Archive for category Reflection
Opening Words for Christmas Eve
Posted by revjudegeiger in Call to Worship, Reflection on December 24, 2012
We gather this hour to celebrate the most extraordinary story birthed in the most ordinary of moments.
Where we find the promise of life within the face of a baby.
Where our heroes, a mother, a son, and an adoptive father are travelers, homeless, and resting for but a night.
We can imagine all too well a time, where the powerful fear a message of compassion, of peace, of simplicity -
when it is wrapped in dirty swaddling clothes, sleeping in a food trough among the animals and the mess of poverty.
A child born of a yet unwed mother, a father whose ties are solely love, and a lifestyle that can only be called migrant.
From the midst of vulnerability we learn a new way.
A love that moves our hearts,
a vision of peace in an age of violence,
and hope where one would never expect to find it -
begins in the quiet solitude of family,
with the meek of the earth,
with the people that must find another path,
knowing the principalities and the powers
can never satisfy the least among us.
May the Christmas story birth in all of us a sense of possibility,
a renewal of faith in the breadth of the human spirit,
despite all the failings of our world.
That with every child that’s born,
this wonder is made known:
We are given a gift that is our own.
Transgender Day of Remembrance: Embracing Our Whole Human Family
Posted by revjudegeiger in News Article, Reflection on November 20, 2011
Check out my blog on the Huffington Post!
The Polity of Abandonment
Posted by revjudegeiger in Reflection on October 27, 2011
Recently I attended an excellent youth ministry intensive at the Liberal Religious Educators’ Fall Conference in Portland, Oregon. In it we reflected on the old model of youth leadership development often getting confused with youth abandonment. We (adults) sought to foster our youth’s development by waiting for them to come to us when they had troubles; or to allow them to plan events and programs without adult inclusion or guidance. This sometimes resulted in incredibly powerful youth groups. This often resulted in youth leaving our denomination as adults. And sometimes, there was great pain or harm present without the guidance of adult mentoring.
I’m reminded of the old adage, “the youth shall lead the way.” It was certainly true with our merger of Unitarians and Universalists 50 years ago. What if this cultural system around youth abandonment is true for our adult leadership circles as well? What if our system of congregational polity reflects all to well the failures of the old youth development model? I think the similarities are striking.
Do our District Executives, Program Consultants, and the UUA Headquarters (or Ministers, Educators for the old youth model) lack authority to intervene in our congregations when there are real crises without first being invited in? Check.
Do most of our congregations invite in district, regional and continental leadership on an infrequent basis to help steer the future? Check.
When congregational leadership begins to “age out” (in youth terms) or die/move away/become home bound (in adult terms) do they fail to change their systems of governance/conversation/process to adjust to the new generation (Freshman Class)? Check.
Personally, I’m all for congregational polity. I wouldn’t want to throw it out. But we have to find a middle ground to integrate the expertise of our regional and continental leadership into at least the quarterly-to-quarterly leadership of our fellowships, churches and congregations. Otherwise, we’re closing our youth group doors to experience and wisdom we desperately need as our denomination shrinks.
Reflection on the 10 Year Anniversary of 9/11
Posted by revjudegeiger in Reflection on October 23, 2011
Ten years ago today, most of us woke up to a Sunny clear sky. I remember not a cloud in sight. It was a shade of blue that many of us can recall vividly still. It was a Tuesday morning, and kids were just starting school for the year. Not all of us were born yet though, and some of us might be too young to remember. I was working at a University in Northern Jersey then, and remember meeting new college freshmen who were away from home for the very first time.
At 8:46am, when kids were in school, and some folks were at work, a group of terrorists – who also identified as Muslims – crashed the first of two planes into the Twin towers of the World Trade Center. About every 20 to 30 minutes we would learn of another such tragedy. The second tower and then the pentagon and finally Flight 93 which crashed in a field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. The news was all confused for some time, with conflicting stories. I remember not believing it when I first heard about it from a co-worker a few minutes before 9.
Some stories would remain confused to this day. People would say that all Muslims (or followers of Islam) hate America. The truth is that although some people are filled with hate, the core of the Islamic faith that I have come to know in the United States calls for peace. Some would say this was the beginning of a religious war; but the truth is that victims on that day came from all religions: Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Paganism to name a few…. Sometimes people hide behind their lies about religion to further their political goals.
We mourn for the loss of those almost 3000 lives, and we gain strength from the stories of hope and renewal. I am inspired by the tales of all those firefighters, police and EMT’s who ran toward the towers to help when everyone else was trying to get as far away as possible. Or the passengers of Flight 93 who wrestled with their hijackers, not knowing what might come, so that even more harm did not happen to innocent lives on the ground. Or the story of our own congregation. Led by our minister at the time, Fred; we crafted an interfaith service on the Brooklyn Heights Promenade overlooking the World Trade Center. That Tuesday evening, members of the churches and synagogues and mosques all around here gathered for a candlelight vigil together. At a time when fear was the easy answer, First UU reached out with love and compassion. It is these stories of hope that we honor those who are lost to us. Not by the clutching or grabbing of anger and fear, but by the reaching out of loving hands do we rebuild and strengthen community.
Golden Calf vs Sacred Calf
Posted by revjudegeiger in Reflection on October 15, 2011
I’ve been deeply moved by the NYC image of the Golden Calf that Judson Memorial Church has processed down past the Thompson Street Brunch crowd on Sunday afternoons in support of the Occupy Wall Street social movement. Rev. Michael Ellick and Rev. Donna Schaper’s interfaith leadership has been effective and powerful. The Golden Calf, the classic false idol of scriptures based in the Abrahamic Tradition reminds us that we’re not here to worship any economic system. It reminds us that religion and faith put human compassion before the call of the dollar. The story of Moses, Aaron and the people’s desire to rely on something familiar rather than the difficult path God put before them is one we can readily relate to. What other way is there but profit? Can we really rely on one another? Will there be enough when I can’t see the way forward?
At a recent interfaith press conference, Donna Schaper reminded us that the story ultimately has a shattered calf at the end of it – and we need to not shatter our calf. Violence has no place in this peace movement. Reflecting upon her words, I would add that our system doesn’t have to be shattered to be healed. Our reliance upon the way things have been done may need to be broken, but destruction isn’t the image we need to look toward. We need to find one of hope and abundance, because that’s the core of our challenge. And it can be the core of our solution.
I was reminded of another tradition’s image of the sacred calf at the press conference. In Hinduism, the cow is sacred. It’s a sign of life and abundance. It’s holy and an image of the divine. I’d like to suggest that we continue to use this image of the Golden Calf in the form of the Wall Street Bull, to remind us that the economic system that parses and funnels wealth against the stream to the few is a dead weight that only brings loss with it. We can also remember the Hindu notion of the sacred calf. The U.S. is a society with a tremendous dream, and an abundance of prosperity – even in the recession we now face. We can cease to pretend that hoarding wealth is our sacred national pastime. We can devise an economy – even a Capitalistic economy – that recognizes that we truly have more than we’re allowing all of us to share in. Approaching our imagination with solutions rooted in this abundance, we can rebuild a sense of hope and possibility for that way forward. It doesn’t have to be them vs us. As one protester wrote, “It’s not you vs. me. It’s we before me.”
