PROFILE OF A PATRIOT

Nov. 4, 2007   Rev. Kathleen A. Green

Summit Unitarian Universalist Fellowship

     “Dear Rev. Green,

I am a stay-at-home mom whose husband is in the military in San Diego.  Actually, we just moved here a few months ago.  After our first child was born and we had her christened in the church my husband and I began feeling uncomfortable with the religion we had grown up with and so when our second child was born we didn’t have a christening ceremony.  We want our children to have a different kind of religious training than we did.  I am really questioning the idea of God.  I think my husband is too.  He will be deployed to the middle east very soon and things will be busy for me but I am thinking of visiting your Summit Fellowship.  I wonder if it would be a good place for us, since we are a military family.  You might see me and my children one day soon.”

     This is an email message that I received just a week or so ago.  I have actually received two others since my arrival here, with similar interest and trepidation.   It almost seems ironic that even as I had planned the topic of today’s service: Profile of a Patriot, months ago to coincide with the upcoming Veteran’s Day, such messages and feelings would come to me in such a timely manner!

     As the game of dirty politics is just around the corner, with presidential hopefuls debating, sometimes pandering, often disappointing, and only occasionally hitting the mark, the time has come to re-examine the idea of patriotism.  What is a patriot, and how might this impact us as a religious community?

       Renowned minister and author, Forrest Church, shares, “In 1816, Stephan Decatur proposed the ultimate toast to nationalism: "Our country, right or wrong!”  American patriotism refutes this sentiment by emending it. In 1899, Senator Carl Schurz of Missouri said, "Our country, right or wrong. When right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be put right.”  When established as national writ, "All men are created equal" excluded both women and slaves.  The first feminist manifesto (written by Elizabeth Cady Stanton in 1848) invoked the Declaration of Independence.  In condemning the curse of slavery, Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln did the same. Expressing his dream, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. looked "forward to the day that this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed.”  From the outset of our history, American patriots have challenged the nation to tune its actions to the key of its ideals.”

       When all is said and done, patriotism is not about wearing a flag pin on your lapel.  It’s not a matter of hitting the high note in our National Anthem.  And it is not about how many ‘support the troops’ or ‘no more war’ bumper stickers our vehicles wear.  Patriotism isn’t a commodity belonging to the Republicans or Democrats; left wing or the right wing.  Patriotism is an ideal; it’s a state of mind, a state of being.

     Today, one of two Unitarian Universalist seminaries is named for Rev. Thomas Starr King, the Starr King School for the Ministry, in Berkeley, California.  There are also two mountains (one in New Hampshire, and one in California) named for him.

     Rev. King was a remarkable man, credited by President Abraham Lincoln with keeping California in the Union during the Civil War due to his stirring orations.  According to the Dictionary of Unitarian Universalist Biography: “Barely five feet tall and physically fragile, King was undistinguished in appearance.  Well into his thirties he appeared no older than a youth. His energy and magnetism as an organizer, minister, and preacher, however, quickly impressed any who had mistakenly judged him by appearance. ‘But, though I weigh only 120 pounds,’ he remarked late in life, ‘when I am mad I weigh a ton!’

     It was Thomas Starr King who said, “Patriotism is unselfish devotion to the idea of a nation, its heaven-inspired soul, its representative office and mission.  And anything lower than this form of it here, any interpretation of it equivalent to a defence of every act of every administration, even when that act does violence to the spirit of our history and the providential pointings of our call, is a disgrace to ourselves, an abuse of a noble word, and an offence before God.

Never was there a people whom it so behooved to be patriotic in the highest sense; for our patriotism is daily passing into fact, and becoming part of the nation’s substance.  We vote it, we speak it, we incarnate it in the men we select to act for us.  We are living for the future.  It doth not yet appear what we shall be.  We can say only that we are a mass of tendencies.

     True patriotism, therefore, which labors to keep a nation faithful to its mission, cannot be satisfied here unless the idea of human worth and privilege that awakened and supported our political struggle, ripen and produce their finest spiritual fruit.

     Patriotism has learned to pronounce with emphasis the word Union.  It is a hallowed word to it.  This country has an ideal character, a representative value.  Its mountains were upheaved, its rivers were grooved, its prairies unrolled, its night-skies bent, for the home of an idea.  Its glory cannot spring from vast extent, populousness, power, and wealth, but from the un-questioned dominion of an idea.  If we are to be one, we must have a great undying sentiment.  “Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable;” that is the marriage-vow, that alone can be the marriage-bond. We cannot vote ourselves together, we cannot keep ourselves together merely by cultivating superficial, or commercial good feeling.

     We conclude, then, by saying that patriotism is not only a legitimate sentiment, but a duty.  There are countless reasons why, as Americans, we should love our native land.  We cannot more efficiently labor for the good of all men, than by pledging heart, brain, and hands to the service of keeping our country true to its mission, obedient to its idea.  Our patriotism must draw its nutriment and derive its impulse from knowledge and love of the ideal America, as yet but partially reflected in our institutions, or in the general mind of the Republic.  The world waits to see the quality and energy of our patriotism.  The book of our country’s history, preserved by human heroism, and providential care, is handed to us, that we may inscribe there the records of its glory, or its shame.”

      And WHO is a patriot?  According to my dictionary, anyone who “loves, supports and defends one’s country.”  Not loves and supports the policies of the government of one’s country, or the president of one’s country, or each and every action or law of one’s country.  As a matter of fact, we have proven time and time again over the course of history in our country that patriotism can also be loosely defined as dissent against the government or policies or actions or laws of one’s country.  That dissent, fully sanctioned by the drafters of the Constitution of the United States of America, was foreseen to be at times necessary for the protection of the true ideals of those who founded our country.  It was Thomas Starr King who also said, “The distinctive feature of true patriotism is that it is pledged to the idea which one’s native country represents.  It does not accept and glory in its country merely for what it is at present, and has been in the past, but for what it may be.”

It is not a coincidence that many of the ideals which Unitarian Universalism holds high are also the ideals which our nation holds high.  Many of the nation’s founders were Unitarians.  Thomas Jefferson, though he never officially joined a Unitarian Church, confidently predicted that the free-spirited religious movement known as “Unitarianism” would “ere long become the general religion of the land from North to South,” and that there was not a young man then alive “who would not die a Unitarian.”

     The ideals of justice, human dignity, and liberty are not passing fancies but foundational precepts set forth by our nation’s forebears, as well as by our religious forebears, and still valid & imperative today.

We are called by our principles and purposes to not only honor all those who have fallen under the red, white and blue banner of American patriotism in the most traditional sense, but also to honor the thousands of others who have given their lives for other manners of patriotism, not so readily acknowledged.

Patriots Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Michael Schwerner, three young men who were murdered for registering blacks to vote in Mississippi in 1964. Patriots Jeffrey Miller, Alison Krause, Sandra Scheuer and William Schroeder; those who are forever known as the “4 dead in Ohio” from the May 4, 1970 shootings at Kent State.  Patriot Dr. Barnett Slepian, an abortion provider who was gunned down in Amherst, New York, in 1998, and patriot Matthew Shepard, a young man beaten to death in 1998 for being gay.   We are called as thinking and feeling beings to honor such patriots.

     Transcendentalist theologian William Ellery Channing:  I call that mind free which jealously guards its intellectual rights and powers, which calls no one master, which does not content itself with a passive or hereditary faith, which opens itself to light whencesoever it may come, which receives new truth as an angel from heaven.

Two of my seminary classmates, David Pyle and Seanan Holland, started   at Meadville-Lombard Theological School in 2005, and are training for chaplaincy in the United States Armed Forces.  David was raised by a military family in Tennessee and followed family tradition by enrolling in ROTC in high school.  By his first year in the military David no longer identified as a Christian and a 1997 stint in Bosnia instilled a new conviction in him: a deep opposition to religious hatred.  This resolution led him to UUism.  After five years of active duty and three in the Reserves, David began working as a student minister in Galveston, TX.  Seanan joined the Marines in his sophomore year of college.  Toward the end of his first tour as a helicopter pilot he began considering UU ministry.  He left for Iraq in 2004, but six months after returning he answered his call to ministry and came to seminary.  I know both of these men, I have studied with them, shared stories with them, and am inspired by their unique calling to serve as Unitarian Universalist military chaplains.  I hadn’t really ever conceived of such a calling before I met them.  And yet, hearing them speak of their call I realized the need for such chaplaincy and began to understand the connection between call to ministry and call to military service.  I call them patriots.

     And then there was Ms. Vishwani Patel.  Ms. Patel was a student of mine some seven or eight years ago.  You see, Ms. Patel had moved to this country from India and wanted desperately to become a citizen.  Though she cherished memories of her birthplace, she did not feel connected there any longer.  Her children and grandchildren were here and she had lived in the U.S. for over seven years when we became acquainted.  I was to tutor Ms. Patel in her studies for the U.S. citizenship test.  She had failed the test the first time because she was so nervous and didn’t understand the interviewer’s instructions.  But Ms. Patel was not deterred.  She was determined to become a citizen of this country and she learned about our history, our politics, and our culture.  I worked with her on language and learned from her about her faith, how important it was to her that all people should be treated equally, and what it means to persevere in order to see your dream become reality.  I accompanied Ms. Patel, on her seventieth birthday, to the state capital of Connecticut and she passed her test with flying colors.  Though she is not a native of this country, I can tell you with a great deal of confidence that Ms. Patel would consider herself a patriot.

     Last Sunday evening, I attended the installation service of the Rev. Kathleen Owens, assistant minister at First UU Church of San Diego.  As the service started, several colleagues stepped forward to offer greetings.  The words of  the Rev. Cynthia Kane were most memorable for many of us in attendance.  I asked for permission to share those words with you today:

“…while I might be the sole active duty UU Navy chaplain, I do not stand here alone.  I am but one in the extended family of Unitarian Univeralist military members.  By way of example, here is this morning’s muster.  Please rise when the category with which you identify is called:

·        Those people currently serving in Active Duty, in the Reserves, national Guard, or Dept. of Defense.

·        Those retired form active Duty, Reserves, national Guard, or Dept. of Defense.

·        Anyone who has ever served any length of time in the military or Dept. of Defense.

·        Active duty, reserve, National Guard, Dept. of Defense, or retiree dependents.

·        Anyone who has a family member who is serving or has served in the military of Dept. of Defense.

Those of us standing – whether or not we served our country in uniform – we are part of every Unitarian Universalist congregation.  (please be seated)

     We military members pray you know, we need such places to call home.  Where we may find ourselves not just among comrades in arms but among comrades in faith.  We need a place where God is not Republican or Democrat.  Where we might be able to balance our personal and professional lives – lives in which the last thing we do before leaving our home is hold our 9 day old infant, and the first thing we do upon coming to work is clean our 9MM Beretta pistol.  Where the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” ban is lifted…and other may ask about those whom we love and we may tell.  Where we may be peace-loving, conscientious objecting pacifists…while serving in the military during a time of war.  Our congregations – especially those based in America’s hometown also shared by thousands of military personnel – can be the one safe haven in which our spirits can be free.

     Unitarian Universalism is THE faith upon which this country was founded.  Any patriotic American can find a spiritual home here, for embedded within the very foundation of our nation’s ideals are the principles of our faith:  the freedom of mind and spirit, the use of reason and responsibility, and a generous appreciation of differing views and practices.”

     We do not have to think alike to love alike.  We can be a spiritual home for stay-at-home moms with husbands in the military.  We can be a religious community that honors all brands of patriotism and believes deeply in the idea of affirming and promoting the inherent worth and dignity of every person, as well as the right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregation and in society at large.  As free-thinking women and men, with reason as our guide and compassion as our drive, we fit the profile.  The profile of a patriot.  May we open our hearts, our minds, our doors to the many patriots who would come to Summit seeking such a beloved community.

Amen and blessed be.