The Hell You Say? Rev. Dr. Jim Culver Sermon at UUSP on June 13, 2010

Transcription

1 1 The Hell You Say? Rev. Dr. Jim Culver Sermon at UUSP on June 13, 2010 To the reader: This sermon was only part of a service of worship with many components working together, all of which were designed to be experienced in a community context. In our "free pulpit" tradition, its concepts are intended not as truths to receive, but as spurs to your own thought and faith. CALL TO WORSHIP (In loving memory of my former colleague & mentor, Rev. Dr. Duncan Littlefair) This is a day for us to live. Let s celebrate it and make a difference in the world. Let s be grateful for the incredible gift of life, And let us be especially grateful for the love which brings us together Giving dignity, meaning, worth and joy to all of our days. READINGS Our readings this morning speak to that concept, place, or state of mind called hell. Of our eight brief readings, the first seven are printed in your programs. Hell is empty and all the devils are here. -William Shakespeare If you re going through hell, keep going. -Winston Churchill Hell is oneself, Hell is alone, the other figures in it merely projections. -T.S. Elliot War is hell. -Gen. William Sherman. Then I saw a great white throne and him who was seated on it. Earth and sky fled from his presence, and there was no place for them. And I saw the dead, great and small,

2 2 standing before the throne, and books were opened. Another book was opened, which is the book of life. The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books. The sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and Hades gave up the dead that were in them, and each person was judged according to what he had done. Then death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. The lake of fire is the second death. If anyone's name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. -Bible; Revelation 20: Today, society does not talk about hell. It's as if it did not exist, but it does. There is eternal punishment for those who sin and do not repent. -Pope Benedict XVI The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make a heaven of hell, and a hell of heaven. -John Milton Paradise Lost. Our eighth reading, actually a joke, speaks to what fun our species can have while discussing a place of fire and brimstone designed to provide eternal damnation and suffering. A northern snowbird was traveling down to Florida for the winter. His wife was on a business trip and planned to meet him there the next day. When he reached their condo in St. Petersburg, he decided to send his wife an . Unable to find the scrap of paper on which he had written her business address, he did his best to type it in from memory. Unfortunately, he missed one letter, and his note was directed instead to an elderly woman whose husband had died only the day before. When the grieving widow checked her , she took one look at the screen, let out a piercing scream, and fainted. At the sound, her family rushed into the room and saw this message on the screen:

3 3 Dearest Wife, Just got moved in. Everything prepared for your arrival tomorrow. PS. Sure is hot down here. SERMON The hell you say? How did this image of hell enter into our human experience? What s with the hot fire and the awful smells and the gnashing of teeth? Is there a Unitarian Universalist approach to this concept that might make hell less hellasious? This morning, let s briefly explore these questions together, which will require an examination of hells history, the hell we put ourselves through and a lot of humor. For our guests here today, please allow me a moment to provide a framework in which to listen to this sermon on a subject that might be considered heretical at many other churches in town. The Unitarian side of UU teaches that we have abundant potential. We are not inherently sinful, doomed to a hell unless some higher authority gives us detailed answers to which we must submit and never question. We are not weak and childlike, incapable of rising up to meet the many challenges life brings. We have inherent dignity and worth, qualities that naturally inspire us to speak the truth in love and to assist the cause of justice, if only we would pay attention. It helps us nurture and develop the potential that life has given us. Not to give us the answers to life s questions, but to give us a loving community in which to follow our own conscience, help us come into the integrity of our own answers. Not to protect us from the realities of suffering, but to move us to engage social problems and do our best to make a difference in the world. Unitarianism is a faith in the abundance of human potential to create unique lives of wisdom derived from trusting our own deepest experiences. Unitarianism gives us the

4 4 support and encouragement to say don t treat me like I m stupid. Don t say I can t ask questions. Don t tell me that there s nothing I can do to make a difference in my own life, in my religious community and in the world. The other side of Unitarian Universalism, the Universalist side, reveals that we are held and supported by a Love that s far greater than who we are as individuals. And so, if we have been trying the best we can to solve the questions of life but, at the end of the day feel that the answers we seek will always elude us, Universalism will offer support that s the love side. That s the Universalist message. Only in giving to another the hope of abundant love, does our own joy become complete. So, let s do the work of today and ask, the hell you say? There are countless references to hell in everyday vernacular. H-E double hockey sticks, hells angels, hells bells, it ll be a cold day in hell, hotter than hell, run like hell, bat out of hell, hell on wheels, funny as hell and on and on. The H-E double hockey sticks one is my favorite, sort of the kid version of adults not saying the word hell because of it s perception as a swear word, a curse word, or a dirty word. It reminds me of the running story line in the Harry Potter series when the good wizards and witches dare not speak the name of the villain Valdemort, choosing instead to call him he who must not be named. Later on in the series, a precocious young witch named Hermione observes that fear of the name only creates greater fear of the person, or in this mornings case, fear of the name only reinforces a mythological fear of the concept. Centuries before becoming a dirty word, there were 162 written references to hell in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. While doing research for this morning s sermon, Rebecca reminded me that back in Michigan where we recently lived, there is

5 5 actually a town named Hell. Hell, Michigan. Of course, in this economy and with the disaster that is now the auto industry in Detroit, all of Michigan might be thought of as hell, but that s another story. Hell Michigan the city was founded back in the 1800s. I can envision that back in the early 19 th century, people from nearby farms would ride into town to visit Hell s general store. I can just hear those 19 th century rural residents chatting back on the farm Where s your husband? Ah, he s gone to Hell. Hey, when are you going to do those winter chores I ll get to them when Hell freezes over. Many people here in St. Petersburg thought it would be a cold day in hell before they would be sitting in a church. After negative experiences in prior religious attempts at other churches, synagogues, temples or mosques, many thought hell would freeze over before they would sign our book and become a member of this church, much less actually enjoy participating. Yet, here we are, participating in an amazing and special place. Here at UU St. Pete, we don t spend a lot of time feeling anxious about walking on a path toward hell. We walk our own true path; forging our own spirituality created by listening to our own deepest experiences. We turn down the heat of hell by choosing love over fear. Most of us here today do not believe that there is an actual place of eternal suffering after life called hell. However, there is a place within where we torture ourselves with judgment and fear. This is the hell that we put ourselves in and through. I believe that there is no literal hell or eternal punishment. There is no judgment other than the one I put myself through, that merry-go-round of perfectionism and anxiety. That s hell. The lack of living in the present, in the Now, choosing instead a tug of war between living with regret of the past and anxiety of the future. That s hell as well.

6 6 The History of Hell This is a radically different view than most traditional churches in town hear about from a pulpit. For 1,600 years, Christianity has used hell to scare the bejeesus out of people and then tell them there s only one way out to follow the rules. It s a effective form of social control. It s also amazing, since it was only in the fourth century after Jesus that hell became institutionalized in the Christian church. After that, and until the middle of the 6 th century, Christianity taught that hell was a place where sinners could be rehabilitated. Unfortunately, the Council of Constantinople in 543 rejected that rehabilitation view, and from that time forward, the majority of Christians were taught to believe in a hell of eternal punishment. So, how did the image of Hell enter into our human experience? The word that the Gospel writers chose for Jesus to use for hell is Gehenna. Gehenna was a valley beyond the suburbs of Jerusalem where during its notorious history it was used as a place for child sacrifice, then later as a dumping ground for the bodies of executed criminals, then finally it became Jerusalem s garbage dump. At the time of Jesus there would have been continuous fires burning to consume the city s garbage. Dogs would have hung around the fires waiting for scraps of food. When the dogs fought over the food, they would have made the sound of gnashing of teeth. It s possible then, that the biblical authors had Jesus refer to this place when he spoke of hell to illustrate a pit of everlasting fire, the gnashing of teeth, and the most horrifying image known to the Jewish community. So, for 16 centuries Christians have been held in fearful captivity to a doctrine of a hell whose physical origin was mostly that of a town dump. To my understanding, the doctrine of hell makes a mockery of Jesus message of love and forgiveness. And how

7 7 has our species coped with this eternal damnation hanging over our heads? Well, one good side effect to all the fire and brimstone is that to break the tension, hell has at least provided humanity with a lot of good jokes. Like this one A man died and was taken to his place of eternal torment by the devil. As he passed burning pits and heard sinners crying and gnashing their teeth, he saw a man he recognized as a lawyer snuggling up to a beautiful woman. "That's unfair!" he cried. "I have to roast for all eternity by myself, and that lawyer gets to spend it with a beautiful woman." Be quiet, replied the devil, "Who are you to question that woman's punishment?" Here s another coping mechanism denial. In a poll taken in 2008, 81% of Americans believe that there is an afterlife, with 79% believing that afterlife exists for a person s soul. While 76% of Americans believe in a heaven where people live with God forever, only 63% of Americans believe in hell where people are punished eternally. Of those who believe in a heaven and a hell, 60% believe that those places are merely symbolic, 10% believe they are a state of mind, and 30% believe that heaven and hell are actual physical places. But the denial gets more interesting. When the questions drilled down a bit closer to home and asked, Do you think you will go to hell after death? only 1% said that they are going to hell. So, almost 2/3 of Americans believe in hell but virtually no one thinks they re going there. Jean Paul Sartre was right; Hell is other people. What is Hell Then? If hell is not an actual place, what is it? What is this journey of inner torment? Unlike the physical hell of Christianity, inner hell for me is not a condition that a supernatural deity can put me in or that other people put me in. Hell is a condition I put

8 8 myself in when I forget who I am, when I forget to tap into my own deep inner wisdom and lose my way, when I become overwhelmed and forget to live in the Now and dwell instead on the anxiety of an unknown future. An example of knowing who you are on the inside is found in this classic Buddhist story. A samurai warrior confronted a Zen monk. The samurai lunged at the master with a sword saying, Don t you know I m a man who can run through you with this sword without blinking an eye? The monk looked up at him and said, Don t you know that I m a man who can be run through with a sword without blinking an eye? The samurai immediately put his sword down. Hell is not what other people put us through. Hell is allowing our lives to be ruled by fear, regret and anxiety. Hell is losing our center and ending up in a world of selfjudgment, disoriented from living in the regret of a past and in the anxiety of an unknown future. Other people or external circumstances don t put us through hell, we do a good enough job of that by ourselves. Other people can not get us out of hell, each of us must do that by ourselves. Love the Hell out of Yourself and Others So how do we get out of our own self created hell? The same way we all survive a Florida summer. We live through it. We accept it. We embrace the heat and humidity and see what it has to teach us. I would suggest that as you go through your own hell, take with you our church s covenant love is the spirit of this church. With that, you can just love the hell out of yourself, and then you ll have the inner strength to just love the hell out of everyone else. Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote, When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the

9 9 timid adventurers. I believe that a physical Hell is a religious myth intended to hold you captive to fear and, for many of you, captive to your prior church s teachings. If you still carry with you remnants of your prior religious doctrines, or when next you re going through another layer of a personal hell, stand up to the myth or the fear or the regret or the anxiety and pull its beard. You will find that it comes off in your hand. As you re loving the hell out of your friends and neighbors, remember that someone you know is wanting to think thoughts outside of the religious box like this and is just waiting for someone else to say it first. Someone you know is wanting to begin making a difference, and is just looking for encouragement. Someone you know is desperate to hear about a place in this community where they can grow and feel supported on their life s journey. That s us. That s what we do. Our unique religion stresses the process, not the destination. The deeds, not the heavenly or hellish afterlife. We may not all believe in life after death, but we believe in life before death. We love and support each other on our own unique spiritual journeys. That s one of the beauties of this special place that we take our unique journeys together, even when those journeys occasionally take us through hell. Please share our faith with others this summer. Let your light shine. Our programs may be slowing down, our summer attendance may be less than usual, yet the good work that we are about always remains to be continuously done. There are so many people out there who would love to have a community in which to learn and grow. Share your passion about this faith community. Share your love of this place that celebrates religious freedom, reason, diversity of persons and theologies. Share your acceptance of each individual s responsibility to walk this life with integrity. All you really have to do is talk about what you have found that

10 10 meets your personal needs. You don t have to be a scholar or a lifelong UU, just one sincere person sharing with another if the opportunity presents itself. Let your light shine. Share and then love the hell out them. This summer, let s shine and share and love in the same spirit and for the same reasons we do all that we do in life to bring Dignity, Meaning, Worth and Joy to all our days. Waves of love