UUgliness

This post needs a little background info: I have been a church-going atheist for several years. The church is the First Unitarian Universalist (UU) here in town. Let me say that I never thought I'd go back to church, and now (after recent events) I wonder if I ever will again. To clarify the church bit, here's a quote from the website:

Unitarian Universalists include people who identify as Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, Pagans, Atheists, Agnostics, Humanists, and others.

Not wanting to confuse anyone on the church-going atheist part of this, but one of my main reasons for going was to hear Dr. Davidson Loehr. He's been the Senior Minister there, and had become a personal hero.

Davidson has never been one to fluff up your pillows, and his sermons are sometimes political in nature. "Political," in this case, can mean having to do with civil rights, human rights, the things done by governments and corporations, privacy, torture, injustice... all the way down to how we choose to treat the person next door. You were made to think, not told what to think.

What I don't mean by political is "partisan," although he has railed against the Bush administration, the Bush Doctrine, and the Neocon agenda he hasn't given the Democrats a free pass either. Although the church is so liberal it would be hard to imagine a Republican as a member (a liberal Republican? ... do they exist?), human nature being what it is, there's a good faction of people who want niceness out of a church service, they want comfort and reinforcement, candles and flowers, and do not want to be left with open-ended, thought-provoking, as he puts it, questions more profound than answers. My assumption is that a lot of these folks are $$$ people, big contributors. Also, the people turning the wheels (the church Board) wanted someone more of an administrator, an "i" dotter and "t" crosser. I would like to say that very often gifted writers, speakers, artists, and other creative right-brained types are not always the best at the left-brained stuff such as business management.

To try and shorten what is becoming a long story, Davidson has been ousted. It was done during the holiday season, with very short notice, and postponement of action on this matter was denied even though Davidson was recovering from prostate cancer surgery which happened just a few days earlier. This feels very much like being in a family that is going through a divorce. There's no fixing this loss. When there's a big dustup like this, nothing lands in the same place as it was. It's changed, done, and broken.

Enough about the jackals. I want to write about Davidson.

His most famous sermon is "Living Under Fascism" [read it here]. It has been widely reposted around the world, including on DailyKos, and became the cornerstone of a book called "America, Fascism and God, Sermons of a Heretical Preacher." He also was strongly anti-Corporate, and preached a sermon inspired by the movie/book The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power. The sermon is called "Corporations will eat your soul" [read it here]. He also delivered several sermons on the topic of "Confessions of an Economic Hit Man" written by former NSA operative John Perkins. More book-inspired sermons dealt with Naomi Klein's "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism". A series of sermons dealt with the societal (and you could say political) behaviors of human ancestors chimpanzees and bonobos, and how our own behavior is similar.

The sermon that really got him into the hottest water was the one where he suggested that 9/11 may have been an inside job. They made him promise never to bring that up in a sermon again, so he took it out of the posted sermon.

I don't mean to create the impression that the sermons were primarily rants against the Neocons - far from it. Here is one that I really enjoyed from a year ago at this time. It was very healing for me (I have big problems dealing with Christmas emotionally or any other way - I am damaged in that area). Don't be fooled by the title. It's probably not what you think.

note: blogging has been rather light partly because I've had this on my chest and really needed to get it out there. There's a Yahoo group for people set adrift by this rift here: ReFUUgees.

More gun craziness

Like many of you, I'm disturbed by the whackjob who decided to shoot people in the UU church in Knoxville on Sunday. Nobody is yet revealing what they think his reasons are. According to this HuffPo story, based on a neighbor's testimony, the guy was ticked off at Christians. I can understand that much of it, but if that's his motive this is ironic because Unitarian Universalism is NOT Christian. It is creedless and openly welcomes Christians, Jews, Muslims, Pagans, Buddhists, Hindus, Agnostics, Atheists... and doesn't require conversion of any kind. That's one big reason that I am a UU and attend nearly every week. Atheists are a small percentage of the membership, just as they are in the population in general, but they are included. If the guy wanted to target fundy Christians, he couldn't have been further off. The Christians who attend there are very liberal and open-minded in their beliefs. I am married to one of them. [note: see update at end of post]

From HuffPo: The church promotes progressive social work, including advocacy of women and gay rights. The Knoxville congregation also has provided sanctuary for political refugees, fed the homeless and founded a chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, according to its Web site.

Karen Massey, a neighbor to Adkisson, told the Knoxville News Sentinel about a lengthy conversation she had with Adkisson a few years back in which she told him her daughter had just graduated from a bible college. She said she was surprised by his reaction when she told him she was a Christian.

"He almost turned angry," she told the newspaper. "He seemed to get angry at that. He said that everything in the Bible contradicts itself if you read it." She also said Adkisson spoke frequently about his parents, who "made him go to church all his life. ... He acted like he was forced to do that."

They have found a multiple-page handwritten letter in the man's car that they are calling a "manifesto", but no details on its content have been revealed. The investigator has said that his intention was to kill everyone, and not just a particular person.

From the Knoxville News: A Knoxville Police Department investigator was observed Sunday briefing Knox County Criminal Court Judge Kenneth Irvine Jr. on the letter.

The investigator, who could not be identified, was seen in the lobby of the Knoxville Police Department Safety Building while in the process of securing a search warrant for Adkisson's white basement duplex at 1919 Levy Drive.

The investigator told Irvine that in a subsequent interview with Adkisson, the suspect had said he entered the church Sunday morning with the intent of killing everyone inside, although he denied having specifically targeted any children.

The kids in the church at the time of the shooting were performing scenes from Annie Junior.

Tennessee Valley UU

UPDATE: It's now being reported that the church was targeted because of its liberal views.

R U A UU?

As a follow-up to the last post on Evolution Sunday, here's the "floral display" they had in the UU church today. Actually, it's unrelated to Evolution Sunday. That whole topic is irrelevant to this church, since it (the topic) has to do with reconciling the teachings of science with religious beliefs on how everything got here -- and UU is creedless -- therefore explanations on how all this stuff got here are not given, and definitely not part of a doctrine. Below, after the link, is a listing of what is generally believed there, taken from their website.

First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin

• We believe that we’re a part of Life, and owe something back to the world for the gift of life.
• We believe that almost all religions are saying that we are precious people who need to treat everybody else as though they are precious, too.
• We believe that we are supposed to live in such a way that, when we look back on our lives, we can be proud, and can make those we care about proud.
• We believe that truth, justice and compassion are requirements for living.
• We believe that love is better than hatred, understanding is better than prejudice, and that if there is ever to be a better world, people of widely differing beliefs will have to help each other build it.
• We believe that, down deep, all people of goodwill hold these same beliefs and that every individual should feel encouraged to develop a fulfilling philosophy of life.

So, OK, it's a nice little bulleted mix, pick and choose the parts you like. Also, there are other atheists going there, along with Muslim, Jew, Pagan, Buddhist, on and on, you name it... you can believe in as many or as few gods as you like -- your choice -- and it's a liberal haven when it come to social issues and civil/human rights. So, back to the floral display with monkeys -- Dr. Loehr has been speaking on on the topic of animals for a few weeks, with a few to go. All about how their emotions, customs, empathy, even politics relate to our species (they don't call Dubya "the Chimp" for nothing! actually, he could use a few lessons in wisdom and civility from some chimps)

Not all Christians are messed-up wackos

Rev. Jim Rigby spoke at the UU church this Sunday. Normally I might not rally around a Presbyterian (or any Christian) speaker, but Rev. Rigby is an alright guy in my book. I always enjoy hearing him. He is somewhat well-known for being a champion of gay rights, and officiated over some 50 same-sex unions on the UT campus during a student-sponsored event on marriage equality a couple of years back, and has performed quite a few more at other times. Some of the more staunch conservative church folks brought a complaint against him, resulting in a "trial" with the purpose of de-frocking him. He was recently acquitted, but was not completely pleased about it because essentially nothing has changed in the Big Rule Book.