Opening Words
Life is this simple. We are living in a world that is absolutely transparent, and God is shining through it all the time. This is not just a fable or a nice story. It is true. If we abandon ourselves to God and forget ourselves, we see it sometimes, and we see it maybe frequently. God shows Himself everywhere, in everything -- in people and in things and in nature and in events. It becomes very obvious that God is everywhere and in everything and we cannot be without Him. It’s impossible. The only thing is that we don’t see it.
-- Thomas Merton
The God in Whom We Live and Move and Have Our Being
A Sermon By Dave Skidmore
Universalist National Memorial Church
Washington, D.C.
January 31, 2010
Opening Exercise
I’d like to begin this sermon somewhat unconventionally. I hope you will humor me by participating in a brief exercise. Please -- as Pastor Lillie sometimes says -- center yourselves, and be still for a moment. (Pause)
Breathe in, slowly and deeply. (Pause)
Now exhale. Notice the feeling of refreshment that spread through your body when you drew air into your lungs. (Pause)
Now, as you sit, move a bit: shrug your shoulders, or lean forward or back a bit, or move your legs slightly. (Pause)
Now, in stillness, become aware of the beating of your heart -- the heart on which your life depends. (Pause)
Thanks. I’ll come back to that exercise later.
Introduction: What Is Panentheism?
The idea for this morning’s sermon came from a phrase that has long stirred my imagination, the God “in whom we live and move and have our being.” I first encountered those words in our second reading this morning, from Paul’s address to the Athenians, as recounted in Chapter 17 of the Acts of the Apostles. But the words are more ancient than Paul. My New Oxford Annotated Bible notes that Paul was quoting -- without attribution -- Epimenides, a semi-mythical Greek seer and philosopher-poet said to have lived in Crete some six centuries before Paul. (Epimenides wrote those words about Zeus, by the way.)
Long after I first encountered that phrase, it was brought to my attention that it expressed a concept of God called “panentheism” -- or “God in all.” That sounds a lot like “pantheism” -- but they are not quite the same. Pantheism -- “God is all” -- is the idea that the whole of the world, the universe, its totality is God. But panentheism holds that God is more than the totality of all things. As theologian Marcus J. Borg writes in his book, The God We Never Knew, “God is both more than the universe, yet everywhere present in the universe. … God is ‘right here,’ even as God is also more than ‘right here.’”
Before I go on I should note that, although the germ of this sermon owes to my encounter some years back with the in-whom-we-live-and-move-and-have-our-being phrase, much of its content is drawn from Borg’s book. Thanks to Pastor Lillie for recommending it to me.
Panentheism as a term has been around since only the early nineteenth century. German philosopher Karl Christian Friedrich Krause may have been the first to use the term. And it’s an important concept in the thinking of such twentieth century theologians as Paul Tillich -- who gave us the phrase “ground of being” to describe God. But, as demonstrated by Epimenides, thinking of God as an all-encompassing spirit rather than a supernatural being who is “out there” has ancient roots -- and can be found in many religions -- eastern and western, including, by the way, the transcendental strain of Unitarianism. Ralph Waldo Emerson, who -- as Unitarians never tire of pointing out -- began his career as a Unitarian minister, asserts in the essay Nature that “the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part or parcel of God.”
God, the Absent Father
What is it about the concept of a God in whom we live and move and have our being that moves me so? I think it is because, like many of us, certainly like the author of Psalm 42, a part of me longs for a relationship with a living God -- “as a deer longs for flowing streams.” Yet much of the imagery and metaphor we use for God paints a picture of a remote God.
Think of the opening words of the Prayer of Jesus “Our Father, who art in heaven.” Entire sermons could be, and I am sure have been, devoted to the metaphor of God as father. It has its positive aspects for many of us. At least it does for me. Jesus referred to God by the Aramaic word, “abba.” It is a term of affection, like “daddy,” and conjures images of a protective, loving God. But, certainly, the metaphor of God as father has many limitations, not the least that it implies God is male and not female. And, it evokes images other than “gentle daddy” -- such as the patriarchal rule-giver who punishes disobedience -- what Borg calls “God the finger-shaker.” Then there is the “in heaven” aspect of the metaphor. God is not here -- not, in the words of Psalm 46, “a very present help.” Rather, God is somewhere else. To put it a bit flippantly, God in this metaphor is like a daddy who spends too much time at the office and habitually gets home after the kids are asleep a faithful provider of daily bread perhaps, but not a present source of joy and love.
So, if we think of God primarily as like a father somewhere up there in heaven, we may feel alienated from God, from our source of life and being. We may feel, as the psalmist in our first reading did, “cast down … and disquieted” as we are asked, continually, (or ask ourselves) “Where is your God?”
Spirit Metaphors for God
Fortunately, our Scriptures offer many, many metaphors -- that can help us try to understand what cannot be understood, to -- as Paul said -- to “search for God and perhaps grope for … and … find” God. Other metaphors and images of God, for me, more readily offer the possibility of a personal relationship with the sacred than the image of an ethereal father figure in the remote starry reaches of space.
Borg writes that metaphors for God cluster around two models: “the monarchial model” -- God as king, lord, father -- and “the Spirit model” -- God as wind, breath, light. He observes that we cannot see the wind, but we can feel it. When it blows, it is all around us. Breath is like the wind, inside the body. The Roman Catholic monk and mystic, Thomas Merton, in our opening words this morning, likens God to light, shining through a transparent world. For me, these metaphors, though in some sense more abstract than the kindly “abba,” offer a better chance to glimpse the holy.
Borg sees these two groups of metaphors as undergirding two models of religious life. The monarchial metaphors imply a “performance model” of religious life: We must obey God. When we don’t, we sin. Our sin is judged. To be saved, we must repent in sorrow and seek God’s mercy. The spirit metaphors, however, point toward what Borg calls a “relational model” of religious life. Instead of obedience, the aim of the religious life is to grow in our relationship with the ever-present God. Instead of sin, or disobedience, the central problem is estrangement from God. Repentance means returning to where we belong. Salvation is not so much a reward in the afterlife but becoming conscious of our relationship with God in this life.
Consequences of Living, Moving and Being in God
As compelling as it is to ponder these theological questions, it is at least as important to focus on what becoming conscious of living, moving and having our being in God might mean in practical terms. What Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount in reference to prophets can be applied to philosophies: “You will know them by their fruits.”
Is panentheism a good tree that bears good fruit? If we could become more conscious of having our being in God, what would it mean for how we live, and how we treat each other? For one thing, it might help us to become more patient. The next time you are stuck in traffic or late for work, think to yourself, “Hey, I live and move and have my being in God, right here and right now -- same as I will when I get to where I am going.” Maybe then you’ll be in less of a rush.
More seriously, how would we conduct ourselves if we truly realized we lived and moved and had our being in God? What endeavors would we consider worthy of our time? I know that we would consider our every action and thought to be of great consequence. How would we think of one another if we truly realized that we all live and move and have our being in God? There’s a line in a classic hymn -- “In Christ there is no east or west … but one great fellowship of love.” Well, if we all live and move and have our being in God. Then, in God, there is no east or west, or male or female, or black or white, or gay or straight there is both east and west, both male and female, both black and white, both gay and straight. If this is so, and we can truly take this knowledge in, how would we behave toward other people? Wouldn’t it liberate us to treat one another with love and compassion?
In that respect, panentheism fits very well with the first of the seven principles of the Unitarian Universalist Association -- “the inherent worth and dignity of every person.” And it dovetails nicely with Universalism -- with the trust -- in the words of our Declaration of Faith -- in “the final harmony of all souls with God.” Because, if we are in God -- right now and always -- are we not in a sense already saved?
Realizing that God is Near
But, is life really “this simple,” as Merton declared in our opening words this morning? Perhaps, but who among us -- except mystical adepts -- can be conscious of the presence of God for more than fleeting moments. It would be like a fish being conscious of the water in which it swims, or if we were conscious of each and every breath we take. Psalm 139, a reading Sue Mosher used in her sermon last week, describes a God that has searched us and known us and is acquainted with all our ways, a God who is present everywhere from the heights of heaven to the depths of the underworld. The psalmist declares, “You hem me, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.” Yet, the psalmist wisely adds, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; it is so high that I cannot attain it.” And Merton, after writing that it becomes very obvious that God is everywhere and in everything, adds, “The only thing is we don’t see it.”
I’m afraid I have no new or unique wisdom to offer on how to cultivate an awareness of God -- how to avoid being continually distracted by material things and the busy-ness of life -- what Tillich called “the spirit of industrial society.”
Borg, in his book, discusses collective practices and individual practices for opening one’s heart to God. It is a familiar list. Collective practices include hearing sacred stories, such as found in the Bible; practicing sacred rituals, such as communion; celebrating sacred seasons, such as Christmas and Easter; hearing sacred music, such as the magnificent anthems just sung by our choir; viewing sacred images, such as the stained glass windows to my right and left; following sacred laws, such as the kosher dietary laws; going on sacred journeys, such as Muslims’ pilgrimage to Mecca. Individual practices include prayer, silencing the mind in meditation, dream work, fasting, spiritual study, and practicing acts of compassion.
Simply living our lives also can help open the heart to God’s presence, if we are paying attention. Sooner or later, we encounter circumstances that break our hearts as well as events and people that warm them. All of these things can help. Yet, I do not think it is within our power to attain that awareness on our own. I only know that, like the apostle Paul, we cannot help but grope for God.
How will we find God? Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount, “Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”
May it be so for you.
Closing Exercise
Let me now conclude where we began, by asking you to repeat the exercise we did at the start of the sermon as a way of invoking the nearness of God.
Center yourselves and be still.
Breathe deeply. (Pause) You live in God.
Now, as you sit, move your body slightly, as you choose. (Pause) You move in God.
Now, become aware of the beating of your heart. (Pause) It beats in God, in whom you live and move and have your being.
Amen.