“Let Your Light Shine”

Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship, Dec. 3, 2006

By Marvin Haave

Our second Unitarian principle states: “We affirm and promote justice, equity, and compassion in human relations.” I think there is very little controversy among us about the value of this principle; I think it useful at the beginning to clarify what we mean by these terms. I am using them in the commonsense meaning of justice as fairness, and equity in the same terms. Compassion is defined in dictionaries as pity or mercy; whereas I prefer to think of it as “suffering with”, a form of solidarity. I think it would be hard to find any thoughtful human being disagreeing with this principle. If you’re like me, however, it is downright intimidating. I can readily grasp it in my day-to-day personal life, when I want to treat those among whom I live with justice, equity, and compassion. But when I look at the wider scene of our global village and how those of us who now inhabit the globe are doing with justice and compassion, I feel suddenly small and weak. What effect can my tiny efforts have on a challenge so huge? Added to that is the fact that by far most human relations going on at this very moment seem far beyond my small sphere of influence.

It is no secret to any of us that we live in a world marked by profound gaps in justice and compassion. No single day’s news passes without numerous examples. This week I learned that 30 percent of females worldwide have been sexually coerced in some way. This week I was reminded once again about the inferior state of First Nations housing, health care, and general prosperity. This week I heard new confirmation that the gap between rich and poor in Canada continues to grow even wider. I learned this week that British Columbia has the highest ratio of poor children of any province in Canada. I observed with my own eyes that we have people living under tents and tarps in the rain and snow in the Comox Valley because they cannot afford housing. And we all know that there are people in poorer countries undernourished and starving while their farmland is used to grow coffee or cocoa or opium poppies for a few export dollars while their balance of trade debts grow and grow. If we were to share all the stories each of us knows about inequities and lack of compassion, what a list we’d have! And we’d be here long into this evening to hear them all. And we would, no doubt, end up feeling even weaker and more helpless.

Justice, equity, compassion: do we really hold these values? I believe that we do. Yet we say that “we affirm and promote” these values. To promote them requires that we practise them, and that’s where things become more difficult. If we’re feeling weak and powerless, facing responsibilities that seem so huge, where do we find the resources we need? The adage to think globally and act locally makes a good deal of sense, I believe. That could mean that we find some of the resources we need right here, in this community of faith. We gather around this flame, remembering that it’s always better to light one candle than to rail at the dark. This small flame reminds us of the light we seek, the truth we seek in our mutual spiritual quest. We can help one another by sharing our understandings of what we must do in order to practise justice and compassion. Another gift of the flame is warmth – the warmth of our commitment, our passion for justice. We can help one another here again by sharing what aspects of justice and compassion move us from lethargy to action. Some of the sharing might well be stories we’ve heard or told. Stories, for example of persons like Mohandas Gandhi or Nelson Mandela or Mother Teresa, who had a burning passion, a fire in the belly for justice. Or stories of persons like Archbishop Desmond Tutu who, in chairing the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, expressed nothing but justice and compassion for his former tormentors.

I believe that this Fellowship is a fundamentally healthy community in its practice of justice, equity, and compassion. Examples of this abound: in the ways in which we honour our children and youth, in the ways in which we honour the elders among us, in the ways in which we care for and about one another and the communities around us, in the facility with which we chose to become a welcoming congregation for lesbian, gay, and transgendered persons, and in the ways in which members of this Fellowship extend hands of solidarity around the world in development support and sponsorships. Yet, this flame, with its light and warmth, reminds us that we can do more, and do it better. How, then, can we practise justice and compassion more fully?

We can certainly find ways to improve our daily performance in our homes, families, places of work and recreation, in short, in our personal treatment of others. And we can support and encourage one another to do more and better. Examples could include our behaviour toward children, the opposite gender, and minorities who experience discrimination, such as First Nations, lesbians, gays and transgendered, disabled, the elderly and the poor. Other examples would include all the things involved in our getting and spending. We share the same earth and its resources with all other life on the planet, human and non-human. What and how much we consume affects this environment profoundly. Did you know that the number of earths it takes to sustain us depends upon where we live on the globe? If we consumed like people in India it would require one third of one globe’s resources. If we lived in Mauritius, we would need one globe, in Brazil 2 globes, if in France 3 globes, and if in the U.S.A. five and one-third globes to sustain the world and its creatures.

We don’t have five and one-third globes, and our current level of consumption is neither sustainable nor just. It matters then to justice and compassion how we make individual choices, how we produce and how we consume, what we eat and where it comes from. It matters what resources go into the stuff we buy, from clothes to utensils to computers and motor vehicles. It even matters in many cases what company or country produces them, and how that company or country practises justice and compassion, or doesn’t. Then there’s the issue of disposable consumption: the useful lifespan of the things we buy. At a time when the average lifetime of a new computer is three years, the issue of what is reusable, repairable, recyclable becomes crucial. We have a good deal of choice about whether we are just and compassionate consumers, and exercising such choice requires that we be informed. Such diligence becomes even more important in this run up to Christmas, when we are bombarded with seductions and incentives to consume thoughtlessly.

Becoming the most thoughtful consumers we can is important, but it won’t in itself create a more just, more compassionate world. To help create a more just world requires that we work together; it requires collective action. And collective action is fundamentally political. Politics has acquired a tarnished reputation in the public mind. This is highly ironic because politics really means public activity, anything that has to do with our life together, whether in our communities or in our global village. I believe that disdain for things political comes not only from disgraceful actions on the part of a few politicians but also from the sort of lethargy and self-hatred that wants to leave it to others to make life better. People become most involved in issues in which they have a personal stake. Witness the recent examples of various development proposals around the Comox Valley and Campbell River or the location of hospitals or schools. Yet in our global village, it is inescapably true that an injury to one is an injury to all.

Collective action for justice and equity takes many forms, at neighbourhood, municipal, provincial, national and international levels. So it is far too complex for me to prescribe priorities for you, or anyone else: I have enough difficulty choosing and maintaining my own. I do want to remind you that members of this Fellowship have been in the forefront of taking public responsibility, of letting their lights shine. I don’t choose to single anyone out for specific mention both because the list is a long one and because I wouldn’t want to omit anyone. Sufficient to say that since coming here three years ago I have admired and learned from the wisdom, tenacity, courage, and commitment I have seen in members of this Fellowship acting in the public arena. And they, and we all, join a long and proud history of Unitarians and Universalists taking public, often unpopular stands on issues of principle. And they become one in my mind with the Mandelas and Tutus and Mother Teresas as some of our local heroes. My one disappointment about our Fellowship is that some of us “younger” ones have not picked up and run with the torch of social justice which has been carried too long in this marathon by some of our older members.

I believe and assume that you share with me the desire to promote these values of justice and compassion. What is it then that holds us back from practising them more and better? Or, more correctly, how do we hold ourselves back? I think there are probably at least three factors at work, namely temperament, perceived ability, and energy. I have done a number of temperament analyses and know myself as an introvert. I feel much more comfortable in my cave than I do in the hurly burly of public life. But it’s a mistake to excuse myself on these grounds because there are many ways to practise justice in public affairs without being in the public eye. And one of the ways, I’m sure, is for those of us who are not comfortable in the public eye to hold up the arms and support the voices of those who are. With respect to ability, I intentionally called it “perceived ability” because I believe that any one of us has more potential than we know or give ourselves credit for. It takes some belief in ourselves that we are capable of change, to be willing the say with Red Green: “I’m a man (or woman), and I can change, if I have to.”

We have to because justice and compassion have become life and death issues in this contentious human family of ours. In addition to that let’s not forget that having differing abilities is more a blessing than a curse. We are a body as well as disparate parts, so that the gifts and talents that each of us possesses enhances and enriches the whole. That’s what letting your light shine means. Your light is your light. Finally, there’s energy, or lack thereof. If we feel that our energies are drained away by the enormity of the issues in the larger world, we need to look again at this small flame and recall that it’s better to light one candle than to rail at the dark. That means to me that we give up the requirement that we change the whole world and focus on what we can do with the energy we have. It is here that my hope lies once again that we are willing to breathe new life into our social justice efforts so that the Comox Valley Unitarian Fellowship can continue to be known as those who not only affirm, but also promote and practice, justice and compassion. “This little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine.” May it be so for you too, and may we encourage and embolden one another to be that community that lives in many ways the spirit of justice and compassion.