Category Archives: teachings

03/4/10

Reform Unitarian Symbols – The Chalice

During this Lenten season leading up to Garden Thursday, let’s discuss one of our key symbols in Unitarian Reform: the chalice.

Now, the flaming chalice is known as a symbolism of post-Christian “Unitarianism” (absent the Unitarian meaning) with origins in the oil-burning lamps in Greek and Roman ritual.

For AUR, however, the chalice is the Cup of Gethsemane: the image Jesus used to symbolize the suffering of material existence, the worst of which he was about to suffer himself.

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02/25/10

Pietist or Liturgical?

One of the primary divisions in the Christian religion is the chasm separating the pietist approach, emphasizing a rigorous Christian lifestyle, from the liturgical approach, emphasizing ritualized public worship.

It may be most appropriate to address this issue a week after celebrating Ash Wednesday with liturgical churches, as American Unitarianism arose from the pietist tradition of Protestant Christianity, which has been very critical and even suspicious of ritual and ceremony.

However, the tide has been turning in favor of liturgical forms recently, and we have learned much in the centuries since the beginnings of American Unitarianism about the important role that social ceremony plays in reinforcing personal lifestyle.

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02/23/10

The Death of Polycarp

Although not an official AUR holiday, today we honor St. Polycarp, who was martyred at the age of 86 or older on February 23rd at some point in the mid-2nd Century for refusing to light incense to the Roman Emperor.  He was first set on fire, then stabbed to death.

Polycarp is important to Reform Unitarianism as he was disciple to St. John, and transmitted John’s teaching to his own disciple, St. Irenaeus.  Connecting Irenaeus with the John the Apostle lends great credence to his description of the Son and Spirit as “the hands of God,” God here being the Father.  This is significant to Unitarian Christianity as it establishes the subordinate relationship between God the Father and His Son and Spirit.

Polycarp himself left us writing only in the form of a letter which consists largely of scriptural quotes, but his courage under persecution and tutelary legacy nevertheless make him a key character in the story of Taproot Christianity.

 

02/17/10

Ash Wednesday, Lent, and the Cross

ashcrossTypically, Reform Unitarianism avoids the veneration of the cross, so it may seem strange for RU’s to join the rest of Christianity in the Ash Wednesday ritual.

Still, the cross does have meaning for Unitarian Reform, in that spiritual commitment must accept the suffering of material existence.  From dust we come and to dust we return.

Even so, there are good reasons that the mark of the cross on Ash Wednesday is the exception rather than the rule in Reform Unitarianism.

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02/5/10

Notional American Unitarian Reform Church No. 9

This is the ninth in a series of light-hearted signs for hypothetical American Unitarian Reform churches, created using an online image generator. We hope to show a range of attitudes and ideas all possible within the scope of AUR.

Today’s notional church is the Reformed Unitarian Church of the Apocalyptic Saints, appropriately promising a homily on the spiritual perils of partisanship.

02/1/10

Notional American Unitarian Reform Church No. 8

This is the eighth in a series of light-hearted signs for hypothetical American Unitarian Reform churches, created using an online image generator. We hope to show a range of attitudes and ideas all possible within the scope of AUR.

The sign for today’s notional church, St. Arius of Africa, presents an interesting take on the martyr Arius, likely a Berber, and thus of North African descent.  The hypothetical sermon refers to Isaac Newton, who wrote a treatise in defense of Arius and indicting his persecutors.  Unfortunately, Newton had some very harsh things to say about Catholics, and honoring him is therefore a tricky matter for Reform Unitarians.

01/29/10

Response to Yesterday’s Topic

The Action Thursday entry yesterday elicited email responses concerning the mixing of politics and religion.  One reader quoted a popular bumper sticker: “The last time we mixed politics and religion, people were burned at the stake!”

Which makes us wonder if they’ve ever heard of Martin Luther King.

Granted, religion was also in the mouths of white supremacists who opposed Dr. King.  This fact, however, simply strengthens the argument that the good should not shy away from pressing the politics of justice with religious reasoning. 

The real question about mixing politics and religion is not whether you do, but how you do it, and to what end.   As with the Divine Right of Kings discussed yesterday, the unjust will mix them whether the just do or not, and if you fail to address religious arguments laid forth in service to injustice, you’ve ceded the contest to evil.

To paraphrase a quote attributed to Edmund Burke, the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good people to fail to engage evil where it actually wages war. 

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01/28/10

The Day Of The Spark

Saturday will be the Day of the Spark, the 12th Day of Action and end of the Winter Interval Season. 

The subject of this Ultimate Thursday’s posting will be “The Spark” itself: a story of inspiration for those who seek justice and truth in matters where politics and religion are already inextricably intertwined.

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01/18/10

Martin Luther King Jr. – American Prophet

It is quite appropriate that the (actual) birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. falls on the 9th Day of Defiance in the AUR calendar, in the middle of Nika Week commemorating when competing factions stood together against oppression in the Byzantine Empire, just as multiracial crowds gathered before Dr. King stood together against Jim Crow oppression in the United States.

But Martin Luther King is significant to AUR for other reasons, not only in his ecumenical attitude, but also the purity of the way he spoke of God’s relationship with Creation and his commitment of character to the will of God.

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