In this sermon “Blessed are the translators” I will present our liberal religious practice of generous translation of scripture, religious language, doctrine, sacred story, religious thought and practice. Liberal translation makes it possible for people with a diversity of theological beliefs to learn and journey together in peace and power. The generosity of spirit provides us a way to experience the beloved community.
There will be a whole lot of translating going on today! As a warmup for this journey, I’ve pulled some nerdy humor from the internet.
How many translators does it take to change a lightbulb? A: It depends on the context.
The past, the present and the future walked into a bar. … It was tense.
Two translators were on a sinking ship … One says “can you swim?” The second translator replies “No but I can shout help in 9 different languages!
A linguistics professor was giving a lecture. He said “In the English language a double negative forms a positive. However, in some languages like Russian, a double negative remains negative. “And” he continued “there is not one single language, not one in which a double positive becomes a negative.”
From the back of the room a student retorted: “Yeah right!”
My sermon title “Blessed are the translators” is an allusion to Jesus in the book of Mathew saying “Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the sons of God.” More recent translations have: “blessed are the peacemakers. The shall be called the children of God.”
Historian and biblical scholar Bart Ehrman tells of an ancient practice that contributed to my understanding of this passage. In ancient times leaders and noblemen would “adopt” an adult in appreciation of exceptional heroism or virtue. Claiming them as a son or daughter bestowed great honor, greater even than being born into the family.
When Jesus said “they will be called the sons of God” This implied that God would have us become peacemakers. Peacemaking fulfills God’s will and intention for establishing divine order on Earth.
The phrase “divine order” is a liberal translation, another way to say “kingdom of God” or “kingdom of heaven.” It implies that Peacemakers are the vehicle by which divine order is established on Earth. This is what Jesus meant when he his disciples to pray “thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven.” Said more simply and in common language of today. “Peacemakers do God’s work.
I just gave you several examples of generous liberal translation. I see these as continuing a theme emphasized by Jesus as he repeatedly spoke critical of the religious conservatives of his day. He accuses them of losing the spirit of the Torah while adhering or enforcing it strictly. Jesus guided his disciples to look beneath and beyond a literal or strict interpretation of Torah in order to hear, find and follow the merciful guidance and love of the one who gave the law to Israel in the first place. Liberal translation is about getting back to love.
That may be the most bible citing most of you have heard in ages. In case it’s a stretch, let me offer a device to make it easier. Remind yourself that we are talking about literature. Most of you had a good liberal education. You know how to do literary criticism and appreciation.
To go a step further, consider that we are reading and talking about poetry. Whether or not bible passages are historically accurate, we are more interested in connecting with deeper truth that can come through the literature. Bringing a generous spirit increases our capacity to hear and receive wisdom found in all of the world’s religious traditions. We sometimes reach this wisdom and power by being able to appreciate symbolic language and religious metaphor
Translating and interpreting liberally, we won’t get trapped in the bramble of literalism. We can persist until we find treasure, wisdom, and useful guidance. We can see the qualities and values that rules and strictures are trying to protect even when we object to those rules and strictures. Generous liberal translation, treating religious literature as poetry, we will find continuous revelation, appreciation of Great Mystery, and reconnection with peace and love. Our liberal approach asks us to call upon love, to study love, to practice love to experience and share love.
The rigid narrow-mindedness associated with religious establishments has keep people from appreciating great mystery and developing faith in the power of divine love! Religious hypocrisy drives people away for the development of authentic faith. People see that religious authorities and establishments use contrived claims of moral superiority to hide greed and lust for power. The wheels of institutional religious power crush and bury truth, beauty and compassion. It’s a betrayal of the call to something greater, and people sometimes realize that they are being duped and led away from true calls to divine order. Strict interpretation of religious matters aids and abets “powers and principalities.” It diverts us from the flow that connects us all.
Awareness of the corruption and abuse of power within the Catholic Church led to the Protestant Reformation beginning in the early 16th century. The establishment of the first Unitarian church occurred mid 16th century after a decade of religious debates in Translvania, (modern day Romania). The first Unitarian King, John Sigismund issued a proclamation and legal document known as the Diet or Edict of Torda in 1563. It stated that matters of faith could not be established by governments or empires. He saw the absurdity and obscenity of the killing done in the name of God. Unitarians denounced the violence and coercion of the church. We knew that these can led people to submission but not to faith. Faith grows from free will. The Edict expressed the value of free religious communities, freedom of pulpit and pews.
It bares noting that the Catholic and other Protestant Churches persecuted Unitarians and Universalist as heretics. We as persecuted heretics became vocal promoters of tolerance, reason and freedom! We denounced the brutal force used by church and kingdoms in the name of maintaining orthodoxy.
We learned to cherish rights of conscience. We saw good reasons to question religious authority. We found a faith that had room for our doubts. We came to hold as sacred, the right to think for ourselves. We have used the power of liberal translation to resist tyranny. Ultimately generous translation has led us to the primacy of love.
Translation is not just something that happens when we go from Aramaic to Greek to Latin to English. It’s not something that needs to happen only to better understand things written hundreds or thousands of years ago. We need liberal translation to connect, understand, communicate and cooperate with each other. Generous translation asks us to realize that each of us has our own worldview, our own way of making sense of things, our own sacred stories.
UU tradition asks us to be respectful when we approach a person’s sacred story. This applies not only to formal theology but to all the ways we forge meaning in order to navigate life. In order to know a person, in order to begin to understand and appreciate a person, we must learn to listen to what they are holding as sacred. We pay respectful attention to their concept of God or Great Mystery or whatever language they use to enable themselves to live with faith, integrity and peace. That is what we do here. We become curious about values and beliefs, theirs and our own.
When I reflect on the influx of new members in the past couple of years, I think also of the violence growing in our nation. Liberals find this group, and say THANK GOD! Even those who thought that they were done with religion, find in this congregation sanctuary and respite from those who attack our library and education institutions, steal our rainbow flags, take away women’s reproductive rights, our right to vote and right to teach history, while they promote hate of marginalized people, we cry out for humanity.
It’s no surprise that many of us associate religion with narrow-minded bigotry and repressive social control. We need generosity of spirit to heal trauma from religious abuse. Our liberal translation of religious matter supports healing and liberation. Stick around and we will show you that religion can be fun, empowering, and will encourage you to develop a faith that has integrity for you!
Liberal generous interpretation and translation is a key. Love and tolerance are our code. We know that while no culture is perfect, each has wisdom, treasure and splendor to aid fulfillment and living with a sense of the sacred.
Our faith is seeded by covenant. We make agreements and promises to each other about why we have come together and how we will treat each other. These guide us and provide us with means for spiritual growth.
Hopefully we experienced welcome. We experienced a sense of shared values and understanding. We felt joy and connection with this congregation. We return because we have experienced a sense of belonging.
However, UU tradition is not about finding people that are exactly like us. Heaven forbid that we should ever become an exclusive club or a place that unites a small group by promoting fear and hate. Heaven forbid us from becoming a place that denies humanity, inherent worth or kinship of others.
Our tradition reminds us that we all come a common source and we share a common destiny. The first Unitarian Church had as a statement of its faith: “God is One.” Today we lean heavily into the learning that “all of humanity and all of existence are one.” We unite to affirm and promote a global community with peace and liberty for all. We unite in our commitment to do the work to dismantle systems of oppression as they exist in and around us.
For all of these beautiful tasks and more, we need generous spirit, liberal translations, the desire and willingness to listen and learn from those whose words and deeds bother us. We will need to grow our capacity to connect with the hearts and the longings of people when they are not doing what we want them to do.
Each of us is a unique manifestation of the one source and substance of our existence. With generosity and an intention to connect, we will find that holy divine living energy and Great Mystery abides in each of us.
We can turn to each person as a Torah, a scripture, a sacred scroll filled with wisdom and challenges that reach back to the beginning of time. We can cultivate reverence and bring it to those we meet. When we become curious about what is sacred to them, they may share their sacred stories with us. We can take off our shoes to approach the holy ground of spirit, soul, awesome life force, the divine within.
Sometimes it is our own words or deeds that bother us. Sometimes we do not speak or act the ways we want us to do. We can also take this journey by turning inside ourselves.
We can approach ourselves with the same curiosity and humility we want to have for others. We can notice what inspires us and what puts us up against the worst thoughts and feelings we have about ourselves. We can bring our liberal translator self as peacemaker to the conflicts that exist within us. We can remember that we too are unique expressions of divine grace. We too are sacred scrolls written by the divine source of life.
When we do this work, we will be studying, learning practicing and sharing UU living tradition. We will be nurturing souls to help heal society. May we be blessed with love and amazing grace and find fulfillment in this sacred endeavor!
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