Sermons

Minister: Rev. Margaret A. Beckman | “Piglet noticed that even though he had a Very Small Heart, it could hold a rather large amount of Gratitude.”  ~ A.A. Milne
“Today I choose to live with gratitude for the love that fills my heart, the peace that rests within my spirit, and the voice of hope that says all things are possible.”  ~ Anonymous
 

READING   ~ “Ending the Year with Gratitude, Autheticity and Hope” ~ Tom Bruett

Gratitude
What are you grateful for? There is a ton of power in the simple act of thinking about what you’re grateful for. Gratitude is a type of mindfulness, and one of the main cornerstones of mindfulness is what we practice grows stronger. If you practice thinking about all the things that stress you out, those worries will grow stronger. If you practice thinking about the things that you’re grateful for, your empathy, patience and compassion will grow stronger.

This isn’t magic, its brain science. Neurologically your brain will change over time. The practice of mindfulness and gratitude is something that you can keep going well into the new year and beyond.

Hope
It’s been a hard year. There’s been a lot happening in the world and I’m sure you’ve had some difficulties personally over the last twelve months. If you’re depressed, anxious or scared about the future it can be hard to have hope.

What are you looking forward to in the New Year? Are there any dreams or fantasies you have about what you’d like to accomplish or work towards for yourself next year? Focus on the here and now, but if you’re not happy with where you are, put a goal post a few months out. Make a clear, simple and achievable goal for yourself. That will give you something to plan and aim for as you enter the next year.

 

READING ~ (insert) “Hope Rises” ~ John A. Buehrens and Rebecca Ann Parker, adapted

Hope Rises.

It rises from the heart of life,
here and now,
beating with joy and sorrow.

Hope longs.

It longs for good to be affirmed,
for justice and love to prevail,
for suffering to be alleviated,
and for life to flourish in peace.

Hope remembers.

It remembers the dreams
of those who have gone before
and reaches for connection with them
across boundaries of death.

Hope acts.

It acts to bless, to protest, and to repair.

 

SERMON

Psychologist Tom Bruett reminds us that gratitude, like mindfulness, is not an event, it’s a practice. And like mindfulness, the practice of gratitude can make us healthier and happier.

It is so very tempting to begin our review of this year with all the things that infuriated us, or disappointed us, or frightened us, or confused us, or offended us, or made us want to run into the wilderness screaming.

We have plenty of material available for that kind of year-end review.

In fact – take a minute. Indulge yourself a little bit. What are the three worst things that happened in 2018?

Ok great. Now, set that aside and let it go.

Focusing on the negative is not helpful – it feeds the wrong dog.

Acknowledging the negative, and then letting it go, is healthy.

Dwelling on the negative is unhealthy.

When we concentrate our emotions and mental or spiritual energy on the negative, it receives more energy grows stronger. Not good.

I want to invite you to get stronger and healthier through gratitude.

Sure, it’s fine to make a list of our blessings or the things that came to us or happened to us that are wonderful and spectacular. That is a kind of

gratitude. It’s not hard and we feel good about the great things in our lives. but, let’s move beyond this simple gratitude for things, events, and particular blessings to a deeper more complex gratitude.

This is the gratitude that Buddhists refer to as a spiritual practice.

Buddhism teaches us to be grateful, period. Gratitude is to be cultivated as a habit or attitude of mind not dependent on conditions.

Let me try to say a bit more about this attitude of gratitude. It is not dependent on conditions. That is an important distinction and it makes things more complex. I am to be grateful. Period. Full stop. Not grateful about something – just grateful. It takes practice to be grateful in this way.

If we are to be grateful people, then we ought to learn how to be grateful in times of adversity as well as in times of plenty. So often, when something goes askew and all we see is the misery or disappointment. There may be a way to work ourselves into gratitude rather than misery. Buddhist teacher, Jack Kornfield, talks about being grateful for difficulties – for it is in such times that we learn the most. He says that in some temples there is actually a prayer where a person asks for difficulties – “May I be given the appropriate difficulties so that my heart can truly open with compassion.”

I’m not suggesting you adopt this prayer – it really does tempt the gods and goddesses into giving us what we’re asking for!

But the observation that we learn compassion and open our hearts through the experience of difficulty is demonstrated time and time again. So, we need not run away from the difficulties that naturally come our way. We may need to seek hard at times to find the positive learning or the strengthened patience that we receive as a result of making our way through life’s difficulties.

Think for a moment about the humanitarian crisis on our southern border. Thousands of refugees seeking a better life – or any life if they are running from the fear of murder.

For what am I grateful?

Certainly not for the suffering our government adds to the already difficult situation migrants and refugees face as they leave their homeland with no certainty that they will arrive and be allowed to enter the United States.

No, I think I am grateful for the stabbing pain in my heart that moved me to actually wake up, pay attention, and do something about this crisis. I am grateful for friends and colleagues and neighbors who are similarly moved to take action. Together, we are making a difference. And again – I am grateful.

You know, just when it seems that everything is going wrong – some things are actually going right.

Remember, we get more of what we focus on, so let’s find ways of putting our attention on the things going right.

In looking back on 2018, there is plenty about which we can be grateful and in being grateful about what we leave behind at the close of the year, we can look forward to the new year with hope.

Diane Cameron, Capital Region writer for the Albany Times Union newspaper, says:

Today, we acknowledge the death of the old year and reflect on the past 364 days. Gratitude is in order, yes, for all that has transpired and for all that the new year will bring. But in addition to gratitude we also need hope as we prepare to step out again and begin another pilgrimage around the sun.

Hope is my word for 2019. Hope has never been in the forefront for me, and maybe that’s because I thought of hope as a weak word. I’ve always liked joy or gratitude better. But now, aware of the many hard issues in front of us — politically, economically, environmentally — I’m choosing hope as my focus in the coming year.

Hope is not pie-in-sky wishing for everything to be perfect and pink and fluffy. Hope is an effort. Hope is what we get when we give up despair and reject cynicism.   Hope is not passive, it is active and it is intentional.

Diane Cameron credits former Czech president and playwright, Vaclav Havel with saying that “Hope is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.”

That, it turns out, is close to what Thomas Aquinas meant when he wrote about hope. Aquinas, a Dominican friar and theologian, studied all of the virtues — prudence, temperance, justice, fortitude, faith, hope, and charity — and he said, “Hope is located in the will.” By which he meant that hope is a choice; we can decide to have hope.

We can decide to have hope. We can decide that in 2019 we will not grump around in despair about all the things that seem (and probably are) terrible. We can choose to look for and find the good things that are happening and give those things our attention and support. We defeat the terrible by establishing the good. We may well have ample opportunity to establish the good in place of the terrible.

Despair is easy and lazy. Hope is hard because it is demanding. It is also rewarding. We see the good manifesting in new and important ways before our very eyes and in our very lives.

John Buehrens and Rebecca Ann Parker write about hope in their book about 21st century UU faith.

Hope rises.
Hope longs.
Hope remembers.
Hope acts.

It acts to bless, to protest, and to repair.

 

This is how we live out our faith in the year ahead – with gratitude and hope. Grateful to be present to this time and to be part of the vast and growing cloud of witnesses who will act to bless, to protest, and repair.

Let me finish as Diane Cameron ended her column in Friday’s Times Union.

So, I’m prepared to enter 2019 with hope. I will practice gratitude as much as I can. I will strengthen my will to be hopeful in the coming year, and I will act. As we heard last week, it is with “a thrill of hope the weary world rejoices.”
Me too. I will myself toward hope.

May we worthy of the trust the world has placed in our being here now.

May this community of faithful pilgrims and spiritual companions be strengthened through the practices of gratitude and hope as we make our way through another year together.

May you all be safe and happy as you celebrate the New Year in whatever ways you choose.

Blessed Be.   I Love You.   Amen.