 A little bit more of that vaults that, you know, and so I thought it was very interesting, you know, very beautiful, and everyone knows it was such a good piece. Oh, she was there? Yeah, it was interesting. She was interesting. Like it's tight. I mean, all I can say is, it's simple. I think it's really interesting. Just a music lover. Please join me for a few moments of centering silence. We sing our in-gathering hymn, which is number 300, and the words are found in your order of service. Welcome to the 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 Karen Rose Gredler, and on behalf of the entire congregation, I would like to extend a special welcome to any visitors who are with us this morning. We are a welcoming congregation, so whomever you are and wherever you happen to be on 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 from the center doors of this auditorium. Bring your drinks and your questions. Members of our staff and my ministry will be on hand to welcome you. You may also look for people holding teal blue colored stoneware coffee mugs. These are FUS members knowledgeable about our faith community who would welcome visiting with you. Experienced guides are generally available to give a building tour after each service. And I understand there is a guide who will be available today after the service. Please meet that person over there on what's your left side of the auditorium by the windows there. If you'd like to take a tour of our sustainably designed addition or the national landmark meeting house across the parking lot. We welcome children to stay for the duration of this service. However, because it's difficult for some in attendance to hear in this very lively acoustical environment, our child Haven back in that corner and the commons outside the auditorium are great places to go. If your child wants to talk, sing, dance, run around, do and say normal child things during the service. And you can still see and hear very well from those areas. This would also be a fantastic time to turn off any devices that might cause a disturbance during the hour, especially cell phone ringers, however much we may enjoy those cute little songs. I'd now like to acknowledge those individuals who help make our services run smoothly. We have Chip Quade doing our sound high chip who pitched in at the very last minute this morning. Thank you very much. Our lame ministers for this service are Tom Boykoff and John McEvna. Our greeter is Claire Box. Our ushers are Paula Ault, Brian Connis, Gail Bliss and Gail Henslin. Making coffee for hospitality hour is Lois Evensson. And John Powell will be the tour guide you would meet over in this part of the auditorium. I do have, well first, I call your attention to the announcements in the red floor insert in your order of service. And I do have a very few announcements I would like to highlight. The first one is that the Capital Times editor and FUS member, Paul Fanlon, would like to extend an invitation to attend the Cap Times Idea Fest next weekend and as his guest. Anyone associated with FUS can go to thecaptimesideafest.com and use Paul Fanlon, wait, Paul Fanlon guest, all one word, as your code for free admission. That's very nice, thank you. See Michael Shuler after the service if you have any questions. Another announcement is the Music Director Search Committee, has begun the task of finding our new Music Director and they are interested in knowing your thoughts regarding our music program and the role it plays here at FUS. There is a table set up for you to visit after the service today, over by, it says the coffee machines, I guess they're machines, but they're being filled by Lois. Please do stop by, discuss your thoughts, fill out a note or complete the prepared survey sharing your ideas and wishes. As a founding congregation of the Dane Sanctuary Coalition, all members of FUS are invited to attend the first coalition meeting. It will take place next Sunday, September 17 at 7 p.m. at Madison Christian Community on Old Sock Road. Also, one more, please remember to leave your hymnals on your seats after this service and then they'll be there for the next folks. Thank you very much. I believe that's it, don't want to leave anything out. Nope, that's it. Again, welcome. We trust today's service will stimulate your mind, touch your heart and stir your spirit. My name is T.K. Browning, as the name tag says that I forgot to take off. I'm the new ministerial intern. Some people might remember me from 2012 to 2014 when I, along with my family, were members here of the congregation. We've been in Texas for a few years where I got my degree, my ministerial degree, and I have the opening words today. These opening words are from Vern Barnett. On the cusp of autumn as we gather as members of the great congregation whose membership embraces all humanity, whose temple is the world, the world of nature, of history, of inner self, our faith is to proclaim the sacred presence of life for every person is a child of the universe. Beyond all barriers of age, race, nation, class, creed, gender, ableness, or loyalty. We arise within each other, rely upon each other, and secure in ourselves and are secure in ourselves only when all are secure and free. Our covenant is to lift the burden of every oppression. Open the locks of every captivity, heal grief and anger, and live in communion with all persons. Thus do we resolve to honor the planet, each person, and our own capacity to shape a better future. And on this day we hold in our thoughts the people of Houston in the wake of Hurricane Harvey and of the Caribbean islands in Florida as Hurricane Irma continues its approach. We'll now have the lighting of the chalice by Karen up here with me to do that. You can find these words in your order of service, would you all mind standing and reading them with me? Ours is a faith in people, hope for tomorrow's child, confidence in a continuity that spans all time. It looks not to a perfect heaven, but toward a good earth. It is respectful of the past, but not limited to it. It is trust in growing and conspiracy with change. It is spiritual responsibility for a moral tomorrow. And now I invite you to turn to your neighbors and greet the good people beside you. And now I invite all the children forward or the children at heart. That's a thing. All the children come up for a story to be able to see right there. All right, just a couple today, just a few. We're going to be reading a story. The pictures are going to be up on the screen if you can see it. It's called Good People Everywhere, and it's by Linnea Gellin. Today, in neighborhoods all over the world, millions and millions of people are doing very good things. Who can count to a million? Can anybody count to a million? Take a while. Today, carpenters are building fences and houses and repairing homes that have been damaged by storms, like the hurricanes that recently hit Texas and Louisiana. Today, moms and dads are cooking dinners for their families, and cooks are working in kitchens, making meals for people who do not have homes. Doctors and midwives are delivering babies and gently passing them into the eager arms of their parents. Teachers are teaching math, spelling, and reading skills. Musicians are opening their hearts and playing beautiful music, and dancers are leaping across the dance floor, practicing performances that will bring joy to their friends and families and their communities. Today, people are planting seeds, picking fruits and vegetables, and driving them to grocery stores all around the world so you can have a ripe, juicy orange in your lunch. Anyone like oranges? Today, a child is trying her very best to do well on her science tests, and a teenage boy is helping a young child who is sad and lonely. Today, a first grade boy. Who's in first grade? Nice. Today, a first grade boy is helping a friend who has a skin knee, and a big sister. Who's a big sister? Oh, nice. It is holding her baby brother while her mother runs across the street to help a neighbor. Today, millions and millions of people will do very good things, and so will you. I wonder what you will do. Has anyone done anything good lately? Want to tell me what good thing they've done? Alright, what have you got? You went to the zoo? That's good. Picked the kale. That's a good Unitarian. Good thing they did. You got homework right there? What have you got? Garlic mustard. That's a good Universalist. You got a TV? What have you got, bud? You got your gardening? You're growing some things in your garden? Great. You got one more? One more. You helped cook? That's real nice. Alright, now we are going to head off to classes. Sorry, I don't want to do a few more. Okay, let's do two more. One more. You saved a house from burning? That's good. Solid. And one more back there. What have you got? Alright, we're going to head off to classes, and we're going to be singing hymn number 182, The Beauty in Life. Oh, you're picking carrots. I'm sorry. Please be seated. So we continue our service now with a selection from Herman Melville's well-known novelette, Billy Budd. And if you remember that particular story from your high school literature classes, Billy Budd is a sailor in the British Royal Navy. And he has been falsely accused of conspiring to mutiny. And the accuser is the ship's jealous and abusive master, sergeant at arms, John Cleggart. Billy is enraged by this false accusation, and he strikes Cleggart in the forehead and inadvertently kills him. And the crew and the captain personally believe that Billy's act was probably justified, and yet protocol does demand that a court-martial aboard ship be held. So here, in the context of that court-martial, is Captain Veer, the captain of the vessel speaking. Your scruples, he says to the crew, do they move as in the dusk? Challenge them. Make them advance and declare themselves. Come now. Do they import something like this? If, mindless of palliating circumstances, we are bound to regard the death of the master at arms as the prisoner's deed, then does that constitute a capital crime, whereof the penalty should be a mortal one. But in natural justice is nothing but the prisoner's overt act to be considered. How can we adjudge to summary and shameful death a fellow creature innocent before God and whom we feel to be so? Does that state it right? Your sad assent signals that it does. Well, I too feel that way. I feel the full force of that argument. It is natural. But do these brass buttons that we wear attest that our allegiance is to nature? No, to the king. Though the ocean which is in violent nature primeval, though this be the element where we move and have our being as sailors, yet as the king's officers, our duty lies in that sphere. So little is it true that this is a circumstance involving natural law that we have ceased to be natural agents. Indeed, let me ask, when war is declared, are we as commissioned fighters previously consulted about its justice? No, we fight at command. If our judgments approve the war, that's just coincidence. So too is this the case in other particulars. So now, for suppose condemnation to follow these present proceedings, would it be so much we ourselves that would condemn or would it be the martial law operating through us? For that law and the rigor of it, we are not responsible. Our vowed responsibility is this, that however pitilessly the law may operate in any instance, we nevertheless adhere to it and we must administer it. The second reading in a rather different vein but related to today's theme is from Harvey Cox, an essay that he wrote in 1999 and titled The Market as God. Harvey Cox was for many years a professor in the Divinity School at Harvard University and he's the author of many books on the interface of religion and culture. Since the earliest stages of human history, there have been bazaars and there have been Rialtos and there have been trading posts. All of these are markets. But the market was never God because there were other centers of value, other centers of meaning, there were other gods. The market operated within a plethora of other institutions that restrained it. As Karl Polanyi has demonstrated in his classic work The Great Transformation, only in the past two centuries has the market risen above these other demagogues and phonic spirits to become today's first cause. Initially, the market's rise to Olympian supremacy replicated the gradual ascent of Zeus above all the other deities in the ancient Great Pantheon and his ascent, Zeus's, was never quite secure. Zeus, it will be recalled, had to keep storming down from Olympus to quell the dire threats to his sovereignty. Recently, however, the market is becoming more like Yahweh of the Old Testament rather than Zeus. Not one superior being contending with others, but the supreme deity, the only true God whose reign must now be universally accepted and who allows for no rivals. Divine omnipotence. That means the capacity to define what is real. It is the power to make something out of nothing and nothing out of something. The will but not yet achieved omnipotence of the market means that there is no conceivable limit to its inexorable ability to convert creation into commodities. But again, this is hardly a new idea, although it does have a new twist. You see, in Catholic theology, through what is called transubstantiation, ordinary bread and wine become vehicles of the holy. In the mass of the marketplace, a reverse process occurs. Things that have been held sacred transmute into interchangeable items for sale. Land is a good example. For millennia, land has held various meanings. Many of them, numinous. There have been Mother Earth, ancestral resting place, holy mountain, enchanted forest, tribal homeland, aesthetic inspiration, sacred turf, and so much more. But when the market's sanctus bell rings and the elements are elevated, all of these complex meanings of land melt into one thing, real estate. At the right price, no land is not for sale. And this includes everything from burial grounds to the cove of a local fertility sprite. This radical desacralization dramatically changes, alters the human relationship to the land. And the same thing happens with the water, the air, the space, and perhaps eventually with the heavenly spheres. As your program indicates, the Oakwood Chamber players are going to be performing this afternoon, holding a concert at Oakwood Village West, and so I'm sure that they would love for some people to attend. What appears that the Wisconsin legislature is poised to pass legislation opening the door, rolling out the red carpet for the Taiwanese tech manufacturer, Foxconn. This is touted as the opportunity of a lifetime for a state that has been hemorrhaging factory jobs for quite some time now. And the governor and other supporters of this project claim that this will be a great deal for Wisconsin workers, perhaps motivating other manufacturers to relocate to or to expand in Wisconsin. Now there are drawbacks to be sure. A percentage of Foxconn's workers in the states southeastern counties will undoubtedly come from Illinois. The $3 billion worth of inducements offered to the company by state officials that translates into a $230,000 public subsidy for each job created, ensuring that Wisconsin residents will be paying higher taxes for at least the next quarter of a century. The deal also sets an unhealthy precedent by relaxing environmental protections for wetlands and groundwater and the Great Lakes in order to reduce the cost of building and operating that huge facility. But as that phrase that was added to those border crossing welcome signs in 2010 proclaims, Wisconsin is open for business, really open. Now of course no one wants to say openly that we are doing Foxconn itself a huge favor. Instead, job creation. That has been the mantra repeated by conservative politicians to rally support for that and many other similar proposals. That prospect has been trotted out to promote massive strip mines in the north woods and confined animal feeding operations in the states midsection. And I find it somewhat ironic that while state leaders emphasize the importance of greater employment in the private sector, even if it's heavily subsidized, they also argue that thousands of decent paying public sector jobs are dispensable and unnecessary burden borne by hardworking Wisconsin families. Now all of this is of course completely consistent with the near sacred principle of free enterprise and market based solutions. Or as President Calvin Coolidge famously remarked just before the Great Depression, the business of America is business. The degree of commitment its proponents have made to this idea, this principle is I think rather extraordinary. You know some religious conservatives even claim that free enterprise is supported by biblical teachings and therefore it's blessed by God. Others argue that since private sector jobs are largely sheltered from market driven forces, they create these unwelcome distortions in the self regulating system. Still others are convinced that concerns about climate change expressed by environmentalists are simply meant to paper over their hostility toward business and capitalism. And all of the foregoing lends weight to Harvey Cox's thesis, the thesis that the free market in certain respects resembles a deity, and in particular the God of the Bible. Thou shalt have no other gods before me, the Almighty declares in the book of Exodus. Or as Harvey Cox puts it, the market is not just one superior deity competing with others, it's the only true God whose reign must be universally accepted and who allows for no rivals. Now since 1999 when Harvey Cox's article first appeared, the trends that he describes have accelerated corporate lobbyists and organizations like Alec increasingly shaped public policy at all levels of government. The privatization of education, the prison system, even the defense establishment continues apace. In former times as Cox notes, there were other centers of value and meaning, other gods that restrained the markets activities, but that is less and less the case. Writing recently in the Atlantic magazine, Franklin Four, who is the former editor of the New Republic, describes how this is even affecting journalistic practice, the fourth estate, one of the bulwarks of our democracy. In this digital age he says competition for clicks. Clicks are your computer. That provides the evidence of market share for any given story. And this is now playing an increasingly decisive role in journalistic content. The rise of Donald Trump is a case in point, Four argues. He says, Trump understood how more than at any other moment in history, the media need to give the public the circus that it desires. Stories about Trump's ill-living traffic that pleases the data gods and benefits the bottom line. Or as Leslie Moonves, the president of CBS, put it during the presidential primaries, Donald Trump may not be good for America, but he is damn good for CBS. I focused on our free enterprise system and the degree to which it has come to monopolize our thinking and our behavior around values because it does lead to a point that we would all do well to consider. That when we elevate a single principle, even an ostensibly good and useful one, when we elevate that principle to a position of ultimacy, then evil is likely to follow in its way. Now we usually think of principles in positive terms, don't we? Because we think that they reflect the bottom line standard to which we can appeal in making important life decisions or in crafting social policies. And so we speak admiringly of those who will take a principled stand or who will adopt a course of action as a matter of principle. We are not wrong to hold such people in high regard, but only if they have engaged in a thoughtful process of discernment and made an honest attempt to fully consider the full implications of their choice. Mindlessly applying a principle simply because we are convinced that it is right is likely to result in considerable harm. So for instance, in our market driven free enterprise system, pretty much any object or any human activity can be and is commodified. Things that have been held sacred transmute into these interchangeable items for sale, Harvey Cox writes. And typically this is not the result of some conscious decision on people's part, it's just our society's, it's become our society's default position. And so in an essay entitled The Two Economies, Wendell Berry reaches much the same conclusion as Harvey Cox. He contrasts in this essay the industrial economy which exists to serve as human needs and to create wealth exclusively. He contrasts that with the much more comprehensive great economy, but he worries that the former, the industrial economy is going to completely overwhelm the great economy. Unfortunately, he writes, the industrial economy does not see itself as a little economy. It sees itself as the only economy. It makes itself exclusive by the simple expedient of valuing only what it can use. That is only what it can regard as raw material to be transformed into something else. The industrial economy is based on the invasion and the pillage of the great economy. It is a grave error to suppose that we can prescribe the terms of our own success and live in ignorance of the great economy and what makes it work, for in the end we are completely dependent on the latter for our survival. The dilemma that Wendell Berry describes was already impacting Native Americans in the early 17th century as William Cronin's careful study of the New England landscape makes clear. Unlike the Indians, in considering their new home, European settlers thought almost exclusively in terms of commodities, and thus they ignored many of the constraints, the competing values and principles that governed the Indians more considerate use of the land. And as a result of this, Cronin writes, capitalism and environmental degradation went hand in hand, a trend that has continued unabated until today. Way back in 1642, a Narragansett tribal leader lamented that our fathers had plenty of deer and skins, our plains were full of deer, also our woods and of turkeys and our coves were full of fish and fowl, but these English have gotten our land and with sides they cut down the grass and with axes they fell the trees and their cows and their horses eat the grass and their hogs spoiled the clam banks and we shall all be starved. 1642. Free market absolutism. But that particular principle aside, we can point to any number of other instances in which excessive devotion to a single less than comprehensive principle has proven unwise. The trial of Billy Budd, as imagined by Herman Melville as a case in point. Everybody on the ship, they like Billy, they admire this young sailor and everybody knows that the master at arms, John Claggart, resents the popular sailor and wishes him harm. Capt. Veer and the crew believe in their hearts, the Billy did not mean to kill Claggart and they probably feel that the cruel man had it coming, nevertheless. The king is the king, the law is the law. In circumstances palliatives don't matter at all, Billy must hang. So here Melville offers a telling example of what can happen when we place principle above people. And this happens all too often. Consider those arbiters of criminal justice who adamantly defend the death penalty even when it's been proven, even when it's pointed out that some unjustly convicted men and women will lose their lives. Or consider those who wish to prohibit minors from procuring birth control because of their moral objections to premarital sex. An unwanted pregnancy? That's just the penalty that a girl must pay for her moral laxity. And what about those folks who would preference the Second Amendment over every other provision contained in the U.S. Constitution? Because for them nothing is more important than supporting those who believe that they have a right to carry at any time and to any place the weapon or weapons of their choice. Now those are somewhat controversial principles to be sure and ones that many of us would not subscribe to. But there are other less controversial principles that also become problematic if they are invested with too much authority. So, first, do no harm. It is often cited as a foundational principle of medical practice. First, do no harm. It is attributed to the ancient Greek physician Apocrates. And this injunction therefore carries with it the weight of many centuries, many regarded as axiomatic. They repeat it thoughtlessly. And that's one of the problems. They don't bother to think through such venerable principles to consider that they might have some limitations. The editor of Harvard University's health publications, Robert Smerling, himself a physician, has taken on that challenge. And Smerling doubts that as a standalone principle, first, do no harm works in practice. If physicians took it literally, he says, no one would have surgery, even if it was life-saving. They might stop ordering mammograms because they could lead to a biopsy for a non-cancerous lump. In fact, we might not even request blood tests because the pain, the bruising, the bleeding required to draw blood are clearly avoidable harms. The fact is, when difficult real-time decisions must be made, it is hard to apply the first do no harm dictum because estimates of risk and benefit are so uncertain and so prone to error. And so Smerling recommends a much more nuanced approach to medical treatment, one requiring considerably more forethought and assessment of potential risks. However, he would not completely abandon the do no harm rule because as he puts it, it is a reminder that doctors should neither overestimate their capacity to heal or underestimate their capacity to harm. The golden rule, that affords another pertinent example here. Many people, Christian or not, invoke the golden rule as the principle that they would appeal to first in making a moral decision. But do unto others as you would have them do unto you presumes that our own personal preferences have universal validity. It could be argued that do unto others what they would have you do unto them, that it makes more sense. It forces us to consider their perspective on what is right or good and not just our own. But if you think about it a little more deeply, the alternative version also runs into considerable difficulties, which is why the ancient Chinese philosopher Confucius insisted that a principle like this one should never be treated as a shortcut, eliminating the need for further moral reasoning. It should only be treated as a starting point for more serious deliberation, which brings us at last to our own unitary universalist principles of which there are seven. You can find them on the back of today's program. Although these principles vary in age, the collection as a whole is about a half a century old. And as a denomination, we revisit these principles from time to time. They are not carved in stone. These principles are quite general, but this is intentional because that provides leeway for communities and individuals to be open and creative in developing strategies to accomplish those principles. Now, personally, I think it makes more sense to treat them as precepts rather than as principles. With respect to our seven principles, I don't particularly care for the word principle. They are neither beliefs that we are required to uphold nor rules that we are obliged to follow. They are rather aspirational statements. Similar to Albert Schweitzer's Reverence for Life, aspirational statements that we all strive to live up to knowing that we are going to fall short. And this approach, treating them as precepts, has more in common with an eastern religion like Buddhism than with the Abrahamic religions where principles are often accorded this transcendent status that makes them almost non-negotiable. Regarded as precepts, we can better understand how, taken together, the seven qualify but also complement each other. The first principle speaks to the dignity and worth of human beings. But it confines itself to matters of human concern, human work. By itself, it would seem to prioritize our own species' interests over those of other sentient beings. But this anthropocentrism is complemented and balanced by the biocentric seventh principle which draws our attention to the web of life, which is Wendell Berry's great economy. And this is also worthy of our concern because we owe to it our existence. There's the fourth principle, calling on us to engage in a free and responsible search for truth and meaning. Its focus inward, personal, rather than outward and social. But the fourth is balanced by the second, a principle that encourages us to promote justice, equity and compassion in human relations. Principle three extols congregational life, what we do together. But number six stresses the need to move beyond all parochialisms, furthering the goal of world community. And so it goes. These seven principles are not arranged in any kind of rank order, and there are going to be occasions when one of them might take precedence over another. But that requires thoughtfulness. That requires moral discernment. Taken as a whole, these principles, these precepts are meant to serve as Confucius maintained as a starting point for more serious deliberation. Well, in conclusion, the environmental advocate and founder of 350.org, Bill McKibben, Bill McKibben stresses the need for us to remain flexible in the way that we understand and apply our principles, even the principles that are most dear to us. Addressing the cause that he has adopted as his own, which is climate change, McKibben reports that sometimes he's in conversation with movement purists who question whether it's appropriate to burn gasoline in order to attend a climate change rally. Isn't that hypocritical, they ask McKibben? He disagrees, saying it's the best gas you will burn in the course of a year. Because he says we live in a world that we wish to change, and so a bit of hypocrisy is the price of admission that we pay to be in the fight. Whether we call it hypocrisy or we call it compromise, the point is that in matters of principle we cannot evade the responsibility of making difficult choices. Like a physician, we must ponder whether the benefits of a course of action are going to outweigh the harm. And let us always remember, it's never the principle that we are meant to serve, only the person who it's intended to support. Our offering today, as you will see, will be shared with G-Safe, and their good work on behalf of our community is outlined in your program. Please be generous. This week, as a community of memory and of hope, to this time and this place, we bring our whole and occasionally our broken selves. We carry with us the joys and sorrows of the recent past, seeking here a place where they might be received and celebrated and shared. We would now pause to acknowledge Kelly Radford. Candle has been lit for her, who had surgery last Thursday and we wish her and her husband Bob well. And Paul Agrimson writes that a friend, Don McDonald of Depeer, has passed away, so condolences to you, Paul. A thank you written in our book to Rob Gurke for the lovely and efficient new book cabinet that you will see over in the Commons area. A wonderful new place to display the books that we have for sale. A beautiful piece of furniture created by Rob, and so we thank him very much. And of course we do hold in our thoughts all of those in the path of Hurricane Irma today, which is due to make landfall at 2 o'clock in Naples, Florida, which is where my own 95-year-old father lives. And I've heard from many people about relatives that are in the path of Hurricane Irma, and we wish them well this morning. And now let us sit silently for just a moment or two in the spirit of empathy and hope. So by virtue of our brief time together today, may our burdens be lightened and our joys expanded. Please join me now in singing our closing hymn number 293. Please be seated for the benediction and the postlude. And we have a simple request for you this morning. If you can, would you please leave your hymnal and your program, your order of service in your chairs as you exit rather than taking them out, because we will need them for the people coming to the second service. And so may the peace of the deep lakes and the peace of the meandering rivers be with us. May our spirits soar as weightlessly as the September clouds and may the warmth of companionship reassure us on our journeys beyond the golden sunset. May the lure of truth yet to be known draw us onward even into the autumn of our days. Blessed be and amen.