The
Problem with Absolutist Religion
Essay by the Rev. Elizabeth A. Lerner
"The Problem with Salad Bowl Religion" is the title of
an opinion essay by Prof. Jon Levenson of Harvard Divinity School,
which recently appeared in First Things, a conservative academic
theological journal. In it, Levenson begins by quoting anonymously
a young Unitarian-Universalist minister whose sermon was excerpted
in the Burning Bush, the newsletter of the UUJA (Unitarian-Universalists
for Jewish Awareness) and then excerpted again from the Burning
Bush for a story in the Jewish Daily Forward on Unitarian-Universalism.
As an enthusiastic former student of Prof. Levenson's and a continuing
admirer of his work and teaching, I wish I had known that his essay
would be appearing, because I am that young Unitarian-Universalist
minister; I found his critique insightful, challenging, and provocative,
and I feel compelled to respond.
Prof. Levenson reviews some usual defenses of "salad bowl"
or "syncretistic" religion early in his essay. He cites
the values of open-mindedness, inclusiveness and free thought, the
high percentage of Jews who participate in Unitarian-Universalism
(8 or 9 %)thus potentially justifying the addition of (in his example)
Jewish traditions to activities and holidays, the timeless tendency
of ritual and tradition to permeate and influence from one religion
and culture to another. He discusses the attractiveness of a faith
community whose world view requires no one to renounce their past
in order to find affirmation, and the attraction of this for mixed
marriages, which halakhic Judaism condemns. He mentions post-modernist
mind sets, which with their deconstructivist understanding of the
world challenge the singular authority and identity of traditional
religions.
His critique of such defenses of Unitarian-Universalism occurs
on many levels. In terms of mixed marriages, Prof. Levenson considers
"by far the easiest resolution...the additive one - to include
elements of both traditions giving little or no thought to how they
fit together to form any sort of integrated structure." I agree
with him in so far as he articulates a challenge to which Unitarian-Universalism
has so far risen only weakly, sporadically and congregationally,
rather than denominationally. Indeed I believe the greatest challenge
facing Unitarian-Universalism today, and the one we must heed to
ensure the future of our faith, is how to address our religious
and cultural diversity more deeply.
Being myself half-Jewish, close with the Jewish side of my family,
fairly well-educated in in Hellenistic and modern Judaism, observant
of the holidays, and possessing a smattering of Hebrew, I have heard
too many stories like the one about the UU church's Yom Kippur potluck
(Yom Kippur being a Jewish holiday observed fasting and attendance
at synagogue), or the doughnut holes brought to a UU congregation's
Passover seder (always marked by the consumption of unleavened bread,
usually 'matzoh') or the minister's December sermon which left the
congregation feeling that essentially Hannukah, Kwanzaa, Christmas
and the solstice are all about the same things: freedom, hope, light
in darkness and faith in the face of adversity. My own sermon on
Hannukah this past year was on the challenges that face us in truly
understanding and dealing with the stories of our heritages: Hannukah
is not only about lighted menorahs and the rededication of the Jerusalem
temple, it is not about a miraculous candle, and it is certainly
not about a struggle for religious freedom. The Hannukah story is
complicated and challenging, founded on a legend about Jews (the
Maccabees) who were zealots as well as heroes, killing not only
their persecutors but also other Jews who were not courageous enough
to die for their faith, brave warriors who imposed their faith on
many when they won dominion over Judea.
When it comes to Judaism I know enough, identify enough and care
enough to be able to engage with my congregation in worship, events
and discussions that I believe are not just additive solutions with
" little or no thought" involved. And I know a number
of ministers who put a lot of thought and research into the work
they do with the world's religions. But no minister can know every
background, every religion, every heritage, deeply and with personal
authenticity. And when it comes to Kwanzaa,or Ramadan, I know I
know there are many stones I am leaving unturned. Prof. Levenson's
point about our easy solutions must be well taken. When we settle
for feel-good interpretations of religious history and scripture,
or refrain from working in a deep way and on a denominational level
to wrestle with the questions and challenges which do not cease
in an interfaith family, couple or individual, the ministers and
lay leaders of Unitarian-Universalism are failing many of our members.
Either we are abandoning them to flounder in a morass of conflicts
and misinformation, or we are healing them lightly with superficial
treatments and lofty phrases leaving the dark and difficult issues
of families, theologies, and traditions untreated by the individuals
and communities which are called and expected to resolve them.
My disagreement with Prof. Levenson arises around some of his opinions
where they are not so much critiques of particular instances or
tendencies as assumptions about the nature of liberal, pluralistic
religion as represented by Unitarian-Universalism. His argument
is build on these suppositions: 1) his aforementioned description
of the "additive solution" of pluralism as easy and ill-considered;
2) that in contrast to halakhic Judaism, the ruling ideology behind
what Prof. Levenson terms "hyphenated religion" is merely
personal preference, obedience to nothing larger than "self-expression,
aesthetic pleasure, familial nostalgia, ethnic identification, whatever;"
3) that this results in the semblance of observance paired with
a denial of (ie. Sinai's) covenantal claims, mistaking "the
appearance of a religious act for the act itself." Prof. Levenson
ends his opinion with some pointed questions regarding religious
practices: "in what structure of authority have they become
embedded, and in the service of what affirmation do they now stand?
And will that authority still be obeyed and will that affirmation
still be made when the price of doing so is inconvenience, monetary
loss, personal anguish, persecution or martyrdom?" He answers
them himself with his conclusion; "Hyphenated obedience is
no obedience at all."
There are many Unitarian-Universalists whose turn to pluralistic,
liberal religion was neither easy nor ill-considered. Often such
a break with one's heritage strains or destroys family relationships.
People struggle, sometimes for decades, before they come to such
decisions. And even interfaith individuals, couples or families
find that the challenges of such a life are ongoing and change over
time, requiring tremendoius energy, time, honesty and study in order
to integrate differences. To be sure, not everyone gives religion,
liberal or otherwise, such consideration and priority. Just as their
are shallow Jews and Hindus, clinging to the obvious of the faith,
there are shallow UU's rejoicing in their newfound religious freedom
only, and not the responsibility. But I am talking about the faith
as we are called to live it, not as some live it. For those Unitarian-Universalists
who do put in the energy, time, honesty and study, to integrate
differing religious backgrounds, it is never easy.
It is a common critique of Unitarian-Universalism that it answers
to no higher authority than the self. But this can be a superficial
criticism. Modern Unitarianism and Universalism, drawing on roots
in transcendentalism and earlier movements, grew out of the shaping
of theologians like Ralph Waldo Emerson and James Luther Adams.
Emerson's heretical injunction delivered in his Divinity School
Address: "Obey thyself." reads like theological narcissism
unless one believes, as Emerson preached, that God shows in the
self, fortifies the self, admonishes and illuminates the self, which
would otherwise be meaningless, so blind to goodness, virtue or
the sacred as to have no justification for upholding and obeying
commandments from deep within. As for affirmation to which Unitarian-Universalists
give service, the best of these is laid out by James Luther Adam's
Five Smooth Stones of Liberalism: 1. Revelation is continuous. 2.
All relations between persons ought ideally to rest on mutual, free
consent and not on coercion. 3. There is a moral obligation to direct
one's effort toward the establishment of a just and loving community.
4. The form of virtue is not immaculate, rather it requires social
incarnation. 5. Resources, divine and human, are available for the
achievement of meaningful change, justifying an attitude of ultimate
optimism.
I know an orthodox Jew who left Judaism, because he no longer believed.
This caused a long estrangement, and permanent condemnation on the
part of his family, even unto death. If he had stayed, believing
nothing of orthodox Judaism's truths, daily a hypocrite, then indeed
he would have been entrenched in the "mere semblance of a Jewish
observance without sustenance from the deepest sources of Judaism."
But he left, intermarried with a lapsed Catholic, and they joined
the Unitarian-Universalist denomination, which they perceived as
a pluralistic faith which in its very syncretism, its conflict,
its attempt at religious even-handedness, and in its failures, was
ultimately truer to their understanding of the world, people, culture
and God than Judaism or Catholicism. In doing this both were ultimately
obedient to a morality and authority which stood at odds with the
religions in which they were raised, but this should not be confused
with obeying no structure of authority, recognizing no affirmation
to serve, and certainly not with thus ducking inconvenience, monetary
loss, personal anguish, persecution or martyrdom. Liberal religion
has its martyrs and persecuted too, from Michael Servetus, dying
at the stake with his heresy "On The Errors of the Trinity"
strapped to his thigh, to Joseph Priestly, the discoverer of oxygen,
whose home and laboratory were torched by a mob angry at his Unitarian
religion so that he fled, in fear for his life, to America, to the
Unitarian-Universalist killed a few years ago in Florida while serving
as an escort at a women's pregnancy and abortion clinic, or my own
former parishioner who was shot by John Salvi at the Brookline Ma.
Planned Parenthood clinic where she worked because of what she believed.
Ultimately Prof. Levenson's and my theological differences are
irreconcilable, because his are those of an absolutist, and mine
are not. As he joked more than once in class, "Relativism may
work for you, but it doesn't work for me." And perhaps any
pluralistic solution to religion's diverse truths and texts may
seem to some superficial or self-concerned. But I trust that in
Prof. Levenson's recognition of the belief that most religions have
in their own validity, he will at least believe me when I witness
as a minister to tears shed, lives and families wrenched apart,
shots fired, on account of people choosing to live and work according
to Unitarian-Universalism's unequivocal commitment to the inherent
worth and dignity of every person, to justice for all, to acceptance,
to searching, to democracy. When I look out at my gay and straight,
female and male, white and brown, Jewish and Christian and humanist
and pagan people and families, linked across every line of gender,
sexual orientation, race, culture and religious heritage, everyone
there because they believe they belong and they want to be there
and with each other, learning from each other, I am proud of them
and their openness and love for each other, and I am proud to be
their minister.
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