 Good morning and welcome to First Unitarian Society of Madison. Good morning and welcome to another Wisconsin winter. And to another Sunday at First Unitarian Society, where independent thinkers gather in a safe nurturing and warm environment to explore issues of social, spiritual, and ethical significance as we try to make a difference in this world. Speaking of things that are different in this world, I'm Steve Goldberg, a proud, good-looking, multi-talented member of this congregation. And it's my special pleasure to offer an extra warm welcome to any guests, visitors, or newcomers. If this is your first time at First Unitarian Society, I think you'll find that this is a special place. And if you'd like to learn more about our special buildings, we'll be offering a guided tour after today's service. Those gather over here by the windows following the service, and we'll take good care of you. Speaking of taking care of each other, this is a perfect time to silence those pesky electronic devices that you just won't need for the next hour because you'll be sitting back or leaning forward to enjoy today's service, which I know will touch your heart, stir your spirit, and trigger one or two new thoughts. We're really glad that you're here today, and we'd like to invite you now to join in a moment of centering silence so we can be fully present with each other this morning. As we gather to worship together, I bring words from the Gretchen, from the Reverend Gretchen Haley. In a world that feeds on moral outrage, we are here to cultivate moral courage. In a time that prizes picking sides, we gather to draw a wider circle. And in a culture that teaches us to get for what we give, and to ask what is in it for me, we come to practice generosity, and to remember we are all in this together. And we are all in this together as we sing our first hymn, number 212, We Are Dancing Sarah's Circle. Please rise for spirit. We are dancing Sarah's Circle. We are dancing Sarah's Circle. We are dancing Sarah's Circle. Sisters, brothers, we can find, we can find our history. Please remain up for our lighting of the chalice which is printed in your order of service. Again from the Reverend Gretchen Haley, we say, in the midst of life's bitterness, we choose to sing, to give thanks, to laugh together, and to be keepers of beauty, to offer a place of belonging for all who come in gladness and in pain, to resist the push to the next moment and the next, to slow down, to breathe more deeply, to feel a part of something greater for this hour and in this space. Let us be the change we wish to see. Come, let us worship together. Please turn to your neighbors and give them a warm welcome. Once to see a story up close, good morning, it's so good to see all of you. I am seeing you with my eyes which have circles in them. Two circles, we have a pupil and an iris, yes. And today we are talking about circles and our circles are everywhere and that's what this book is about. It's called All Around Us, but before we read that book I want us to do some circles with our bodies. So make a circle with your hands. You can do this out in the audience and at home too if you want. A circle with your hands, can you see the circle? Now turn your fingers down on the top a little bit. Do you see the heart now? That's why I think that circles are about loves. Now let's make a circle with our hands, let's give ourselves a hug. It's a very small circle. Someone said it's not a circle. I guess you have to use your imagination. And then what if you make a circle, let's say you're going to give your parents a hug or your best friend, except a really big person. So it has to be a really big circle with your hands like this, yes. And then there is the moon up in the sky that is super round. So we're going to hug the moon. You have to use your imagination, don't you? Yeah. Then we just kind of bring our hands down and rest. So those signs, those movements go with a song that Drew is going to teach us after we read this story. So this story is called All Around Us. It's about circles. I know. Yeah. I know, he says. Grandpa says circles are all around us. We just have to look for them. He points to the rainbow that rises high in the sky after a thunder cloud has come. He traces the colorful arc with his hand and says, can you see that? It's only half the circle. The rest of the circle is down below in the earth, where there's water and light and new life. That is the part of the circle we cannot see. But in my mind, I try. She was using her imagination just like we were. Grandpa and I work side by side in the garden, planting flowers and pulling vegetables. Raise your hand if you've ever been in a garden. It's interesting to think about circles in the garden. This is what Grandpa says. He saves the stems and leaves and seeds to bury back in the ground. This is another circle, he says. What we take from the earth, we return. Then he draws a circle on his belly. Can you do that? And then he draws a little circle on mine and says we even have circles inside. So we have to use our imaginations for that too. This of course makes me laugh because he is drawing a circle on her belly. Then they go outside for a walk in the neighborhood. And they start looking for circles. Now do you see any circles in this room? What do you see? Lights that chime over there, that gong, my earrings, the candles, the microphone tip. I saw a special circle over there this morning with our musician. That was pretty cool, a drum, yes. And in this picture, do you see the sun? That is a circle too. Look at this. On the next page we have our eyes, just like we were talking about earlier. We stare at the green and brown rings in each other's eyes for a long time and then we laugh again. These right circles are everywhere. I'll show you one more important circle before the big ground moon comes out, says grandpa. We walk way back in our yard and it is under a tall pecan tree. Grandpa seems sad when he sits here because this is where we bury the ashes of our ancestors. I don't remember them, but he does. Then our bodies return to the earth, he says and pats the ground with his big hands. Can you pat the ground? But that's only half the circle, that's the part we cannot see. Finally, we walk to the front and water our smallest tree. Grandpa planted it for me the day I was born and everything that fed me while I grew in my mother's belly is buried at the roots. I love bringing water to the apple tree. It is already taller than I am. I'll pat my head. Some people last night said our heads are circles. Do you see my child? He says we have new life with you. I am part of the circle too, the part that we can see, just like a rainbow. And our mouths are kind of circles and we're going to use our mouths to learn a new song with Drew. And you and I are going to help with motions, okay? This is where you help with the circles that we sing. I have a reading from Bruce Marshall entitled Radical Hospitality. He writes, let me suggest an image, a table, a long table where people gather to eat. It doesn't have to be fancy with expensive china and chandeliers hanging above. In fact, it's better to be less imposing. Maybe a picnic table outdoors on a warm day, imagine that. When I was growing up in central Illinois, we often had summer dinners outside. It gets hot in that part of the country and we didn't have air conditioning. By the approach of evening, the day's heat was still trapped inside the house. But outside, cool breezes began to set in. My mother and father, sister and I, and my grandmother, who lived upstairs, gathered at the picnic table outside for dinner. Dinners outside were different. The air was fresher. You could breathe deeply. Everything came more easily and it often continued after the food was gone. We could relax and be ourselves. Usually, it was just the five of us at the picnic table for dinner, but sometimes there were visitors, relatives, a friend, someone new to town who my parents thought to invite. To accommodate them, we brought out more tables and set them in a row. On one such occasion, a visiting relative from Germany had his first encounter with watermelon. He exclaimed in surprise, I have never tasted anything so wet. What I'm envisioning for this imaginary table is a table with plenty of room. We'll set places for each person we expect to join us and we'll put out a few extra settings for others who might arrive unannounced without an invitation whose names might not appear on the guest list. Isn't that a little frightening to include strangers who might be disruptive or dangerous or might not share our social graces? Well, yes, it can be uncomfortable, strangers at our table. In our lives today, we are taught to fear strangers, turning on the TV or the online news or read the paper. Strangers blow up airplanes, compete for us, for jobs with us, steal our money and our identities. We devote considerable energy to protecting ourselves from those who are not like us. So here we are. Excuse me, here we are walking. Here we are welcoming them to our table. But this is radical hospitality, hospitality that returns us to our roots, and the roots of hospitality involve not just inviting friends and family, not just those who you share outlook and value, but also strangers and outcasts. In the Christian story, Jesus was accused of inviting people from the margins to his table, sinners, tax collectors, those who would normally not be welcome at a dinner party. In radical hospitality, we greet the stranger. We invite them into our lives, even though it can be uncomfortable. We honor that person's worth and dignity and our own. As we open ourselves to who they are, what their stories are, how life looks through their eyes, we stretch ourselves to accommodate this stranger's view of the world. As leaders, we offer hospitality even to strangers we do not fully understand. Even the stranger, deserves to be heard, has value and receive welcome. There is something special about saying circle round. For me, it conjures up images of campfires with marshmallows, complete with tall tales and laughter spewing forth. Or maybe circle round brings up images of a raucous family reunion with the storyteller at the center, captivating the imaginations and the memories of the listeners gathered around. In either scenario, there is a real sense of belonging. Today we gather around the warm glow of our chalice to hear stories about belonging and expanding and love, and so that we may consider the impact of these stories on our lives and remember that everything is held in love. Belonging is our theme for the month of October, and it's not much of a stretch to see how circles represent belonging. Consider all the ways we use that word circle. Social circles, political circles, journey circles here at FUS allow for small groups spiritual deepening. I also think of people singing in circles and making beautiful music together, or dancing in circles like how we were dancing in Sarah's circle earlier. And listening circles, they are a part of a method for restorative justice. All of these circles are examples of belonging in our various communities and subgroups. It sure feels good to belong, doesn't it? I recently came across a post on Facebook that takes that idea, that feeling of belonging and it augments it. Unitarian Universalist Minister Reverend Scott Taylor notes that, the true blessing of belonging isn't that you get to come inside the circle, it's that you get to participate in expanding it. The truly healing question is not just where can I find belonging, but also how can I become belonging for others? That's a wonderful and curious question. How can I become belonging for others? How can we here at FUS or elsewhere in our lives become belonging for others? Well, maybe that is what UU Minister Bruce Marshall was talking about in the reading that I offered earlier. Radical hospitality is about becoming belonging for others. It means putting out a few extra places for others who might arrive unannounced. And it even means being uncomfortable with strangers at our table, so to speak. This feels particularly timely because last night we had our first potluck. On the second Saturday of every month through most of the program year we will be having these community meals. And as is the case for most community meals where I attend, it's a little awkward at first. When we engage in radical hospitality, we feel uncomfortable with the folks at our table, the folks who have circled round. But that's okay. Marshall reminds us that radical hospitality is in the roots of our Unitarian Universalist faith. He references how Jesus was accused of inviting people from the margins to the table. Sinners, tax collectors, those who would normally not be welcome at a dinner party. Jesus was becoming belonging for the social outcasts of his day. In many ways that was his theological statement. You too belong here. You too are saved by love. We Unitarian Universalists follow in that tradition when we honor each person's worth and dignity as well as our own. We open ourselves to the strangers who are among us. We open ourselves to their stories, to how the world looks through their eyes. We stretch ourselves to accommodate this person's view of life. We are expanding the circle to become belonging for our neighbors. We also see this expansion of a circle when we fast forward 18th centuries from the days of the early Jesus movement to the days of Edwin Markham. Born in 1852, Markham was poet laureate of Oregon from 1923 to 1931. In Unitarian Universalist circles, we know Markham for the short poem he wrote, the one that gets recited as an example of universalist beliefs about love, salvation, acceptance, and belonging. Complete with the original male pronouns, it goes like this. He drew a circle that shut me out, heretic, rebel, a thing to flout. But love and I had the wit to win. We drew a circle that took him in. This redrawing of the circle, this redefinition of boundaries of who is in and who is out, this is powerful work indeed. Our Universalist ancestors offer us a radical understanding of belonging, a belief that there is a love large enough to include everyone. Let me muddy the waters though. While there may indeed be a love that is big enough to include everyone, that does not mean it is easy or simple. In fact, I have some hard questions to ask about circles and belonging. What about, for example, when we are the ones about which the campfire's tall tales are being told, when the funny stories told by the powerful are actually harmful lies about the powerless? Or what if family reunions are not just uncomfortable but harmful to our health? Or perhaps we're not even invited because we've been disowned. These sorts of circles are about not belonging. For some of us, we're not even in the circle, and that is painful. Similarly, there are experiences about boundaries and belonging that go beyond the personal to the political, the historical. It is, after all, the weekend before Indigenous People's Day on Monday. What does it mean to belong given the historical context of colonization in which we live? Who belongs? And where? Back in June of this year, officials of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and elected leaders and citizens of the Ho-Chunk Nation dedicated a new heritage marker that was placed on campus, on Bascom Hill. The plaque was a joint effort, and it reads as follows. The University of Wisconsin-Madison occupies ancestral Ho-Chunk land, a place their nation has called Dejope since time immemorial. In an 1832 treaty, the Ho-Chunk were forced to cede this territory. Decades of ethnic cleansing followed when both the federal and state government repeatedly, but unsuccessfully, sought to forcibly remove the Ho-Chunk from Wisconsin. The history of colonization informs our shared future of collaboration and innovation. Today, UW-Madison respects the inherent sovereignty of the Ho-Chunk Nation along with the 11 other First Nations of Wisconsin. Let me repeat that year, 1832. That was a year that the Ho-Chunk people were forced to cede this territory, including this land on which we are worshiping today. 1832. That was just 20 years before the poet Edwin Markham was born. So the question is, who is drawing the circle? Who is in power? Who is deciding? Who is in? And who is out? The Reverend Alicia Ford is a contemporary Unitarian Universalist who gets at some of these same questions in her piece, We Are Not Guests. Though lengthy, it is worth sharing in its entirety. She writes, am I a guest here, here in this house? Are you? Are we guests here, here in this house? And whose house do we inhabit? In the small world of our lives, the borders between us, the easements, fences, gates, hedges, they serve to delineate, to separate us, to remind us of where my property begins and ends, and where your property begins and ends. If you cross over, you are a trespasser, or a guest in my house. You've worked to own this small plot of land and the house erected on it. You have claimed it, it is now part of yourself, your definition of self, your identity. If I cross over your fences, I am a trespasser or a guest in your house. What does it mean then that in 1845, the United States crossed over into Mexico and took half of that country, took land, resources, labor? Was the U.S. trespasser or guest? Are there to be no consequences for taking what does not belong to you, she writes? Should we simply forget whose house we inhabit? To speak of hospitality in immigration often erases historical context. The actions of the past that have led us step by step into this current predicament. Professor Miguel de la Torre writes, perhaps it might be more accurate to speak of the responsibility of restitution rather than the virtue of hospitality. Hospitality in this case implies that the house belongs to us, that the land, the resources that are part of this house is ours, and we who now live here are being virtuous in our willingness to share. It erases the history that would have us remember that those who cross the border today, those choosing to brave the harsh conditions of the desert, those who face the possibility of death, imprisonment, deportation, criminalization, they are doing so because the U.S. once crossed their borders to extract their resources and labor. It is for them a matter of survival. It is for the U.S. a matter of restitution. Reverend Ford's continues, the prospect of restitution is scary. Where do we begin? With Mexico? With Native Americans? With territories? With the descendants of those who were enslaved? How do we acknowledge and address the complexities of our history present and, if we're not conscious, future of dominance? What would right relationship look like? What would unilateral conditions and considerations would make restitution possible? And for us, unitarian universalists, what would it mean for us to shake off the idea of hospitality as a central principle that is often attached to immigration and delve into the concept of restitution? Whose house do we inhabit? For we are not guests. Nor are we hosts. What then is our responsibility? So, we have some unitarian universalists who are advocating for radical hospitality for the expansion of the circle. This call implies an inner circle identity or positionality. Other UUs call for drawing the circle wider, even if it means we are drawing the circle from outside of its original location. And still other unitarian universalists acknowledge the limits of a version of hospitality which is attached to immigration, one in which we hosts are being virtuous in our willingness to share. This call acknowledges power dynamics and advocates for a larger justice, one grounded in taking responsibility, one based in restitution. Because we belong to a faith tradition that values the inherent worth and dignity of every person, and that believes in a circle big enough for everyone, a circle large enough to hold us all, then it seems to me that it is possible to listen to all of these calls at the same time. Yes, we should absolutely offer radical hospitality when we are in a position to do so. And yes, we should absolutely draw the circle wide enough to include even those who have done us wrong without condoning their actions. And yes, we should absolutely take responsibility to offering restitution, and in doing so help to repair the circle. Like we were sharing with the kids, there is a large, a love large enough for everything to belong. I'm held by this love. You are held by this love. All that we love is held by this love. Indeed everything, even that which is beyond our comprehension, is held by this love. Now that song ends with, may we rest in this love. May we rest in this love. And as we rest in this love, may we be renewed, for there are circles to expand. And together, we are called to do the work of this world, ensuring that everyone knows belonging. Blessed be, and amen. One way we help to expand the circle is by sharing our offering each week. And this week, our outreach offering goes to Native Vote, which in 2011, the Wisconsin conservation voices worked with the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa to stop an open pit mine produced near their community in northern Wisconsin. So that partnership turned into a highly successful nonpartisan voter engagement project that has since spread to many Wisconsin Native communities. And our offering today will be shared with that organization. I invite you into a time of giving and receiving. Thank you for including your generous giving in our circle of First Unitarian Society. That same spirit of giving and completing the circle is exemplified by the people who volunteer to make sure that these services run smoothly. So let's make sure that we express appreciation to the following individuals for their volunteering today. Running the sound system to make sure you can hear everything. Thank you to Creel Zeering. Thank you to our lay minister and Smiley. Our friendly, upbeat, smiling greeter today has been Gal Bliss. And our ushers, Marty Hollis, Cynthia Nolan, Paul Abramson and Prudy Stewart, thanks to all four of those individuals. And providing radical hospitality in the kitchen, preparing coffee, Bissnitschke and Teresa Rademacher. Staffing the welcome table, you'll find Mary Bergen to answer any questions you might have. And our tour guide is John Powell. So again, if you're interested in learning more about our special buildings, John Powell is the consummate tour guide and he will host you over here at the windows right after the service. Just a couple announcements. Please be sure to leave your hymnals in the chairs so that the 11 o'clock participants can enjoy them. The second announcement involves another kind of circle, the journey circles. And Karen mentioned those briefly during her remarks. The signup for those journey circles continues. These are theme-based small groups that meet every month and there's room for more of you in those journey circles. You can find information and registration form in the commons following the service. And you can see how gray the day is right now. But at 12.30, there'll be a ribbon cutting to mark the opening of our solar panels. And maybe that will invite sunnier skies in the future. So 12.30 this afternoon for that ribbon cutting, so endeth the announcements. Each week we take time to hold in our hearts and in our shared space the cares of this community, which if you would like to write in our book, it's outside of the sanctuary every week. Today, no, nothing was written but that does not mean that we do not bring things on our minds and hearts with us into this room. I know my week has been full and I invite us into some time just to consider all those in our lives who are impacted by worry or health issues, by fear or concern, by hurt. And to also hold up the joys of new jobs or new life, new possibilities, celebrations of love, the circle of life has so much for us to experience and together we hold that. May we remember that no matter what we are holding, we are not alone in that. We are part of a web of life that makes us one with all of humanity and all of the universe. May we be grateful for the miracle of life that we share and the hope that gives us the power to care, to remember and to love. And in the spirit of community, we get to sing together one final time. Him number 155, circle round for freedom will be our closing hymn. 155, I invite you to rise in all the ways that we do. The melody is printed in the middle staff. That's what I'll be singing. You can sing whatever you want. Let's do that one more time together. We prepare to move back out into the larger circle of the wider world. May we remember that we circle round for freedom so that we can keep the circle whole for everyone. We extinguish our chalice remembering in the words of John Donahue that to belong, to be human is to belong. Until we circle round together again, I invite you to go in peace. And before we do that, I invite you to sit down for one last gift of music.