 Right mute it then pull it out check check one two check one two one two Yeah, lay minister Tom Boykoff will be working that See Please join in a moment of silent centering and please join in our in gathering him number 184 it's printed in your order of service Good morning Welcome to first Unitarian society of Madison This is a community where curious seekers gather to explore spiritual ethical and social issues in an accepting and nurturing environment Unitarian universalism supports the freedom of conscience of each individual as together we seek to be a force for good in the world My name is John Powell and on behalf of the congregation. I'd like to extend a special welcome to visitors We are a welcoming congregation. So whoever you are Wherever you are wherever you happen to be in your life's journey. We celebrate your presence among us Newcomers are encouraged to stay for our fellowship hour after the service and to visit the library Which is directly across the Adrian model from the auditorium Bring your drinks and your questions and members of our staff and lay ministry will be on hand to welcome you You may also look for persons holding teal stoneware coffee mugs These are members knowledgeable about our faith community and they would love to visit with you We welcome children to stay for the duration of the service However, because it's difficult for some in attendance to hear in this very lively acoustical environment Our child Haven and commons are excellent places to retire if a child needs to talk or move around The service can still be heard from those areas and speaking of noise This would be a very good time to shut off any electronic device that might go off during the service It takes a lot of Volunteers to run the service each morning and we'd like to acknowledge our volunteers this morning Our sound operator is Peter Daly lay minister Tom Boykoff our greeter Patty Reardon Usher's this morning and Ostrom Marty Hollis and Nancy Daly Coffee is being served this morning for hospitality by Chip Quaid and Biss Nitschke Care for the puppet pulpit palms by John twos and our flowering offer this morning from Kennedy Gilchrist Please note all the announcements in the red floors insert in your order of service we want to point out one announcement and Put together another announcement this morning, of course we welcome singers from Madison's Festival Choir Directed by Bryson Mortensen They'll sing excerpts from Tchaikovsky's all-night vigil settings of Psalms and other sacred writings from the Russian Orthodox liturgy and the Festival Choir will be in concert here in the Atrium Auditorium Saturday, November 1st at 7 30 in the evening One other announcement to the FUS youth group water interns are raising funds to help people in specific International communities obtain access to clean water So the weekend of October 24th at 25th and 26th rather 50% of the service offerings will be used to fund small-scale clean water projects Selected by the youth group and if you wish to donate directly to the project Please address checks to the First Unitarian Society of Madison with Water Justice Project Written in the memo area Again welcome, we hope that today's service will stimulate your mind touch your hearts and stir your spirit Our opening words are from the 12th century Sufi poet and mystic Jalaluddin Rumi This being human is a guest house Every morning a new arrival a joy a depression a meanness Some momentary awareness comes in as an unexpected visitor Welcome and entertain them all even if they're a crowd of sorrows who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture Still treat each guest honorably He may be clearing you out for some new delight The dark thought the shame the malice meet them all at the door laughing Invite them in be grateful for whoever comes because each has been sent as a guide from beyond I Invite you to rise and body or in spirit for the lighting of our chalice And if you will join with me in reading the words of affirmation printed in your program to be open to new truth Respectful of all opinion Patient with all people this is our religion To speak responsibly To choose wisely to act deliberately These are the marks of a free fate We come together seeking not only comfort and support But the stimulus we need to become the best persons possible And now on this bright and sunny October morning Please turn and exchange a warm greeting with your neighbor. Please be seated once a month We generally set aside a few minutes at the beginning of the hour for the sharing of joys and sorrows This is a time for members friends and even visitors to our congregation to relate to the entire gathered community Some special event or circumstance that has affected your life or the life of someone close to you in recent weeks or months General announcements news items and particularly in this election season partisan appeals are discouraged during joys and sorrows And so for the next few minutes anyone who wishes is invited to step to the front of the auditorium Light a candle and either of the candle arbor is to my left or my right and then using the microphone Provided by our lay minister share your name if that feels comfortable as well as your brief message Please note that our services are live cast to a larger audience So listeners are not restricted to those who are sitting in this room You may also step forward and wordlessly light a candle of commemoration and then simply return to your seat And so now I open the floor for the sharing of these important and personal matters of our lives And I'd like to begin lighting a candle for Deb Mies who is a coordinator of religious education here at First Unitarian Society and Deb lost her mother last week as in Arizona for the funeral right now so if you'll My name is Ruth and I'm lighting a candle for two purposes for a colleague of mine Whose mother died a couple weeks ago and for my very dear uncle who suffered a significant fall this week My name is Karen and I would like to light a candle for my mother-in-law Elizabeth who is being released from the hospital on Tuesday My name is Don and I'm lighting this candle for the Edgewood High School boys cross-country team Which yesterday at Lake Farm Park? When their second southern badger conference title and as you can tell I'm a little horse Because I was cheering him on I'm Nancy Vetterschultz and I have two joys one to be singing with the festival choir this morning Please do come to our concert, which will be wonderful And my second joy is that I just spent not the last week with the week before with my daughter at Well, if I said it was a meditation retreat you would have the wrong idea We were ecstatic for five days. We weren't quiet and comfortable We were just joyful and I'm I Continue to bring that into my life and I'm so happy about that few of you may know that I'm a career water scientist But my joy is working with the youth group eight Fantastic interns from the youth group have been working on a water justice Project, we've been working very hard for the last couple of months preparing posters and getting ready for Service where we'll be collecting monies for that very worthwhile project. So it's been a tremendous joy for me working on this very important project and I would like to light a candle for a very good friend of mine who is having heart surgery this week and Or if you would like one more candle to represent all of those Unexpressed joys and sorrows that may have occurred to you as others were speaking. We hold those with equal concern in our hearts I invite you to join me in the spirit of meditation From many places and many conditions of the spirit we come today Seeking a center for our lives and a sense of greater wholeness From dry places where words and knowledge seem broken into brittle fragments that do not cohere From overfilled places where information abounds, but there is no real depth of understanding From hard places where feelings are dulled and From lonely hollow places where meaning seems thin Here in this caring and supportive community and in this time of quiet reflection We come to be emptied of all the clatter all 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 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 power for love power for creativity Power for hope and power for transformation and given this brief reprieve from the daily pressures of life May we learn once again to appreciate that every inch of space is a miracle that every instant is a wonder and An opening for new opportunity at this very moment then May our hearts be open to compassion Our minds open to wisdom our spirits open to grace May it be so Amen, and now as we Sing our next Tim 322 verses 1 2 and 5 we invite any children who are present to depart for their classes Thanks, please be seated Once upon a time a little being was sitting by a stream sighing sad and just a little bit frightened and At the same moment as fate would have it Solomon the wise old owl happened to be flying just overhead And during his many years of watching over the well-being of the forest for all the creatures living there Solomon had been of assistance in quite a few situations similar to this one Solomon knew that he could help this sad little being if she wanted him to and so with a turn of his head and a Slight banking of his great wings he swept down and landed ever so lightly alongside a small log On which the little being was seated And to make sure that his arrival was not too startling he began speaking quietly to her even before he had finished folding back his wings My my little one he said in the most gentle tone What on earth could be making you feel so sad? But the little one didn't even look up from the ground let alone speak and so Solomon just acted as though She had answered him and continued on in the most congenial manner. Oh, yes He said yes, for sure. I know exactly how you feel And again he waited for her to at least acknowledge his presence, but still Nothing You know he said There are times when it helps to speak with a friend about one's troubles Especially if that someone happens to know something about them which And he paused just long enough to make sure he had her attention which it just so happens. I do Another moment slowly passed between them and then ever so slowly the little being turned her head Looked up at Solomon their eyes met. He smiled into hers And she must have seen something in his face because she took a deep breath and began to speak All I want she said is to be happy with myself Is that asking for too much the other creatures they seem content with themselves? But this feeling never seems to last for me something always comes along to spoil it And then dropping her head into her little hands. She cried. What on earth is wrong with me? Well, nothing is wrong with you little one Solomon replied, but I do suspect then why she interrupted him Why do so many little things bother me? How come no one seems to understand or appreciate me for who I am and Then and then there is this terrible need to prove myself to everyone not to mention fear that Solomon had heard enough he stepped into her stream of thought hold on just a moment little one Let's not get ahead of ourselves If I'm to help you understand the sorrow of yours, and I'm pretty sure that I can don't you think that we should Introduce ourselves Wouldn't that be a good place to start and without waiting for her to agree. He said my name is Solomon Pleased to meet you. What's your name? Realizing that he was right the little being gathered herself up and sat up straight and said in a small voice My name is someone Really said Solomon now, isn't that an interesting name were you given that name at birth? I Really don't recall she said timidly. I don't think so Well, then how did you come to be called someone who gave you that name? Actually, she said it's it's a little bit foggy But one day one day I found myself wandering through some deep woods, and I remember Wondering at the time how I'd gotten there and and even who I was And then realizing how confused her story must sound to this complete stranger She glanced up at Solomon to see his response, but but he didn't seem surprised at all And so after another deep breath she continued on It was right about then that I had the good fortune of bumping into a very helpful crow by the name of Magnus And he must have known me from some place before because when I told him about all of my confusion He was kind enough to tell me my name And then managing a small smile. She looked at Solomon again waiting for him to smile in return But if he was happy he wasn't showing it Hmm. He said Yes, just as I suspected His tone troubled her I Think I see your problem. I know why you're not able to get along with the other creatures in the forest And what's what's keeping you from being happy with yourself? Well the little being wasn't at all sure that she liked where this conversation was headed She had no interest in hearing Solomon remind her of what she already knew But then after a moment she asked anyway The unintended sarcasm in her voice startling her and just what would that be? Solomon paused choosing his words carefully and finally he replied in measured gentle tones little one You've been lied to About your name Your name is not what you have been told Of all the answers that she could have imagined this was the least likely She felt a jolt a small shock pass through her her heart raced in uneven beats and then catching her breath She swallowed hard and asked what on earth do you mean? I was lied to about my name if my name isn't someone Then what is it? Your real name Solomon replied is Everyone thank you my friends for gifting us with your lovely music Well among their regular contributors to the New York Times op-ed pages, which I read religiously There are a few that routinely peak my curiosity that capture my interest On the other hand I find Paul Krugman to be somewhat repetitive Maureen Dowd rather a cervix David Brooks disingenuous Gale Collins entertaining, but just a little too glib at times But on the other hand I am seldom disappointed with the columns that Charles blow offers up And I suspect that's because blow somehow seems to me to be more authentic than the others that he's more willing to share Something of his own life journey his own inner life with his readers And at no time was that more clearly evident than a month ago when a piece appeared In which blow wrote of the struggles that he had had throughout his life coming to terms with his sexual identity And in that column adapted from his memoirs this esteemed African-american journalist spoke candidly about what it had been like to discover and then try to cope with his bisexuality My world he said had told me that there was nothing worse than not being all one way That any other way was the same as being dead and Blow in that column spoke openly of being sexually abused as a child of Painful attempts to fulfill his desires of the self-flagellation and moral confusion that followed those attempts of His failed first marriage of his repeated refusals to own up to his bisexuality because of the stigma associated with it dishonest dishonorable Scandal prone and disease-ridden that is how the larger culture regards it blow wrote But then in his maturity and after considerable Experimentation and introspection blow does come to terms with the ambiguity of his true nature. I had to stop Romanticizing the man I might have been and be the man that I was he declares Not fitting into other people's definitions of masculinity or their constructs of sexuality But by being uniquely me nurtured in the bosom of nature forged in the fire of life. I Would have to learn to simply relax and be complex be twist in between and Absolutely all right What does it mean to be authentic? Charles blows personal narrative affords a vivid and courageous example And while it is by no means necessary to emulate his exercise in self-disclosure Authenticity does require us to recognize and to accept Unflinchingly the truths that are unique and particular to us It means that one must learn to be comfortable in one's own skin less affected by other people's opinions And blow admits that he himself was terrified of taking this step because as he put it when you cease to wrap yourself in artifice You are naked you are vulnerable But he continues vulnerability is the leading edge of truth For Charles blow becoming authentic was a long drawn-out process requiring that he be ruthlessly honest with himself and completely devoted to the enterprise The process is somewhat analogous to that by which a piece of ancient Chinese porcelain or a newly discovered piece of music Or an ancient manuscript is authenticated Is it the genuine article? Can we prove what it purports to be that it's not just a clever copy? People that undertake this kind of investigation are highly trained. They know what to look for They appreciate the weight that their verdict will carry it can take years to establish the authenticity of such artifacts But this isn't something that many of us really appreciate we convince ourselves that it is not all that difficult to be authentic It's just simply a matter of being ourselves giving free reign to our feelings and our thoughts Let it all hang out That was the expression that people used in the 60s and 70s an ethos that still prevails with some users of today's social media But this kind of uninhibited and unreflective self-disclosure bears little resemblance to authenticity Which always requires some very serious self-scrutiny Who am I? I mean really who am I? That age-old question is where the process starts And it's the title that Yifu Tuan attaches to his memoirs Born in mainland China to upper-class parents Educated in England at Oxford Yifu Tuan distinguished himself as a cultural geographer here at the UW Madison For all of his academic brilliance all of his outward success Yifu Tuan had great difficulty Finding himself ascertaining what it meant in his case to be authentic He recalled being a doctoral student at UC Berkeley and his advisor routinely described him as an Englishman with a Chinese face Which only added to his confusion and so it was announced to the world he writes that I wore a mask While my fellow students had no need of masks. They enjoyed a firm grounding in culture and society In other places Yifu Tuan expresses regret about the absence of a loving partner He never married or of children of his own close friends in his life And to the question who am I the best answer that he can give is I am a geographer In most other respects Yifu Tuan remains something of a mystery to himself But in admitting that he's probably being more authentic than many of us Now as a synonym for integrity Authenticity is clearly an admirable trait to possess and taken in this context the word connotes wholeness the possession of an undivided personality the outward acts and appearances of a person reflect their underlying beliefs and their sentiments their inner self what you see is what you get we say of a person with integrity and So an authentic person is therefore trustworthy someone with whom we know what to expect and So defined the principle doesn't need to be justified its value would seem to us to be self-evident But Charles blow an Yifu Tuan aside This is not how authenticity is often understood in understood in popular culture and and there have been therefore those who find the concept to be very vexing and the pursuit of authenticity problematic Simon Critchley for instance is a philosopher Jameson Webster a psychoanalyst and in a jointly written article Entitled the gospel according to me these authors complain that something of a cult of authenticity has Emerged in recent years by virtue of a highly successful marketing campaign by the self-help industry And as a result they say the quest for authenticity has displaced other more meaningful and socially beneficial endeavors Personal well-being they say has become the primary goal and rather than being the byproduct of some collective project It has become an end in itself What happens when authenticity is overvalued well for one thing it can lead to a kind of solipsism an unhealthy reliance on our own Individual judgment as to what is proper and meaningful and relevant and even truthful and so authenticity The authors warn Needs no reference to anything beyond itself indeed It does not require a belief in anything that might transcend the living of one's own independently conceptualized and adjudicated life The phenomena Critchley and Webster criticize is Hardly a new one For several generations now Americans have insisted on doing their own thing or in keeping with Joseph Campbell's advice following their bliss Troubled by the authenticity the artificiality of the surrounding culture and Unreceptive to the conditions that culture imposes and the claims it seeks to make upon them Disillusioned people have increasingly been walking to the beat of their own drum And this pattern actually goes back much further than Joseph Campbell or James Dean and his rebel without a cause Benjamin Anastas traces it all the way back to the early years of the 19th century and dear old Ralph Waldo Emerson and His essay self-reliance, which is arguably the most influential essay that he ever wrote Most men have bound their eyes with one or another hankerchief Emerson wrote and they have attached themselves to Communities of opinion and this conformity makes them not false in a few particulars. It makes them false in all particulars a Man must carry himself in the presence of all opposition as if everything were titular and ephemeral, but he trust thyself Every heart vibrates to that iron string Now Emerson may have had good reason for staking out this rather extreme position Because social and religious customs exerted a profound influence over individuals in the early 19th century much greater than in more recent times Too much cow-towing to society and to elders have tamed Americans of their natural gifts and sapped them of their courage Emerson suggests and so he urged his countrymen to shake off their shackles and walk as they were meant to without skulking with a swagger in their step and In this light in this light Emerson's admonitions Do make a certain amount of sense but his apathems Emerson's sayings have been repeated so often in the last hundred and fifty years that they have begun to seem to many of us like natural law and Thus we are reluctant reluctant to challenge those principles of self-reliance and authenticity that the sage of conquered imparted to us as his legacy and Yet we need to remember that these principles as important as they might be are not absolute and they should be subjected to certain qualifications like etiquette for instance etiquette a prerequisite for any aspect of civilized life the rules of etiquette constrain Limit the free and open expression of one's thoughts and feelings and opinions for the sake of some overriding social political or spiritual interest We cannot insist on complete authenticity in the public square or in the sanctuary if we expect to live in relative harmony with one another Judith Martin She wrote the column Miss Manners for the Washington Post for many many years She's a recognized expert in this area and she offers in terms of etiquette the example of a Deliberative body where representatives have to argue over contentious issues Now convention dictates that legislatures must disagree respectfully that they must couch their remarks in polite phrases such as My distinguished colleague seems to be unfortunately misinformed Now if that same lawmaker wished to be authentic he or she might say something much more harsh and Thus making a reconciliation of differences that much less likely That such etiquette is essential in our political institutions was underscored in 2009 when President Obama addressed a joint session of Congress and it was televised and I can remember this well and He was heckled by South Carolina's representative Joe Wilson you lie Wilson shouted when the president made a point with which he took exception and it was such an egregious violation of etiquette of Protocol that his colleagues formally rebuked Joe Wilson His South Carolina constituents on the other hand seemed to appreciate his candor Re-electing him handily the following year Etiquette Judith Martin writes Resembles the law in that both require both of them regulate social conduct in the interest of community harmony It recognizes that people may sincerely harbor a great many thoughts a great many feelings that if they were expressed would cause social disruption now this observation is consistent with the complaint that most critics lodge against authenticity that it can excuse preoccupation with the private self and its own projects and to the extent that a person prioritizes his or her own ideas and interests social solidarity can suffer But real real authenticity is different. It needs to be different and it is achieved real authenticity By becoming aware of the contingent nature of the self and its inescapable participation in a web of mutuality Sasha reminded us of this in her sermon of last week when she she suggested that no one can be a whole person By him or herself in the kingdom of God. She said we will be whole because we are together Real wholeness real authenticity comes about when we recognize that legitimate and honest authenticity It isn't just about me It's also about us My name is not someone that as Solomon the wise old owl said is a lie My real name and yours as well is everyone because we are conditioned and defined by our Linkages as much if not more than by any qualities that we have developed independently and Traditional indigenous cultures have not completely forgotten this in studying the wind to Indians of Northern, California The anthropologist Dorothy Lee asked some of the tribal members to share with her their personal stories But much of the narratives that she heard Were focused on the lives of the individuals relatives Because as Lee observed for the wind to the self is not so much a bounded entity It's a concentration of qualities that fade at the edges and give way to other entities And in this sense too Charles blows account of his personal struggle to create a more authentic and thoroughly integrated self That example that story is instructive in Devulging such deeply personal information blow was not I believe was not being self-indulgent He was not pursuing an agenda that excluded others from consideration just the opposite in stepping out He was stepping into solidarity with the larger bisexual community Many of whose members may still be searching for the wholeness that he achieved and By exposing a side of himself that had caused him deep shame blow makes it easier for his readers to embrace Those parts of themselves that they would just as soon hide that they would just as soon disown As Florida Scott Maxwell puts it you need only claim the events of your own life to make yourself yours When you truly possess all that you have been all that you have done Then you become fierce with reality Fears with reality that is as incisive a definition of authenticity as I have heard So equipped with the insight that authenticity Possesses not just a personal but a trans personal character. We can lead lives that are both personally meaningful and socially responsible and so that ancient human question who am I Must lead inevitably to an equally important question Who's am I? Parker Palmer says that anything that one can do on behalf of the true self Is ultimately done in the service of others now Switching gears a little bit Ours is not a tithing tradition Unitarian Universalists are not typically asked to contribute 10% of their income to the church I thought that the following explanation that a Methodist man offers for giving at that level was Interesting however and I offer it as a capstone to all that has preceded To tithe this man told his minister is to tell the truth about who I am If I did not tithe it would say that I am a person who has nothing to give a Person who has received nothing from life a Person who did not matter in the largest society a person whose life's meaning was in providing for his needs alone But in fact, he says I am the opposite of all these things. I am a person who has something to give I am a person who has received abundantly from life I am a person whose presence matters in the world And I am a person whose life has meaning because I am connected to and I care about things that are larger than myself And so he says if I did not tithe I would lose track of these truths About who I am and that my friend is the real deal Which is another phrase that we often use when we are in the presence of generous and genuine authenticity And in that spirit of generosity, I invite you now to tithe into our offering plates Please be seated for the benediction in the postlude and Before offering the benediction, I would like to note that the day has arrived select to connect is Going to be spread out throughout the commons There are over 40 different meals and types of entertainment and activities for you to choose from a great opportunity To meet people that you don't know in the congregation established new friendships and relationships So as you go out and enjoy your coffee and your other drinks please look around at the descriptions of these various events and Sign on they're going fast that last night the Saturday people were very very enthusiastic about it And we hope you will be too So we close with these words from John O'Donohue May all that is unforgiven in you be released May your fears yield to their deepest tranquilities May all that is unlived in you blossom into a future graced with love May it be so