Dear Members and Friends,
“Action is the best antidote to anxiety” is a phrase I’ve heard many of you share with me, then followed with the question, “What specifically can we do that is meaningful at this time?”
To answer this question whether individually or collectively, this takes discernment. It’s been nearly two months since the current administration took office, and there are threats to civil liberties, to many government institutions meant to protect the wider population, to our education system, to the well-being and health of millions of people worldwide, to women’s access to healthcare, and the list goes on. This has been a time for lamentation while clinging to trust that the human spirit will endure and rise from untold number of places—that there are people of faith and people of compassion all over this nation that will rise in a multitude of ways to co-create our future from out of the challenges of this time.
But what can we do now??? All of us must answer that for ourselves, and together we can answer that collectively. As a congregation, we can continue the ministries that provide direct care to others, including John Street and Beardsley School. We can organize with others who share our values. This might look like cultivating solidarity with Make the Road and providing accompaniment services. It might be writing postcards with UU the Vote. It might be participating in a collective legislative effort to support legislation that protects ordinary people.
This past Sunday, we reflected on reproductive justice. If any faith tradition takes the lead on organizing, it is Unitarian Universalists. I was heartened by the response to Sunday’s service, so much support was expressed. I trust this will translate to some of you entering into discernment with our Reproductive Justice Team where to put this congregation’s efforts, such as raising funds for Black doulas locally, supporting a specific effort in another state where women cannot access abortion, and creating a team of condom-queens as the First Unitarian Church of Rochester did to ensure local youth have access to birth control. If you want to join the discernment of our Reproductive Justice Team, don’t hesitate to reach out to reproductivejustice@uuwestport.org and the chair, Leslie Cenci, will be in touch with you.
Our Social Justice Council has identified a specific action that you take that will take only 15-20 minutes of your time. In Hartford, there is a bill that has been proposed, HB7212, that improves the current Trust Act by legally restricting ICE’s aggressive tactics to treat undocumented people as if they are criminals. This legislation directs local law enforcement to automatically hand over undocumented people to ICE if they have a felony on their record—for simply being identified as undocumented results in a felony conviction. You can read the entire bill HERE.
An interfaith effort to gather support for the Trust Act recently formed with Rev. Josh Pawalek, a UU minister, as the co-chair. UU Westport member David Vita serves as the Fairfield County convener, signing up faith leaders and institutions to support.
I invite you to join me , other members of UU Westport, and many other people of faith to show up boldly and lovingly for immigrants by submitting written testimony on behalf of this bill. The only caveat is that this needs to be done before 10am tomorrow (Wednesday) morning!
So would you be willing to take 15 or 20 minutes today or this evening to do so? Click the following link: Trust Act Testimony Link
In the meantime, if you want a space to discern where your spirit is calling you, you’re welcome to join me tomorrow at 11:00 online for Poetry for the Spirit. Our sharing with one another will have as an underlying inquiry: where are we being called to put our efforts?
Our poems this week reflect our monthly theme: Living Love through the Practice of Trust.
Warmly,
Alan
“Growing Trust” by Rosemerry Trommer
Now since I’ve tasted trust in life
why would I ever
slip again into armor?
The armor of an insincere smile
sometimes as dangerous
as the armor of a sword.
Why would I ever try to know
what to say, how to act,
how to plan, when,
with zero effort of my own,
life itself will move through me,
will rise up in me to meet itself?
Of course, like the child I am,
I forget this trust.
I slip back into habit,
believe I need protection,
fear I am isolated.
But I have fallen in love with life
at a time when that might seem impossible,
and this strange fact alone
seems enough to remind me
to ditch the armor,
to cast wide my arms,
to unsheath my heart
and say yes, life,
I trust you, I serve you.
Why would I not trust life?
It would be like a seed
evading the rain,
like a sunflower
just unfurling
trying to avoid the sun.
From Pema Chodron
As I look out of my eyes at the world,
I see that a lot of us are just running around in circles
pretending that there’s ground
where there actually isn’t any ground.
And that somehow,
if we could learn to not be afraid of groundlessness,
not be afraid of insecurity and uncertainty,
it would be calling on an inner strength
that would allow us to be open and free
and loving and compassionate in any situation.
But as long as we keep trying to scramble
to get ground under our feet
and avoid this uneasy feeling
of groundlessness
and insecurity
and uncertainty
and ambiguity
and paradox,
any of that,
then the wars will continue.
from Mark Nepo
It was years ago, but I remember it clearly. I was walking along the shore of a lake in the middle of the day, and there in the sun, a good ten yards out, was a duck curled into itself, asleep. With its slick tufted head tucked into its body, it bobbed peacefully in the lapping of the water. This little scene undid me, for here was an ultimate lesson in trust. Without any intent or knowledge of itself, this little duck, asleep in the womb of the world, was a deep and wordless teacher.
It was obvious that the duck would wake and swim its little patterns on the water, but this little creature’s ability to let go so completely allowed its time on Earth to be filled and saturated—if just for a few minutes—with a depth of peace that only surrender can open us to.
Only rarely have I let go this completely, yet those moments of total surrender have thoroughly changed my life. When struck with cancer, I somehow fell from the ledge of my fear and entered the operating room like this little duck. It was the threshold to the other side. When lonely and afraid to reach out, I have somehow collapsed repeatedly into the ocean of another’s love, and it has cleansed my weary heart. And in my search now for wisdom to live by, I stumble at times and surrender what I think I know, so completely, that I find myself adrift in a deeper way that is neither wise nor unwise, but simply life-affirming.
