Eastrose
Fellowship
Unitarian Universalist
1133
NE 181st Avenue, Gresham, Oregon -- 181st Avenue between Glisan and
Halsey
WE
ARE A WELCOMING CONGREGATION
Monthly Letters to the Congregation by Rev. David Maynard
2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011
| February 2012 The
minister's view: Agreements Recently I was driving on the freeway out to Eastrose. Per usual, I worked my way to the right lane after merging onto I-84 Eastbound. I often prefer the slow lane – while I'm quite capable of going too fast, I prefer the relaxed feeling that goes with being at or below the speed limit. As I headed for the 181st Avenue exit, I pondered how dependent we are on “agreements.” During that journey I needed the trucks and cars in the other lanes to either stay where they were or signal any different intentions. I also needed the vehicles before and after me to keep a steady speed so that I could keep a safe distance from them. Finally, I needed the freeway itself to have been built and to be maintained in such a way that driving on it was predictable and safe. These, along with hundreds or thousands of similar agreements, are around us in our lives every day. School teachers depend on them; pilots and travelers depend on them; businesses depend on them; governments depend on them. One reason corruption and dishonesty are social problems is that the agreements affected by such behaviors are broken. The biblical prophet Amos mentions agreements in Chapter 3: “Do two journey together unless they have agreed?” As Amos rants against the sins of Israel, he reminds them that God and his people have agreed to certain things – and that the Israelites were not holding up their part of the bargain. Though Amos' rants are not my theology, the importance of agreements is. When you and I journey together – be it to Eastrose or the supermarket or school or work – we have agreed to certain rules and expectations. We might call these laws, ethics, manners or common sense. It does not matter – they are all agreements. They are implicitly important to our capacity to travel through this world and this life together. As Unitarian Universalists we hold ourselves and others responsible for the agreements of our culture. We UUs cast a pretty wide net, too, as we expect all people regardless of age, race, economic status, sexual preference, abilities or personality to be included in the agreements that benefit us. We are accountable for our differences and our similarities. Just as we have different strengths and gifts, so we have an obligation to respect everybody else's. This can be difficult – it's part of why we stay so small, I believe. Nonetheless, it's that awareness of freedom and responsibility that attracts us to our liberal religious faith. I hope we can all be in agreement on that. See you in church! Love, David P.S. To date the $3,000 matching grant to incorporate the 179th Avenue house into our weekly operations is being met – and we are making progress on funding the second six months of using the house which was omitted in the proposed 2012 budget. I hope you will join Jane and me in helping this happen. Matching gift forms are in the lobby or found elsewhere in this Petals. January 2012 The minister's view: Calendars and Clocks for 2012 Surely human beings have always known about the passage of time! The shift from dark to light to dark alone every day would teach that. The perceived motion of the sun or the moon across the sky gives another natural basis for knowing about time. On a longer scale, the change in seasons with predictable temperatures and weather during each season gives a sense of the year. However, each of these examples is grounded in itself. There is nothing abstract or portable about the movement of the sun or moon or the changing from winter to spring: they only exist in the here and now for us all. Not so about clocks and calendars. While the movements of the stars and planets may undergird them, these measures of time can travel with us from place to place – on a boat or airplane, say – and can be modified independently of when the sun rises or sets. That's why the clocks we use can have daylight savings time and time zones – each of these was introduced, I understand, by the railroads to make their trains run more smoothly. Likewise, calendars have a certain arbitrariness about them which explains “leap years” like 2012 and the differing dates for Ramadan and Roshashana every year. The Gregorian calendar we use was introduced by a Pope in 1582, replacing the slight cumulative error in the older Julian Calendar which was playing havoc with the timing of Easter. Clocks and calendars are both helpful and useful around the world, especially when people are moving around or holidays need to be observed. These thoughts are on my mind as we enter the New Year 2012. Noting, arbitrarily or not, the “start of a year” gives me pause. What happened last year and might happen this year? Do I have any resolutions to give me direction or a “yearly theme” to help me appreciate the phase of life I am in? Every New Year is a time to ponder birth, growing up, pairing up, perhaps having children, accumulating adventures, and thinking about moving on. Even though each of our lives is grounded in some reality conditioned by genetics, fate, and happenstance, we still resort to clocks and calendars to measure out the hours, days, months and years. In fact, these help us to remember the events and the meaning of such events in our lives and in our relationships with others. That's why forgetting a wedding anniversary is such a big deal. That's why some traditions annually remember the death of a parent or spouse or child. Keeping a calendar in mind literally keeps the person in mind. May the hours of each day be a blessing and may the passage of the days of 2012 be helpful and healthy for you. Together we can celebrate and commiserate what the year will bring. See you in church! Love, David P.S. Elsewhere in this issue of Petals is an opportunity to help Eastrose take advantage of a $3,000 matching grant to incorporate the 179th Avenue house into our weekly operations. I hope you will join Jane and me in helping this happen. |