The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Salem, Oregon

MY LAST FINGER

The Reverend Richard R. Davis, December 14, 2008  

            From time to time, in order to gain a certain level of credibility, we members of the clergy need to confess our own sins from the pulpit.  This not only spares us from the charge of being rank hypocrites but serves as a good reminder that we’re all pretty much alike. 

            As one of my early mentors, a man who, quite frankly, had an abundant stock of sins from which to draw, told me: “Within reason, people love to hear about their minister’s sins.  It keeps them awake during the sermon, and it can be entertaining.”  To this I will add that such confessions can also be cautionary tales.  

            So let me tell you about my last finger.   It was early January of 1986 – twenty three years ago.  I had just come to the First Unitarian Church of San Diego to be their first ever intern minister in the entire century long history.  During my first few days there I was driving on the freeway and came to a fork on an entrance ramp to the freeway where you had to choose which direction to go.  The problem was, I was new to the area and didn’t know my way around – so I slowed way down to read the sign and figure out which way to go.  As you can imagine, I was a bit tense in those days – too many new things coming at me all at once.   Suddenly I heard loud honking and looked in my rearview mirror – the motorist behind me was laying on his (or her) horn.  They didn’t give a fig if I knew where I was going or ever got there, they just wanted me to move along so I wouldn’t slow them down.  I was instantly filled with anger and righteous indignation –  aggressive drivers tick me off.  Without any forethought I did what is sometimes done in our culture to signal your extreme displeasure with another person.  I rolled down my window and put my hand out in the familiar gesture known as “the finger.”  Yes, I confess it now – I gave this other driver the finger - my extended middle finger.  Let me hasten to add that even in those days this was not a common practice of mine – in fact, I can’t ever remember having done this before.  It’s just that I was very tense and emotionally reactive at that moment. 

            At first it felt gratifying – especially when the driver stopped honking.  Perhaps this person feared that I might be prone to violence.  Or perhaps they realized how upset I was.   Whatever the case, I felt justified and righteous.  But then I was suddenly struck by a thought that sent chills down my spine.  “What if that person remembers me and greets me in the receiving line after I preach in the Sunday service tomorrow?   Yikes!”  

            You see, I had not yet gotten used to being a minister.  It just hadn’t sunk completely in.  It had not fully dawned upon me that I was now a more public figure,  supposedly embodying higher standards than the rude and crude ways of the world, and that my actions in public could have lasting repercussions.   

            First of all, let me just ask:  Is the person who was on the receiving end of an obscene gesture from a young man driving a 1980 Toyota Corolla on the freeway in San Diego in 1986 here this morning?  I’d like to apologize, but I will suggest you might use your horn a bit less. 

            What’s truly humbling about this confession is that I did not feel remorse for what I had done.  I was simply worried about what other people whom I aimed to impress might think of me.   That’s a big worry that many folks lug around all the time – This internal question: “What will other’s think?” is perhaps the most paralyzing thought ever to enter the human brain.  How constraining it can be to live in constant concern about the impression you are making on others, rather than just getting to be yourself.  

            Nevertheless, this concern about what others might think of us is not altogether a superficial matter.  It may well lead you down a more wholesome path.   Consider the trajectory of our moral development: as young child we may refrain from hitting another child or stealing a piece of candy not because we realize that it is inherently wrong but because we have learned to fear the consequences of getting caught. A child’s concern is focused on how others – especially those in authority – will react.   But later, as the child grows, he or she comes to realize that the rules against violence and theft aren’t just arbitrary dictates but practices grounded in protecting and preserving the common good.  So having this fear, “what will others think?” can sometimes (not always) be a good fear to guide you  – it might actually lead to internalizing some wholesome values. 

            Now I had expressed myself using an obscene gesture.  Although that wasn’t typical of me, in those days of my adolescence and young adulthood obscene words were not at all foreign to my lips, and I blame the Southern Baptists for this.  You see, when I was growing up in the Southern Baptist Church taught me that swearing was a sin, and to make sure I got the point my mouth did get washed out with soap at least once.  But as I grew older I came to realize that the Southern Baptists were wrong about almost  everything, that apparently they perversely imposed arbitrary rules to bleach all the color and joy out of life, so I reasoned that they must be wrong about swearing.  In the enlightened circles in which I traveled, swearing was a sign that you were liberated, free from the constraints of conventional morality, that your verbal palette was inclusive of the full range of human thought and feeling.   The Southern Baptists should have anticipated all of this and taught me that swearing like a sailor was a good thing because then I would rebelled and stopped swearing altogether.  

            Be that as it may, that regrettable moment on the freeway was the last time I made that obscene gesture.   I swear.  Over the next few years, as I internalized my ministerial role, foul language drifted out of my speech patterns.   I’m not saying I never, ever use such language but it’s pretty rare.  If I hit my finger with a hammer I’ll momentarily regress into using foul language, but I have pretty much sworn off swearing to express personal outrage.  

            This, however, begs the question:  Doesn’t censoring your language hamper your ability to vent your anger and frustration from time to time?  Why deprive yourself of the freedom to indulge in a few choice words after enduring some outrage - at least in private?  Aristotlean and Freudian logic underlies this question.  According to Aristotle we need to have a “catharsis” – some strong emotional release from negative feelings.  Freud took this one step further and said that if you don’t vent, you’re repressing your negative feelings and your bottled up emotions will eat away at you.   

            There is some truth to this – bottling up your rage, frustrations and disappointments, isn’t good for you.  But neither, according to a fair number of psychological studies stretching back for half a century, is venting these emotions.  In a study “The Pseudopsychology of Venting in the Treatment of Anger” psychology professor Jeffrey Lohr debunks the widespread notion that venting is cathartic and helps restore balance:  “In study after study, the conclusion was the same: Expressing anger does not reduce aggressive tendencies and likely makes it worse. … even those who firmly believed in the value of venting ended up more hostile and aggressive after thumping pillows or in other expressions of anger….What people fail to realize is that the anger would have dissipated had they not vented. Moreover, it would have dissipated more quickly if instead of venting they had tried to control their anger instead, or taken deep breathes or relaxed or taken a time out.”

Really, this makes perfect sense if you think about it.  You get good at what you most often practice – if you practice at being angry and venting, you’ll get really good at that.  That’s one reason why shelters for abused women are so full – there are so many men who practice anger and rage – they may think that they are letting off steam, when in fact they are just throwing more logs on the fires of mindless rage and anger – and innocent people get burned badly by this.    The anger and violence gets worse over time. 

On the other hand, if you practice being calm, letting it go, not taking things personally, you will get better at that.  We have such subtle, untapped power to shape our hearts and minds by virtue of what we practice day by day, moment by moment.  Personally, I think it makes more sense to practice being calm, centered.   

I got started on this path in part because many years ago I was concerned with what other people might think of me, the intern minister in San Diego .  Yet that is not a negligible thing.  To be sure, enshrining the desire to be accepted and respected in society as an absolute value is a recipe for spiritual and psychological disaster – it leads to a crippling concern about what others think, leads to mindless conformity, superficiality and culminates in rank hypocrisy and even worse than that, if the social group you’re in is up to no good.  But a healthy desire to cultivate a good reputation as someone who is trustworthy, compassionate and fair is not to be scorned.  This can make life flow smoother for you and for those around you.  Plus, in the act of practicing these virtues you begin to internalize them, they transform you. 

People expect ministers to be kind, compassionate, to embody the values we all profess – you don’t want to see me driving around town spewing foul language and making obscene gestures, and this expectation has actually helped me become a better person.  Please don’t think I’m boasting – I know I have my fair share of faults and flaws, but I’d probably have more than my share if I had not become a minister.  Having the identity of a minister has helped make me make wiser choices in the way I live and think and feel.

Yet there is also something really odd about this idea that I am a minister and others here are not.  Perhaps that’s why sometimes people - who rightfully like to challenge authority - ask me why I choose to have “The Reverend” placed before my name.  That’s an excellent question.  I don’t choose this title because I think I’m some exalted personage favored in the sight of God.  I certainly don’t agree with the ancient Christian teaching that the act of ordination causes one’s soul is transformed to a higher state of being than the rest of humankind.  Rather I accept this title of “the Reverend” because it has symbolic value.  Think about it this way – we use the chalice as a symbol of our faith – it helps us focus our minds on the essential qualities of our liberal religious tradition.  Similarly, the word “Reverend” helps us focus our minds upon the essential qualities of ministry. 

Really I’m a walking, living symbol, a blank screen upon which you can project your images of ministry, and that’s OK as long as it serves some common good.  Just remember this: whatever noble or exalted image you project upon me or any minister comes from within you – your image of ministry tells you more about who you are than who I am.  Above all, think about what ministry actually is.  It’s a servant role – in Latin the word minister in Latin means “to serve.”  In the bible the prevailing image of ministry is not someone in a position of power and authority, but rather one who serves others.  A minister is a servant of humankind.  We each have different gifts and talents that we bring to bear, but the essential qualities and characteristics of ministry are the same:  Ministers are those who are guided by their highest and holiest values to serve humankind, who strive either directly or indirectly to bring more compassion, caring, love, courage, hope and justice into the world. 

It’s true that there are those who would convince you that professional clergy are distinct and different.  We may have specialized skills and training that help us do certain things, but we are no more morally or spiritually elevated than anyone.  We don’t have any special mystical connections that others lack.  To believe otherwise is a dangerous and disempowering notion.   Beware of overweening authority, whether it comes clothed in clerical garb or some other vestments of expertise and control.  Be aware of your own power, your own wisdom, your own call to serve. 

In religious history there has been some sentiment that because there is a dangerous tendency among religious authorities to seek power over others that such offices should be abolished.   Really, just the opposite should happen.  Like some radical Christian theologians, I believe we should not abolish the clergy, rather, we should abolish the laity.   We’re all ministers, we’re all called to serve according to the unique gifts that we have to offer.  I’ll tell you this – if I am regarded as the only minister here we are doomed, we might as well close down shop.  The calling to ministry is too big to lay upon one person’s shoulders.   I try to do my part, but I need your help in more ways than I could say.  You, as a member of this religious community are called to serve.  You are a minister.   Ours is a shared ministry.   This is not a role to be taken lightly.  It is to be internalized and taken to heart where it can shape your heart.   This calling to our shared ministry is a high calling but it is also a joyful calling.  It’s fun to be a minister – it gives you permission to be kind, considerate and understanding of everyone. 

Especially, it’s important to remember your ministerial identity in the stress and strain of life, when you might be tempted to react without wisdom and compassion and instead perpetrate the anger, the rage, the stress, the despair that clouds our world.   Here’s what helps me do this:  I strive to think of every person I meet as a member of the ultimate congregation I serve – sometimes known as “the church universal.”