Motion is the Reality
Reverend Janet Parsons
Gloucester UU Church
April 18, 2021
I hope that you are able to think of yourself as a shimmering jewel, one of billions that together make up the universe. Can you picture it? What color would you be?
We Unitarian Universalists have long had our own vision of Indra’s Net: we think of it, as described in our seventh Principle, as the ‘interdependent web of all existence, of which we are a part.’ I’m hoping that thinking of ourselves as glittering jewels is easier for us to imagine, or at least more fun.
The important lesson of the story of Indra’s Net, or our own seventh principle, is that since everything and everyone is connected, what we do affects everything. We are all connected by an invisible string, by energy, so that the movements of one affect the whole. Imagine a spider’s web, touched by a gentle breeze. Imagine being in a roomful of people, all holding onto a string. If one person pulls, everyone will feel it. Our poet said it this way, earlier:
“Remember you are all people and all people
are you.
Remember you are this universe and this
universe is you.
Remember all is in motion, is growing, is you.” (from “Remember” by Joy Harjo)
If we picture the universe in this way, we understand that it is not fixed, that it cannot be stationary. If all our movements are felt throughout the universe, then it must be constantly in motion.
“The motion,” writes Rebecca Parker, “is the reality.” (A House for Hope, p. 106.)
“Rocks are not what they used to be,” writes Parker. “Now we understand that inside a stone, there is a vibrating dance of activity.” (ibid., 104). Even rocks are in motion.
We here on Cape Ann understand rocks in an elemental way. In our daily travels we see boulders, popples, pebbles, and sand. We grasp that rocks do not stay the same through all eternity; they get worn down, broken down, into other forms. We know that building a fire too close to a granite boulder can cause it to break, as happened to the famous Whale’s Jaw formation in Dogtown. And those of us living near quarries know that granite can be broken by a tool called a feather. Granted, one also needs a wedge. But we know that rocks are not eternal, no matter how inert, unmoving, unchanging they seem.
Our spiritual theme this month is Becoming. There are many ways to think about the act of becoming – over our lifetimes we become adults, we might become educated, or married, or parents. We ask ourselves, though, when do we stop becoming, and are simply being? If we look closely at our lives, we can see that we never stop becoming. We are always changing and evolving, in response to the circumstances surrounding us, in response to our hopes and dreams that call us forward. We never arrive. We are never just being.
Think about this past year, as we have all been forced to respond to all the changes we have faced due to the coronavirus pandemic. Did you know you could adapt so much and so quickly? The universe we knew changed, and we changed along with it.
“Inside a stone there is a vibrating dance of activity.” We know that rocks are not eternal. The question for us then becomes, what is eternal?
Is God eternal? Or is God in process, becoming, just as we all are? Is God outside of Indra’s Net, removed from the interdependent web; an unmoving, unchanging separate entity? Or might God, the Mystery, the Source of Life and Love, be present within the Net, moving along with all the vibrations and the energy that make up the universe?
Being part of a net, or a web, implies connection. We know that what we do affects others; that stones we throw into a body of water cause ripples outward. We know that what we say and the actions we take can have effects so small and widespread that we might never understand the impact. We have never seen this more clearly than in the past year, when a tiny object, visible only with a microscope, a virus, has caused millions of deaths, caused disruption to daily life, and brought powerful economies almost to their knees.
Let’s think about God again. God is often thought of as a rock. Think of the old hymn: “Rock of Ages, cleft for me. Let me hide myself in thee.” A rock, unchanging, eternal, always present. Or is it?
If we look more closely at those lyrics, we see change and movement implied. We see a belief that God would open up, respond to the person in need, embrace them. Do not people the world over, throughout history, believe that God hears their prayers, and responds? Aren’t people most often angry with God, reject God, when they believe that God has not answered them?
Humans crave relationship, and over the centuries many have yearned for and sought relationships with the Holy. If God is present within and beyond the Net, the web, then perhaps God is affected by this desire, and responds.
“God changes,” wrote UUA President John Buehrens. “There, I’ve said it.” (ibid.,p. 107).
There is a school of progressive theology called ‘process theology’. It proposes that in an ever-changing creation, everything and everyone is in process – moving, responding, becoming. Everything is in process, from the smallest particles, to the very source and spirit of life itself.
It’s a lot to take in, isn’t it?
This is a morning with many questions, and here is another: if the divine is not unchanging, unmoving, or sitting on a throne in heaven, how and where would we find it? If the holy is in all things, in process, becoming along with us, where do we seek? Where does God manifest?
So often the Holy can seem to be hiding from us. This year has been a good example. We have been largely helpless, most of us, able to only protect ourselves, as a virus has ravaged the world. We have watched as our country seems to hang in the balance between those who affirm the humanity of all, and join in the care of our creation, and those who disdain others, who rob innocent people of life, who do nothing to protect the planet we live on. We watch the pendulum swing back and forth, almost daily. Is God present in all this?
Rather than think of God eternally sitting on a cloud, or a throne, unreachable, unchanging, perhaps we find God when we participate in the creation, when we are active co-creators. Perhaps we can find the holy right now, in this life.
What are ways that we can help foster life, and uphold the holiness of creation?
We can begin by noticing everything around us. One of the really freaky theories in particle physics is that merely observing an event, an action, can change its outcome. What if we were to commit ourselves to be more observant, to seek the holy all around us? In sunsets, in the faces of babies.
Perhaps we can seek the holy in each other. Many of you have heard of the Sanskrit word, “Namaste”, which roughly translates to ‘the holy in me recognizes the holy in you.’ We can practice saying “Namaste” to one another, perhaps even silently. Might we come to see one another differently as a result?
We can practice compassion, to see the pain and suffering experienced by other people and to not turn away. We can make sure that we are choosing Love, turning toward Love, wherever we observe it. We can work intentionally to make the world a more loving place, where God will feel present.
In considering how God, and all of creation, are relating, adapting, and becoming, I thought a great deal about justice, and how throughout human history we have struggled to become more just. As I always do, I turn to the words of the abolitionist Unitarian minister Theodore Parker, who said, in 1853: “Look at the facts of the world. You see a continual and progressive triumph of the right. I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends toward justice.” (Theodore Parker, Ten Sermons of Religion, Of Justice and the Conscience, 1853.)
The moral universe bends toward justice. Again, like everything, it is in motion, becoming, responding to our human demands, even if sometimes the arc seems more like a roller coaster. What is the moral universe? Perhaps it is God, or more likely a part of God. What makes the moral universe bend? Humans do. And whenever we help to create a more just society, we turn toward the holy, we become once again co-creators of a planet where all can live well and in harmony. God is not among the oppressors, the killers of innocent people, or those who pollute and destroy. God is to be found among those who seek justice, offer compassion, and turn toward Love.
That which is eternal about God is where God can always be found – not God’s substance, but God’s movement: toward love, toward life, toward flourishing.
My friends, I hope you can see yourselves as sparkling jewels, moving within the net of all existence. I hope you can sense the movement of the creation, the universe, and understand that all is in motion, that everything, including you, including God, is continually becoming, never finished. I hope you can see yourselves as part of the whole, and that everything you do, even everything you witness, can change the motion of the universe, can help to increase the hope and the love that is needed to sustain life. And may you come to see that, by participating, by being in relationship with all of life, caring and loving, planting and watering, that you will be able to find holiness, and all that is sacred to you.
In a world without end,
Amen.
