December 22, 2019

The unifying themes of this program are justice, love, learning and hope.  The messages come from sermons and readings from Unitarian-Universalist sources.  The program title comes from a beloved Unitarian-Universalist hymn, “Spirit of Life,” which includes the words, “Sing in my heart all the stirrings of compassion” and “Move in the hand, giving life the shape of justice.”

This week we’ll hear two messages about hitting the pause button.  In a still spirit of reverence and wonder, we can find out what it truly means to be alive.

Commentary

Written by Orlando Montoya

I love Christmas music.  What other song style do we put away for 11 months only to sing for a short but festive season?  Its absence makes it more special. So when their time comes, Christmas songs bring back Christmas memories.  I heard Truman Capote’s “A Christmas Memory” for the first time this year.  A seasonal classic, the 1956 story talks about country living, friendship, abundance in the midst of poverty, loneliness and loss.  The story revolves around a seven-year-old narrator and an elderly woman who is his cousin and best friend.  By the time the story ends, presumably a decade after it begins, the narrator is in military school where he receives word of his dear friend’s death.  Now, we don’t have the luxury of choosing which memories come to the front of our minds when we hear a song, hear a story or feel the first sting of frost.  So Christmas always will be a time of both joy and sorrow as surely as we have no one season of joy or season or sorrow.  And that could be the point of both Capote’s tale and my own love for the fa-la-la-las, the glo-o-rias and the rest of the Christmas cannon.  Life has its share of seemingly permanent and repeating things, like the songs that we sing or the fruitcakes that the characters bake in “A Christmas Memory.”  The joys of life, people around us.  But life also is terribly fleeting.  And it will end in sorrow, just as the Christmas concert that I attended this week ending with “Danny Boy,” perhaps the saddest song ever written.  And why shouldn’t “Danny Boy” be a Christmas song: “And I shall hear, though soft you tread above me, and all my grave will warmer, sweeter be, for you will bend and tell me that you love me; and I shall sleep in peace until you come to me.”

Sermon

“Building Foundations” (11/17/19)

Rev. Ellen Quaadgras

Westminster Unitarian Church, Massachusetts

Sermon

“Alert for the Awe-Inspiring” (12/1/19)

Shana Lynngood

First Unitarian Church of Victoria, British Columbia

Sermon

“Seeing the Meaning of Life in Ordinary Events” (9/2/18)

Rev. Roger Fritts

Unitarian-Universalist Church of Sarasota

Sermon

“Being Part of Something Larger” (9/29/19)

Rev. Shawn Newton

First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto

Braver Wiser

Used by permission of Braver Wiser, a publication of the Unitarian-Universalist Association

Quest Monthly

Used by permission of Quest Monthly, a publication of the Church of the Larger Fellowship

UUA Statements

Messages from the Unitarian Universalist Association

Natural Silence

Used by permission of ListeningEarth.com

UUA Principles and Sources

Our liberal faith as defined by the Unitarian Universalist Association

World Religions

Written by Orlando Montoya

Interfaith Calendar

Written by Orlando Montoya

UU FAQ

Written by and used by permission of John Sias from interviews with Rev. Steve Edington

Published by the Unitarian-Universalist Church of Nashua, NH