IN TIME FOR THE HOLIDAYS
Anne Bancroft
12 December 2004

Reading:
Ought To

I cannot love
Because I ought to.
I cannot hope
Because I ought to.
I cannot believe
Because I ought to
Or because I want to
Or am taught to
Or because
It is reasonable
Or desirable
Or possible
For someone else.
I can only love
And hope
And believe
Sometimes or often,
Not quite or almost,
Seldom or never really
And I need you
In between.
J. Donald Johnston
Beginning Now, 1970


Some of you may remember a supplication that Gerry Krick used to make at the beginning of sermons: “May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be ever acceptable in thy sight.”

The translation that always runs through my head when I’m about to share from this pulpit, or that one, is that my words and thoughts might be useful to you. And with that thought, I hope this holiday season finds you, at least for occasional moments, calm and in good humor. Since next week’s service will be quite jovial, I’ve attempted to make this one somewhat more contemplative, so that we are sure to take time for the rejuvenating qualities of reflection.

I was at Yoga class several weeks ago – you know, the 90 degree one down the street – and the instructor opened class with a story that might feel quite familiar to many of you. It was about her seven year old daughter having lost her tooth on Thanksgiving Day, and the fact that she was so preoccupied with entertaining her guests that when she went to bed, she forgot to exchange the carefully placed tooth with the dollar from the “tooth fairy.” She sat bolt upright at 4:30 in the morning, realized her mistake, and quickly hustled into her daughter’s room to carefully and quietly grope under the pillow, pull out the lost tooth and replace it with the gift. As you may have experienced, her daughter suddenly opened her eyes, stared intently at her, and then fell back asleep. So the mom let out her breath, put the dollar under the pillow and went back to bed, feeling quite smug about her adventure. When she went down to breakfast the next morning, her daughter was sitting at the table eating cereal, and said, “I have three questions for you. Were you in my room last night?” “Yes,” the mom answered truthfully. “Did you see the tooth fairy?” “No,” she said, still fairly truthfully. And then somewhat predictably the child asked, “Are you the tooth fairy?” Our instructor told us calmly how she pondered her yoga precepts about honesty and integrity. She looked lovingly at her daughter, and said, “No.”

“Because,” she told us, “it’s important for children to have those beliefs to hold onto - beliefs in the tooth fairy and in Santa Claus, and world peace. Those are important gifts we provide for children to hang onto.” Wait, wait, wait , I’m thinking. Tooth fairy, Santa Claus, and world peace? In the same sentence?

And later in a conversation with one of my brothers about this event, he suggested that in fact, it’s not the kids who want to believe in tooth fairies and Santa Claus and world peace, it’s us! It’s not about the gift we give them. We’re doing this for ourselves. Well, you know he’s been in therapy a lot more than I have, so I had to kind of wonder if he had a point . . .

Now, we could take this vignette in any number of directions. We could unpack the issue of the overscheduled parent who forgets the simplest of deeds that would complete the child’s expectation. If you are one among us with children, this may be a fairly recent occurrence in your life, and if you do not have children of your own to disappoint, it may be that there were disappointments bestowed upon you that are memorable. We could consider the validity – or lack of it - of the tooth fairy, Santa Claus and World Peace being clumped together. We could consider why we as adults might find it useful to perpetuate myths for children to perpetuate with their children when they are adults.

In such a simple story, we might find an abundance of messages – but for today I’d like to suggest that we all exhale, and think about what this story might have to say about forgiveness. These holiday times have days filled with rampant expectation, evoking emotions we can hardly predict. We try to be and do for others, or so we think; or we try to put one foot in front of the other, and at least wear a happy face. And in the midst of the fa-la-la, whether we love it, simply put up with it, or really struggle with it, our daily lives continue, replete with war, personal loss, disappointment, or the more mundane but not insignificant “tooth fairy” forgetfulness. It seems it might be especially useful to have a way to forgive all that is and will undoubtedly continue to be imperfect about ourselves, the people around us, the nation - the whole picture - so that we might put ourselves right with the world as a gift for the days before us. Simple enough!

I am always reminded at Thanksgiving time about the idea of living with an Attitude of Gratitude, and I believe it’s immensely important and useful. But there is something to be said for the daily practice of forgiveness as well. The question is, how does it happen?

It’s easy to imagine that forgiveness has something to do with love, though it feels a little like the chicken and the egg thing. If we love better, are we then able to forgive? Or if we are forgiving, are we better able to love? And of whom, or what, are we asking forgiveness anyway?

Among the things we have lost along the way, in this faith tradition of ours, is a ritual venue for apology and forgiveness. In the traditions from which we have grown, there are specific vehicles: Yom Kippur, in the Jewish tradition, is entirely focused on atonement, on identifying and seeking forgiveness for transgressions. And while some of the transgressions are between yourself and another human, some of the forgiveness involves God. The Christian faith has many such supplications: the idea of confession, to a priest as intermediary in the Catholic tradition, or in the general confession of many protestant faiths. Reminiscent for me is the line: we have erred and strayed from thy ways like lost sheep, we have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts. It is rich and poignant liturgy.

But when Unitarians and Universalists rejected the notion of sin as inherent in human existence, affirming instead the basic goodness, the worth and dignity of every person, and when we eschewed an explicit theological relationship, we lost the practice of evaluation, i.e. confession, and the recovery implicit in forgiveness. Unfortunately, losing the terminology of sin doesn’t mean we don’t make mistakes. It doesn’t mean our worlds are set right, and it doesn’t mean we don’t carry a fair amount of disgruntlement in our hearts toward those we feel wronged by, or disappointed in. And that includes any lingering or indeed living concepts we individually might have about God.

The late Rev. Lewis Smedes, a frequent writer on forgiveness, said that if there is an "ought" of forgiveness, it is not an "ought" of obligation" but an "ought of opportunity." In forgiveness is the opportunity to free ourselves from so much that holds our infinite human potential captive in anger and hurt. In forgiveness we let go of what binds us to judgment and sadness, with ourselves as much as others. The book, In the Time of Trees and Sorrows, about an oppressed caste in India, has an image of the unheard “voices from under a stone.” Anger is like that stone that oppresses, and resentment is as well. Imagine the power of forgiveness to remove the stone, whether pebble or boulder, to liberate the voice beneath. How it might sing.

And what might our process be? Is it enough to think forgiveness, and expect it will happen? Might forgiveness manifest in similar fashion to gratefulness, with a shift in intent?

Certainly that is a beginning. Particularly for those small issues that pick annoyingly at us: someone’s tardiness, perhaps, or carelessness with things that have meaning for us. Those can be held up relatively easily, and considered – apologies offered and accepted. Efforts can be made to change old habits. “I’m sorry,” one offers. “I forgive you.” The change in intent needs regular visiting, regular reminding to pay attention, to make amends, to forgive and let go. And I suggest the greatest gift and best means of imparting this practice to our children is by example. They will learn by seeing, hearing and feeling, far better than by being told, the value of an apology, and what it means to forgive and to be forgiven, in person, in the present.

But what of the larger wounds? What of the hurt we carry from loss or injury, physical, psychic, or emotional? Gandhi said there is no better way to alleviate one’s own pain than by addressing the needs of another. It’s not so much avoidance of the issues we own but a recognition that we are not alone. If we can look outside ourselves long enough, our light can shine not only for ourselves, but serve as a guide for others. Gonna let my little light shine, shine, shine. Maybe someone down in the valley, tryin’ to get home. Imagine letting go of our illusions of control, of being victims, or targets – our voices set free from under the stone. In the book, The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini, which I’m sure many of you have read, is a description of the way that healing might begin. A man imagines his half brother as being the one their father favored, and yet the thought brings “no sting with it . . . . I wondered,” he says, “if that was how forgiveness budded, not with the fanfare of epiphany, but with pain gathering its things, packing up, and slipping away unannounced in the middle of the night.” What a gift.

In the New Testament, when Peter asks Jesus: "How often must I forgive my brother if he wrongs me? As often as seven times? " Jesus, the teacher, answers, " Not seven, I tell you, but seventy times seven." We know that forgiveness of each other, of ourselves, of the fates that toss our lives out of control, is not a one-time thing. If not in our collective, congregational ritual, let us add the practice of forgiveness back into our individual lives, forgiveness for our limits, our foibles and our follies, and for those same limitations in those we love the most; for hurts beyond measure, no matter how old.

“Are you the tooth fairy,” she asked? “No,” the mom answered. “And I hope you’ll forgive me when you’re grown.”

May we quiet our minds to the joys of the season, make amends for our errors, and forgive what we can. May the love that flows between us and among us make us open, and yet more open, to wholeness.

Amen.