This month UU congregations across the world are considering the question, “What does it mean to find our center?”
What is our center? One of the great gifts and also challenges of our faith is that we don't, like so many others, come together to find inspiration in a single story. We don’t all believe in the story of Christianity, or Judaism. We find inspiration not just in these stories, and the stories of the Buddha and the ancient Greek philosophers, but also in science, nature and contemporary thought and writers.
We don’t come to a single, laser focused point in our tradition. Instead, together we create a sacred space where different inspirations are welcomed. In our hymnal we can find a reading accredited to Lau Tse:
Thirty spokes share the wheel’s hub; It is the center hole that makes it useful. Shape clay into a vessel; It is the space within that makes it useful. Cut doors and windows for a room; It is the holes that make it useful. Therefore profit comes from what is there; Usefulness from what is not there.
Our center is what is NOT there. This center allows us the freedom to live in integrity with our hopes, aspirations and values. There need not be conflict.
As we consider our center this month, let us ever keep in mind that there is room enough for all.
Rev. Joe
