June 3, 2018
Rev. Emily Wright-Magoon
AUDIO:
EXCERPT of sermon (listen to full sermon above)
And so, here, in a church that strives to honor and celebrate difference, I love it that, thanks to Tom Parks’ generosity, we now have this historical artifact and powerful symbol in our sanctuary: this tablet with multiple languages on it. This is a symbol emblematic of the diversity among us, and our responsibility – in a diverse, covenanted community – to do our own listening and translating so that we can each bring ourselves here as we are without disappearing difference.
Now of course, as Tom has lifted up in our reading today, this symbol also serves as a warning – for the words written on the tablet articulate the unchanging human tendency toward empire and forced unity. If the powerful in our country were to carve words on a stone now for all to see, might it say something similar?
So this symbol in our sanctuary also serves as a warning. It is a warning against what moves within history – within the fragile part of the human spirit – that fears diversity and seeks uniformity.
We know there is another part of the human spirit – the part that knows that diversity strengthens us. The part of us that knows that our universe – our lives – have a bias toward diversity, a love of diversity.
…
“Time does not change us. It just unfolds us.” (Tom Parks)
Again the words of UU minister Leslie Takahashi:
The day is coming when all will know
That the rainbow world is more gorgeous than monochrome,
That a river of identities can ebb and flow over the static, stubborn rocks in its course,
That the margins hold the center.
– Rev. Emily Wright-Magoon