As a seminary student, I learned of the importance to our Unitarian heritage of Manchester College, Oxford, its predecessors and the remarkable people who have led those institutions and the British Unitarian churches through difficult times, past and present. And so it is a great honor for me to be with you this morning, speaking in this historic chapel and college.
It seems now, perhaps more than ever, there is a great yearning to achieve peace, both in our personal lives and in the world at large. And yet, we seem to be failing miserably in this endeavor. Our Buddhist friends would attribute this to a lack of skillful means on our part. While this may initially seem negative, they also believe that with time, dedication, and considerable effort, we can learn to be more peaceful. This morning, I would like to discuss the process of growing toward peace, first at the individual level then a few words about global peace.
In reading the biographies of my heroes, I found that their spiritual growth and development was often gradual, as life continued to present them with new challenges and opportunities. The concept of gradual growth in awareness and understanding has certainly been true in my own case. I began as a student of the physical sciences at the U.S. Naval Academy, later to be chief engineer of a Navy warship. My travels exposed me to the impoverished conditions in several developing countries, including a year spent in South Viet Nam. Inspired by the life and writings of Dr. Albert Schweitzer (who gave the Hibbert Lectures here at Manchester College in 1934), I decided to leave the naval service and train to become a physician. In the late 1970's, I was fairly content and even optimistic. During those years, I trained as a cardiologist and became a medical school professor. Jimmy Carter was elected President and I agreed with him when he said: "A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It’s a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity." and Jimmy Carter did keep the faith, implementing a foreign policy based on human rights, not the economic advantage of our business leaders.
But, with the advent of the 1980's, United States politics took a sharp right-ward turn, and as events unfolded, such as the Iran- Contra affair, the altruistic vision of America that I had acquired as a school boy began to fade away, and was replaced with an increasing disillusionment with the kind of politicians that we Americans seem to elect. I thought back to the 1960's, and the image of religious leaders of many faiths, linked arm in arm, marching for justice and peace, and I remembered that the moral authority that they represented did change the tide of public opinion about the American war in Viet Nam. Ultimately, the politicians were forced, against their self-interest, to end the war. And so, I applied to Starr King School, the Unitarian Universalist seminary in Berkeley California. When asked by its president why I wanted to train for yet another career, I found myself saying: "I just want to learn to help people stop killing each other." That determination on my part gained momentum in August, 1990, when Iraq invaded Kuwait. At that time, I still held a commission as a Captain in the Naval Reserve. I realized that this was my call to discern my deepest feelings about peace and war, and whether I could continue in the military, even as a physician and non-combatant. After much prayer, I came to understand that I had become at the age of 51, a conscientious objector to all wars, and so I resigned my Navy commission.
As I continued my seminary studies, I learned how individuals proceed through the various stages of moral development, and I recalled my medical school classes on physical and emotional development. Putting these concepts together, I began to better understand how the different systems - body, mind and spirit - continue to change through our lifetime. And I have come to believe that our capacity for a peaceful life is directly linked to our sense of self, which in itself continues to change throughout our life span. We are all born rather defenseless, but with the protective love and care of others, we manage to survive infancy. As we grow, we eventually reach the stage of self-assertion, and in later childhood, we struggle to be accepted by our peers as part of a community. Then comes the stormy adolescent period, which is often characterized by intense self-absorption as we seek to define ourselves.
For many, university, love, marriage and children follow in rapid succession. If our sense of self has become sufficiently strong by this time, we can become less self-absorbed, allowing us to focus more on the needs and care of others near and dear to us, whom we begin to realize are integral parts of our own life. Finally, if our sense of self, family and local community has grown even stronger, we recognize that we are involved with the whole of humankind, and we turn our attention to the needs of others more distant. We can become truly concerned, and actively engaged, when situations like those in the Darfur region of Sudan occur.
I see this process of growth, then, as one of learning to love and put trust in ourselves, in others, and in the Ultimate and Sacred. But many of us get stuck at some point along the way; our emotional and spiritual growth stops, and we fail to ignite the Divine Spark and fulfill the potential that resides in all of us. The good news, however, is that, when they are functioning at their best, our various religious traditions can significantly contribute to our growth, both at the individual and collective levels. As our insight expands, and our capacity for compassion and loving-kindness increases, we will find peace growing in our hearts, in our communities, and in the world.
In strengthening our individual sense of self, I find Buddhist and Christian concepts particularly helpful. I believe that we are all endowed with Buddha Nature, and we are all children of God, and that the seeds of our Divine Nature and an Enlightened State are always present within us, although they are often obscured in our competitive, consumerist world. The deep realization of this spiritual heritage can provide the foundation for a strong sense of self, and allow us to grow further by developing love for, and a radical trust in, others. Mohandas Gandhi reminded us that "we must become the change we wish to see in the world." And Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote: "A religious person is one who holds God and man in one thought at one time, and at all times; Who suffers in himself the harms done to others, Whose greatest passion is compassion, Whose greatest strength is love and defiance of despair." In the Mahayana tradition of Buddhism, the achievement of individual enlightenment is not the final goal. Instead, practitioners have the altruistic aspiration to achieve enlightenment for the benefit of all sentient beings. They also advocate the practice of tonglen, mentally substituting oneself for others, and in particular, assuming the suffering of the other.
If only these understandings could be extended throughout all cultures and nations, we would no doubt have a more peaceful world. But there is a third stage in our spiritual development, growth beyond self. It is most clearly articulated by the mystics in each spiritual tradition, and involves a sense of transcendence beyond our individual and communal self, of merger with the Infinite. I believe this is more likely to occur in those with a strong sense of self, reinforced by the love and support of their spiritual community. The Native American spiritual leader, Black Elk, spoke of this understanding of peace in the heart, which he called the First Peace: "The first peace, which is the most important, is that which comes within the souls of the people when they realize their relationship, their oneness with the universe and all its powers, and when they realize that at the center of the universe dwells the Great Spirit, and that this center is really everywhere; it is within each of us."
With these teachings to guide us, then, (to quote Ezekiel), "how then shall we live this life?" Well, my prescription for any individual would read something like this: 1st. Strengthen your sense of self, because you are loved no matter what circumstances befall you. 2nd. Leave your zone of comfort and go help others, particularly where the need is greatest. In so doing, you will receive more than you give. 3rd. Stay open to the realization that, while you are doing these things, you are a part of all that has been created and will be created, that you are part of life in the deepest sense, and always will be. This realization may only come in brief flashes, but know that it contains the truth.
And so it does seem possible that we individuals can find peace in our souls, in our community, and in our relationship with the Absolute, but, you may ask, can we transfer any of this understanding to global peace? We can look at the emotional and spiritual states of nations as we have done with individuals. Unfortunately, many countries today most resemble the period of adolescence, intensely self-absorbed and subject to violent outbursts - and it seems that they have become stuck there. They may have developed physically and economically, but they have not grown to full maturity, towards a genuine concern for others, particularly those less fortunate. Without compassion for others, they fail to see the underlying unity of all peoples at the spiritual level. They begin breaking treaties and failing to pay their dues at the United Nations, claiming that those are no longer in their national self-interest. Hopefully, the powerful nations of the world can come to a more mature understanding of themselves, of others, and of the Ultimate.
On most days, it seems to me that this new enlightenment period won’t happen in our lifetime. But, just when our despair over the human condition seems to have reached the breaking point, we remember great souls like the late Mother Teresa of Calcutta, who said: "There is a light in this world, a healing spirit more powerful than any darkness we may encounter. We sometimes lose sight of this force when there is suffering, too much pain. Then suddenly, the spirit will emerge through the lives of ordinary people who hear a call and answer in extraordinary ways." As in her case, quite often, this begins with the principled action of one individual, speaking truth to power, without regard to the earthly consequences.
In this regard, we can draw inspiration from the lives and words of those individuals so engaged, those voices in the wilderness, calling for the advent of peace. Particularly helpful to me are the reflections of those who have seen war first hand: Charles Clements, a young U.S. Air Force Academy graduate, became a conscientious objector after flying missions over Vietnam. After graduating from medical school, he served the poor in rural El Salvador during their civil strife. Today, he is president of the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee, and oversees its world-wide humanitarian efforts. Another of my heroes is Charles Liteky, a Roman Catholic priest who served as a US Army chaplain with a combat unit in Vietnam. Unarmed, on several occasions, he crawled across a battlefield under fire to bring back the wounded and dead. For his actions, he was awarded the highest American decoration, the Congressional Medal of Honor, by President Johnson in a White House ceremony. Within in a year, however, after better understanding the full effects of that war - and of all wars -, he returned his Medal of Honor. Today, he continues to actively work for peace, sometimes from jail, sometimes from the steps of the U.S. Capitol building where he undergoes extended fasting.
And so I suggest that each of us has not only an opportunity, but an obligation to work tirelessly for peace. In particular, I feel we have a responsibility to those young men and women who, through the course of our national histories, have responded to the call of their country to risk, and give, their lives for what we perceive to be our national interests. Even as politicians make foolish and self-serving decisions to begin wars, the nobility of those who serve in our military organizations remains clear. In their grief, some parents of Americans killed in Iraq and other wars abroad have found that it is emotionally impossible for them to believe other than that the decisions of our politicians were correct. Otherwise, they must feel, their children have died in vain. I believe that those young persons will not have died in vain if, but only if, the citizens of our countries come to understand that our politicians are not always right, that our administrations can make tragic and fatal decisions, that sometimes our young people do die serving an illegitimate, and perhaps even immoral, cause. But their deaths can - and will - have meaning if we someday come to our senses and realize the folly and immorality of war, if we elect wise and courageous politicians who will keep us out of war without appeasement, and if we strengthen the United Nations to make it a truly effective global police force whose peacekeepers will not be forced to stand by while genocide occurs.
I believe that it will take much effort on our part to develop the political will among our fellow citizens to change the present course of our two nations. Hearts will need to be softened one heart at a time. But I suggest that we can - and should - do no less, for as the poet Archibald MacLeish wrote: The young dead soldiers do not speak. Nevertheless, they are heard in the still houses: who has not heard them? They have a silence that speaks for them at night and when the clock counts. They say: We were young. We have died. Remember us. They say: We have done what we could but until it is finished, it is not done They say: We have given our lives but until it is finished, no one can know what our lives gave. They say: Our deaths are not ours; they are yours; they will mean what you make them. They say: Whether our lives and our deaths were for peace and a new hope, or for nothing, we cannot say; it is you who must say. They say: We leave you our deaths. Give them their meaning. We were young, they say. We have died. Remember us. Amen.