Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of DeKalb

TEXT: Reading by Tracey L. Hurd, Ph.D. 
“When our world or community is shaken by trauma or disaster, we – children, youth, and adults – need to come together.  We need to be able to be vulnerable.  We need to make meaning.  And we need to simply be gathered, face to face, with each other.  We need to find a feeling of ‘home.’ Our congregations do our best service to children and families by continually enveloping them in messages about life as a cycle of change, growth, death, birth, sadness and joy.  The rhythms of our days and years are important… In the wake of turbulence, we mark our days more clearly.  UU minister Victoria Safford wrote, “We are trying to know we are alive, hoping to mold that knowing into good work – hopeful, brave, and helpful later on.  We are trying to remember what we love and what to do, and how to be ourselves, good gifts.”

SERMON:    How shall we mark our days?  by Rev. Linda Slabon       

We are now a member of the litany: 
Columbine High School, Littleton, CO (April 20, 1999);  Santana High School, Santee, CA (March 5, 2001); Rocori High School, Cold Springs, Minn (April 24, 2003); Red Lake Band of Chippewa reservation, Red Lake, Minn (March 21, 2005); Campbell County Comprehensive High School, Jacksboro, TN (Nov. 8, 2005); Amish school in Mines, PA (Oct. 2, 2006); Virginia Tech University, Blacksburg, VA (April 16, 2007); Success Tech Academy, Cleveland, OH (Oct. 10, 2007);
Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL (February 14, 2008).  How shall we mark our days? 

You’ve seen the headlines.  On Friday, Feb 15 the front page of the Rockford Register Star read, “NO. NOT HERE.”
But, YES, HERE.  The illusion of safety has been broken, again.  How shall we mark our days?

Our local paper, The Daily Chronicle, headline screams “Campus Horror” and so it is that we have now experienced what some children have seen, or see, day after day in Baghdad, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Dafur…around the world…day after day.  How shall we mark our days? 

Unitarian Universalist Tracey Hurd wrote, “We need to find a feeling of ‘home.’ Our congregations do our best service to children and families by continually enveloping them in messages about life as a cycle of change, growth, death, birth, sadness and joy.  The rhythms of our days and years are important… In the wake of turbulence, we mark our days more clearly.” 

Here was one way, one day, was marked. 
I met an NIU student at an open sharing session at Kish Hospital this past Friday.  He had lived next door to one of the victims of the shooting.  She was so nice, he said.  She was my friend, he said.  He stayed at Kish that afternoon talking with me and others who came and went from our circle of conversation.  He stayed almost 2 hours.  His demeanor drifted over the course of the minutes…from shock, withdrawl, and sorrow, to anger, insistent questioning, and to…by the time he left..not acceptance (No, not that), but the calm of having been heard and validated.  He plans to attend her memorial service thought he does not know her family.  He needs to attend, he said.  She was so kind, he said. 

A portion of that conversation that lingers for me is when we discussed how trauma can make you fearful, or it can make you fearless.  He spoke of having lived through additional episodes of violence, and how he had come to feel that he didn’t care if he lived or died.  A lot changes when you lose that fear, he said.  He had lost his fear of death, he said, so it didn’t matter. 

“No, No!” I argued,“it matters!”  It matters because you chose; You chose to go towards the chaos and danger to help others.  Maybe it is crazy…that loss of fear…that some of us acquire because we have already seen some versions of hell.  “I really do get it”, I said and I told him briefly about my x-husband.  How at the age of 23 he had attacked me with a knife.  He came home in an agitated state and held me at knifepoint until he brought the knife down and cut open fingers on my left hand. Twenty one stitches and much trauma later, I did stupid, unsafe things like walk across my grad school campus late at night alone – while I was living in Hyde Park, a neighborhood in Chicago  – because once you lose the safety of your own home, with your own husband, what is there left to fear?  

But it matters; it matters because that kind of crazy fearlessness can be transformed.  It can become something more.  And you, I said, you choose to care for others when the shooting began.  That shows courage and compassion and that matters.  That truly matters. 

How shall we mark our days?  Let us mark them with meaning. This does not mean platitudes.  You know them – “It was God’s will” or “God doesn’t give you any more pain or troubles than you can bear.”  But we, people of faith, do not have to accept them. For our faith does not require reliance on a god whose will elects some to live while some are chosen to die.  No. The love of the Holy extends to all. And, our faith does not require reliance on a god who will not give you any more pain or tragedy than you can bear.  Because in my experience sometimes it is more than we can bear.  We may lay on the floor curled in a fetal position from sadness and grief (I have), or sit at the window exhausted and vacant, or withdraw into a place of dark pain in our mind…But then the phone rings, or we find strength within and pull ourselves up and out, or someone reaches out to you and connects, sharing their love like a warm blanket.  And they ask, “How are you?  I’m here for you.  Let’s remember together the laughter and love, and mark the days.”   That is divine Love at work.  That is sacred healing. 

Yes, we shall mark our days…with more awareness, sensitivity, passion, grief, anger and need…for a while.  And then we shall find a new normal.  It shall never be what it was before…but that is a good thing.  It is a good thing that we learn.  We humans are fashioned, evolved, created, and blessed to learn from our pain, and for now we rediscover again and again a basic survival need…and here it is:  for our survival we need for one another to make peace.

As Rev. Victoria Safford wrote, “We are trying to know we are alive, hoping to mold that knowing into good work – hopeful, brave, and helpful later on.  We are trying to remember what we love and what to do, and how to be ourselves, good gifts.”

Mark your days knowing, knowing that you are a good gift and for each of us there is a ministry to teach others these truths:  You are a good gift.  We need one another.  Let us make peace.  Let us make peace.   
Amen. Shalom, Salaam, Blessed Be.

Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of DeKalb
158 N. Fourth Street
DeKalb, IL 60115
815-756-7089
uufdchurchoffice@aol.com

 

Child care services available.

Our church is handicapped accessible.

For directions to our church, please click [map]