 What picture comes into mind when I say Buddhist monk? For me, the picture that comes immediately to mind is Tich Nhat Hanh, the kindly, compassionate, 95-year-old Vietnamese monk and peace activist. I'm guessing that many of you maybe had a similar picture come to your mind. Here's another picture of a Buddhist monk. This is a monk from Sri Lanka, the island country off the southeast coast of India. He leads a group called Bodu Balasena, Army of Buddhist power. He is an ardent Buddhist nationalist who verbally attacks Muslims and Hindus and has been implicated in violence against Muslims. Buddhist nationalism in Sri Lanka has been shaped by a sacred scripture called the Mahavamsa that dates to the sixth century of the common era. This tells the story of a young Buddhist prince in Lanka who led an army against the invading Hindus from India. He, at the front of the army, he carried a spear which had a Buddha relic on its tip, 500 monks marching beside him into glorious, victorious battle. This powerful myth has been a key foundation of the brutal civil war between the mostly Buddhist singles and the mostly Hindu tomos. The civil war raged from 1983 to 2009. The army of Buddhist power emerged a few years after the end of the civil war when the singles Buddhist won the war. And it attempted, it's been attempting to preserve and consolidate Buddhist power, which it's been quite successful in. Thich Nhat Hanh tells a very different Buddhist story about a different prince, Siddhartha, who gave up worldly goods and power to share a message of peace and serenity and compassion. Stories matter. Stories have power. A story composed 1500 years earlier helped propel a civil war in Sri Lanka. The Lost Cause story proclaimed by white supremacists around 1900 in our country helped propel Jim Crow segregation in a century later, the January 6th insurrection. Trumpists are using a new Lost Cause story, the story of an election stolen to propel a Trump comeback. Whether there is truth in a story does not matter. Stories can of course be used for good as well. I think of the story of Rosa Parks sitting on that seat in the bus, not going to be moved by the forces of segregation. A story that helped propel the civil rights movement. Stories shape, make, break. Not just nations and movements, but also communities and individuals. Stories can motivate, instigate, immobilize, or even curse us. I picked the key, the book Keep the Lights Burning Abbey today for the message of all ages because there's no doubt that that story that Abbey lived as a child was a source of strength. A source that shaped her for the rest of her life. It matters what stories we tell. Today through music, we're hearing part of the stories of Linda's and Heather's and Drew's mothers. Here's a story, a little of the story of my own mother. My mother's story began with a big mystery. She was adopted right after being born. And she never had any interest whatsoever as an adult in finding anything about her birth parents. The fact that she was adopted wasn't revealed to my siblings and I until each of us turned around 12 years old. There was this big revelation and then it was clear that was not a topic for continued discussion. I really never talked again to my mother about that. January 1st of this year was the 10th anniversary of my mom's death. I kind of thought ahead of that that once she died I might do some genealogical research and find out about her birth parents. But I haven't and probably won't and I don't think my siblings have either. There's a hole in my mom's story that is likely to always be there. My mom's adoptive family was not all sweetness and light. Reading between the lines it seems likely to me that her adoptive mother had an untreated mental illness. My mom had a warmer relationship with her adoptive father. But I'm sure he had his hands full as a newspaper cartoonist during the depression trying to keep his family together economically and emotionally. She had no siblings other than some imaginary ones called the dims. She blamed when she got in trouble. She had a grandmother who lived with her family and showered her with love. Grandma Fulton is one of the heroes of the story. Overall I have the sense that my mom had a rather rough start to her life. I think she probably learned a lot of skills in that difficulty that served her well in life. Perseverance, independence, a fierce loyalty to family. I'd say other skills that she needed to survive as a child maybe didn't serve her as well as an adult and in herself that she didn't easily share a stiff upper lip. Unlike my mom, my own story had a very clear beginning, a remembered beginning. I was born on the third Sunday of Advent in December of 1962 around 6 a.m. My dad's brother-in-law was the first person to greet me as I came out of my mother's body. He was my mother's OBGYN. My dad was at the hospital when I was born but not in the room like was common in that day. He saw me through a window in the nursery and then went off to church where he played the organ at Children's Chapel Service at 11 o'clock that morning. I had jaundice so I stayed in the hospital for eight days. My mom stayed most or all of that time. I have the sense that with five kids now she was glad to have a little bit of respite in the hospital. To be honest my parents gave me even more information about my beginning that I really wanted when they told me one time that they went on a cruise about nine months before I was born. How different all this is from my mom not knowing much of anything about her beginning. The whole in her story is a major part of her story even if she wouldn't talk about it. Well a congregation is a place for stories. One of the things I love about congregational ministry is hearing people's stories. The power of people's stories was palpable when I returned to the Fox Valley UU fellowship in Appleton which I served for 25 years after an absence of about four and a half years. My successor invited me back to be part of a celebration of my being named Emeritus Minister. The receiving line after a Saturday night reception and the two Sunday services felt endless. People mostly moved along in the line but they very quickly updated me on their stories. They knew I wasn't their minister anymore. I didn't have the feeling that many of them wanted pastoral care from me. They just wanted to share the next chapters of their story with someone who had been part of their story or had heard their story for a chunk of years. It was pretty amazing to hear hundreds of next chapters in such stories during that receiving line. Linda, Heather, Drew and I share stories about our mothers today as an invitation to you to contemplate your mothers and if you are a mother to think about yourself as mother. We acknowledge that many of the stories are complicated. Some no doubt have a lot of pain and heartache in them. We make space today for the stories of birth mothers and adoptive mothers, for foster mothers and chosen substitute mothers. We also make space for those who want or wanted to be mothers but could not. We make space for mothers who had miscarriages and stillborn babies. We honor all of these stories and so many more I have not named. All of these stories, even the ones we don't share with other people, make us who we are in this congregation of souls. So this is a good place to think about how your interpretation of your stories impacts your life. Are your stories helping you live a whole and healthy life? Are some of them in need of refreshing, reframing or reinterpretation? That kind of reflection would help those Buddhist nationalists in Sri Lanka question the stories that have been guiding and motivating them. Here at First Unitarian Society in Madison, we are also part of a collective story that began in 1879. A story that stretches now beyond us, hopefully at least another 142 years. There are obvious milestones in this story, the founding of course and the bond of union that was adopted at the outset. The decision to leave the old building downtown and move to the west side to a new building designed by the world's most prominent and famous architect. The growth that began when Max Gabler was senior minister and took off when Michael Shuler was senior minister. The ambitious beautiful atrium edition where we're filming the service today. These are just a few of the stories, there are so many stories, big and little, that make up what FUS is today. The last three years have been a sort of interlude chapter in the story of FUS. All stories have these critical moments of transition. They are liminal spaces full of possibility and also danger. And even though they are interludes, they are incredibly important chapters in the unfolding story of a congregation. That's why I feel called to enter a ministry. This interlude chapter here at FUS has not been easy. You have done some difficult work together. You've done good work together. It feels like a lot's been accomplished this past year, but it's really important to say that these accomplishments are embedded in the work that you did during the first two years of the interim period. I know a lot of you were not happy about this transition period going an additional year. No doubt I'm biased, but I think it was the right move. I don't think that the kind of feeling and spirit and excitement about possibility that you had during Candidating Week and the parish meeting last week where you voted to call Reverend Kelly Weisman, asked Ruth Jackson to join Reverend Kelly Crocker as co-senior minister. I don't think all of that would have been possible a year ago. I think it's really good that you waited a year. So friends, this long interlude chapter is winding down. You are poised for a next exciting, wondrous chapter which is not to say it will be perfect or without some moments of challenge and even struggle. But you are ready. You are ready. I'll be here a few more months, but I feel moved this morning to share a good word from another really good story. Go, my friends, and fulfill your destiny. It made the Force be with you.