Unity Church of Castro Valley
Sunday Message for August 19, 2007
Sermon in the Park - Nature
Where did you learn about religion? So many of us end up as adults with the idea that religion is anything that is otherworldly. We think that religion is quiet and solemn. We get the idea that religion is anything that is unexplainable and so we give it supernatural explanations. We have been told that religion is a set of beliefs that we are required to believe in.
SHAPING YOUR OWN SPIRITUAL DESTINY
Unity wants to turn that notion completely around. Unity is about experiencing the sacred in every detail of life. Every moment of life has the sacred built into it if only we would wake up, if only we would have eyes to see and ears to hear the sacred in every single moment. The sacred is built into the natural world, natural processes, life itself, our brains, our emotions, and the community that we experience. All of these things carry a sacred seed within them if only we would wake up and experience them.
A few years ago the book The Celestine Prophecy came out. It is a book all about synchronicity and finding meaning in life. When the book came out a Catholic cardinal said, "This Manuscript is a curse. It undermines our basic structure of spiritual authority. It entices people to think they are in control of their spiritual destiny."
I don't mean to particularly pick on the Catholic Church. Religion in general is teaching us that we are not in control of our own spiritual destiny - the church is. It's important to the church to contain your spiritual identity around a certain collection of activities, particularly on a Sunday morning.
But Unity wants to say to you that you are in control of your spiritual destiny. Unity says that you are your own religious authority. No one will tell you what to believe- not me, not the Church. No one will tell you what to believe. You will decide what makes sense to you. And through that you will be expressing the divine seed within you.
You might ask yourself how deeply you hold your beliefs and how self-aware your beliefs make you. How much do your beliefs empower you? How conscious are you of your own motivations? And most of all, how much do your religious beliefs drive you to a deeper honoring of nature and life. How much do your beliefs take you into a deeper experience of life?
FIRST CENTURY NATURALISM
I believe that's the very question Jesus was asking in Matthew 6 when he said to consider the lilies of the field. I believe Jesus was asking how deeply they honored nature. But we need to understand the context of these words to know why Jesus expressed them they way that he did.
About 3 centuries before Jesus, a philosophy called naturalism became mainstream through the influence of Epicurus and others. It was also called materialism in the sense that "matter" is all that there is. If you take any object down to its most basic you will find a series of atoms. The essence of the form of naturalism they were exploring was that life is random and purposeless.
I sense that what Jesus was doing in Matthew 6 was attempting to put nature into a broader and more meaningful context. Life is more than just matter. I believe Jesus was expressing spiritual naturalism. All things are connected, all things are one, and all things are beautiful and wondrous. He did that, and the people who recorded his words did that, with the only language they had at the time, which was the language of theism. So they expressed it as a supernatural God clothing people.
But I believe that what was happening in those words was that they were attempting to get to the essence of spiritual naturalism. Spiritual naturalism is the belief that what we have in the natural world, in our brains, our emotions, is sufficient to live our lives in wonder and awe of life. There is enough miracles here in this present moment, to keep us amazed until the day that we die. The patterns of life, life and rebirth, death and re-growth are the wondrous patterns of nature.
CONSIDER NATURE
Consider the lilies of the field. Consider these natural facts:
Consider the fact that the stars I can see with the naked eye are as far away as 10,000 light years leaves me speechless. Consider the fact that the DNA in a single cell in my body, that is so small I cannot see it, if stretched out would reach from fingertip to fingertip of my outstretched arms, and that there are trillions of cells in my body, and that there is enough DNA in those cells to reach to the sun and back a dozen times. These facts fill me with wonder and astonishment. And consider the fact that the Milky Way Galaxy has a trillion stars, and that the universe contains at least 50 billion galaxies, and thus thousands of trillions of stars similar to our sun, fills me with amazement far beyond my poor power to describe. I am overcome with astonishment at the thought that my body consists of 10 trillion cells and that my brain contains of about 100 billion neurons and 100 trillion synapses.
Consider these natural wonders, and become lost in the wonder of it all.
CONSIDER THE RED KNOT SANDPIPER
Consider the red knot sandpiper that every year travels more than 18,000 miles from the arctic islands of northern Canada to the southern tip of South America, and back again. They stop on their way for food, always at the same beaches where they have fed for centuries. They gorge themselves in order to be prepared to engage in week long legs of their long journey. In their northern summer they mate and breed. By mid-July the female knots abandon their offspring and head south, and a few weeks later the males follow. The babies fend for themselves until late August when they too commence their journey.
Now here is the amazing thing: the young red knots by the thousands, and without adult guides or prior experience, find their way along the very same route, stop at precisely the same beaches for food, and join the others at precisely the same place in Southern America.
How do they do it? How do they know where to go along a route they have never traveled, to a destination where they have never been? Scientists can only wonder that the red knot's genetic inheritance includes a map for the journey, what Rupert Sheldrake calls "Morphic Fields". The red knots point to the mystery and grand patterns of life.
Does the sandpiper lead us to honor a supernatural God more deeply, or do they lead us to honor life and nature more deeply?
CONSIDER THE GEESE
Consider the geese that fly in a "V" formation. They do it for a couple of reasons: it's more efficient, they can fly further and faster by working as a team, but also because they can see if anyone gets left behind. Consider what they teach us about life and community, and leadership.
Do the geese lead us to honor a supernatural God more deeply, or do the geese lead us to honor life and nature more deeply?
CONSIDER THE BUTTERFLY
Consider the butterfly emerging from a cocoon. You may have heard the story:
A little boy sat and watched the small opening in a cocoon for several hours as a butterfly struggled to force its body through the little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no further. So the little boy decided to help the butterfly. He took a pair of scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon. The butterfly then emerged easily, but it had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. The little boy continued to watch the butterfly. He expected that, at any moment, the butterfly would take off in freedom.
It didn't happen! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled wings. It was never able to fly.
What the little boy didn't understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening was nature's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.
Consider the butterfly. It teaches us that struggle is sometimes necessary in order for us to fly. It teaches us about relationships where we don't always want to solve another's problem, because we are taking away from them an opportunity to flourish, to grow, to be unleashed. And to fly.
Does the butterfly lead us to honor a supernatural God more deeply, or does it lead us to honor life and nature more deeply?
CONSIDER MIRROR NEURONS
Consider your own brain and what scientists are calling mirror neurons, the latest and greatest thing in brain research. Mirror neurons explain why when we walk towards someone and they are smiling, we smile back at them automatically. Smiling is contagious. Niceness and decency are contagious. When we are in the presence of someone who is very positive and upbeat it can affect our mood. Similarly, when we are in the company of someone who is struggling and negative, that too can affect our mood. Consider the mirror neurons. Consider the ability that is more than metaphoric, an ability to affect the world around you; to change it, to make it a better, more joyful place.
We can do that through honoring life, humanity and nature. This is not religion as usual; this is life as it is. Seeing the divine seed in every single moment, and living that present moment.
Everywhere I look I see a divine seed. Everywhere I step I see a letter from God written to me telling me something new about life. Every struggle, joy, achievement, is a letter from God. What is creation and nature? Nothing but God manifest. You and I are God manifest. The seed of divinity is within you. In your brain, emotions, in every step of life that you take. That's the wonder of spiritual naturalism.
I'm not here to tell you whether you should believe in a supernatural God or not, I'm here to ask you some searching questions. Do your beliefs lead you to honor life and nature more deeply? Consider the lilies of the field, consider the red knot sandpiper, consider the geese, consider the butterfly, consider your own brain, consider the energy that we pass between us, our intuition and ability to affect our environments, consider all these things, and imagine.
Just imagine.
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Last updated
August 21, 2007
