What do I believe?

It's a question that most Unitarians ask themselves at least a few times a year. Sometimes the questioning is a formal process, as in Coming of Age when you sit down and write a credo, a statement of beliefs. It can also be an informal process where in the course of your daily lives you come to the realization that what you believe has shifted, maybe for the present, maybe for good.

It's been a long time since I've self identified as a Unitarian, and even longer since I've sat down and really thought about what it is I believe. I find it hard to articulate what I believe, just as I've found it hard to find a political label, or a religious home.

I know I believe in self-reliance, I know I believe in taking care of your family, your wife, your home. I believe that if all else fails you should go down fighting, that if things truly fall apart around you that you should be able to say with a straight face, and no reservations that you tried everything, that you left no avenue unexplored and no fight un-fought.

I know I believe in fighting, in the simple uncomplicated honesty of exercise, and the value of discipline. I know I believe that you should not have children unless you plan to raise them, not the TV, not the schools, not a nanny, you as their parent should be charged first and foremost with the task of raising your children. I believe if you are unwilling to do this then you should not have children.

I believe that everyone should have access to medical care, especially contraception, and that everyone should have to work. I believe that there should be no such thing as a hand-out, only a hand-up and that the government exists only for it's own betterment.

I believe that religion is a sham, and that prayer never solved anything. I believe that work, no matter how humble, should be the ideal. I believe that every child should be raised with the belief that they should work to support themselves, and to help those who due to disability or age are no longer able to help themselves.

I believe that an armed society is a polite society, and that disciplining your kids is not only correct, but should be viewed as the good and proper action as a parent. I believe that boys should be told from a young age that there is nothing wrong with their anger, that they don't have to be in touch with their feminine side and that at the end of the day if someone is in their face they have every reason to fight. I also believe that with that right to fight should come the belief that loosing is not bad, that winning is not the ideal, and that not everybody gets a trophy.

I believe that there's nothing wrong with sex, that there's nothing taboo about a womans period, and that the only effective sex education is the one that leaves no mystery. I believe that every child should know how to put on a condom, and that every school nurse should be able and willing to dispense them.

I believe that every doctor has the right to refuse to perform an abortion, and I believe that no pharmacist should be able to refuse to fill a prescription, no matter their religious beliefs. I believe that no politician should be able to tel any professional how to do their job.

I believe that you should spend no more money then you make, that college should be affordable, but not required, and that anyone who wishes to learn, to better themselves, should be afforded that chance.

I believe that no man deserves a million dollar paycheck.

I believe that these may all change.

I believe.

Legislated Atheism

It sounds idiotic just reading it, doesn't it?

I had a debate with a friend of mine the other day. He's a good guy, we just don't agree on some things. We were discussing the inauguration as I'm sure were a lot of people. Yet what we disagreed on was not the President, the policies, the future by the Pastor.

Now, for those of you who did not watch the inauguration a Pastor spoke, evoking the usually symbols of God and Jesus while leading the assembled masses in prayer.

Now, when asked what religion I follow I usually answer Unitarian Universalist, though I don't necessarily approve of the way the faith as a whole behaves. But that's for another time. I also identify as Agnostic, sometimes Atheist, and generally disregard religion as a whole.

Now what my friend and I were arguing was whether or not it is appropriate to have prayer in our official ceremonies. My point was this: We live in a country with no official religion, a firm stance on the separation of church and state and yet we have a Christian prayer at our Inauguration. I went on further to argue that seeing as we have a wide array of faiths represented in the American public why not have a varied prayer, if a prayer at all? Why do we consistently evoke the same Christian imagery?

I see it as unofficially endorsing a Christian faith through the evocation of that faiths symbols and norms. I went on to say as we are unable to accurately represent every faith, why represent any at all? Why not just do away with prayer in official ceremonies?

His response was that to do that would be legislating atheism.

I honestly did not know what to say.

Atheism, is the lack of a belief in a deity. Legislating something like that would be so ridiculously unenforceable to be laughable. Not to mention my point was to remove prayer, not religion. I don't care if you believe in God. It simply does not matter to me. Yet why do I, as a person who does not believe in God, have to constantly encounter the symbols, and icons of religion? It seems to fly in the face of our constitutional mandate of a separation of church and state, but what do I know. I'm just legislating Atheism.

Why, What, and Belief

Years ago i went through the Coming of Age process at my church. It's a Unitarian equivalent of a Bar/Bat Mitzvah or First Communion. It's a marker that defines the transition from youth to adult in the UU church. One of the pieces of this process is the writing of a credo. This is often not given the due diligence it deserves.

I held then, and still hold now, the belief that your credo should be both a living document and as complete as possible. This belief upset some of my fellow youth who felt that I was unduly questioning their beliefs. Eventually I stopped asking yet the reason I was asking was important and I still feel is important.

Most religions have a creed, their practitioners are told not only what to believe but more importantly why they believe it. It is the why that most UU's don't get. We know what we believe, in fact if you ask almost anyone I'm certain they can tell you what they believe yet the ability to articulate why they hold their beliefs is much rarer.

If Unitarian Universalism is ever going to be anything other then a niche religion it's practitioners need to be able to not only say what they believe in but why they believe, and what is more the why needs to be air tight.

Now this is no small task and I know this, a creed is a living document, it is expected to grow and change as the person who wrote it grows and changes. I'm sure my creed if I were to write it today would differ greatly from the one I wrote all those years ago in Coming of Age. Yet I had inadvertently begun a quest to add the why to the what and it's only now that I've begun to formalize that and begun to realize the importance of why as well as what.

How to write a creed:
1) Determine what you believe.
2) Talk to someone who disagrees with your beliefs. Defend yours and challenge theirs. Do this as often as necessary till your certain in what you believe.
3) Determine why you believe what you believe.
4) Talk to someone who disagrees with your beliefs. Defend yours and challenge theirs. Do this as often as necessary till your certain your reasoning is both valid and sound.

Let's see if it actually works.

So a Mennonite is lost in the woods....

I went to RAMF yesterday. RAMF being the Rochester Area Mennonite Fellowship. It's a small Mennonite congregation located with biking distance of the house. The Missus had been looking into them for a few weeks and we decided to finally attend a service.

The church itself is small, just over a year old and still smells faintly of new paint and drywall. We arrived a few minutes before the service was supposed to begin and found the chapel empty with the exception of a gentlemen in his mid-thirties strumming a guitar. My bemused look must have been move visible then I had thought as he stopped playing and stepped into the narthex and said hello. We chatted for a moment then the Missus and I entered the chapel proper and found a seat. The chapel itself sits roughly sixty and by the time service started most seats were filled. Both the Missus and myself were greeted warmly by a fair number of he parishioners. I considered it to be a warm and welcoming atmosphere, the chapel itself was decorated, or more accurately, not decorated the walls were whitewashed drywall with light colored wood accents. No obvious iconography, Christian or otherwise, and I found it to be a very inviting space.

The service was lay led as are all their services. While some Mennonite churches have a full or part time minister RAMF is wholly lay led. This past Sundays speaker spoke on the Welcoming Face of God. It was a rather tame service, while there was some biblical references, no actual quoted scripture, I found the references unnecessary in terms of the message being conveyed. The sermon boiled down to a look at the home Jesus was raised in, and the advantages that lifestyle, the label of carpenter must have been in helping him connect with people. I found it an interesting take on the subject, I found the delivery to be average to good, and the singing quite good.

All in all I found the service itself to be a very comfortable. The Missus expressed a desire to return and I think I will as well. While I do not feel I'll ever self identify as a Mennonite I find them to be an interesting and wholly welcoming people.

I Went to Church Today.....

It was a Baptist service at First Bible Baptist Church. I went not because I am Baptist, but because a good friend asked me to come to church. I rarely think about, or discuss religion. In fact I would only self identify as a Humanist if I thought anyone I dealt with on a daily basis would understand. Truth be told I'm not even sure that's the proper label so, for convenience, I stick with Unitarian Universalism.

But, back to church.

The service was made up of two sections, the first part was made up of singing, prayer and music. While the presentation at First Bible Baptist was incredible, a large orchestra, choir, and stage accompanied by several large projector screens make for an awe inspiring spectacle. They definitely get a 10/10 for presentation but it's not the presentation that I took offense to. Almost without exception the message contained in the music and prayer was one of subservience to Christ, and subservience to God. There was a common thread running throughout that we, the congregation, were not good enough, faithful enough, could not love enough to truly be worthy of God yet he loved us anyway. This just seemed wrong to me. Why would I pray to someone while fervently believing I was not good enough? Would not I, who is made in God's image, be worthy to pray to the force that ostensibly created me? In my mind it was akin to saying a child was not worthy to ask a parent for a favor. It just seemed wrong. Yet I behaved myself and made it through to the sermon.

Now, the pastor of First Bible Baptist is a fantastic speaker. I've always said that a Minister/Pastor's principle job is to put on a show Sunday morning. All else is window dressing. Well, he put on one hell of a show. He spoke on what qualities made a good leader and interspersed his talk with short quotes from the Bible, Solomon to be specific. I did not find these quotes to be offensive or to interrupt the flow of his sermon. He used the stage well, moved well, spoke clearly and enunciated well. In short he was a fantastic speaker and gave a really good sermon.

Would I go back to First Bible Baptist? Probably not, however I would love to see their Pastor speak in a different setting. His sermon made the trip worth it for me.