Find a Stillness Unitarian Church of All Souls, NYC August 10, 2014 Rev. Lissa Gundlach

Transcription

1 Find a Stillness Unitarian Church of All Souls, NYC August 10, 2014 Rev. Lissa Gundlach It was fall in Brooklyn and the sun had begun setting earlier and earlier, magenta and gold and the cool blue colors of winter nights ahead. Walking home from the subway one Friday evening, my partner at the time and I encountered an outgoing man about our age on the street. He stepped up off of his front stoop and stood in front of us as we were about to pass. "Sorry to bother, but would you be willing to turn off our lights for us? Our apartment is just upstairs." My partner and I looked at each other with a look of distrust. It's very rare in New York for strangers to just start talking to you on the street, nevertheless to ask you to do things for them, or invite you into their homes. I looked past the stoop at the decaying Brooklyn brownstone, noticed the mezuzah posted on the doorway, and shrugged. "Why not? I'll be your shabbos goy!" She looked at me, slightly confused, as I asked her to hold my things and dashed upstairs after the young man. After two flights of stairs, the young man quickly disappeared into a cluttered apartment and I encountered another woman my age, just out of the shower, her hair in a towel. She gestured toward the light switch and said "Thanks!" I did my job flipping the switch and walked back down the stairs. I laughed about it as my partner and I walked home slowly, chatting about the meaning of what had just happened. We had been invited into the weekly Sabbath preparations of one Jewish couple in our neighborhood. As we thought about what we were going to make for dinner, what we were to do that night, our neighbors were frantically preparing not to DO anything at all. For them, all work had stopped, rushing, cooking even turning on and off light switches. I knew nothing more about my neighbors other than what they had asked of me, but I 1

2 can guess that they were preparing for an evening of candle light, food, prayers, singing, and rest.this happened several years ago, but still, when I pass by my neighbor's apartment, I look up at the Mezuzah on the doorway and wonder what their Friday nights and Saturdays are like. My rushing brain stops a minute, takes a breath, and remembers that at that moment, people are practicing faith by resting and finding stillness after the busy-ness of the work week. I am reminded of this story now for a few reasons. This summer, while beautiful and temperate, has been a deeply unsettling and challenging time for many of us, here in this room and across our globe. It has been an incredibly violent time for our world, with our country implicated in threats of war developing in Iraq and Syria. An intractably bloody struggle for power in Gaza continues to weigh on our minds and hearts. Police brutality has surfaced in our city with the unjust killing of Eric Garner. Once again, one of our Unitarian Universalist congregations was violated during worship by a religious extremists because of our reproductive justice work. A frighten virus is ravaging West Africa. Closer to home, many losses have plagued our community. We have lost several community members, some of them, like All Souls members Jane Supino and Margot Adler, quite suddenly, leaving us missing their luminous spirits. In times of stress and grief, we need spiritual practices that can help us cultivate resilience, peace and hope. We need some good news! While social action is so important, in times of higher stress and grief it s easy to be overwhelmed and feel helpless, to lose our ground and become paralyzed. We need permission to take care of ourselves, to enjoy the good things in the world and restore our faith in the goodness of humanity. We need to sharpen our tools in our spiritual tool box for us, keeping Sabbath could be one of those tools. You may know a little bit about Sabbath from your own families and community circles. Maybe you keep Sabbath in your own home. You may recall that one of our ministers Ana Levy-Lyons talked a lot about Sabbath during her time at All Souls, as an active practice for her own life and an invitation to us as Unitarian Universalists to practice too. So how did the Sabbath originate? Although mentioned many times in the 2

3 biblical books of Genesis and Deuteronomy, the most well known charge to keep Sabbath is from the fourth of the Ten Commandments in Exodus: Remember the Sabbath day, and keep it holy. For six days you shall labor and do all your work. But the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; you shall not do any work... For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but rested the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy. 1 Perhaps the best contemporary interpretation can be found in Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel's slim volume The Sabbath: It's Meaning for Modern Man, first published in He was one of Martin King's most influential colleagues, theologically and politically, and is one of the most widely read Jewish Theologians of the 20th century. Heschel was writing during the 1950s, a time of global expansion and healing after the devastation of world wars. Today his call for retreat from the chaos of contemporary life still resonates so clearly. Heschel describes the earliest practice of the Sabbath within the Jewish home, before modern understanding of sacred space set apart for worship existed. He names our modern attachments, just as relevant for us today: the continual drive for progress, a focus on work achievements and accumulation of material wealth. He considers these ways of being in the world necessary means for our survival, but warns of mistaking them for a spiritually fulfilling use of time. In Heschel s view, the holiest creation is not anything achievable by human beings, but the mystery of time itself. Time should be treated as a sanctuary in which human beings are given the opportunity, to connect with the beauty of the world and what matters most in our lives. He writes: "Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to holiness in time. The Sabbath offers a glimpse of 1 The Holy Bible. New International Version. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, (Exodus 20:8-12). 3

4 the eternal, a moment each week to enjoy heaven on earth. It is a time where dominion over the world ceases, and humans pause to enjoy the rich abundance of creation. 2 He lovingly calls the Sabbath the "The Holiest of Holies," and " A Palace in time" unable to be destroyed, displaced, or disparaged by human forces. He even references Sabbath as one of the many names for God, deserving of the most sacred human regard. He also points out its historical use as resistance under conditions of oppression and captivity, the practice of Sabbath was used to counter constant demand for work, progress, and assimilation into Christian culture. For myself, I find this understanding of time challenging but compelling. Our contemporary culture places such a value as time as money, and there seems to be never enough time or not enough hours in the day. Our always on cell-phone, social media and the 24-hours a day news-cycle creates few opportunities for pause. How often do we take time to find the stillness in our life to honor time as holy? For many of us, summer is a time where we intentionally take time off or time out from our work lives. We do things we don t usually do in our urban lives sit outside long into the evenings, tend gardens, seek beaches and lakes, and a healthy dose of sunshine. We retreat from our everyday lives to find in special places, sacred places, where it becomes easier to connect with what is truly important in our lives, and to enjoy the bounty of beauty that surrounds us. Whether we stay close to home or travel, I wonder if summer might inspire us to keep Sabbath. So what might it look like to keep Sabbath in your home? We each have the freedom to create our own sense of what holy rest might look like for each of our lives. Maybe it's for an hour, two hours, or half the day. Maybe it's an entire Sundown to Sundown retreat. Whatever the amount of time you choose for your Sabbath, it's about what you do, or do not do to honor that time which hallows it. For you, perhaps it is taking a digital Sabbath turning off the computer, television or radio for a whole day 2 Heschel, Abraham. The Sabbath: It s Meaning for Modern Man. New York: FSG, (10) 4

5 and simply reflect on all of the pain and violence of the world while enjoying the world s beauty. Maybe you buy nothing for one whole day. Perhaps you cook a meal from only ingredients from the farmer's market, enjoying what has been created from local land, labor, and harvest. Playing with your kids without interruption. Perhaps for you it means carving out a day to simply be sleeping, eating, loving, playing. What would finding the stillness of Sabbath like for you? When do you experience that sense of time where all seems to be holy? What it would be like to bring that sense of peacefulness into your life on a regular basis? What changes would you need to make to carve out that "Palace in time" each week for yourself to enjoy your life and relax in its beauty? In this season of time away from the rush of our everyday lives, (and our every week church lives too!) may we savor the beauty of the world that we live in, enjoy the people that surround us, and hallow time as the gift it is. May we cultivate practices like Sabbath keeping which bring greater joy and resilience to our lives and to the world, which is so badly in need of peace and healing. Go now in peace, and may the season of summer inspire you to go inward, outward, and onward on your spiritual journeys. Amen 5