Today we aim to “Overcome Oppression with Spirituality and Connection.” I am very excited to give this sermon. The pursuit of liberation, of overcoming oppression is at the core of our religious tradition. In recent years, growing numbers of UUs have agreed to an articulation of our mission as coming together to build the beloved community, and as a guide for that pursuit we have named 7 core values with love being the center. Love will guide us “on the road from greed to giving.” It will inform us, challenge us, and encourage us as we seek to dismantle systems of oppression.
It’s a big and heavy subject, but when I say overcoming oppression, I’m implying the possibility of liberation. When we realize the possibility of liberation, we have found holy ground.
I hope to lay down a foundation that we can build upon for further work in this direction. I hope to raise enough good questions to be challenging and encouraging. That intention is representative and characteristic of our religious tradition.
All religion attempts to address ultimacy, the most important, the most sacred, the most holy, the most High, Rastafari! Most religious traditions use the word G*d or some variation of it to refer to that ultimacy.
Hey, this topic wasn’t challenging enough, I thought I’d bring God into it. If that excites you, tell me about it sometime. If on the other hand mention of G*d stimulates in you a fight, flight or freeze response, ..Breathe! (pause) Remember where we are. Our congregation welcomes atheists, agnostics, theists, pantheists, panentheists, nature mystics, new agers, skeptics, cynics, and “I don’t know, leave me alone already- ists.”
Here are some words from the basic text of Alcoholics Anonymous that I believe fit us. “To us the realm of spirit is broad, roomy, inclusive, never exclusive or forbidding to those who earnestly seek. It is open, we believe to all… do not let any prejudice you may have against spiritual terms deter you from honestly asking yourself what they mean to you.”
I’ll share a few perspectives on G*d that I think are relevant to our discussion today. Also, relevant will be two powerful and universal needs, truth and understanding. Sometimes when I use the word G*d, I’m referring to the Big Is, the ultimate reality beyond perceptions. An phrase that states something similar goes “G*d is Truth.” It would follow then that truth is god.
It seems to me that many religious traditions claim to possess the absolute, final and complete truth. Or they claim to have a divine expression of truth sufficient to explain and direct every person through any and every challenge in life.
What does our UU tradition have to say about Truth? What is our relationship to this aspect of divinity? We say that revelation of truth is continuous, that whatever truth we might possess, more can be revealed to us if our minds, hearts and will are open to further learning.
The concepts of oppression and liberation are central to Judaism, and our UU tradition inherited these through liberal Christianity.
The story of exodus from slavery in Egypt is the narrative that formed Jewish identity as a people. … If you recognize the following song, please sing or speak the 4 word response and refrain:
(me) When Israel was in Egypt land, (them) let my people go
OPPRESSED so hard they could not stand, “ “ “ “ “
Every year at the Passover seder Jews retell the Exodus story. In this story G*d is the force that calls Moses to lead his people out of slavery. G*d has Moses tell old Pharoah to let the Hebrews get out of town. In this story G*d is the force that gives the Hebrews the courage to flea Egypt, to wander through the desert in faith or hope of reaching a “Promised Land.”
This story reminds me that the life force, the energy that lives in us causes us not to be satisfied with bondage. In this story the journey out of oppression is difficult and takes years wandering without proof that they will ever finding a place of permanent refuge. It tells me that the journey to liberation does not come with complete instructions. It requires struggle, discernment, mistakes, guidance from a force beyond humanity, faith and persistence to strive for better conditions.
Throughout the rest of Torah, variation of one phrase is repeated most often: “refrain from mistreating the stranger, (the oppressed) remember you were once strangers oppressed in Egypt.” G*d promises the Jewish people that if they follow the instruction given as Torah, they will prosper. The nature of these instructions has everything to do with justice, righteousness or right relationships. The requirement for divine blessing is to share prosperity with neighbors, to treat “strangers” and everyone fairly. I believe this formula explains why this tiny people have been at the forefront of countless liberation movements.
Something similar is true of us UUs, although a slightly different message comes out of our Universalist tradition. It reminds us that we all share a common origin and will share a common destiny. Our tradition asserts that humans are one race. UU offers a gospel that people from different cultures can come together to create a beloved community where divinity is found as we cherish the interconnected web of our existence and celebrate the worth and dignity of every soul.
Our UU forebearers believed in discipleship to Jesus teaching that the kingdom is at hand and his example of ministry to the “least;” the poor, sick, despised and marginalized. Unitarians and Universalists saw this as the way of life that Jesus offered. A growing number of UUs have come to understand our soul work as the work of coming to terms with many ways our privileges are tied to systems of oppression. Working to create the beloved community requires us to educate ourselves to the ways we have internalized oppression, to become conscious of how we are participating in its continuation, to change our ways and to advocate for the dismantling of systems of oppression.
To promote and advance liberation, it is essential that we learn to distinguish between personal prejudice or bias, and systemic oppression, by which I mean the traditions or societal patterns that enforce discrimination and create a caste system.
IMO one of the biggest traps and failures that liberation valuing people have fallen into is putting faith in the diagnosis and putting down of individuals as racist, sexist, transphobic etc. The systems of oppression love it and thrive when we use the ammunition of name calling and take aim at individuals. Systems of oppression thrive when we fight and divide up into further and further small groups isolated and disconnected from each other.
Now don’t get me wrong. I am not blaming anti-racists or feminists or progressives for the reticence of people to look at this stuff. We are not going to come to terms with patterns of intergenerational oppression without feeling some of the pain, shame, guilt, hurt, disappointment, fear and despair that we have inherited. And really, who wants to do that?!
When I talk about systems of oppression, I’m talking about the ways that society keeps down, oppresses or retards the advancement of specific groups of people. For example, I’m talking about all the ways that girls and women have been mistreated, discriminated against, shamed, punished, and violated. That is sexism. The sexist messages and beliefs are internalized. Girls learn to defer and take care of other’s needs, in particular to prop up and support the egos and the privileges of men and to not speak up when they are mistreated.
Girls and women don’t need to get these messages explicitly. Society is structured in such a way that demonstrates women’s less important place and a host of other harmful beliefs that impair and oppress women.
(added extemporaneously) One reason that I choose sexism as my example of systemic oppression is that women may be the only oppressed group that is not a minority.
The purpose and the effect of society’s systemic oppressions is to divide the populace which makes it easier for the dominant groups, especially the super-rich to exploit, extract, consume, control and degrade resources that are needed by everyone for health and wellbeing. Most of these resources are generated or harvested by people from oppressed groups. The subjugation and disempowerment of women, minorities and people with lower incomes makes exploitation easier. Similarly teaching people to blame and despise oppressed groups makes it harder for people to unite and organize for their common good.
I’m talking about a flaw in humanity, a condition that stands in the way of human cooperation. The planet is burning, undergoing rapid climate change, patterns that are bringing devastating effects to human populations and to many ecosystems. Why can’t we cooperate to change our collective ways? Because a flaw, perhaps the primarily flaw with our current operating system is that it is possible indeed likely that individuals and corporations can profit and expand their wealth while degrading the environment and depleting the commonwealth! Individuals and corporations wield undue power. They intervene to prevent the cooperation that humanity needs.
War is another example. Wars exist because rich and powerful men can get the poor to do their bidding. Rulers use systems of oppression to wage war knowing the costs including loss of life will be paid by poor and oppressed people. Oligarchs like Putin disregard the wellbeing of the people in Russia and Ukraine. Because Russia has squelched its citizen’s ability to resist and rebel, off to war they go.
Before we speak of a solution, two more obstacles to be named. One, the continuation of oppression relies upon deception. If people were permitted to recognize their natural alliances, they would be harder to steal from. When whites are taught to see people of color as a threat, or men to see women or gays or trans people as a threat to their male privilege and masculinity, all can be distracted enabling oligarchs to siphon off more wealth.
However, failing to see the humanity of those who dominate us also serves to further disempower us. Hating “them” keeps the system in place. The problem here has been described as “empathy doesn’t tend to flow uphill.” Unless we can connect with the humanity of those who dominate us, we will react rather than respond. And the system will continue.
Part of the solution will come when we realize that what we are dealing with is intergenerational trauma. Then it will take three simple but very difficult things; empathy, courage and the ability to connect across divisions. Fear, hate, resentment, blame, name calling, these will only keep us stuck. We must come to understand on a deep deep level, human kinship. We must hold the sacredness of our vision of beloved community where the divinity or inherent worth of every soul will be celebrated.
Much of the trauma can be healed with respect, affection, honest communication, restorative practices. To be clear though it’s very difficult to heal when the oppression continues to be perpetrated. Sometimes protective use of force is needed. We need to successfully intervene and thwart people from unleashing horrific oppression upon others. Such intervention is sometimes called tough love. And love it is.
We will not heal trauma with attitudes of superiority or hating the ones we think are evil. We must ground ourselves in our spirituality of interdependence and in the beauty of connection. We must strengthen ourselves and learn to rest in our integrity.
We will not be able to complete the task of building the beloved community this year. We need to grieve many losses along the way. And we also need to celebrate not only every achievement but every effort. Camus said “sometimes carrying on, just carrying on is a superhuman achievement.” Whenever you feel the beauty of connecting, give thanks. If you catch yourself hating or whatever diminishes the power of love inside you, give thanks for your awareness. And if you blew it, resolve to do better. Set out to repair mistakes. And if you get to be a part of a community where love is present and souls are nourished, give thanks by contributing to its survival.
Lastly when hell seems to have broken loose, fill the air with songs that speak of heaven, of spirit, of connection. Rejoice and give thanks for the good that is growing in us day by day.
Amen
Hymn “How Can I Keep From Singing”
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