The Moments of My High Resolve

Keep fresh before me the moments of my High Resolve,

that in good times or in tempests,

I may not forget that to which my life is committed.

--Howard Thurman, UUA Hymnal, Reading #498

This morning I did not want to go to the UU service.

I wanted to stay in bed. Because of the increasingly shorter days, my circadian rhythms have yet to find the beat. I'm tired all day, but when I turn the light out at night, I cannot sleep.

I was afraid to drive. I've totalled three of the four cars that I've ever owned. "Heavenly-minded" people like me shouldn't drive on roads that caused 66 accidents Friday night.

I wasn't really interested in the sermon topic: "The Social Gospel: Liberal Religion in the Nineteenth Century." Good stuff, but not new to someone who's been to seminary.

So when the alarm clock started playing classic rock, I argued with myself for a while before turning over to go back to sleep. What's left of my Protestant work ethic kept reminding me that if I had decided to be a Unitarian minister, shouldn't I get my ass out of bed and into the pews (with a short stop in the shower)? Resistance was futile.

Once safely there, I settled into the back row, nursing a cup of coffee. I looked around me and saw one more reason why I would have wanted to stay home, had I known. There were lots and lots of kids. Great. It was the Sunday where the kids start out in the service upstairs before going to their classes downstairs.

For the record, I have to say that I don't believe in hiding children. I think intergenerational activities should be the norm, not the exception. I just think that Kid Sunday, at AUUF, is a little hard to take. Having 100 kids enrolled in RE in a building that size is a mixed blessing, to say the least. But then again, mixed blessings are part of what I'm trying to talk about in this post anyway.

But I digress. Back to the point at hand.

I decided to light a candle of joy and concern. I had never done that before, feeling that it was an act of fuller participation than I was ready for. But today, with my newfound clarity, it was time to express myself. It was time to light a candle for the joy of the inner call and the concern of the yet unseen outer confirmation.

My heart skipping more quickly than usually, I made my way up the side aisle, following a few other brave souls. My hands were clumsy as I lit the candle, almost burning myself. Then Fran, the minister, leaned forward and whispered to me, "Shoelace alert." "Thank you, I said," carefully heading back to my seat to re-tie my bootlaces.

A few minutes later Fran introduced a period of silent meditation with the above words from Howard Thurman. And all of this was what the sermon was for me today. Sleepless nights, icy roads, rowdy children, untied shoelaces--and High Resolve. The mixed blessings of our sacred, ordinary lives.