Radical Hospitality All Souls Church, Rev. Lissa Anne Gundlach August 12, 2012 On a summer morning just over four years ago, a man carrying a guitar case walked into the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Knoxville at 10:18 am. With their minister on a final week of sabbatical, a children s musical was being performed for Sunday morning worship. The man walked down the hallway and as he crossed the threshold into the sanctuary, he removed a rifle from his guitar case and open fired into the congregation. He was armed with enough ammunition to impact hundreds of people, and intended to continue shooting until his own life was taken by an intervening police officer. Although he was quickly restrained by courageous members of the congregation, he had already wounded nine people. Two congregants lost their lives that morning, Greg McKendry, an usher, and Linda Kraeger, a visitor from another UU congregation. I honor their lives today. As the police learned more about the attacker, it became clear that his violent act was motivated by a hatred for liberalism. Fueled by right wing media, the gunman had been convinced that liberals were in his words ruining the country. Since he couldn t directly attack liberal policy makers, he vowed to attack those who voted them into power. Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist church had been a beacon for liberal religion for decades, known throughout the community for their social and racial justice work, their wide spiritual embrace, and their inclusion of gays and lesbians. After the attack, the church and the larger Knoxville community was left in absolute shock, as was our denomination. This was the first time one of our churches had been the direct target of such hate fueled terrorism. What followed was an outpouring of love, and a resolution to redouble our efforts at becoming an even more open, hospitable religious community. 1
The Unitarian Universalist Association took out a full page ad in the Sunday New York Times with the headline: Our Doors and Our Hearts Will Remain Open" The text, written by our UUA president at the time, Rev. Bill Sinkford, included the following message: On August 3rd, just one week after the joy and innocence of their Sunday service was defiled by gunfire, the Tennessee Valley congregation rededicated their sanctuary to peace. Inspired by the Unitarian Universalists of Knoxville, Unitarian Universalists everywhere have rededicated themselves to our religious mission: to welcome the stranger, to love our neighbor, to work for justice, to nurture the spirits of all who seek a liberal religious home, and to help heal this wounded world. We will not give in to fear. We will meet hatred with love. We will continue to work for justice. Our hearts, and the doors of our more than 1,000 congregations nationwide, remain open. Unitarian Universalists stand on the side of love. We invite you to stand with us. As we gather this morning for worship, I am reminded of how timely Reverend Sinkford s message is, not just for our community, but for our religious neighbors as well. Last Sunday, while All Souls worshiped together, a lone gunman attacked a Sikh temple in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. I know you saw this on your cell phone or heard this on the news when you after church last week and were as horrified as I was. This time, the gunman entered the temple around 10:15 am, the same time as the Tennessee attack. He walked up to an elder as if he was going to engage in a conversation, then began opening fire throughout the kitchen, bedrooms and sanctuary. He killed six people and wounded another three before he turned his weapon on himself in a struggle with police outside the temple. We honor all their lives this morning. The Sikh community members who lost their lives were pillars in their temple, called a gurdwara assisting the transition of new immigrants from their homeland of Punjab, India, preparing and serving food for temple meals, leading prayer services and playing music, maintaining the temple grounds. The Sikh community in Wisconsin has been in mourning all week, reading their holy book from cover to cover. Support has flowed in from the Sikh and interfaith groups from all over the country. This morning we 2
join our Christian neighbors in dedicating a national day of prayer in solidarity with our Sikh brothers and sisters. As for the shooter background, his beliefs seem even more extreme than in the case of the Tennessee violence. He was a member of a white supremacist hate core band, whose aggressively racist lyrics condemned immigrants and gays as well as religious and racial minorities. We might never fully know why he chose to attack the peaceful Sikh community, only that their appearance, accent and skin color somehow made them a target for the attacker s racist hatred. Mark Potok from the Southern Poverty Law Center guesses that the shooter most likely mistook the Sikh community for Muslims, who have unjustly been the target of racist and religiously motivated hate crimes since 9/11. What we do know is this in Wisconsin as in Tennessee, both communities were attacked for the public expression of their religious beliefs. To the shooters, both groups were strangers foreigners far away from sharing any common experience of life. The attackers were able to use their hatred to other both groups to distance and dehumanize people, denying them of their most basic right to exist and worship freely. While this is an extreme form of othering, smaller acts of othering happen each day, laying the groundwork for such extremism to exist just below the surface of everyday life. After the attack, many Oak Creek residents expressed little if any knowledge about the Sikh community. One Oak Creek man said: We didn't know about them. We see them but we don't pay much attention. A lot of them drive cabs and have gas stations and convenience stores. The only thing I ever heard about them was that a lot of people thought they were Muslims after 9/11. Another resident agreed: "I knew nothing about them at all. I don't think a lot of people did, she said. When we don't know about somebody's religion we assume the worst. 3
As I read these responses from local Wisconsin residents, it had me wondering what New Yorkers might say. Do we as New Yorkers know our local Sikh community any better than our Midwestern counterparts? How about here at All Souls or in our Unitarian Universalist community? As Unitarian Universalists, have we opened our hearts to share grief with their community and our common story? I am reading a little gem of a book entitled Radical Hospitality: Benedicts Way of Love, which I commend to each of you. The book is written by a journalist and a Benedictine monk. They share the belief that at the root of the violence permeating our culture is a lack of understanding and knowledge of the other. Rather than generating curiosity, the lack of understanding generates fear and makes us feel threatened by others who are in some way different from us. The authors offer radical hospitality the unconditional embrace of the other as a path to heal American s fear of the other in a post 911 world. To overcome our fear, they write: We only need to consider the discovery of a neighbor in the stranger. We welcome strangers in the little ways we open ourselves up to them. Let s consider what it means to be the other. The other is the one who is not like me. She is the liberal if I am conservative, the rich if I am poor. He is the guy who does not go to the same places I go, the family that does not worship where I worship or shop where I shop. The other is the person from the neighborhood I avoid, the woman I don t want sitting next to me on the plane. He is the person who votes for the candidate I consider way off the map. I don t know about you, but I think this is challenging work, even for us open minded religious liberals. We tend to surround ourselves with people just like us. We tend to distance ourselves from the political and religious other rather than engage in a way that might create conflict or reveal our ignorance. So let s take a little time, right here, to get to know our Sikh friends. We share more in common than you might think. One member of the Oak Creek Sikh community said this in an interview after the shooting: We never expected this to happen. This is a place where we come to pray, not just for ourselves, but for everyone. Their house of worship, like ours, is open for all people to enjoy their sacred space, regardless of 4
religion, race, age or orientation. Like Unitarian Universalism, Sikhism is a nonhierarchical religion without a clerical authority, with principles based on the integrity and equality of every person. Sikh followers live this principle by placing hospitality at the center of their community life. The most central activity in their spiritual life is the preparation and service of the Langar, a meal served twice a day, every day of the year. This tradition was started by the first Sikh guru, Guru Nanak as a way to invite all people to share a table together regardless of caste, religion or social status. To this day, visitors and guests are invited to enjoy the Langar. Today, the doors of the Oak Creek temple are open and members expect to see the largest crowd ever in attendance. The acts of terrorism suffered by the Sikh community have not dimmed their commitment to their principles to hospitality, now in the form of a place for all to grieve and to pray for a world without hate that calcifies into violence. Four years ago, Unitarian Universalists had the same resolve to keep doors and hearts open wide. To welcome all, especially those who are unlike us, is to do so in spite of the fear we feel towards the unfamiliar and threatening other. It might feel more natural to us to go inward, to make the light of our liberal faith a little dimmer to avoid attention from those who harbor hate. Or it might feel more natural to become a fortress, to close off, protect and defend our community after learning of such violence. If we truly open our doors to all, might we also become vulnerable? As the authors of Radical Hosptiality remind us, Amazing things will happen if we stop protecting ourselves and become available to others. As the Sikh religion also does, our faith calls us to live into the promise of our namesake, to be a house of worship for the great family of All Souls. Radical hospitality has always been our calling as well as our challenge as Unitarian Universalists. If all are truly worthy of the love we name as saving, then we are called to nurture love for all people in our religious communities, with no exceptions. This doesn t mean that we don t set boundaries and expectations. Keeping our community safe is our number one priority, but we cannot let safety dissuade us from our purpose, as inherently risky as it may be. 5
Every religious group uses hymns to tell the story of their unique theology. Unitarian Universalists are no exception. It is fitting then that the very first hymn in our Singing the Living Tradition hymnal is entitled May Nothing Evil Cross This Door. It s one of my favorites. The lyrics go like this: May nothing evil cross this door, and may ill fortune never pry about these windows; may the roar and rain go by And though these sheltering walls are thin, may they be strong to keep hate out and hold love in. May this be our prayer for our church and for our sisters and brothers in faith, in Wisconsin, in Tennessee, and all across the world. Amen. 6