July 4, 2010

Religious Freedom: A Celebration

Frank Valenti, Worship Associate
Unitarian Universalist Church of Asheville

Asheville, NC

Readings

"Two Plaques"

In the downtown Philadelphia Unitarian Church, gathered in 1796, there is a plaque commemorating the longtime ministry of Rev. William Henry Furness, father of famous American architect Frank Furness. The elder Furness was called right out of Harvard Divinity School as the church’s minister from 1825 to 1875 and then as Minister Emeritus unto his death.

During his ministry in Philadelphia he was famous as an outspoken advocate for the abolition of slavery. This he preached from his pulpit with courage and conviction, and on many occasions church members sat in the pews armed with rifles in order to protect the minister whom they loved so dear and whose message struck an agreeing chord within some hearts.

But such was not the case with all members of the church.

In fact, within the congregation there was a Southern plantation owner who was one of the wealthiest members of the congregation. Another, the Chairman of the Church’s Board, was himself pro-slavery and was decidedly against the preaching of his minister, the minister his church had called.

But, today in that church’s building, where there is a plaque given by the church commemorating Rev. Furness’ ministry, there is another plaque given by Rev. Furness’ architect son commemorating that Board Chairman’s staunch support of the freedom of the pulpit; the freedom the congregation gave Rev. Furness to preach the truth as he saw it when they lent him their pulpit as their minister; a freedom that yielded a message the Board Chairman disbelieved.

Two plaques reside in the same church representing two people on opposing sides of the single most important social and theological question of their time.

(From a sermon by UU Minister Brent A. Smith delivered at All Souls Community Church, Grand Rapids Michigan, August 26, 2007)

"An Unlikely Affair"

I had preached a strong sermon again the war in Viet Nam. For five years I had opposed the conflict – speaking at demonstrations, organizing a draft counseling service, and founding an underground railroad for deserters. My feelings ran deep.

Suddenly, a voice in the sanctuary asked to respond to my remarks. It was Carlton Burr: a graduate of Harvard University, an officer in the Navy during World War II, a distinguished businessman in southeastern Massachusetts, and a member of the Republican Party. I invited him to speak from the pulpit.

We were two different people – in our birth, our education, our politics – in almost all of our life experiences. Yet we had been friends from the very beginning of my ministry. He was warm and generous. He was open and direct. He was honest and dedicated. Carlton would never abandon the church – even if he stood alone on every issue. He was a Unitarian Universalist in the finest tradition.

So he appeared in the pulpit with a short rebuttal. He defended the policy in Viet Nam. He exonerated the President and the military. He claimed that his minister was mistaken.

I was very proud of Carlton – even as I thought of the misery and destruction of the war.

Was that so wrong?

(A Reading given on July 1, 2007 at the service at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church, Kansas City, Missouri accompanying the sermon given by UU Minister Jim Eller.)

SERMON

Less than two years ago, a man entered our neighboring Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church in Knoxville, Tennessee and opened fire on the congregation with a shotgun, killing two people and wounding seven others. He said that he targeted that particular church because of its liberal teachings. This assault, on who we are and what we believe as Unitarian Universalists, was an unmistakable attack on our religious freedom -- our freedom to believe what we think right, to say what we believe, and to act on our beliefs. A couple of weeks later, the Unitarian Universalist Association took out a full-page ad in the New York Times carrying the message, "Our Doors and Our Hearts Will Remain Open". This was a message to the world that we will never falter, never give in, in living our faith. That we will live and die by our religious freedom.

Our religious freedom is the foundation of our Unitarian Universalist liberal faith. By our fourth UU principle, we covenant to promote and affirm “A free and responsible search for truth and meaning.” In our church’s Mission Statement, we promise to “work in community for freedom, justice and love.”

Our religious freedom had its beginnings at the time of the Protestant Reformation, when the dogmatic religion that had prevailed for a millennium was under siege. In the remote mountains of Transylvania in Eastern Europe, the first edict of religious toleration in history was declared in 1568 during the reign of the first and only Unitarian king, John Sigismund. This was a clear and unqualified statement that preachers shall preach according to their understanding and congregants shall not be compelled to believe anything they do not agree with.

This spirit of toleration survived down through the centuries to be embodied in the founding of our country. The First Amendment to our Constitution guarantees that “no law shall be made respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise of religion.” Our Constitution also says that “no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office under the United States.”

Over the years, the United States Supreme Court has handed down a body of law broadly interpreting and vindicating these rights. But you may not realize, that even today, our religious freedom is not shared by most people in the world. Whatever we may find wrong in this country, looking back through history and looking at every nation on the globe today, there can be little argument that our Founding Fathers did well.

We have good cause to celebrate on this Fourth of July. Our country offers the greatest degree of personal liberty and opportunity to realize our human potential of any nation that has ever existed. And that includes, especially, our religious freedom. So as Unitarian Universalists: we can believe what we wish; worship as we please; allow complete, unfettered speech about religion; and not require anyone to hold any belief they do not choose to hold.

All is well in our denomination and at our Unitarian Universalist Church of Asheville. Or is it?

I suggest that all may not be as well as we might want to believe. Our religious freedom is constantly being tested and under siege, is vulnerable and fragile. Take the case of Herman Bisbee, best known as the only American Universalist minister to have been found guilty of heresy. Bisbee was ordained in 1864. At the outset of his career, he was a theologically traditional Universalist. But a few years after his ordination, Bisbee became interested in the Transcendentalists of the previous generation – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Theodore Parker, James Freeman Clark – who espoused Natural Religion ideas and a radical new Free Religious movement.

Bisbee gave a series of lectures which became known as the “Minneapolis Radical Lectures” that included talks on miracles, the origin of the Bible, and natural religion.

Reaction to Bisbee’s lectures was quick and negative. He was castigated for denigrating the Bible and Christianity. Bisbee was formally charged by the Minnesota Universalist Convention with “unministerial conduct” and a resolution was passed withdrawing fellowship from him. On appeal, the Universalist General Convention upheld his ouster.

Bisbee’s case is nineteenth century, yesterday’s news you might think. Surely, Unitarians Universalists would never do anything like that now. Well, let’s look at a sermon given by UU Minister David Keyes while serving as Interim Minister at the Rochester, New York Unitarian church, in 2003. In his sermon, Keyes says that formal complaints were made to the denomination about his preaching -- one of them enclosing the text of a sermon he had preached, and tipping off UUA President Bill Sinkford that he should know this sort of thing was going on.

Keyes says that, the evil thing that was going on, warranting the attention and action of the president of the denomination, was that he was not saying enough nice things about UUs. And “oh yes, that I might harbor Christian sentiments as well. At any rate, I was unorthodox and probably dangerous.” Keyes calls his condemnation a tendency toward conformity, and says that the protests to the denomination about his preaching were really about his non-conformity to a comfortable and narrow range of secular expression. In his sermon, Keyes challenged the congregation to reexamine its commitment to religious freedom.

Although Keyes was criticized for being too Christian, such criticism can cut both ways. Our own minister, Mark Ward, has experienced intolerance in some places for his humanistic perspective – and on more than one occasion has been told by members of this congregation that things that he has said from our pulpit were offensive, with the unmistakable implication that they should not have been said.

Let’s step back and see if we can bring all of this into perspective. A recent study reports that about a third of the countries in the world, and 70% of the world’s population, have high restrictions on religion. The study found that government restrictions were relatively low in the U.S., but that levels of religious hostilities were higher in our country than those in a number of other large democracies.

Recent surveys and polls reveal that half, half of all Americans categorically refuse to vote for atheists for public office, regardless of their qualifications, and believe that it is impossible for atheists to be moral people. Courts in some states routinely discriminate against atheists in child custody battles. I want to argue that the religious freedom that we UUs espouse is a privilege under attack.

Freedom is paradoxical. If we have religious freedom, we are in danger of losing it. Having freedom is no guarantee that it will continue. It is not inherited from generation to generation, but won again and again through the courageous acts required to keep it alive in each age. I believe that a free mind, the right to believe what we wish, is among our greatest liberties. Our exercise of this potential is what makes us truly human.

As the British philosopher, Bertrand Russell, eloquently said, our freedom allows us to “worship at the shrine that our own hands have built… and sustain a world that our own ideals have fashioned.” What Russell is saying is that our ideals and values are ours for the making. THAT, I think, is the true essence of our religious freedom.

But, to be fully human we must do the work. It may be easier to lead a mindless, materialistic life, seldom thinking about the things that really matter, just drifting along – but this will bring us to the end that Henry David Thoreau so greatly feared: “When I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” 

So if our religious freedom is so vital to who and what we are, we need to fully understand and appreciate what the exercise of this privilege entails. I find it helpful to think about our religious freedom in two ways – as public freedom and as private freedom. I see “public religious freedom” as the openness of the public forum to a plurality of beliefs and ways of worship and “private religious freedom” as our individual, personal exercise of that opportunity.

Let’s look at each of these more closely. In our particular UU religious tradition, public religious freedom is embodied in two time honored institutions that are, or should be, guarded by the clergy and laity as if they were the Holy Grail -- the free pulpit and the free pew.

“Free pulpit” means, that when a congregation offers its pulpit to a minister by calling that minister as its spiritual leader, the congregation pledges complete freedom of speech to say anything from that pulpit that the minister believes to be true. That freedom should be limited only by the good judgment, responsibility and bond of affection between the minister and the congregation. Our own Minister, Mark Ward’s Letter of Call expressly states that, “It is a basic premise of this Church that the pulpit is free and untrammeled. All Ministers of this church are expected to express values and commitments without fear or favor.”

“Free pew” means that no theological test will be given for membership in the congregation – we don’t have a required creed -- and that all congregants are free to speak their views openly and without recrimination.

Now, how close to these ideal do we actually come -- what degree of tolerance and respect for beliefs and speech are afforded here in our UU congregation?

I ask you to consider some unsettling questions. Will we support our minister when he declares what we, as individuals, do not believe, or even are strongly against?  For example, how much God talk, or right-leaning social or political talk will we tolerate from our pulpit? Or, what if our minister takes a position that is more liberal than our personal belief?

Is it hard to be a Christian in our congregation, because many of us have already decided that the miraculous foundations of Christianity are dubious at best? Can one speak freely on any side of any social issue here? How well do we welcome those who are not political liberals? I dare suggest that we might do better.

For example, when an individual says that he or she is “offended” to hear, from the pulpit, a view in conflict with his or her own view, even if that view is presented respectfully, I think that, intentional or not, this is left-handed way of limiting open discussion, and of limiting our religious freedom. All views should be welcome to be expressed freely and openly.

Later in life than I would have wished, I have come to understand that many people who hold views opposed to mine are not irrational, uninformed, or misguided. I regret that I’ve often called them worse. But many of these people are reasonable, intelligent, individuals of integrity, who hold their beliefs sincerely, and live by them honorably. To smugly dismiss such decent people, is not only unjust, but self-defeating.

I believe that to live in an all or nothing world is unrealistic. We live in a diverse, pluralistic world. Like it or not, all of our beliefs and prejudices will never rule the world. Certainly, we should do everything we can to promote our values. But to disrespect or dismiss those with whom we do not agree, is not only contrary to our best interests, but is also not being the kind of people I think we want to be.

We may vehemently disagree with any view, without devaluing or negatively judging the person holding that belief. This is often very difficult for most of us, but to strive to do so is the essence of everything we stand for as Unitarian Universalists. It is sometimes easy to forget our Congregational Covenant, by which “We promise to celebrate our intentional diversity; attend to our differences with openness, compassion, and trust; and create healing by listening and speaking in a spirit of love.”

As religious liberals, we need to stay open; to forego certainty; be willing to be changed; and to consider all views on an ongoing basis. The moment that we know, we have the final, true, right and real answer to life’s most persistent questions, is the moment we cease to be a religious liberal. For example, would we, at this congregation, welcome a talk from our pulpit defending the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, the way Carlton Burr was welcomed by UU Minister Jim Eller in today’s reading? Does our church deserve a plaque, like that in today’s other reading, symbolic of the tolerance of the pro-slavery plantation owner, who supported his abolitionist minister’s freedom to say what he, as a slave owner, vehemently disbelieved.

Today, it is hard to imagine anyone supporting the practice of slavery.  But that was a prevalent view at that time. It is an even harder thing now, to consider a plaque in a church honoring someone who held a belief we find so reprehensible. But the principle is the same today. Is it conceivable that we could think, in a similar way, about the other side of social issues we feel passionately about? Would we deserve a plaque in our church, for allowing to be heard, sincere, honest arguments in favor, for example, of strict immigration restrictions, inflexible abortion prohibitions, or unbridled capitalism; or against environmental regulation, gun control, or even gay marriage? Could we, in all honesty, agree with Voltaire who said, “I disapprove of what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it”? Our public religious freedom, if it is to be truly meaningful, compels us to think about these kinds of uncomfortable, provocative questions.

But, in addition to public religious freedom, there is another side to our religious freedom. The freedom that lies at the heart of our UU faith is a radical individual freedom. That is the essence of our private religious freedom. This means that as individuals, we must work out matters of belief for ourselves. It means that we have a duty to take a stand on important ethical issues of our day. If we merely go with the flow, accept our socialization and our culture’s values, our religious freedom is practically worthless. This takes work and it takes courage.

As the French existentialist, Jean Paul Sartre, put it, “We are condemned to freedom.” We have to continually choose what to value, and how to act in difficult situations, with little to guide us. But does this mean, as many people, including a surprising number of UUs, often say, that we can believe anything we want? I don’t think so.

The issue is -- what should I believe? Are there parameters to what I can believe responsibly? Should we even be responsible for what we believe? I suggest that we would do well to believe what we are compelled to believe by the dictates of our own active and critical minds – by the dictates of our own active and critical minds. 

I’m sure that some of you will not agree with this …  and would rather rely on a faith about which asking for reasons is irrelevant. I sincerely respect your choice.

But what I’m suggesting is different way of being in this world. I suggest that we do ask ourselves, are there good reasons for what I believe? Does my belief square with what I know to be true? Will believing this harm me, or others? What do my UU Principles require?

As Unitarian Universalist’s, our free and responsible search for truth and meaning is a lifelong challenge. A challenge not just on Sundays, but every day. Ours is not an easy faith. Being a liberal religious person is difficult. It takes what Paul Tillich, in another context, called “the courage to be.”

We turn our back on our religious freedom at our peril. Today, controversy rages in our country over the proper place of religion in our society. This controversy is between those who wish to restrict government involvement with religion, and those who wish to increase the role of government in religion. There is increasing support in high places for the religionist position. The wall of separation between Church and State espoused by Thomas Jefferson has recently come under direct attack by some conservative Supreme Court justices.

There are many people in our society who would take control in moment if allowed to do so, and legislate their particular brand of morality for all of us and our children to live by. Our UU principles, by which we declare ourselves willing to live and let live, distinguish us from most other religions. We must never permit these principles to be taken advantage of by others, less open-minded that we, by allowing them, to co-opt our religious tolerance into a means to foist their agenda on us.

As Dr. Martin Luther King said: “Freedom is not given, it is won by struggle. We die when we refuse to stand up for that which is right.” The American patriot Thomas Paine put it more succinctly: “They have rights who dare maintain them.” Today, as we celebrate this Fourth of July, and every day, we must dare to maintain our precious, fragile, religious freedom.

May it be so.

Acknowledgment

I am grateful for the wonderful sermons of UU ministers Jim Eller, Sarah Oelberg, Kim Riegel, and Brent A. Smith on various aspects of this sermon; they have stimulated my thinking and in a few places provided eloquent words that I could never match. Thanks also to my minister Mark Ward, Linda Bair, and Sheila Valenti for their helpful comments.