promising young men of the Harvard class of 1942.  Among them were John F. Kennedy and Ben Bradlee. 

These young men were the creme de la creme: they were intelligent, sophisticated, advantaged in every way.  They had been selected from the rest of the entering class because they were considered the most well adjusted.  Since they were college sophomores, they have been visited by researchers regularly and studied in every aspect of their living.  The results are known as the Grant Study, and they are summarized in Shenk's article, which I have not as yet had a chance to read--but eagerly await.

Judging from their privileged beginnings, one might expect that these men would grow into highly successful, happy individuals.  The life stories, however, show quite a different outcome.  Brooks points out that one third of the men ended up suffering at least one bout of mental illness.  Many would be plagued with alcoholism.  A few, understandably, could never admit that they were gay, until they were of an advanced age. Brooks is struck, he says, by "the baffling variety of their lives."  What causes us to make certain decisions, to follow life-giving as opposed to destuctive paths?  And a man who seems to do well in one phase of his life might just fall apart in the next phase.  Why?

The study apparently produced some correlations.  Correlations don't prove, but they do suggest.  The men by and large did better as they aged.  Those who suffered from depression were much more likely to be dead by their early 60's.  But it's George Valliant's final conclusion that is the most profound and the most instructive to us all.  In a video he says, "Happiness is love.  Full Stop."

Ironically enough, love always seemed to elude Valliant himself, Brooks reports.  When he was 10, his father, who seemed successful and content, shot himself beside the family pool.  The mother removed the children from the house, and Valliant never saw the house again.  There was no memorial service.  Valliant married three times, returning then to his second wife.  For long periods he was estranged from his children.

Brooks concludes, poignantly, "Even when we know something, it is hard to make it so."

Yes, this is true.  But I have a response to this statement.  Stay tuned for my next reflection.

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During Archbishop TuTu's recent visit to Portland, some of us were asked to participate in panel discussions on several related topics.  I was asked to be on a panel entitled "Religion as a Bridge to Reconciliation."  The following is part of what I said in my introductory remarks:

The word religion comes from the prefix re, meaning back and the Latin ligare, which means "to bind" or "to bind back" or "to reconnect."  One might say that the function of religion is to repair the illusion of our separation.  Religion should play a natural, a logical role in reconciliation--to bind us together in common values of love, compassion, justice, and forgiveness.

Unfortunately, religion--and I can speak with real authority only of the Christian religion, which is my own--religion most often seems to do the opposite: it serves to separate and to divide.  Christianity has such a bad reputation that the very use of the word in the common vernacular connotes "one who is rigid in belief," and people who are not religious are wary of those who are, for these unconverted individuals--those unwashed in the blood, so to speak--too often have been targets for conversion and have not been respected as the persons, theological and otherwise, that they are.

Of course, all religious people are not Fundamentalists by any means, but even so, when any group of people begin to say, "My way is the way, my path is the only path," the result is division and acrimony.

In fact, religion then becomes no different in this way from any other ideology, whethers an idealogy of communism or capitalism or racism or deconstructionist thinking.  One who becomes an ideologist, or a true believer, begins to exist in a closed system.  Whatever fits into this chosen system is labeled "true" and whatever does not is labeled "false."  The curiosity, spontaneity, and growth of such an individual become limited.

Because each of us is troubled by a multitude of interior forces we do not and will not ever totally understand, it is our nature to look for a system which explains our angst and which makes us feel safe within the walls of that system.  We do not see that system as arbitrary, as created by humans who are terrified of our own inevitable demise, and so we reify those structures--that is, we come to believe that there is a concrete reality there.  Therefore, we cling to these beliefs as to life itself, and whatever threatens them must be challenged--or perhaps stemped out, eliminated.

Given this very human and very pervasive problem with religion, one can see why religion often fails to be a sturdy instrument of reconciliation.  At the same time, we know that there have been instances when it has been.  I'm thinking of enlightened leaders who have internalized the radical way of being that seems to be at the heart of all major religions--the radical way of love, compassion, peace.  Violence and retribution have no part to play.  I'm thinking, for example, for Martin Luther King, Jr., who taught non-violence in the Civil Rights movement; or Gandhi, who practiced satyagraha, or passive resistance, to free his people from British rule; or a more recent example, the Amish, who forgave the man who gunned down their children in a Pennsylvania schoolhouse a few years ago, because these gentle people could do no other: forgiveness is their way of being.

So if we mean by religion, a spiritual commitment to love and compassion and non-violence--if we mean by religion, a radical change of being in which the individual or community understands that we are all one and that love and forgiveness are central to their being, then yes, religion is the essence of reconciliation and a path to that difficult state.

But if we mean by religion--which we generally do--an institutionalized set of beliefs, then, no, just the opposite.  For religion in that sense divides people into the righteous and the unrighteous, the saved and the unsaved, the good and the evil.  And of course if we have made "the other" evil, then the righteous must have control over the evil ones.  We righteous ones can then project all of our shadow side onto these evil ones, and then Christians can smile as we say things to gays and lesbians like, "I hate the sin, but love the sinner," or say to those of another faith tradition, "If you haven't accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you're going to hell."  Not to mention the generations of wars between believers of various faiths throughout the world, throughout all time.  Make the people of a different tribe or race or religion "other," and they are much easier to kill.

So is religion a path to reconciliation?  Not until its practititioners mature as religious beings.  Not until its institutions become more devoted to the heart-lessons of their prophets than to the divisive theology of their true believers.

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A new study by the American Religious Identification Survey has shown a sharp decrease in the number of people who claim to be religious.

--the number of people who call themselves Christian is at 76%, down from 86% in 1990

--30% of couples who marry do not bother to have a religious ceremony

--when asked to speciify their religion, 8.2% said "none" in 1990; in this study, 15% said "none"

So what's the deal?  Have people given up on God?

I think people have given up on the kind of religion that they see in the media.  Almost every story about contemporary religion is about fundamentalist religion, and almost every story has to do with some scandal or some abuse of the cloth or some terrible lie or some hypocrisy--or just some nonsense that people who have gone beyond the fifth grade find difficult to respect--like God made the earth in 7 days. 

I have been to the Hall of Justice in the State of Alabama and seen in the rotunda the huge boulder inscribed with the Ten Commandments, plus quotations from our alleged "Christian" founding fathers (it has, thankfully, removed).  I have talked with the creationist who explained that her mentor has 2 large stones on which are pictured dinosaurs and humans, proving therefore that dinosaurs and humans roamed the earth at the same time.  I have seen on TV the woman who says that God brought her dead chicken back to life, through prayer and mouth-to-beak resuscitation.  I have been confounded by the Ph.D. theology professor who told me that Gandhi was in hell because "he did not accept Jesus as his Lord and Savior."

Worse than this, I have seen my gay and lesbian church members fear for their safety because they have been told they are sinners and less than whole by fundamentalist Christians.  I have known Catholic "good old boy" church bureaucrats that have sent priest sex offenders from parish to parish, to molest other children.  I have known people crippled with guilt, running from God, because they had been told they were bad and were going to hell.  And now the latest: the Pope has denounced the use of condoms in Africa to prevent AIDS.  He added that he was bringing  "the Christian message of hope." 

The way I read the New Testament, Jesus is all about love and tolerance, compassion and forgiveness.  How did so many Christians go so wrong?  Are they reading the same Bible I am?

Of course, there are liberal religious people--like Unitarian Universalists and many liberal Christians.  If we got a little more press, perhaps religion wouldn't have such a bad name.  At least I would like to think so.  God is obviously a liberal--who could be more bounteous, generous, beneficent, caring, more lavish, prodigal, profuse, and charitable? 

Why are people giving up on church?  Because church has given up on them.  Churches of whatever name or theological persuasion had better get back to the core message.  It's the shortest verse in the Bible, and it's pretty simple: "God is love."

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Those of you who have been following my blog know that my cat Molly has been having problems with urination--or rather, I have been having problems with Molly's urinating on my rugs.  I tried punishing her by calling her attention to the wet spot and saying, "Bad kitty, bad kitty!"  I know she understood, because the behavior would stop for a while--but then it would start again.

You may remember that I took my little Molly to the vet, who suggested that Molly might be having problems adjusting to my new human friend, who she believes has stolen my affection from her.  Well, it is true that she is no longer #1--that would be accurate.  So what to do?  The vet suggested that maybe she should go on kitty Prozac.  He said, however, that the drug "might change her personality."  I can imagine that I might have a cat that would sleep all day, with a silly grin on her face.  I didn't want to go that route. 

One friend suggested that I contract the services of a "cat whisperer" (the cat equivalent of a "horse whisperer").  Another said that Molly should have cat psychotherapy.  Still another said that I should try to engage an "animal intuitive."  All of these solutions sounded if-fy to me, not to mention expensive. 

So I decided on another approach.  I decided to give Molly . . . LOVE!  I reasoned that if she was feeling rejected, then telling her she was a bad kitty would just make her feel even worse.  So instead my new friend and I decided to shower her with love and affection.  We say things to Molly like, "Molly, you are the most beautiful cat in the world!" and "Molly, you darling kitten, I just love you so much!"  We pet her as soon as she comes round, and naturally keep her food dish full and her water dish fresh.  After only a few days of this LOVE treatment, Molly stopped her bad behavior and started purring most all the time we come near her.

Why didn't I think of this earlier?  Isn't this what all living creatures want--love, I mean?  No one wants to feel displaced.  No one wants to be told that they are "bad."  Everyone likes to have a full food dish given to them--and fresh drinks prepared.  Everyone likes to be stroked and petted by those they love.  What a simple and pleasant solution!  And much cheaper than Prozac.  

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It was predictable--conservative Episcopalians have decided to just by golly go off and sulk and have their own church.  They can't stand the idea of gay clergy.  When Gene Robinson was ordained a bishop (wearing a bullet-proof vest, as I remember), bishops representing around 14 dioceses met to explore the possibility of a new Anglican church in North America.  Only 4 dioceses have actually broken away, however.  Bishop Martyn Minns, a leader of the breakaway movement, explained "there's some people standing back to wait and see if we pull this off, which I think we'll do.  Then others will join us--parishes, and maybe dioceses."

Dream on, Bishop Minns.  You are the last of a dying breed--the same guys who didn't want to ordain women and who didn't want to ever, ever change a word of the Book of Common Prayer.  Time is not on your side, ethical evolution is not on your side, and for sure youth are not on your side.  A case in point: California voted against gay rights in this last election--but when you look at who voted which way, you see that it was the older folks who said no to gays and the younger ones who said yes.  It's just a matter of time. 

And don't forget that we just elected a young African American President.  How does this event relate to the question at hand?  Well, things are changing.  It's not all old white men anymore, in their dark suits.  It's women and people of color and gays and young people.  It's all of us.  I like what Jim Naughton, canon for the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, and a liberal blogger, wrote in response to the viability of this new church: "I think this organization does not have much of a future because there are already a lot of churches in the United States for people who don't want to worship with gays and lesbians.  That's not a market niche that is underserved."

Listen up, Christian churches everywhere!  Why are churches often the last to extend love and acceptance to all who enter their doors?  Who is this Jesus that I read about in the New Testament who loved and accepted prostitutes, tax collectors, Roman soldiers, women, children, lepers, rich people, poor people, etc., etc.  Where is the church's prophetic voice?  The church should be the first to speak out for the disenfranchised, Bishop Minns--not the institution to keep people out, but the one to broaden the circle and invite people in. 

Jesus asked us to do one thing, and one thing only: he asked us to be on the side of love.  In our personal lives, we all measure up to this standard imperfectly.  But with love as the standard and goal, systemic discrimination has no place in Christian churches and institutions. 

And my prediction?  Love will win the day.  It's just too beautiful to disregard.  Let's watch and see.

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One of the most difficult of all human tasks, emotionally and spiritually, is forgiving those who have harmed us.  I suppose the difficult part is that we are human, and it is natural to want to strike back and hurt this person in return. Because so many of my congregants found my sermon, "Slouching Toward Forgiveness" helpful, I decided to expand upon it and to write a book on the subject.  The book is small and unpretentious--indeed, I do not claim to have perfected myself in this regard--but it contains the essence of what I have discovered thus far in my own search for understanding and practice.  The book is entitled simply A Little Book on Forgiveness, and it is now for sale in our own Beacon Book Store.  I will be doing a book signing on Nov. 30 and also on Dec. 14, for this book and for my other titles, which the bookstore carries. 

To give you a taste of the content of the new book on forgiveness, I'm going to reprint a few passages here in today's blog:

"Forgiveness asks us to go beyond that understandable impulse to judge and to punish.  It is a softening and healing of the heart, in response to pain or injustice.  It is a gift, not to the offending party, but to ourselves . . . ."

"Forgiveness is not just a single act, but is a way of being.  I believe that this way of living--living, that is, with discernment but not with judgment--is our best chance as human beings to find at last the peace of body and soul that we seek in vain, through other means."

"Forgiveness is a profound act of self-healing.  It allows us to make choices for our lives that we could not otherwise make, to make room for joy, for love.  Yes, as we forgive, we find that we are no longer defined and controlled by our pain and sadness . . . ."

"We need not be surprised if forgiveness is difficult, or if it takes a long time.  We need not feel guilty about our struggles to forgive.  We are not bad people because we struggle in this way.  We are just human.  We simply cannot will ourselves to forgive.  Quite honestly, I think forgiveness is an act of grace."

"We grow in compassion as we reflect upon our own lives and circumstances.  We realize that even our best-intentioned, most spirit-led decisions have the capacity to hurt others, including those we love."

"Each of us, no matter what our circumstances, has a rock-bottom choice to make, and that choice will determine the character and direction of our lives.  We can decide to be on the side of love, or not."

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