On Pluralism
Reading & sermon preached by Reverend Carolyn Patierno
December 2, 2007

From the Nobel Lecture given by The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in December of 1964

"We have inherited a big house, a great "world house" in which we have to live together - black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, Moslem and Hindu, a family unduly separated in ideas, culture, and interests who, because we can never again live without each other, must learn, somehow, in this one big world, to live with each other. 

This means that more and more our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. We must now give an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in our individual societies. 

This call for a worldwide fellowship that lifts neighborly concern beyond one's tribe, race, class, and nation is in reality a call for an all-embracing and unconditional love for all men.

This oft misunderstood and misinterpreted concept so readily dismissed by the Nietzsches of the world as a weak and cowardly force, has now become an absolute necessity for the survival of man.

When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life.

Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. … Let us hope that this spirit will become the order of the day. …"

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This past Friday, the following AP story ran in the The Day:

Fort Collins, CO - City Council members rejected a proposal to create a strictly secular, multicultural display of the holiday season starting next year, choosing instead to stick with Christmas trees and wreaths.  Seeking compromise in yet another battle over religious holiday symbols on public property, the council voted to allow colored lights and Christmas trees and wreaths on the exterior of city buildings and other city property.  But inside buildings, only secular displays and messages will be allowed.

Of course, at the root of these so-called “battles over religious holiday symbols on public property” lie a number of issues.  One is the matter of separation of church and state.  Another is the one we’ll be focusing on today – the ever-present matter of religious pluralism about which both sides of the political and cultural spectrum are squeamish but for different reasons and in different ways.   What each has in common with the other, methinks, is a need to feel safe and part of the whole.

Despite the fact that our country was founded on the principle of religious freedom (among other things) the founding fathers and mothers could not have imagined the kind of religious diversity that would emerge in the 20th and into the 21st century in the United States.  Here our lives are entwined with the lives of those who are different from us.  It is hardly possible to move through any circle without pushing up against some kind of difference in world view based on any number of things.  This is what we call, “diversity.”  Let’s begin by getting the terms straight.

Diana Eck is the guru of religious pluralism.  At Harvard University she founded and directs the Pluralism Project.  I look to Eck for a working definition of the concept. 

• First, “diversity” and “pluralism” are not synonymous.  Diversity is what we have come to understand as that which denotes various kinds – that is, various races and ethnicities – various theological and religious beliefs.  Pluralism, on the other hand, is much more involved.  Eck names pluralism as “the energetic engagement with diversity.”   

• Second, pluralism is not just about tolerance.  However, I appreciate that Eck names tolerance as a “necessary public virtue” for “tolerance” has gotten a bad name among the progressive set.  Tolerance is not enough, we say with great conviction and just a touch of self-righteousness.  Whenever I hear the “tolerance tirade” Ernie comes to mind.  Ernie was the guy in my neighborhood who owned the liquor store on one corner and the grocery store on the other.  He knew everybody and everybody knew him.  If you needed to leave a key for a friend to get into your apartment, you left it with Ernie, that’s how kind he was, how trusted.  Ernie offered his opinions often enough but always with restraint.  In response to then-Mayor Dinkins’ “gorgeous mosaic” metaphor for the city and during the tense time period that followed the OJ Simpson verdict  – Ernie said, “Gorgeous mosaic - eh.  I just want us to leave each other in peace.”  In other words - tolerate each other.  Eck is quick to point out that tolerance doesn’t require us to know anything about each other.  It doesn’t encourage the “active seeking of understanding across lines of difference” she says.  What is likely true is that we can’t rely on tolerance alone to keep the peace.  But it’s a good enough start for me.

• Third, pluralism is not based on relativism, that is, what’s true for you and your social context may not be true for me in mine.   Rather, pluralism is the encounter of commitments - even through deep and sometimes religious differences - while still entering into honest relationship with others.   It is based on dialogue & encounter – give & take, criticism and self-criticism.  Eck explains it thus, “It doesn’t mean that everyone at the table will agree.  Rather it involves commitment to be at the table with one’s commitments.”

That we even have to entertain such lofty concepts seems to point out what a complicated time we’re living in, doesn’t it?  Or does it?  We think it’s complicated.  We bemoan the fact of the complicated times in which we live and then we read speeches given in 1964 and we are caught up short … hear ourselves saying, “Hey!  This sounds eerily familiar!  The speech could be given next week and with some semantic updates, it would fly.” 

“We have inherited a big house, a great "world house" in which we have to live together - black and white, Easterners and Westerners, Gentiles and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, Moslem and Hindu, a family unduly separated in ideas, culture, and interests who, because we can never again live without each other, must learn, somehow, in this one big world, to live with each other.  …..”

We get that.  Oh, we love that, we religious liberals.  But then the Reverend wraps up his Nobel Lecture with these words: 

When I speak of love I am not speaking of some sentimental and weak response which is little more than emotional bosh. I am speaking of that force which all of the great religions have seen as the supreme unifying principle of life. Love is somehow the key that unlocks the door which leads to ultimate reality. This Hindu-Moslem-Christian-Jewish-Buddhist belief about ultimate reality is beautifully summed up in the First Epistle of Saint John:

Let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone
that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.
If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and His
love is perfected in us.

And we good liberals … good, committed-to-pluralism liberals … we get nervous, frustrated, disappointed.  Why did the Reverend have to get all … Christian … on us?  Why did he have to bring in ultimate reality andthe God of St. John’s Gospel?  We reason that these are private matters and in this country, one’s religion should not matter.   We ask, “Because we separate church and state, shouldn’t we keep separate our religious convictions from our public lives?” 

To which I say, “No.”  Not because we should or we shouldn’t keep separate our religious convictions from our public lives but because it is impossible.  I am a Unitarian Universalist.  Religious.  Righteous.  Committed to the values that liberal religion offers to all of us.  Hopefully, I am most of the time doing the best I can to live as the person my religious tradition demands me to be.  My religious values influence everything I do.  And when I fail – as I sometimes do – I fail something larger than myself.   I fail my religious heritage and tradition.  How can I possibly separate that out from my public self?  How can you?  How can we ask anyone else to do the same? 

What Reverend King did brilliantly was publicly speak the private language of faith.  In the book Building the Interfaith Youth Movement (which was edited by Eboo Patel – of Speaking of Faith fame – and the beloved Patrice Brodeur) it is written that Reverend King infused the political ideal of the pluralist society as a “community of communities” with his Christian spirituality and called this “the Beloved Community.”  That term should be familiar to all of you as it is one that is included in the liturgy we celebrate each week.  The ideal of pluralism is infused in the meaning of the Beloved Community. 

As I read this speech, it occurred to me that the Democratic presidential candidates should be reading all of Reverend King’s speeches to learn something about sincere discourse in such matters.   In fact, as I submerged in the task this week, I found I was experiencing a bit of sermonic déjà vu.  Allow me to share a bit of the sermon I preached on November 7th, 2005 – the week after the presidential election during which I said that I …

… read an article from the Associated Press concerning the religious and moral divide in the U.S..  The writer ended with this quote from Michael Cromartie of the conservative Ethics and Public Policy Center, “The election shows that Democrats in 2008 are going to have to say they are religiously attuned to America and make it stick and make it authentic.”

To which I said, “Amen.”   I continued …

Former Pres. Clinton also weighed in.   He said we “need a clear national message and [we] have to do this without one big advantage …, which is [we] won’t have a theological message that basically paints the other guy as evil.”  

Remember that week?  Remember that Sunday service? 

In an interview in 2001, Diana Eck said that, “We have this challenge in the U.S. - to do something that has really never been done before which is to create a multi-religious and democratic state.” 

But whereas liberals are determined embrace religious pluralism while refraining from talking about religion from a personal perspective, neo-conservatives are determined to reject pluralism and hold back the waves of change inspired by our diversity by wielding their particular brand of theology as weapon. 

I’m not going to say much about the neoconservative strategies.  The strategies have been well documented and you are well informed.  I am more interested in considering our own contributions that hamper an authentic religious pluralism.

We ignore the requirements of an authentic pluralism at our own peril.  Those of us who identify as religiously and culturally progressive must accept that one’s religion is not something that can be checked at the threshold of the town square. 

It wouldn’t have occurred to Reverend King to do such a thing.  And it shouldn’t occur to us, either.  Yet we’re stuck in this cycle in which liberals demand that religious holiday decorations be banished from public spaces, that church bells stop ringing and conservatives counter demanding that the decorations stay up and that the official White House party line better be Merry Christmas and nothing other. What a drag. 

And because we are all of us missing the point, we’re stuck with dramas like the one played out in Ft. Collins and in towns and cities all over the country, which is why I am grateful that I live & work in a little New England city where the church bells ring and the Christmas tree sparkles beside the Menorah that will be lit each of the eight nights of Hanukah, which may seem banal to us, but that’s likely cynicism talking. 

If we think for just a moment, we can all come up with more than a few places where such a display would be downright radical.  I’m also grateful to be part of a community where people representing many faith traditions came together to quite literally build a “World House” named for Reverend King’s ideal.  Habitat for Humanity and their partners, we being one of them, will dedicate two houses in the Davis Farm development this afternoon exemplifying a movement toward pluralism at its best. 

And so it is appropriate that I close with Reverend King’s wisdom.  This, the conclusion of his Nobel Lecture:

We can no longer afford to worship the God of hate or bow before the altar of retaliation. … Love is the key to the solution of the problems of the world.  Let me close by saying that I have the personal faith that mankind will somehow rise up to the occasion and give new directions to an age drifting rapidly to its doom.

In spite of the tensions and uncertainties of this period something profoundly meaningful is taking place. Old systems of exploitation and oppression are passing away, and out of the womb of a frail world, new systems of justice and equality are being born.  … Here and there an individual or group dares to love, and rises to the majestic heights of moral maturity. So in a real sense this is a great time to be alive. Therefore, I am not yet discouraged about the future.

And neither am I, friends.  I am not discouraged.  Two houses were built out of love.  A few Souls here this morning helped to build those houses.  Many of you offered money to support its construction.  Today, on our behalf, Sue Robidoux will offer these families a Bible, for they are Christian, but as well, books that include wisdom of the world’s many faith traditions. 

In our way, by being involved in such an endeavor, we are helping to birth the new systems of justice and equality to which Dr. King referred.  We are rising to the majestic heights of moral maturity.  And we will continue to rise.  We will rise.   So long as we thoughtfully consider how we ready our wings, we will rise.

May it be so.  Blessed be.  Salaam.  Shalom.  Amen.

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