Crisis
Sermon for Sunday, August 23rd, 2009.
In this sermon I discuss the role that crisis plays in our lives, the constancy of crisis, and the connection to the human need for narrative.
Playlist:
Lay my love by Brian Eno and John Cale
Don’t leave me hanging on the telephone by Blondie
Shelter from the storm by Bob Dylan
Hi Reverend Jon, after hearing your 8/23 sermon, the phrase “god shaped hole” had a particular resonance with me. And I totally dug the “fate to freedom” timeline you talked about: from oedipal fate to calvinist predestination to this unpredictable, large kinda buddhist universe to the freedom of particles and quantum craziness.
What it all made me think about for some reason was the word “relationship.” To me, “relationship” applies to two aspects of your sermon: One is this need to see connections between things or how we crave neatly woven narratives about life. The study of taxonomy and Bible stories are examples of the need to find relationships between organisms, events, random happenings, etc. The second meaning of “relationship” that related to your sermon is pretty simple – interaction between human beings as social creatures, like parent & child, Laverne & Shirley, reverend & parishioners.
I think religious narrative in particular really combines these two readings of the word “relationship.” Religion attempts to fill in the gaps of knowledge that are looming mysteries to us. AND religious institutions have been used not only to congregate & socialize people but also to assert control and authority over-and-between humans. Being a total heretic, I don’t buy any of them. However, I am reminded of the role of story telling in my family. Example: my maternal grandmother’s tendency to impose her brand of narrative on people and events was what made her an engaging person and a great entertainer, but at the same time she could often inaccurately interpret situations and (sometimes hurtfully) peg people. It sort of hit me that my first real sense of freedom, like a first emotional growth spurt, occurred when I learned not to accept family narratives at face value or at the very least take them with a grain of salt: you don’t have to believe that the dead dog ran away with the circus, or that a crass, lazy, drunk uncle was “certain” to be a successful stand-up comedian, or that a nerdy cousin’s demise at college was just “inevitable” (these are just illustrations, by the way – none of these actually applies to my family). But anyway, by rejecting fate-filled narratives, I became more of a “free particle.” But this, too, may be part of my own narrative! Yeah, so what the hell IS a duck bill platypus anyway?