Temples of the Heart
Led by Rev. Steven A. Protzman
October 13, 2013
First Reading
Second Reading
"Temples in the Heart" by Patrick Murfin1
"Ultimate Concern, Ultimate Commitment"
by Rev. Don Beaudreault2
Temples of the Heart
By Steven A. Protzman
© October, 2013
In his beautiful poem "Temples in the Heart", UU layperson Patrick Murfin wrote: "Here
we build temples in our hearts". His poem invites us to think about whom or what we
understand as holding ultimate importance in our lives. As we welcome new members
today, we will also renew our covenant to walk together as we ask life's deepest questions
and live out those answers.
United Church of Christ Congregational (UCC) minister Lillian Daniel is in a bad mood.
She says: "I am tired of hearing people say stupid things in the name of religion. I am
tired of nutty, pistol-packing pastors who want to burn the Koran. I am tired of
televangelists who claim that natural disasters are the will of God. I am tired of preachers
who promise prosperity. As grumpy as it sounds, I am even tired of Tim Tebow."3 To
this list I would add that I am tired of people who refer to the holy bible, let's make that
the holy (fill in the blank), and the smug, self righteous fundamentalists of all stripes
whom we really want to ask: Who died and made you God or, in the spirit of UU
inclusivity, Whomever It May Concern? Lillian Daniel is tired of religion that misses the
point of religion. She's tired of religion that elevates things to ultimate importance that
are meant to point us toward the Ultimate and are not ends in themselves. She's had it
with people who have stopped growing spiritually, holding on so tightly to an idea or
belief to the point that they become unwilling to question their beliefs or worse, they
close their minds to the possibility that Truth might not be limited to their narrow
understanding.
Lillian Daniel is wanting true religion, which recognizes that revelation is not sealed, that
new understandings and new insights are always possible, that, as the UCC tagline says,
"God is still speaking". As Unitarian Universalists, we affirm, as one chalice lighting
says, that new light is ever waiting to break through to illuminate our minds and new love
is ever waiting to break through to warm our hearts. We know and celebrate that we are
part of the ancient and endless human quest for meaning and purpose which Patrick
Murfin speaks of in the first reading. In his poem Temples in the Heart, Patrick, a
member of the Congregational Unitarian Church of Woodstock, Illinois and president of
the Interfaith Council for Social Justice, names our spiritual work- we search through the
wisdom of the ages for momentary glimpses of Truth which come from all the world's
religious traditions. Our faith is a balance of possibility and hope grounded by reason.
1
He writes:
Yes, here we build temples in our hearts.
Side by side we come,
Scavenging the ages for wisdom,
Cobbling together as best we may
The stones of a thousand altars, leveling with doubt,
Framing with skepticism,
Measuring by logic,
Sinking firm foundations in the earth
As we reach for the heavens.
Here we build temples in our hearts –
A temple for each heart,
A village of temples,
None shading another,
Connected by well-worn paths,
Built alike on sacred ground.4
This poem uses the temple as a metaphor for our spiritual journeys and for the diversity
of Unitarian Universalism. Our faith is a village of temples-each of us has a temple for
our heart, where our own truth can dwell. In this spiritual village the temple of my truth,
although standing next to your temple, is not shaded. Every heart has full and free access
to the light of truth. And yet none our temples stand in isolation, for we are connected by
the well-worn paths of community and trust. Together we build our temples on the
common ground that is our interconnectedness, held in the Mystery that sustains and
embraces us and all of life.
This morning as we welcomed new members and we renewed our covenant with one
another, I charged our new members to continue your spiritual journey, to keep building
the temples of your hearts, reminding all of us that our fourth principle calls us to engage
in a lifelong search for truth and meaning. This is one of the great gifts of the UU faith
and it is also one of the great challenges. My colleague Erica Baron writes that: "As
Unitarian Universalists, we are encouraged to bring all our resources to bear on the
search for truth and meaning. So, we may have had an experience that told us something
about God. We may have used our considerable human capacity for reason and logic to
come to some conclusion about life. We may have read or heard some words of wisdom
that were like a brilliant light, and we hold onto them as the truth about the holy. In all
our searching, we may have found something. That something we have found may be
deeply, profoundly true. We can then bask in accomplishment, in the contemplation of
the incredible truth we have just discovered. We share this truth, we love it, we worship
it. And this is good and right. We celebrate the moments of clarity along the hard and
often murky path of faith. Such moments of truth are gifts from the Ultimate and the
sustenance along the path."
2
But our spiritual journey must not stop at that Aha! moment. Erica goes on to say that:
"But here, in the moment of greatest promise lies one of the most dangerous pitfalls of
the religious quest. For heaven help us if we stop at one, or two, or even a hundred such
moments of clarity. If we ever stop searching for the next moment of clarity, we risk
worshiping the part for the whole."5 We risk committing idolatry. Our fifth UU source
of spiritual wisdom, Humanist teachings, counsels us to heed the guidance of reason and
cautions us against idolatries of the mind and spirit. This is a warning about being
trapped by beliefs or ideas that are not truly Ultimate or becoming spiritually lazy,
stopping at that moment of insight and not continuing the search. This morning I also
reminded our new members that they have become part of this spiritual community and
that ours is a shared journey. Rebecca Parker tells us that there is no life apart from life
together. The question is not whether we are social, connected beings. The question is
how we shape our modes of being with one another and with the sources that uphold and
sustain life."6
Our covenant with one another calls us to listen to each another and to gently call one
another back into covenant when we fail to live up to our promises. Our commitment to
journey together calls us to encourage and guide each others' spiritual growth by helping
one another pay attention to what is worthy of worship and our deepest commitment, for
such things determine who we are. Ralph Waldo Emerson warns us to be aware of what
we hold to be of ultimate importance: "A person will worship something- have no doubt
about that. That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our
lives and character. It behooves us to be careful, for what we are worshipping we are
becoming."
What do we hold to be of ultimate importance and to what are we willing to commit
ourselves? As we reflect back on our lives, how do we feel about our choices? The
ancient Egyptians, according to Leo Buscaglia, believed that upon death they would be
asked two questions and their answers would determine whether they could continue their
journey in the afterlife. The first question was, 'Did you bring joy?' The second was, 'Did
you find joy?” In the second reading, Rev. Don Beaudreault creates a similar scene in
which you're dead and standing in judgment before God. God asks two questions:
Question #1: During your life, what was your Ultimate Concern?
Question #2: And what was your Ultimate Commitment?
As Don says, you're nervous, probably terrified, and your answer is a muddled mix of
clichés you hope will appease the Ultimate Inquisitor: "to serve others by walking softly
in another person's moccasins, and carrying a big stick and a monkey on my back as well
as my brother (since he ain't heavy); and to show my love for others by not calling
attention to the fact that they aren't as rich, smart, white, or good looking as I am and
were not born in the U.S.A. with me and Rick Springsteen but that's okay, because I
really do believe in diversity - as long as diversity doesn't move in next door to where I
am."7
3
I saw a rather pointed cartoon recently in which a man in a car cuts off another car. Both
drivers are confronting each other and one says: "If I didn't have somewhere special to
be, I'd punch your lights out." The other guy replies, "Yeah, same here, jerk!" In the last
frame of the cartoon, they're both sitting in church with an odd look on their faces. I
wonder what those men hold as ultimately important in their lives. I wonder what that
pistol packing Koran burning pastor worships in the temple of his heart. Intolerance?
Hatred of others who believe differently? What kind of a god does that preacher of
prosperity and that televangelist worship? A parental deity who rewards good children
and punishes bad children? Who or what do we hold to be of ultimate importance? Our
culture of white supremacy worships skin color, heterosexuality and physical abilitywith the right combination of these, no doors will be shut in your face. The god of
consumerism constantly tries to convince you that whoever dies with the most toys wins.
The idol of rugged individuality says it's all about you- whatever you want, whatever you
need, no matter the damage it may do to the environment, to your body or to others- no
matter what.
Spiritual wisdom from every tradition reveals these things to be false gods which when
made a high priority in life lessen our humanity. Buddhism teaches us that the human
heart, when left to its own devices, naturally pursues the treasures of this worldpossessions, wealth, prestige, power. When what Buddhist teacher Nichiren Daishonin
calls the "hungry heart" is in control, it is never satisfied. Psychological research is
finding more and more that people whose primary focus in life is the attainment of
"extrinsic goals"—externals such as wealth, property, fame or status—tend to be less
happy. In general, they are said to experience higher levels of anxiety, suffer more from
illness, and have less of a sense of fulfillment.8
In the Christian scriptures there is a story in the gospel of Matthew where Jesus of
Nazareth gives us a warning about the treasures of the world. He tells us that who we are
depends on what we hold to be ultimately important. He says: "Do not store up for
yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in
and steal; but store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust
consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there
your heart will be also." If we replace the word heaven with the words "the temples of
our hearts", we are challenged to store up spiritual treasures within ourselves. These
treasures are the values and practices of a fully human person: generosity, compassion,
creativity, wisdom, and reverence. These true treasures inform our lives on a daily basis
and reveal to the world our ultimate concerns and our ultimate commitments.
The work of building the temples of our hearts is searching for what is truly worthy of
our worship and our reverence and making our deepest commitment to live our lives in
service to this ultimate concern. We do this not because of hope for a reward in the next
life or a fear of eternal punishment but because we believe in this life and our heart
desires the deep joy that comes as we become more fully human. In her spiritual
autobiography, Karen Armstrong writes that: "I have discovered that the religious quest is
about living as intensely as possible here and now. The idea is not to latch onto some
superhuman personality or to “get to heaven” but to discover how to be fully human.
4
Becoming more fully human involves the transformation of the mind and heart from selfcenteredness to a sense of one’s self as part of a larger sacred whole and to a deep
commitment to the human and natural worlds. It is about the transformation from a
shallow life of fear, greed, hedonism, and materialism to a meaningful life of love and
caring, gratitude and generosity, fairness and equity, joy and hope, and a profound
respect for others."9 What spiritual treasures do you hold in your heart? In the way you
live your life every day, does the world see those treasures in your actions? It matters
what we believe and it matters how we live out those beliefs. The final part of my charge
to new members was to commit yourselves to sharing your energy and ideas, your
dreams and your hopes.
In return, there is life's promise and gift that you will grow as a person and your life will
be deeper and richer through giving of yourself to this community and to the world. You
are invited to be a blessing to yourself and to the world. Dr. Rebecca Parker, president of
Starr King Seminary in Berkeley, writes: Your gifts, whatever you discover them to be
can be used to bless or curse the world. The mind’s power, the strength of the hands, the
reaches of the heart, the gift of speaking, listening, imagining, seeing, waiting; Any of
these can serve to feed the hungry, bind up wounds, welcome the stranger, praise what is
sacred, do the work of justice or offer love. Any of these can also close the prison door,
hoard bread, abandon the poor, obscure what is holy, comply with injustice, or withhold
love. You must answer this question: What will you do with your gifts? Choose to bless
the world.10
May the temples we build in our hearts be truly worthy of that which we hold to be of
Ultimate importance and may the treasures we store in our hearts inspire us to bless the
world.
References
1
Murfin, Patrick, We Build Temples in the Heart, Boston: Skinner House Books, 2004,
pp. 1-2.
2
Beaudreault, Don, "Ultimate Concern, Ultimate Commitment", Sermon, March 16,
2013, http://www.uusarasota.com/sermons/sermonArchive/minister/don112.html
3
Daniel, Lillian, When Spiritual But Not Religious is Not Enough, New York: Jericho
Books, 2013, pg. 83.
4
Murfin, Patrick, Ibid.
5
Baron, Erica, "Idolatries of the Mind and Spirit", Sermon, February 28, 2010,
rutlanduusermons.wordpress.com/.../idolatries-of-the-mind-and-spirit
6
Buehrens, John and Parker, Rebecca, A House for Hope, Boston: Beacon Press, 2010,
pg. 34.
7
Beaudreault, Don, Ibid.
8
Living Buddhism, July 1999, p.5, http://www.sgiusa.org/memberresources/resources/buddhist_concepts/bc5_treasures_of_heart.php
9
Murry, William, Reason and Reverence, Boston: Skinner House Books, 2007, pg. 152.
10
Parker, Rebecca, Blessing the World- What Can Save Us Now, Boston: Skinner House
Books, 2006, pp. 163-165.
5