 Please join in a moment of centering silence so we can be fully present with each other this morning and now Let's get musically present by turning to the words for our in-gathering hymn, which you'll find inside your order of service Morning everybody and a happy. Hello on this Sun-filled Sunday at First Unitarian Society where independent thinkers gather in a safe nurturing environment to explore issues of social Spiritual and ethical significance as we try to make a difference in this world I'm Steve Goldberg a proud, but slightly overweight member of this congregation and it is my particular pleasure to extend the special welcomes to any Guests Visitors or newcomers if this is your first time at First Unitarian Society I think you'll find that this is indeed a special place and if you would like to learn more about our special buildings We conduct guided tours after every service Just meet over here by the windows after the service and we will take care of you speaking of taking care of each other This is a perfect time to silence those pesky electronic devices that might get in your way this morning And this announcement goes for those of you watching or listening at home. Thank you for taking care of that And if you are accompanied this morning by a youngster, and you think that youngster might prefer to See and hear the service from a more private space. We offer a couple options One is our child Haven located in the back corner of the auditorium And the other is a group of comfortable seating just outside the main doorway in the commons from which you and your Youngster can see and hear the service As is the case every weekend our service is brought to us by a wonderful group of people we call these people Volunteers we are grateful for their service And I'm going to announce their names. They deserve our thanks and appreciation. So please Give them a handshake or a hug a high five when you have a chance to thank them later We thank mark Schultz who's handling the sound system today. Thank you mark and smiley who is our lay minister and who also Provided the flowers that you see behind me in memory of patricia leonardy Our greeter upstairs kyle Kern. Thank you kyle Thank you to ellison brooks and dug hill for being our ushers And also the chip quad a and gene hills for handling the Hospitality and the coffee a little bit later on today and richard miller for serving as our tour guide just a couple announcements One is that our elves need our help. Did you know that our elves need our help? Who would think elves needed help because they're the ones providing help in this case They need help with our f us family-to-family holiday giving program Which provides gifts and food cards to more than 130 families in need Throughout dame county to help make their holidays a little bit brighter so next weekend you'll have a chance to sign up and match with a wish that will be on the list indicating the kinds of tasks and Support that these families might need you can spare just a couple hours in the next month or so to help those elves We would appreciate it take a look in the red floors bulletin and also come with your eyes open next week To sign up for a volunteer opportunity The second announcement also includes reference to the holidays. This holiday is Thanksgiving In a few weeks our potluck dinner on Thanksgiving Thursday right here At first Unitarian Society starting at 230 and that's when dinner will be served You'll have an opportunity to bring your favorite Thanksgiving dish to share with others Small donation to help cover some of the costs and a lot of fun If you'd like to get involved in helping with arrangements or get more details check with Donna Kanglossi She's arranging this and you can also see information about the Thanksgiving dinner At one of the information tables in the Commons during the break Two more brief announcements One is very important to those of you who might have made the mistake of parking on University Bay Drive this morning in the 900 block unless you want to contribute $40 to the revenue of the village of Sherwood Hills You might want to move your car Something that FUS is trying to negotiate with the village, but meanwhile the fine stands $40 for parking at University Bay Drive today The other announcement is a little more pleasant and that is it's only a hundred and fifty three days until the next cabaret so Those are the announcements for the morning Please sit back lean forward and enjoy today's service. I know it will touch your heart Stir your spirit and trigger one or two new thoughts. We're very glad you're here We continue with these words from an unknown author and titled a caregiver's morning prayer As I begin this new day, let me have the courage and the strength to face what lies ahead Let me practice tolerance and patience. Let me reveal empathy and love. Let me offer sustenance and hope And let me have the wisdom to know when I need to step forward and when I need to step back I Ask of this so that when I come to the end of the day I might rest having known that my time and my energy have been wanted and Have been needed and yes, I am asking all of this for my own sake And I'm also asking for the sake of another I Invite you to rise in body or in spirit for the lighting of our chalice and Our words of affirmation are responsive in nature this morning So if you will join your voices in reading the bolded sections We would come to this house in an attitude of openness Not knowing quite what will happen yet daring to receive a new idea a new experience Sustenance for our minds and hearts we would come in an attitude of humility Knowing how much we need one another and how alone we can be in the world how vulnerable if we face life solely by ourselves We would come in the spirit of joy seeking Reaffirmation and renewal of life of love and of hope And now I invite you to turn to your neighbor on this fine November day exchange with Emma warm greeting And as you settle in I invite you to join me in the spirit of meditation from many places and many conditions of the spirit we come We come here seeking a center for our lives and a sense of greater wholeness We come from dry places where words and knowledge seem broken into brittle fragments that do not cohere and from overfilled places Or information abounds But there's no real depth of understanding We come from hard places where feelings are dulled and From lonely hollow places where meaning seems thin Here in this caring and supportive community At this time of quiet reflection We come to be emptied of all the clatter in the confusion of the information that we once thought was all sufficient emptied and Then filled with the spirit that flows in and among us And that can be for us a reliable source of solace and of insight in this time of quiet Let us center our spirits Ground our being That we might find that power that already lies latent within us power for love power for creativity power for hope and power for transformation Given this reprieve from daily pressures may we learn once again to appreciate that every inch of space is a miracle Every instant a wonder an opening for new opportunity at this very moment then May our hearts be open to compassion Our minds be open to wisdom and our spirits open to grace Let us continue on in a moment or two more of silence Blessed be that I'm in Now I invite you to rise in body or in spirit as we sing hymn number 326 And at this time if there are children who are still in the auditorium They can go for the classes or they can remain here if you like first of our readings comes from James Miller and Susan Kutchall Their slender volume the art of being a healing presence being present is Not a complicated matter All you do is wake up You open your eyes look around come to your ordinary senses and once you are awake You simply stay that way as long as you can You wake up where you are taking in all that is around you Sometimes you survey the entire panorama But other times you can focus on the details Paying attention to lines shapes colors textures following your natural curiosity. You just open up to as much as possible And you wake up not just to your surroundings, but to what is going on in those surroundings Is their movement? Where? What's sort of a movement? Is there stillness? What's the quality of that stillness? Are there sounds how many sounds? What kind? What do your senses gather and convey to you? Being really present includes being awake to yourself. What's happening within you while all these things are happening around you? So what's your body telling you? your feelings What are you thinking? Another person or persons they may be present so you you awaken to them as well Who are they? What are they like? What are they doing? What's going on between the two of you? When you are completely present you stay awake to each unfolding moment You give yourself fully to the present instant letting go of what was and choosing not to anticipate what will be You don't do presence. You are presence It's as simple as that and yet It's not necessarily easy for in today's world. Most of us are busy too busy We overfill our days with activities until these activities overfill us The multitasking attitude that we fall into in everyday moments and workaday situations Can interfere with simple presence We unthinkingly presume that these moments are so ordinary that we just take them for granted We see a tree. We see the sky a particular person so many times day after day That we forget We forget how truly amazing a tree is how truly spectacular the sky can be the unique miracle of another human being We lose sight of the Extraordinary as it lies hidden in what we call the ordinary And once we allow that to happen It becomes difficult to reawaken To consciously discover the wonderment and the vitality that's all around us And yet the more we practice being completely present the more natural it becomes The more we wake up to what is around us and within us The more we are inclined To stay that way the second reading from Mary Oliver's collection Dog songs which are prose poems about the various dogs that have shared her life with her and her partner and so in this first one there is a Imaginary conversation taking place between Mary and her dog Ricky and other characters who appear are a dog that she once had now deceased by the name of Percy and Her partner Mary's partner Ann Got that straight So Mary Oliver begins Ricky Can you explain how it is that Ann and I can talk with you as we did with Percy too? And we all understand each other Isn't that a kind of a miracle? It's no miracle says Ricky. It's actually simple When you or Ann talk I listen when I talk you listen as you did with Percy Well, of course we listen. No, no, I mean really listen Here's a story and you don't have to visit too many houses to find it One person is talking and the other isn't really listening someone can look like they are But they're actually thinking about something that they want to say next Or their minds are just wandering Or they're looking at these little boxes that people hold in their hands these days And so people get discouraged and After a while they quit trying And the very quiet people you may have noticed They're often the sad people Ricky you've really thought about this, haven't you so we can talk together because We really listen and that's because yes because We care it is a pleasure to welcome Wes and Jess back for our Sunday services and We're getting used to this fine music. You're spoiling us folks One of the busiest Intersections on the west side of Madison is at University Avenue and Midvale Boulevard During the morning and the evening commute period traffic can back up for a couple of blocks in either direction And the stop lights on University Avenue feature arrows for those Intending to make a left-hand turn either on to Midvale or for eastbound traffic into the Village of Shorewood Hills The latter turn arrow unfortunately is a very short duration Allowing only three or four cars at most to execute that turn before the light changes Because I live in the Village of Shorewood Hills. I am a frequent visitor to that intersection On most occasions, I'm able to beat the light But occasionally there will be a car in front of me whose driver is simply not paying attention And I suspect that they are busy checking their smartphone or sending a text message What they are not doing is watching for the green turn arrow to illuminate Thus leaving both them and those stranded behind them frustrated for yet another cycle of the lights Such behavior is of course highly inconsiderate and yet it is becoming more and more common Despite repeated admonitions from transportation officials to leave the cell phone alone while you're operating a motor vehicle Now I don't believe that people intend to cause inconvenience to others when they are inattentive They just don't appreciate that attention is at a minimum A responsibility It's a courtesy that we owe to others and at other times it can be a precious gift That we all have the ability and the opportunity to bestow And I understand of course that this can be a challenge in a society that competes for our attention every waking hour Writing last spring in the New York Times Matthew Crawford shared his own discomfort with today's Capitalists who as he puts it seem determined to dig up and monetize every bit of private headspace by appropriating our collective attention Crawford describes his experience in major metropolitan airports where fields of view that haven't been claimed for commerce are getting Fewer and fewer and fewer one cannot ride the moving walkway at O'Hare without being distracted by advertisements for Lincoln financial group that had been applied to the handrail televisions tuned to CNN are ubiquitous almost impossible to avoid and thus there is less and less space left for travelers to attend to and possibly conceivably to engage with one another What is lost Crawford says is the public space that is required for Sociability the kind that depends on people not being self-enclosed an Airport lounge. He continues once felt rich with possibilities for these spontaneous encounters Even if one did not converse our attention was free to a light on one another and to linger there We encountered one another in person if only in silence And so the author goes on to suggest that we may need to begin treating our attention in the same way as we do our air our water and our soil It is a resource to be protected from the predations of those who would expropriate it for the sole purpose of making a buck off of us We have the right Not to be addressed to be shielded not from those who would address us face to face But from those who never show their face Yes, attention is a precious and limited resource and we do well to shepherd it to direct it toward those activities objects and individuals that are most worthy and deserving It is after all the rare person who does not crave attention I have the feeling that in today's world where it's increasingly hard to get it for free We often resort to paying for it. Do we suffer from a deficit of attention from our friends and our families? Well, there's always counselors Fitness trainers personal coaches who for a fee will step in and fill the void now to be sure these people also have expertise to offer But also a reliably human touch that is in itself of considerable merit Francis Weller an authority on traditional and indigenous methods for handling grief and loss argues that for thousands of years human beings were Emotionally and spiritually nourished by the members of a closely connected community We were communal people and people would gather around the fire at night They would listen to the elders tell their stories They would sing together share meals in the evening share their dreams in the morning And they would support each other in times of loss and bereavement And according to Weller those communities satisfied what he calls primary human needs But today because those needs often go unmet People turn to other devices to satisfy them But they satisfy them indirectly through what he calls secondary Satisfactions status well privilege or more problematically addictive behaviors We need the attention of a group Weller insists especially when we are hurting Especially when we are under stress But we also need each of us to grant attention as a participant in a reciprocal self-sustaining process And this is I would argue what many of us look for when we enter the doors of a faith community and Attentiveness that we try to maintain and share with one another in this privileged commercial-free environment Now truthfully we don't always succeed in our efforts Because many of us have simply gotten out of the habit Or we unconsciously repeat those inattentive patterns of behavior that we have acquired out there in the larger world But here at least we recognize the importance of attention and we do our best to practice it What we are speaking here about here is an attitude of the heart Pope Francis wrote in his latest in sickly oladito say One which approaches life with serene attentiveness Which is capable of being fully present to someone without thinking about what comes next Which accepts each moment as a gift to be lived to the full And for inspiration and instruction in this discipline I can do no better than to observe our dog Sasha For her as for Mary Oliver's dogs Ricky and Percy Attentiveness seems to be a natural attribute one that dogs developed over thousands of years of partnership with human beings At least some of the more recent literature on dogs Speculates that it was this very ability that endeared them initially to human beings Dogs study us. They look for cues in our eyes our hands our postures in our tone of voice In order to give us what we want and for us to give them what they need and Nothing seems to harm a dog emotionally more than to be neglected to be ignored That's when you notice that pitiful hang dog expression on their faces Now I don't want to press the comparison of human and canine attention too far because we face challenges in this respect that dogs Simply do not as creatures of the modern age. We are fated to spend a good bit of our time Up here preoccupied with thoughts and daydreams and storylines That neither dogs nor earlier generations of humans had to cope with We don't have to have our cell phones close at hand to suddenly find that our attention has wavered That we've tuned out a conversation or that we've missed the green turn light According to Kay Lindahl the author of a book entitled the Sacred Art of Listening While we do on average spend about 45 percent of our waking hours listening The average person is also distracted or inattentive for three quarters of that process 22 seconds 22 seconds That's about how long Without making a concerted effort that most of us can hold our attention steady Being attentive takes practice As one manager of a large business told Lindahl I've always prepared myself to be able to speak I've never prepared myself to be able to listen But the benefits of paying attention are considerable Whether one is the object of that attention or the person doing the attending for instance in studies that have been done of Effective salesmanship those men and women enjoy notable success Who take the time and are able to listen carefully to customers as they explain their needs Rather than push their product on an unfamiliar prospect the smart salesperson steps back Asks questions draws the person out and therefore Convinces that person that this the salesman this is someone who wants to understand me and to satisfy me Now of course that can be overdone Attentiveness must always be accompanied by a certain sensitivity We want our presence and our interest to be affirmed, but not scrutinized When interest is too intense Makes the other person uncomfortable as if they were being examined under a microscope So a healthy interaction always involves respect for those personal boundaries Alan Wofelt is a noted grief counselor and he underscores this point when he notes that in Companioning those who have suffered a major loss or someone who is actively dying We need to let that person call the shots Respect their need to be alone part of the time Allow them to express their thoughts and feelings, but don't force the issue if they seem to be reticent don't try to raise the other person's spirits by doling out cliches But just listen and then provide assurances of your own care and your own deep concern for their well-being Wolfelt writes give your person your friend permission to express feelings without fear of criticism Learn from that friend don't instruct don't set expectations about he or how he or she should respond And thus think of yourself as someone who walks with Not behind not in front of that grieving or that dying person walking side-by-side It's hard to underestimate the advantages that the act of consciously attending confers a Number of years ago the psychologist and family therapist John Gottman decided to observe newlyweds in a clinical setting what he called his love lab He wanted to see Gottman wanted to see if he could isolate certain behaviors Negative or positive that would help him to understand why it is that some marriages succeed and why some of them fail the most meaningful gesture between couples that he discovered was turn toward In other words when one party to that relationship wants to share something The other party quickly drops whatever it was he or she was doing and redirects their attention turning toward their partner Couples who were good at doing this Gottman labeled masters But those who evinced irritation or resentment over having been interrupted He called those people or those couples disasters Couples who were still together after six years of marriage were very adept at turning toward each other 87% of the time To illustrate the difference he offers the example of a spouse who comes home bursting with excitement Anxious to share some great news promotion at work Entrance into a prestigious graduate program the partner Might respond half-heartedly Glancing at the watch Shutting down the conversation with it. That's nice dear By contrast the masters practiced what Gottman calls active constructive responding If the partner reacted to the good news in this way active Constructive responding then he or she would stop what they were doing immediately turn toward the partner and say that's great Congratulations, when did you find out? Did you get a call and? According to Gottman's findings the only salient difference between couples who were still together and those who broke up After six years was this active constructive? Responding the parties paid attention to each other and thus showed that they prioritized the relationship between Couples in families and among friends the dividends of paying attention are typically shared Both sides benefit the person being attended to feels validated and Despite the effort that might be involved the person doing the attending experiences a deeper than usual sense of well-being as The renowned Harvard psychiatrist George Valiant found after tracking a large sample of Harvard graduates for better than three decades Sustainable happiness for these men and women Correlated much more closely with meaningful connection to others than with any measure of personal success Sometimes the rewards can be quite tangible Rachel Naomi Raymond is a pioneer in the field of integrative medicine She tells the story of a colleague who was providing health care on an Arizona Indian reservation Well, one day a native woman well in her 90s was brought into the clinic by her daughter The physician Raymond Raymond Rachel's friend was named Elizabeth and Elizabeth took on this woman She did everything that she could from a medical standpoint. She addressed her urinary tract infection She managed her diabetes. She reversed her incipient heart failure. She also ordered any number of lab tests Mobilized social service agencies to help with the daughter and even located an agency that would provide some extra financial assistance for the family Well, the old woman died many months later at about the age of 96 and after that the physician Elizabeth received a call from a researcher at the University of Arizona and This researcher was planning on writing a book on traditional American Indian medicine and He had become aware of this woman a very important practitioner who had recently passed away This lady had received the lineage from her forebears was one of a handful in the Southwest Who had kept alive these ancient ways of healing and the researcher had first contacted this woman's family But the family had referred him to Elizabeth because well, she too was a healer The two women knew each other well the daughter said and so she presumed that Elizabeth and her mother had discussed these matters during their visits Not so much Despite her solicitous and impeccable professional approach to the woman's medical issues Elizabeth had never inquired into her background And because Elizabeth had never asked the old woman had never shared Native American women are typically kind of reticent about that. I have never forgotten this Elizabeth said ruefully I think of her sitting there all of these months watching me shuffling my papers tracking my lab data And knowing what she knew just sitting there What was going through her mind? I've been so busy with my numbers and with my tests what I would give now for just an hour with her to ask her all Of my unanswered questions to get her perspective on suffering and loss and illness and death or maybe maybe Just to ask her blessing Raymond says with respect to this instance you have to be present to win And by winning of course, she is referring not to any particular opportunity But winning at life in general because attention is in the end a form of love as well as of respect and In fact attention can serve as a fulcrum for love can even generate love In her book all joy and no fun at the paradox of modern parenthood Jennifer senior disputes the classical notion that we care for our children because we love them Parental love. She says it's about time. It's about engagement. It's not just about biology We love our children because we care for them. Both assertions are probably true And taking care of kids can be as any parent knows a thankless task at times But sometimes it is thankless because a part of us wants to be somewhere else Part of us wants to be doing something else And so we refuse to give our full attention to the child that's standing there before us And if at some point in time We do discover that love and attention go together We will also understand that the one and the other are reciprocal and they are contingent upon each other May we always be cognizant of that association? as parents with our partners with our pets With one another And when we're waiting at a green turn signal light on University Avenue blessed be and amen and Now it is time for the giving and the receiving of the offering and as you can see it'll be shared 5050 with dry hooch Which is an organization that assists veterans with their substance abuse problems And there is a table out in the comments where you can get more information. Please be generous We gather each week as a community of memory and of hope and to this time and this place We bring our whole and sometimes our broken selves We carry with us the joys and sorrows of the recent past and seek here a place where they might be received and celebrated and shared It is with deep sadness that we announced the passing of Patricia Leonardo Patricia passed away on Friday afternoon due to complications of multiple myloma We will miss her bright spirit her creativity her deep and immense generosity and love We are holding her partner Linda and the many leonardies in our hearts and the service Has been planned for December 19th at 1 p.m. Across the parking lot in the landmark auditorium. Our hearts are also With this and Rupp Nitschke as they recover from a recent automobile accident This had very successful surgery on Thursday and is being released this afternoon We send our prayers and our strength for healing to both of our friends And then on a more joyful note. We extend our congratulations to last year's ministerial intern here at FUS Sasha Ostrom Sasha was ordained at the Unitary and Fellowship of Raleigh, North Carolina yesterday morning at 11 o'clock and I had the privilege of preaching the ordination sermon for her and My only regret is is that the plane was two and a half hours late into Madison, so I'm a little jet lag this morning But Sasha was absolutely thrilled our shawl ministry bestowed upon her a lovely shawl with a chalice on it in honor of her ordination and We again send to her our very best wishes and congratulations And so in addition to those mentioned we would acknowledge any Unexpressed joys or sorrows that remain among us as a community We hold those with equal concern in our hearts let us now sit silently for just a moment or two in the spirit of empathy and of hope And so by virtue of our brief time together today may our burdens be lightened and our joys expand These rise in body or in spirit for our closing hymn in the teal hymnals number one zero one two in peace deeply regard each other Truly listen to one another Speak what each of you must speak with candor and compassion and be ready at any moment to disarm your heart and Always live as if the reign of love had begun May it be so please be seated for the post loop