It is perfect timing for us to
consider how we might be bearers of light.
We are in the darkest time of the year.
Both literally and metaphorically. Pagans will celebrate returning light
with Winter Solstice celebrations, Hanukkah is the Jewish Festival of Lights
celebrated in countries all over the world. Diwali, meaning array of lights, is
a Hindu light festival. It symbolizes the triumph of light over darkness. During the 9 days prior to Christmas, Mexican families march from house to
house with candles looking for a room at the inn. Kwanzaa begins on December
26th to honor African harvest traditions. It was created in 1966. Candles
representing the seven principles of Kwanzaa are lit each night for a week.
Family and friends come together to take pride in their unique culture and to
celebrate their common heritage. And of course we have our own candlelight
ceremony here in this Congregation on Christmas Eve. We must be bearers of
light. We must be light in the lives of people around us as we navigate these
desperate times.
When I was little we lived in a
double house on the Canadian border. Our
family lived in the back of the house while my grandmother lived in the front.
It was a house my grandfather bought for his sons when they married after the
WWII. Rumor has it that my grandpa did pretty well bootlegging whiskey during Prohibition.
But that’s another sermon. My dad’s family was a close-knit Scottish/French Canadian clan. We were always together. Maybe it was because we
lived in the same house, but we ate together many nights a week and always on
Sunday. My dad’s family was loud and passionate, and they could yell at you one
minute and hug you the next. One time our neighbor asked me why my family
argued all the time, which was a great puzzle. We didn’t argue we were… well,
colorful!
In March 1989, our color was surely
drained when my father died suddenly. He was 48, and I had just turned 20. I remember my dad’s smile, his
wicked sense of humor, and his laughter; it could light up a room. When he died, my mother went into mourning.
As was the custom, the bereaved wore black as a sign of loss. I think it
was a way to say to the world, “Be easy with me, I’m grieving.” My mom said she
did it out of respect, but I suspect it truly represented her deep sorrow. She
wore only black for a long while. She
hung on to her sorrow and her mourning clothes; it seemed as if she was stuck.
She eventually began wearing her regular clothes again.
Now our close-knit family also included
our neighbors Alphonsine and her clan. Alphonsine, a feminine and French name
meaning noble and ready, was my mom’s best friend. Our houses were so close;
you could stand at the kitchen sink and wash dishes at our house and talk
across the driveway to Alphonsine as she stood in her kitchen washing
dishes. In the summer of 1989,
Alphonsine decided it was time to help my mother move beyond her black mourning
clothes. I don’t know how their conversation went at all. But I remember the
day clearly, as if it were yesterday. My mom left the house wearing black and
returned hours later in a cloud of lavender. I can see her walking toward me, a
big smile on her face and lavender beads around her neck. But more than dressed
in lavender, or the even the beads, my mother looked different because she had
her light back, a light that had been dimmed by her tragic loss.
In a book by artist Jeanne Dobie
called “Making Color Sing,” the author introduces the idea of mouse colors.
That’s right, mouse colors…m-o-u-s-e. They are subtle pale colors. When they
are brushed up against a darker color, they illuminate the painting. They are
almost imperceptible when you look from a distance, but their impact on the
painting is profound. Mouse colors create a setting where it is possible for
the brilliant color to come into its fullest bloom. Mouse colors are like the
bit players who support the stars. I
believe there are people in the world who are like mouse colors; they bring
light to our dark places. They are most often subtle. If we are lucky, they
come to us with presence and gentle influence at the exact time we need them. I
think of them as light bearers.
Our friend Alphonsine, in the story about my
mom, was a light bearer. She cared for my mother and their relationship by
showing up when needed and finding the right path that led my mom back to the
color of her life.
In 2006, one year after Hurricane
Katrina decimated Louisiana, Rev. Marta Valentin offered a sermon to the UU
congregations of New Orleans. Those congregations suffered immense challenges,
but most congregations struggle with difficult times and change. I think her
words are relevant to all of us. In her sermon she described the bearers of
light who showed up with aid and support during a tragically dark time for
the congregations. This is what she said: “To be a bearer of light is to hold
in the highest esteem the building of relationships. Bearers of light are not concerned with what
they can take, but with what they can give to any situation, even one that
might rile them. It can be a commitment one makes to lighten an experience that
might seem heavy, to share an insight even when it might scare you to do so. It
can be a commitment to remain calm, when all around you the world is spinning,
to remain grounded when the urge is to take flight, to remain loving when the
devil is knocking on your door, pushing you into the abyss that is misdirected
anger.”
Who doesn’t need people like this
often in their lives, people who love us and value our relationships and our
community and are committed to hold the lantern when life seems so very dark? I
think we all know that our body craves light. Any one who lives on the Canadian
border in February knows that. Light stimulates our neurotransmitters; we
produce more serotonin. It improves our mood, and lightens our life. But I believe our spirit craves light too. We
are hungry for illumination, enlightenment, the mystical experience, or…in
Universalist language -- a gentle stirring of love in our hearts. The presence of spiritual light offers us a
sense of healing in difficult times. Our ability to see this light makes it
possible to feel a sublime connection to one another. We blur our separation
and our ability to see deeply into each other’s hearts opens us to true
communion. When we do that, we become bearers of light for one another.
Now we all know there are times in
our lives when we live in the light and our world is in technicolor. And other
times we live in the dark, when the black hole of circumstance sucks us in.
Like post-election season. Times where there is no light, and we see no color,
even as we look out at our vibrant world. Perhaps we lose someone we loved, we
end a relationship, or we simply experience life changes, and we can get drawn
into a dark lonely place. At such times of struggle, it is difficult even to
see our own light. We find ourselves living in the shadows. We can become frightened
and sorrowful and angry. As a young
adult I thought the idea of mourning clothes was silly and outdated. When my
own mother died, I wore a green suit with a lavender tie; it was her favorite
color, after all. But in the months following her death, I felt so deeply and
profoundly sad. I remember feeling as if I needed to wear black, because the
wound I carried was invisible to others but wide open and gaping to me. I lived
in the shadows; I went through my days taking care of my young family with
little joy or brilliance.
I think we all have such shadows. They are
sorrow and pain we don’t want to see; they are our lesser qualities -- our meanness,
our stinginess, or our judgment of others. They are our inadequacies, the parts
of ourselves that just don’t measure up to our self-expectations. Like a
dormant virus, they sneak out, especially during hard times, political and
otherwise. And it wouldn’t be so bad if
we just waited for the virus to pass, but I’m afraid all too often, we project
our shadow onto others, ascribing motives to them that simply aren’t true and
that have more to do with us than with them. These are the times we need light
so we can honestly and openly see our hidden selves.
There is a Sufi teaching
story about a character, the Mulla, named Nasrudin. A man was walking home late one night when he
saw the Mulla Nasrudin searching under a street light on hands and knees for
something on the ground. “Mulla, what have you lost?” he asked. “The key to my
house,” Nasrudin said. “I’ll help you look,” the man said. Soon, both men were
down on their knees, looking for the key. After a number of minutes, the man
asked, “Where exactly did you drop it?” Nasrudin waved his arm back toward the
darkness. “Over there, in my house.” The first man jumped up. “Then why are you
looking for it here?” “Because there is more light here than inside my house."
It’s pretty clear Nasrudin is looking
for something very important, a key. And the key could easily symbolize an
aspect of himself. Aren’t we all looking for that key? But in this case, the
key is in the darkness of his house, so that is where he must look. This is
also true of finding the shadow parts of our selves; it requires us to look in
the darkness and uncover the key to our behavior. Perhaps there is a way to bring light to
those dark places, our shadows. Perhaps that’s where the light bearers come
in.
To explain that, I’d like to borrow
the concept of light from the Quakers. They believe that there is a light in
each of us that is more than our intellect or conscience. The light within is
like a flickering flame deep in our souls that when responded to and tended,
grows to fill our entire lives with light. When the internal light is dim, and our shadows are long and dark,
another person who sees us and sees the light can make all the difference in
our lives.
That is the work of the light
bearers. They mind the light. They pay close attention to all that connects us.
They see beyond the shadows and hold a vision of us in the light. They see us
as whole and perfect, exactly as we are, even when it’s hard for us to see
that.
Now some people are gifted with
that ability; I can actually think of a few people in this Congregation who
have the gift, and believe me, we are lucky because communities need such people. But most of us are more
ordinary, and we need practice. Seeing the light and minding the light in
others is in fact something we can learn. It takes willingness and commitment,
because seeing the light in others is easy when they are pleasant and so much
harder when they are not. It is really hard to feel connected or to see the
light in other persons when they are disappointed in you or you them. But that’s when they need it the most. If only we could wear black mourning colors
when we are lost, or perhaps red when we are enraged at life, or maybe green
when we are too tender to touch. If we had an outward sign of our innermost
circumstance, maybe then we could tell the world around us, “be easy with me,
I’m hurting, and I’m scared.” But life isn’t like that; there are no uniforms.
So maybe the key is to invoke the
spirit of love or if you like, the spirit of — God. When we see others in the
light of love, we find their challenges are probably no different from our own.
We see beyond their shadow to the deep light within, and holding them this way
we ensure that we are touched by their lives, by their pure humanness. The
distance between us lessens, and our concerns become each other’s. And in that way we become bearers of light…we
see and mind the light in one another…and by doing that our own light grows
brighter, and together we bring understanding to the shadows between us. Perhaps
we simply say Namaste–the light in me sees the light in you…
May it be so.
"Bearers of Light", a sermon delivered by the Rev CJ McGregor, at 1stUUPB, on Dec 4, 2016.
