June is here with its sweet days, refulgent with the scent of flowers, almost leisurely with its elongated evenings lit by the lasting light. I can think of no better time than to issue the call to finish creation. Put more manageably, I hereby declare June “Do Something Month,” the month in which each of us claims what is ours to do—and keep doing it year-round. As Grace said so eloquently in her testimonial, none of us need to do everything. None of us need offer salvation of biblical proportions to make a difference. Instead we are called upon by the very creation that spawns us to do our part to complete it. From the Jewish mystical tradition comes the concept of Tikkun Olam, repairing the torn fabric of creation. Each good deed, each mitzvah renders a stitch.
The writer Howard Mansfield provides an excellent summary in his book, The Same Ax, Twice.
Each moral act works toward Tikkun, or restoration. Gershom Sholem, the pioneering scholar, defines Tikkun as the “restoration of the right order, the true unity of things.”…
“Every human deed or misdeed may change the whole universal balance…”writes Joseph Dan. An individual’s deeds shape “the fate of divinity itself.” The world may be at “any one moment just one step away from the complete redemption, and a minute sin performed at that very moment by some individual would prevent and delay the redemption,” says Dan. “There is no neutral ground, there are no deeds or thoughts that do not contribute to one side or the other.” Each person’s actions carry the weight of the entire community’s redemption. The mending of the world is a communal act. Each day we rise to finish creation.
This is an awesome responsibility. I hear echoes of it in the Passover story where God enlists Moses to free the Israelites from bondage so they can become a covenantal people. God doesn’t liberate them so that they can do nothing. Moses commands Pharaoh to “Let my people go” so that the people can get busy finishing creation by receiving and fulfilling God’s commandments.
The great evolutionary chain of being that gathers periodic elements and fashions them into stars that explode and humans that compose, requires participation. Look at ants and bees: their elaborate social structures that serve creation, not just themselves. The natural world abounds with examples of inter-specie interaction and reliance. The universe is designed to bring us into relationship, engaging us in the acts of co-creation all the time. No one gets a free pass.
In a world grown ever more complicated by human achievement and human failing, there is all the more reason for Tikkun Olam. Howard Mansfield asks,
How do we mend the world? When everything needs doing, when the sky is falling, where do you start? There is a formula in urban forestry: When a mature shade tree falls, you do not replace it with another tree—with one spindly wrist-thin sapling. To restore the shade of that older tree you have to plant dozens of young trees.
Perhaps this is a model. When we lose a good soul, we have to go forth and mend and restore this world in all the ways we know. We have to plant anew—we know this. But with the crisis all around us, we have to plant groves.
Here at First Parish, as the next phase of strategic planning gets underway, what I hear over and over is a fervent desire for this church to remain vital. No one is willing to let this congregation wither on the vine. We all want First Parish to flourish; but are we all willing to do our part to restore and maintain it?
That is the perennial question; and on this sweet June day in this season of refulgence, I ask of everyone sitting here, and the ones gone missing who still get our mail, what can and will you do? Our forebears did not gather so that we would sit comfortably on our tushes making summer plans that don’t include First Parish. No, our forebears, like theirs, had more in mind.
On Tuesday I paid a visit to Bill Ward. Bill lay dying after a long and fruitful life. A life not without its challenges and sorrows, but a life made purposeful and strong by Bill’s willingness to engage. Bill Ward was last of ten children. He joined the Navy at seventeen and served in World War Two. Born in 1925, Bill got his GED in 1967 after learning the construction trades and becoming a construction superintendent. He oversaw the building of Civic Center in Fitchburg, the post office, schools, fire stations and factories. He swept mines in the war and built his family’s home by hand. He has been married almost 67 years and raised four daughters with his wife Eunice. Even though Bill hasn’t come in a long time, he and Eunice still pledge.
It wasn’t Bill who listed his accomplishments the first time we met a few months ago. It was his wife and daughter. Thinking of Bill this week as I am, I reflect on a lifetime of labor given in love. With humility Bill spoke to me of a job well done, of the satisfaction he found in committing himself to a task fully.
Before Bill got pancreatic cancer, I did not know him, nor was I aware of his service to this city. The membership rolls of this congregation brim with people who have participated in Tikkun Olam. A few have plaques when money as well as effort was involved but most of the members through the last two and a half centuries go unrecognized. But it is their shade we rest under, and it is incumbent on us to plant the next groves.
Since I arrived in 2007, I have heard the cry for new members. And since 2007, probably a couple of dozen people have joined. Some have stayed, others drifted away. So here’s a simple act of Tikkun Olam. If you are sitting here today and wonder where someone is you haven’t seen in a while, go home on this sunny day and before you get out in the garden or yard or involve yourself in the afternoon’s activities, take a moment to call or write a note to that person. Invite him or her or them to the church picnic on the 19th and offer a ride.
You want more members? Take it upon yourselves to be the ambassadors of this congregation. If you can ambulate through these doors you can make a call or write a note. Glenda has a wonderful ministry of sending cards and I send some too but it is not our exclusive province. It is everyone’s. We all know that a personal invitation is more compelling than a blanket one. So why not take the time to invite a newcomer here today to join your family at the picnic or for iced coffee some summer afternoon?
This church rocks. I love it fiercely and tenderly and I give my heart to it and I expect you to do the same. Not on your first visit or even your third. But if you believe this congregation matters, if it matters to you there is a religious community in Fitchburg that welcomes you, that welcomes any peace-seeking person who hungers to communally engage in Tikkun Olam it’s time to go out on a limb for that. Everyone won’t fit on the same limb so you get to choose the limb that suits you. Today, Martha shared her practice of meditation with us and she’s graciously offered to share it after service on Sundays and I hope through the summer as well. Fred H. restarted the forum and has kept it going all year. Someone started a book group this week and on Thursday at 2:00 any of you who can come to the first meeting of the “Do Something” group are invited. This church cannot sit idle all summer nor can we just gather for worship on Sundays from September to June, when it’s convenient.
That is not Tikkun Olam. Restoring the world is not about deciding what’s convenient. What fits into the schedule. Tikkun Olam is about waking each day and saying, ah, I am alive today so it is my work to help mend creation. You may do it with a smile, a kind word, attentive listening. You may do it with a microcredit loan or a donation. You might do it attending the forum Fred re-ignited or the book group. You might write a letter to the editor like Betty Gelinas did. You might do it phoning a newcomer or a neighbor. You might do it caring for someone who is ill or bereaved. You might do it by attending Bill Ward’s service when it happens. Or you might withhold the hastily uttered harsh word. Restoration happens when we reframe our comments to lift up the positive, when we nudge ourselves to look at a situation from a perspective beyond our own. It happens when we get up off our rumps and take the blessing of aliveness and energy and revel in the day we’ve been given and this glorious world awaiting repair.
Think of anyone in bondage. Think of the ones constricted by theologies aflame with heaven and hell. Think of the ones being instructed right now in catechisms of hate and doctrines of misunderstanding: secular or religious. Now breathe in the air of Unitarian Universalism which summons us to a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. We, who have found or been led to this expansive way of being owe it to others, not ourselves, to get on with the mending of creation and the revitalizing of this congregation.
In the back of our hymnal the poet Adrienne Rich writes, “My heart is moved by all I cannot save. So much has been destroyed. I have to cast my lot with those who age after age, perversely, with no extraordinary power, reconstitute the world.”
In Judaism, there is a maxim that whosoever saves a life saves all of creation because a singular act of restoration swings the world toward redemption. Each of us has something to offer. None of us will attend every church event, every service, not even me, but we can commit to each doing something. We can each do our part to revitalize this congregation. We can each do our part to reach out to others, to be the welcome we wish any newcomer to feel. We can each actively support an activity or ministry. There are no neutral acts. To sit back and do nothing is neither neutral nor covenantal. Each week we recite a covenant that expresses our promise to one another that love is our doctrine and service our prayer. Love is not a spectator sport. And in order for a church to thrive, love must be a verb not a noun. We covenant to help one another in fellowship which means we must create and sustain fellowship not simply partake in the fellowship others organize.
Today I call on everyone to make this a Do Something church. A church placed at the top of the common needs to cast its light outward not keep it confined to a couple of hours on Sunday morning nine moths a year. Every day we get twenty-four hours to make a difference. Choose one. Make this a congregation of Tikkun Olam. “The mending of the world is a communal act. Each day we rise to finish creation.” Amen.
