Susan Halse - "Courage to See and to Be" (May 25, 1975)
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| - | Testing, testing, one, two, three, four. | 0:04 |
| (gentle piano music) | 0:07 | |
| - | Let us pray. | 5:48 |
| For the rest of the past night | 5:52 | |
| and the gift of a new day, O God, we thank Thee. | 5:55 | |
| Grant that we so pass through its waking hours, | 6:01 | |
| that it even tied, | 6:05 | |
| we may again give thanks unto Thee | 6:06 | |
| through Jesus Christ, our Lord, amen. | 6:10 | |
| (choir music) | 6:20 | |
| (soft piano music) | 7:00 | |
| (choir music) | 7:48 | |
| - | It is an awesome thing to come | 9:45 |
| into the presence of the living God, who is holy love. | 9:48 | |
| Therefore, it behooves us to recognize | 9:55 | |
| that we are creatures and sinners, | 9:57 | |
| and to acknowledge the same with penitence and loneliness | 10:02 | |
| to the end that we may be forgiven. | 10:08 | |
| Therefore, I ask you, who are here present | 10:13 | |
| to accompany me with sincerity and humility | 10:16 | |
| unto the throne of grace in the unison prayer of confession. | 10:21 | |
| Forgive us our sins, O Lord, | 10:29 | |
| the sins of the present and the sins of the past, | 10:33 | |
| the sins of our souls and the sins of our bodies, | 10:38 | |
| the sins, which we have done to please ourselves, | 10:43 | |
| and the sins, which we have done to please others. | 10:47 | |
| Forgive us our casual sins and our deliberate sins. | 10:51 | |
| Forgive us them, O Lord, forgive them all | 10:57 | |
| for Jesus Christ's sake, amen. | 11:02 | |
| And now let us offer unto God, quietly, | 11:07 | |
| our own personal confessions. | 11:10 | |
| Dearly beloved, you remember that Jesus told Peter | 11:35 | |
| that he should forgive his brother unto 70 times seven, | 11:40 | |
| 490 times, which being interpreted | 11:48 | |
| means always, at all times, on every occasion, forever. | 11:53 | |
| Do you think God will do less for us | 12:02 | |
| who ask forgiveness in penitence and faith? | 12:06 | |
| Therefore be a good cheer. | 12:14 | |
| Our sins are forgiven because God is merciful. | 12:18 | |
| Thanks be to God. | 12:25 | |
| (gentle piano music) | 12:31 | |
| (choir music) | 13:18 | |
| - | The Old Testament lesson | 16:48 |
| is from the book of the Prophet Isaiah, | 16:51 | |
| the 66th chapter, versus five to 14. | 16:55 | |
| Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble at His word. | 17:04 | |
| Your brethren who hates you | 17:11 | |
| and cast you out for my name sake have said, | 17:14 | |
| let the Lord be glorified that we may see your joy, | 17:19 | |
| but it is they who shall be put to shame. | 17:26 | |
| Hear an uproar from the city, a voice from the temple, | 17:32 | |
| the voice of the Lord rendering repentance to His enemies. | 17:38 | |
| Before she was in labor, she gave birth. | 17:46 | |
| Before her pain came upon her, | 17:51 | |
| she was delivered of a son who has heard such a thing, | 17:54 | |
| who has seen such things. | 18:01 | |
| Shall a land be born in one day? | 18:06 | |
| Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment? | 18:11 | |
| For as soon as Zion was in labor, | 18:17 | |
| she brought forth her sons. | 18:20 | |
| "Shall I bring to the birth and not cause to bring forth," | 18:24 | |
| says the Lord. | 18:30 | |
| "Shall I who cause to bring forth shut the womb," | 18:32 | |
| says your God. | 18:38 | |
| Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad for her, | 18:41 | |
| all you who love her. | 18:45 | |
| Rejoice with her in joy, all you who mourn over her | 18:49 | |
| that you may suck and be satisfied | 18:55 | |
| with her consoling breasts, | 18:59 | |
| that you may drink deeply with delight | 19:02 | |
| from the abundance of her glory for thus says the Lord. | 19:06 | |
| Behold, I will extend prosperity to her like a river | 19:14 | |
| and the wealth of the nations like an overflowing stream | 19:20 | |
| and you shall suck. | 19:25 | |
| You shall be carried upon her hip and dangled upon her knees | 19:27 | |
| as one whom his mother comforts. | 19:34 | |
| So I will comfort you. | 19:39 | |
| You shall be comforted in Jerusalem. | 19:43 | |
| You shall see and your heart shall rejoice, | 19:48 | |
| your bones shall flourish like the grass, | 19:53 | |
| and it shall be known | 19:57 | |
| that the hand of the Lord is with His servants | 19:59 | |
| and His indignation is against His enemies. | 20:04 | |
| He render the Old Testament lesson. | 20:10 | |
| A New Testament lesson is taken | 20:20 | |
| from the gospel according to St. John, | 20:22 | |
| the seventh chapter at verse 53 | 20:26 | |
| to the eighth chapter at verse 11. | 20:29 | |
| Let us stand for the gospel, | 20:35 | |
| and let us remain standing for the Gloria | 20:43 | |
| and the affirmation of faith. | 20:46 | |
| They went each to his own house, | 20:52 | |
| but Jesus went to the Mount of Olive's. | 20:55 | |
| Early in the morning, He came again to the temple. | 21:00 | |
| All the people came to Him, and He sat down and taught them. | 21:05 | |
| The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman | 21:13 | |
| who had been caught in adultery, | 21:16 | |
| and placing her in the midst, they said to Him, | 21:20 | |
| "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. | 21:24 | |
| "Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such. | 21:34 | |
| "What do you say about her?" | 21:42 | |
| They said to test Him | 21:47 | |
| that they might have some charge to bring against Him. | 21:49 | |
| Jesus bent down and wrote with His finger on the ground. | 21:54 | |
| And as they continued to ask Him, | 22:02 | |
| He stood up and said to them, | 22:04 | |
| "Let him who is without sin among you | 22:08 | |
| "be the first to throw a stone at her." | 22:15 | |
| And once more, He bent down | 22:21 | |
| and wrote with His finger on the ground. | 22:23 | |
| But when they heard it, they went away, | 22:28 | |
| one by one, beginning with the eldest, | 22:35 | |
| and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before Him. | 22:41 | |
| Jesus looked up and said to her, | 22:51 | |
| "Woman, where are they? | 22:54 | |
| "Has no one condemned you?" | 22:59 | |
| She said, "No one, Lord." | 23:03 | |
| And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you. | 23:09 | |
| "Go and do not sin again." | 23:17 | |
| Thanks be to God. | 23:24 | |
| (choir music) | 23:28 | |
| Let us affirm our faith. | 24:11 | |
| We are not alone. | 24:14 | |
| We live in God's world. | 24:16 | |
| We believe in God who has created and is creating, | 24:19 | |
| who has come in the truly human Jesus to reconcile | 24:25 | |
| and make new, who works in us and others through the spirit. | 24:30 | |
| We trust God who calls us to be the church, | 24:37 | |
| to celebrate life and its fullness, | 24:42 | |
| to love and serve others, | 24:46 | |
| to seek justice and resist evil, | 24:49 | |
| to proclaim Jesus, crucified and risen, | 24:52 | |
| our judge and our hope. | 24:56 | |
| In life, in death, in life beyond death, God is with us. | 24:59 | |
| We are not alone. | 25:07 | |
| Thanks be to God. | 25:09 | |
| The Lord be with you. | 25:12 | |
| - | And with your spirit. | 25:15 |
| - | Let us pray. | 25:17 |
| Let our first prayer be one of thanksgiving. | 25:27 | |
| For the joy, which is born of sympathy and sorrow, | 25:31 | |
| for the joy of the lost soul, finding love again, | 25:37 | |
| and for the joy of the angels over one sinner that repented, | 25:43 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 25:48 | |
| For all pure comedy and laughter | 25:53 | |
| and for the gift of humor and gaiety of heart, | 25:56 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 26:01 | |
| For all who have consecrated myth with the love of Christ, | 26:06 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 26:12 | |
| For all singers and musicians, | 26:16 | |
| for all who work in farm and color | 26:20 | |
| to increase the joy of life, | 26:24 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 26:27 | |
| For poets and craftsmen, | 26:30 | |
| for all who rejoice in their work and make things well, | 26:33 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 26:40 | |
| For all who have loved the common people | 26:44 | |
| and burn their sorrows in their hearts, | 26:48 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord. | 26:52 | |
| For prophets and reformers who cry shame on all social wrong | 26:56 | |
| and point the way to fairer life for all the people. | 27:03 | |
| glory be to Thee, O Lord, most high, amen. | 27:07 | |
| And let our second prayer be one of intercession | 27:15 | |
| for all kinds of hope. | 27:19 | |
| Loving and Holy Spirit of God, | 27:22 | |
| we pray that we and all people | 27:27 | |
| may increasingly work together | 27:29 | |
| that Thy will may be done on the earth, | 27:32 | |
| that the resources of the earth may be gathered, | 27:38 | |
| distributed, and used with unselfish motives | 27:42 | |
| and scientific skill for the benefit of all, | 27:47 | |
| that beauty may be given to our towns | 27:54 | |
| and left to our countryside, | 27:59 | |
| that children may be finally bred and finally trained, | 28:04 | |
| that there may be open ways and peace | 28:10 | |
| and freedom from end to end of all the earth, | 28:15 | |
| that all may learn goodwill | 28:20 | |
| through keeping Thy company | 28:24 | |
| in the spirit of Jesus Christ, Our Lord, amen. | 28:27 | |
| And let our third prayer | 28:35 | |
| be one of supplication for ourselves. | 28:36 | |
| Help us this day, O God, to serve Thee devoutly | 28:42 | |
| and the world with sympathy. | 28:47 | |
| May we do our work wisely. | 28:50 | |
| Give sucker secretly, go to our meat appetitely, | 28:54 | |
| sit there discreetly, arise temperately, | 29:01 | |
| please our friend duly, | 29:07 | |
| go to our bed merely and sleep surely | 29:10 | |
| for the joy of our Lord Jesus Christ. | 29:15 | |
| And now as our Lord Jesus taught us to pray, | 29:20 | |
| we say together, our Father who art in heaven, | 29:23 | |
| hallowed to be Thy name. | 29:29 | |
| Thy kingdom come. | 29:32 | |
| Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. | 29:34 | |
| Give us this day our daily bread | 29:39 | |
| and forgive us our trespasses | 29:43 | |
| as we forgive those who trespass against us. | 29:45 | |
| And lead us not into temptation, | 29:49 | |
| but deliver us from evil. | 29:52 | |
| For the Thine is the kingdom | 29:55 | |
| and the power and the glory forever, amen. | 29:57 | |
| Our preacher this morning is the Reverend Susan House, | 30:07 | |
| who graduated from the divinity school this year. | 30:13 | |
| She is an ordained minister of the United Methodist Church, | 30:18 | |
| and we welcome her to the chapel pope. | 30:23 | |
| - | Old Testament prophet spoke to enlighten a people, | 30:42 |
| to call a people to a new vision, | 30:46 | |
| to make the children of Israel see themselves, | 30:50 | |
| see themselves as they truly were, | 30:55 | |
| and see themselves as Yahweh would have them to be. | 31:00 | |
| Amos, the shepherd of Tekoa | 31:06 | |
| in the time of Uzziah and Jeroboam, | 31:07 | |
| sounded the judgment of Yahweh. | 31:11 | |
| "Let me have no more of the din of your chanting, | 31:14 | |
| "no more of your strumming on harps, | 31:17 | |
| "but let justice flow down like water and integrity, | 31:20 | |
| "like an unfailing stream." | 31:26 | |
| Micah of Mosefa, speaking to Judah called in Yahweh's name. | 31:30 | |
| "Now listen to this, you princes of the house of Jacob, | 31:35 | |
| "you rulers of the house of Israel, | 31:40 | |
| "you who loath justice and pervert all that is right, | 31:43 | |
| "because of this, since the fault is yours, | 31:48 | |
| "Zion will become a plow land, | 31:52 | |
| "Jerusalem, a heap of rubble, | 31:56 | |
| "and the mountain of the temple, a wooded height." | 31:59 | |
| Ezekiel, priest and prophet, | 32:03 | |
| addresses Jerusalem with the word of Yahweh. | 32:06 | |
| "I will treat you as you deserve, | 32:10 | |
| "you who have despised your oath | 32:13 | |
| "even to the extreme of breaking a covenant. | 32:16 | |
| "But I will remember the covenant | 32:20 | |
| "that I made with you when you were a girl, | 32:22 | |
| "and you for your part will remember your past behavior | 32:26 | |
| "and be covered with shame." | 32:30 | |
| Isaiah too, calls to the children of Israel, | 32:34 | |
| to listen to the word of Yahweh, | 32:37 | |
| the voice of Yahweh bringing retribution on His enemies. | 32:41 | |
| "Rejoice," Isaiah says. | 32:46 | |
| "Rejoice, Jerusalem. | 32:48 | |
| "Be glad for her all who love her | 32:49 | |
| "for thus says Yahweh, | 32:53 | |
| "at her breast, will her nurse lings be carried | 32:56 | |
| "and fondled in her lap. | 32:58 | |
| "Like a son comforted by his mother will I comfort her. | 33:01 | |
| "To his servants, Yahweh will reveal His hand, | 33:07 | |
| "but to His enemies, His fury." | 33:11 | |
| Jesus's words also confronted people | 33:15 | |
| with a mirror image of themselves, | 33:17 | |
| forced them to see themselves as they really were. | 33:21 | |
| "Master," said the religious leaders, | 33:27 | |
| "this woman was caught in the very act of adultery | 33:29 | |
| "and Moses has ordered us | 33:33 | |
| "to condemn women like this to death by stoning. | 33:35 | |
| "What have you to say?" | 33:39 | |
| Jesus, perhaps to distract them | 33:42 | |
| from their feverish and foolish question, | 33:45 | |
| or perhaps to find a time and a way | 33:48 | |
| in which to help the see themselves, | 33:52 | |
| bent down and made marks on the ground, | 33:55 | |
| and yet still they persisted with their own blindness | 33:58 | |
| and their keen vision of another sins | 34:02 | |
| until Jesus looked up at them and said, | 34:07 | |
| "If there is one of you who has not sinned, | 34:10 | |
| "let him be the first to throw a stone at her." | 34:15 | |
| And they all slipped away, | 34:20 | |
| beginning with the eldest and perhaps the wisest. | 34:21 | |
| One by one, having caught a glimpse of themselves, | 34:25 | |
| they slipped away. | 34:31 | |
| The message of all the true prophets | 34:34 | |
| and of Jesus of Nazareth | 34:37 | |
| is to critically consider ourselves, | 34:40 | |
| to examine our souls, the expression of ourselves, | 34:44 | |
| to have the courage to see who we are, | 34:50 | |
| to see where we stand, to see how we act. | 34:56 | |
| Now, the prerequisite of seeing in this way is that we look, | 35:03 | |
| and this looking implies awareness, honesty, openness, | 35:09 | |
| that this is a religious task is obvious. | 35:17 | |
| The story of human beings and of human weakness | 35:21 | |
| constantly requires us to reassess ourselves, | 35:25 | |
| to reassess the way in which we have worshiped, | 35:29 | |
| the way in which we have lived, | 35:33 | |
| and without this reassessment, | 35:36 | |
| we fall into the sin of arrogance, | 35:38 | |
| maintaining that our blindness is true sight, | 35:40 | |
| that the picture we have created | 35:46 | |
| is the picture God has created, | 35:49 | |
| that our vision is infallible. | 35:53 | |
| Such arrogance is all too common in human history. | 35:58 | |
| From the time of the religious leaders | 36:03 | |
| who knew what women like that should be punished | 36:05 | |
| to those of us in this room who know about other people | 36:12 | |
| and know how they should be treated. | 36:17 | |
| "To us," Jesus says, | 36:21 | |
| "if there is one of you who claims to see so clearly, | 36:23 | |
| "let that one be arrogant enough to claim such certitude, | 36:29 | |
| "and finally, let that one gain a glimpse | 36:37 | |
| "of his or her own blindness." | 36:41 | |
| In a more general way, the same point is made | 36:47 | |
| by saying that the emergence of faith in each one of us | 36:50 | |
| in the truly Christian sense of the word | 36:55 | |
| does not guarantee the maintenance of that faith. | 36:57 | |
| Faith can be maintained only in process, | 37:01 | |
| only in the process of its constant reevaluation, | 37:06 | |
| its constant self-realization, and self-purification. | 37:11 | |
| Faith, as well as knowledge is always disproportionate | 37:18 | |
| to the ultimate reality of God | 37:23 | |
| for God can never be comprised | 37:28 | |
| within the totality of the world | 37:30 | |
| or within the totality of humanness. | 37:32 | |
| In a sense, God will never be reached | 37:36 | |
| and contained in that way. | 37:39 | |
| No matter how much we evolve | 37:43 | |
| and no matter how much our consciousness, | 37:45 | |
| our religious experience, our faith develop, | 37:47 | |
| there is no foreseeable point | 37:52 | |
| at which we can forgo the prayer of confession. | 37:54 | |
| There is no foreseeable point | 38:00 | |
| at which we shall no longer need | 38:02 | |
| to constantly reevaluate our faith. | 38:05 | |
| Leslie Dewart in "The Future of Belief" | 38:10 | |
| calls this the normal inadequacy of Christian faith, | 38:13 | |
| the underdevelopment of Christian theism. | 38:18 | |
| Christian theism cannot respect ever to comprehend | 38:23 | |
| and to exhaust in its concepts the reality of God. | 38:28 | |
| The possibility of further development shall always remain, | 38:32 | |
| and indeed the faith of Christianity as a whole | 38:36 | |
| must develop ceaselessly and forever. | 38:39 | |
| And this means that Christian doctrine must develop, | 38:43 | |
| both in a collective sense and in an individual sense | 38:48 | |
| and such development requires that we truly see ourselves. | 38:52 | |
| Such a search is only the humble recognition | 38:59 | |
| of our own humanness, a humble recognition | 39:02 | |
| of our continuing search for transcendence. | 39:07 | |
| For you and I would stone the woman caught in adultery, | 39:12 | |
| you and I would quickly turn away | 39:17 | |
| in the way of our forefathers and foremothers | 39:20 | |
| in the people of ancient Israel. | 39:23 | |
| The scripture for today was chosen because in it, | 39:28 | |
| the authors, intentionally or unintentionally, | 39:30 | |
| have helped us to reevaluate our concepts of God, | 39:33 | |
| our understanding of the faith. | 39:37 | |
| God is as a mother who cuddles her child. | 39:40 | |
| The son of God is unlike the men who make religious laws. | 39:44 | |
| The son of God does not punish arbitrarily, acts in mercy, | 39:49 | |
| does not categorize and castigate a woman | 39:55 | |
| because of the group she belongs to | 39:58 | |
| rather responds to that woman as a person, | 40:01 | |
| as a child, a beloved child. | 40:05 | |
| The underdevelopment of our own Christian beliefs | 40:10 | |
| implies that we will drift in the direction of absolutism, | 40:15 | |
| that we will tend to go our own way and deify our own way, | 40:21 | |
| that we will tend to worship our own images | 40:27 | |
| projected on God, | 40:30 | |
| and this, the unqualified belief in God, | 40:34 | |
| the uncritical belief in God, | 40:38 | |
| an absolute and unconditional affirmation of God | 40:41 | |
| is not what the Christian faith is all about. | 40:45 | |
| It is truly a distortion of faith. | 40:50 | |
| And with the kind of humility | 40:55 | |
| that St. Theresa of Avila calls us to, | 40:57 | |
| we must recognize the truth, | 41:00 | |
| and in that truth, find the courage to see. | 41:04 | |
| This can mean suffering, | 41:11 | |
| this can mean pain for us | 41:12 | |
| as we struggle to build that kind of courage, | 41:14 | |
| but it is, I say to you, a sign of health | 41:18 | |
| and it can reveal and motivate | 41:22 | |
| a heightening self-consciousness, | 41:25 | |
| and where there is such self confidence, there is hope. | 41:28 | |
| Mary Daley, a modern religious philosopher and feminist, | 41:35 | |
| suggests that there is a direction in which we can go, | 41:40 | |
| having seen that indeed, we are called to be courageous, | 41:43 | |
| we are called to look at ourselves, | 41:47 | |
| become aware of who we truly are. | 41:50 | |
| She suggests that this direction can be found | 41:55 | |
| by linking this courage to see, | 41:57 | |
| the courage that the prophets called us to again and again, | 42:01 | |
| linking the courage to see with the courage to be, | 42:05 | |
| forging a bond between the courage | 42:11 | |
| to see ourselves as we truly are, | 42:14 | |
| and the courage to be as we can be. | 42:19 | |
| This requires what Paul Tillich | 42:24 | |
| has called living on the boundary. | 42:25 | |
| On the fringes of the known and the acceptable, | 42:29 | |
| it stands as a great challenge | 42:33 | |
| to those of us who seek comfort and assurance. | 42:35 | |
| And women of today are asking this question, | 42:40 | |
| women who follow in the tradition of Mary Daly, | 42:45 | |
| women who say that we too must look at the way we are, | 42:50 | |
| must have the courage to see who we are, | 42:56 | |
| to see what we could become, | 43:00 | |
| and the courage to be in the face of that vision. | 43:03 | |
| And here I say to you is a prophetic voice | 43:09 | |
| in our day and time, | 43:14 | |
| the voice of women asking questions never asked before, | 43:17 | |
| the voice of minority groups | 43:23 | |
| seeking directions never explored before, | 43:25 | |
| the prophetic voice of all people | 43:32 | |
| seeking true human liberation. | 43:34 | |
| As a feminist of 150 years ago put it, | 43:41 | |
| "I'm not going to simply question your opinions. | 43:45 | |
| "I'm not going to middle with your beliefs. | 43:48 | |
| "I'm not going to try to dictate mine to you. | 43:52 | |
| "All I say is examine, inquire, | 43:56 | |
| "look into the nature of things, | 44:01 | |
| "search out the ground of your opinions, | 44:03 | |
| "the for and the against, know why you believe, | 44:06 | |
| "understand what you believe, | 44:10 | |
| "and possess a reason for the faith that is in you." | 44:11 | |
| Such courage to see and to be | 44:17 | |
| is the driving revelatory force in our day and time, | 44:22 | |
| the driving revelatory force that makes possible | 44:28 | |
| the continuing development of Christian theism. | 44:32 | |
| The becoming of women in our society | 44:38 | |
| is making it possible for women and men | 44:43 | |
| to speak and to hear each other | 44:46 | |
| speak more authentically about God, | 44:47 | |
| to speak and hear each other | 44:51 | |
| speak more authentically about faith. | 44:53 | |
| This is a calling into question of images and orders, | 44:58 | |
| language and ideas. | 45:04 | |
| Before this time, until this time, | 45:08 | |
| held as the absolute understanding of God. | 45:10 | |
| In this process, | 45:16 | |
| women and men seeking true human liberation | 45:17 | |
| will free traditions, thought, and customs | 45:22 | |
| by hearing each other and thus making it possible to speak, | 45:25 | |
| and this involves us in the courage to see and to be. | 45:31 | |
| This courage is dynamic and could never be static | 45:38 | |
| and it has two sides. | 45:42 | |
| The courage to be as a self and the courage to be as a part. | 45:45 | |
| Women and men are beginning to see, to question, to create, | 45:52 | |
| and such courage makes creative, communal, | 45:58 | |
| revolutionary hope possible. | 46:02 | |
| And herein lies the hell of our faith. | 46:07 | |
| The way in which we respond to a prophetic voice | 46:12 | |
| that calls us ever forward in our understanding of God, | 46:16 | |
| in our understanding of faith, | 46:22 | |
| in our understanding of ourselves, | 46:25 | |
| Mary Daly has called this a human spiritual revolution. | 46:29 | |
| And so I say to you, it is indeed pointing us | 46:35 | |
| beyond the absolutisms that we have accepted, | 46:39 | |
| that we have allowed to stymie our faith, | 46:43 | |
| that we have allowed to exclude other people. | 46:47 | |
| Pointing us beyond the idolatries of a sexist society | 46:51 | |
| and sparking creative action in and toward transcendence. | 46:57 | |
| This sexism is epitomized in an infamous quotation | 47:07 | |
| from a recent theological work. | 47:10 | |
| Hear for once or again, | 47:13 | |
| the limitations that exist in our present time, | 47:17 | |
| the limitations that exist | 47:22 | |
| in our present forms of expression, | 47:24 | |
| in our present forms of thought. | 47:26 | |
| "To believe," this author says, | 47:29 | |
| "to believe that God is Father | 47:31 | |
| "is to become aware of one's self, not as a stranger, | 47:33 | |
| "not as an outsider, but as a son who belongs, | 47:37 | |
| "a son who shares with the whole of community." | 47:44 | |
| To believe that God is Father means to be able to say we | 47:48 | |
| in regard to all men. | 47:53 | |
| In juxtaposition to that, | 47:57 | |
| I would remind you of a bit of our history | 47:59 | |
| that we have let slip by | 48:02 | |
| for the potential of sparking creative action | 48:05 | |
| in and toward transcendence has been expressed | 48:08 | |
| for at least the last 150 years in American history. | 48:12 | |
| And such delightful comments | 48:17 | |
| is that of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, | 48:18 | |
| who noted that the first step in the elevation of women | 48:21 | |
| under all systems of religion is to convince them | 48:24 | |
| that the great spirit of the universe | 48:28 | |
| is in no way responsible for any of these absurdities. | 48:30 | |
| She spoke of the kind of absurdities | 48:35 | |
| that existed in her day and time | 48:37 | |
| that prevented women from being legal entities, | 48:40 | |
| prevented women from being truly human beings, | 48:43 | |
| or the inspiring and indeed magical words | 48:49 | |
| of a wonderful woman named Sojourner Truth, | 48:52 | |
| former slave, ardent, feminist, | 48:56 | |
| and great leader who rose to speak | 49:00 | |
| at a woman's convention in 1851, | 49:02 | |
| convention that had been characterized | 49:06 | |
| by disagreement among the women | 49:08 | |
| and had been dominated by men of the cloth | 49:11 | |
| who opposed granting women any rights. | 49:13 | |
| She rose and spoke to the congregation. | 49:18 | |
| "Well, children, where there is so much racket, | 49:22 | |
| "there must be something out of kilter. | 49:25 | |
| "I think that twigs, the Negros of the south, | 49:28 | |
| "and the women of the north, all talking about rights. | 49:31 | |
| "The white new men will be in a fix pretty soon, | 49:34 | |
| "but what's all this you're talking about. | 49:38 | |
| "That little man in the back there, | 49:41 | |
| "he says that women can't have as much rights as men | 49:43 | |
| "'cause Christ wasn't a woman. | 49:46 | |
| "Where did your Christ come from? | 49:49 | |
| "And if the first woman that God ever made was strong enough | 49:54 | |
| "to turn the world upside down all alone, | 49:57 | |
| "surely, these women together | 50:00 | |
| "ought to be able to turn it back | 50:03 | |
| "and get it right side up again." | 50:05 | |
| 150 years ago, the question was asked as it's asked now, | 50:10 | |
| what do you women really want, anyway? | 50:14 | |
| And as a stately and educated feminist said in 1838, | 50:19 | |
| "I ask no favors for my sex. | 50:23 | |
| "I surrender not our claim to equality. | 50:27 | |
| "All I ask of our brethren | 50:31 | |
| "is that they will take their feet from off our necks | 50:32 | |
| "and permit us to stand upright | 50:35 | |
| "on the ground which God has designed for us to occupy." | 50:37 | |
| Perhaps a bit more poetically, | 50:43 | |
| women in Lawrence, Massachusetts at the turn of the century, | 50:46 | |
| striking for decent wages and conditions | 50:50 | |
| in their textile factory called it bread and roses. | 50:53 | |
| As we come marching, marching in the beauty of the day, | 50:59 | |
| a million darkened kitchens a thousand mill loss gray | 51:02 | |
| are touched with all the radiants | 51:06 | |
| that a sudden sun discloses | 51:07 | |
| for the people hear us singing bread and roses, | 51:10 | |
| bread and roses. | 51:13 | |
| As we come marching, marching, | 51:16 | |
| we battle too for men for they are women's children | 51:18 | |
| and we mother them again. | 51:21 | |
| Our lives shall not be sweated from birth until life closes. | 51:24 | |
| For hearts can starve as well bodies, | 51:27 | |
| give us bread and give us roses. | 51:31 | |
| As we come marching, | 51:35 | |
| marching unnumbered women dead, | 51:36 | |
| go crying through our singing their ancient song of bread. | 51:38 | |
| Small art and love and beauty, | 51:43 | |
| their struggling spirits knew, yes, it's bread we fight for, | 51:45 | |
| but we fight for roses too. | 51:49 | |
| As we come, marching, marching, we bring the greater days | 51:53 | |
| for the rising of women means the rising of the race. | 51:57 | |
| No more the drudge and idler 10 that toil where one reposes, | 52:02 | |
| but a sharing of life's glorious bread and roses, | 52:08 | |
| bread and roses. | 52:14 | |
| Elizabeth Cady Stanton at the very end of her life | 52:21 | |
| had great hopes for the women who would live | 52:23 | |
| at the very early part of the century. | 52:26 | |
| And she said, | 52:31 | |
| "We who like the children of Israel have wandering | 52:32 | |
| "in the wilderness of prejudice and ridicule for 40 years, | 52:34 | |
| "feel a peculiar tenderness | 52:39 | |
| "for the young women on whose shoulders | 52:41 | |
| "we are about to leave ours, the younger women, | 52:43 | |
| "for they are starting with great advantages. | 52:47 | |
| "They have the results of our experience. | 52:50 | |
| "They have superior opportunities for education. | 52:52 | |
| "They will find a more enlightened public opinion. | 52:56 | |
| "They will have more courage | 53:00 | |
| "to take the rights which belong to them." | 53:02 | |
| And yet, as with the children of Israel, | 53:08 | |
| it is clear to us in this day and time | 53:11 | |
| that the wandering in the wilderness is not over. | 53:15 | |
| And so the poignant question raised | 53:19 | |
| by one of the very earliest feminists, | 53:22 | |
| who in the year, 1792, I asked, | 53:25 | |
| who can tell how many generations may be necessary | 53:29 | |
| to give vigor to the virtue and talents | 53:34 | |
| of the freed posterity of abject slaves | 53:38 | |
| that women have been? | 53:41 | |
| And the answer to her question has not yet emerged. | 53:45 | |
| Women and men have come a long ways | 53:51 | |
| on that path toward human liberation | 53:53 | |
| and yet we have so far to go | 53:58 | |
| before we can reach out for that freedom and responsibility | 54:01 | |
| that is truly God's gift to each one of us, | 54:06 | |
| but we know a little better the way in which we are to go, | 54:12 | |
| the method for our madness, | 54:19 | |
| for we know that it will require of men and women, | 54:23 | |
| of Christian men and women, the courage to see, | 54:26 | |
| and the courage to be in the face of that vision, | 54:31 | |
| to look and listen, to ask and reflect, to know who we are, | 54:36 | |
| what we are called to be, what we choose and to act, | 54:42 | |
| to have the strength to exist | 54:49 | |
| as the children God would have us to be | 54:56 | |
| so that it may be said of us | 55:01 | |
| as it was said of the great Hebrew woman, Judith, | 55:02 | |
| you are the glory of Jerusalem. | 55:07 | |
| You are the great pride of Israel. | 55:11 | |
| You are the highest honor of our race. | 55:15 | |
| By doing all this with your own hand, | 55:19 | |
| you have deserved well of Israel | 55:23 | |
| and God has approved what you have done. | 55:26 | |
| May you be blessed by the Lord in all the days to come. | 55:30 | |
| In the name of the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier, | 55:38 | |
| may it be so in our lives, amen. | 55:41 | |
| (soft piano music) | 55:53 | |
| (choir music) | 56:37 | |
| - | Here we offer and present unto Thee, O Lord, | 1:05:37 |
| our silver and our gold, | 1:05:41 | |
| the symbol of ourselves to be a reasonable, holy, | 1:05:44 | |
| and living sacrifice unto Thee | 1:05:51 | |
| through Jesus Christ, Our Lord, amen. | 1:05:54 | |
| (choir music) | 1:06:01 | |
| - | May the blessing of God come upon you abundantly. | 1:10:42 |
| May it keep you strong and tranquil | 1:10:48 | |
| in the truth of His promises | 1:10:52 | |
| through Jesus Christ, our Lord. | 1:10:55 | |
| ♪ Amen, amen ♪ | 1:11:04 | |
| ♪ Amen ♪ | 1:11:17 | |
| ♪ Amen ♪ | 1:11:32 | |
| ♪ Amen ♪ | 1:11:54 | |
| (bell ringing) | 1:12:10 | |
| (piano music) | 1:12:28 |