First Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany

”Building and Rebuilding Public Relationships”

Rev. Samuel A. TrumboreSeptember 19, 2004

Sermon

I was feeling very lonely, lying on an uncomfortable bed with sagging springs in a cheap residential hotel room in downtown Palo Alto, California, in October of 1977, with nothing but a backpack and a suitcase.I’d traveled across the country on a rail pass from my home in Newark, Delaware visiting old friends and having adventures.Now I was at the end of my trip and it was time to start my new life with no job, no home, no friends, and not much money.

On Sunday morning, I decided I’d go to the Palo Alto Unitarian Church.Being raised a Unitarian, I thought this would be a way to escape my solitude.When I arrived, everyone was two to four times my age.Of the people who still had hair on their heads, few of them still had the same hair color as when they graduated high school.My heart sank a little, wondering if I’d fit in with these folks.Then I saw a hand waving at me from a table on the far side of the courtyard.Connected to the hand was the smiling face of an elementary school teacher named Peggy George.She welcomed me, asked about my circumstances, and introduced me to a few people she thought I’d like to meet.After the service we went out to lunch.Suddenly, I didn’t feel alone anymore.

Thus began my twelve-year residency in California and my membership in the Palo Alto Unitarian Church.It became my community as I found work and attended community college in preparation for my transfer to UC Berkeley to finish my engineering degree.I formed a Unitarian student group there.My first serious romantic relationship was with a young woman who grew up in that congregation.It was through that church, I felt connected to my new home.

Because I grew up with a very strong sense of community, I knew what to do to begin to resolve my feelings of loneliness and isolation.Many others today do not.Many are raised without a religious community or a sense of connectedness with a stable circle of friends and neighbors.With the significant and rapid changes in the economy, many families are uprooted again and again to seek employment in a new location.

Add to those disruptions the changes in the way we spend our leisure time.More and more, people relax and seek entertainment at home in front of the television, sound system or the computer.Email, electronic chat rooms and instant messaging give us the feeling of community but at the expense of physical isolation, chained to a screen and keyboard.As one who spends a lot of time engaged in developing online community with hundreds of people, I find that electronic communication is a helpful supplement to and sustainer of face-to-face community rather than a substitute for it.

An increasing sense of social alienation and emptiness seem to be a byproduct of our technological advances.Particularly the automobile allows us to be on a busy street or in a traffic jam and avoid any social contact.People work alone in cubicles staring at a screen all day often communicating with co-workers by email rather than chatting at the water cooler.Today, you can get up, go to work, zip through EZPASS lane, come home, shop, scan and pay for your groceries, watch TV and go to bed practically without speaking to, let alone having a satisfying emotional exchange with, one other flesh and blood human being.

Technology has helped us realize our dream of independence and freedom at a significant social cost.The seeds of the struggle planted when we were infants have come to full flower and the beauty and smell isn’t as satisfying as we’d hoped.

Freud recognized and described the conflicting human desire for autonomy as opposed to oneness, for independence as opposed to community.The struggle begins with the infant’s complete dependence on and strong bonding to its mother.Some believe the source of the desire for union with God begins in an experience of oneness we enjoyed in the womb. There may be few experiences as holistically satisfying as being lovingly held to the breast as a baby.

The euphoria, however, is ruptured when the breast is taken away a moment too soon or offered a moment too long.No mother can perfectly satisfy an infant’s every need at every moment.It’s impossible.All infants at one time or another will experience some sense of separation, abandonment, pain, and longing.They will be confronted with the truth that they are vulnerable to a world that can be dangerous, unpleasant, hurtful, and impersonal.

If mother can’t deliver what the infant wants when it wants it, then the infant soon recognizes he or she will have to depend on their own resources to get what’s needed.As my mother chuckled to her friends about me when I was young, the toddler starts saying, “Do myself!”The natural drive toward independence and autonomy doesn’t erase the desire to return to the oneness of infancy.With physical and mental development, the toddler recognizes there are others who can satisfy their oneness needs besides their mother.

So we learn to fulfill this primal desire for oneness through interpersonal relationships.Many people satisfy this social need by developing a few close friendships and forming an intimate life partnership with one other person. For some, this may be a satisfying way to take care of their relational needs.For others who are not currently in an intimate relationships or don’t get all their social needs met by close friends and their partner, or for those who enjoy the discovery process of meeting new people and beginning new relationships, they need another kind of relationship to meet their social needs.

Impersonal relationships and close friendships bound the continuum of most people’s relationships.We have a formal, role-bound relationship with, say, a doctor who listens to our heartbeat, a dental hygienist who cleans our teeth, or perhaps a clerk we see at the store where we shop.The relationship is contractual--fee for service.At the other end of the spectrum are close friends.Close friends are people we implicitly trust and rely on, people who listen to us, care about us and will be there when we need them.

This morning, I’d like to highlight another form of relationship found in the middle of this continuum, called a “public relationship,” based on limited self revelation, mutual recognition, shared commitment, and mutual accountability.Having been active in many social, political, and religious organizations, I’ve been involved in many of these kinds of relationships throughout my life.It wasn’t until I met Greg Galluzzo, the Executive Director of the Gamaliel Foundation, that I realized how these relationships worked and can be intentionally developed and refined.

Greg taught the first ARISE community organizing training I attended in February of 2001 on how to do one-on-ones, the basic relationship building strategy ARISE uses.The one-on-one interview method helps the interviewer learn about the background, values, concerns, talents and interests of the interviewee.In the training, Greg emphasized the value and personal satisfaction of developing a wide network of public relationships and their critical importance to successful community organizing.Being a minister, I immediately recognized these relationships he was describing were similar to what the membership committee does as we encourage visitors to become involved in our congregation.It matters who you are as an individual here.The shared values we cultivate bring mutual recognition.By joining the congregation and signing the book, people make a commitment and become accountable for it’s support and guidance through the use of the democratic process.

We are very intentional about encouraging people to develop a relationship with this congregation and Unitarian Universalism.What can be much harder for us is facilitating the same process to happen between our members.Many of us find coffee hour a daunting challenge as a way to meet new people.If Peggy at the membership table in Palo Alto hadn’t offered her help, I would have had a difficult time meeting people and forming relationships.

What excited me about learning the one-on-one interview technique was its value to accelerate the building of public relationships between members of our congregation.The strength and satisfaction of being part of a congregation comes from the width of the network of your relationships--the place where everyone knows who I am and respects me for who I am.Unfortunately one-on-ones are typically employed for a specific community organizing purpose and require training to do well.

Thankfully, Small Group Ministry, another highly effective way to build public relationships, became part of the life of our congregation three years ago.Small Group Ministry is a closed group of between five and ten people who meet twice a month.The content of the meeting includes a check-in, a stimulating topic and time for personal reflection on that topic while the other group members actively listen.The purpose of the time of reflection isn’t debate or argument but self-revelation.Self-revelation stimulates a sense of mutual appreciation through both listening and talking.

The purpose of Small Group Ministry is to:

-Foster connection and caring,

-Provide for personal growth and spiritual development,

-And ultimately to strengthen to fabric of our community.

The power and benefits of these small groups comes from the effects of active listening.Active listening, similar to the one-on-one process, goes beyond the content of the speaker’s message and tries to connect with and identify the emotions that energize the speaker’s words.The listener can hear even more deeply universal life delights and dilemmas.This kind of deep listening breaks down barriers between group members as they recognize each other’s common humanity.We all struggle with fear, anger, and loneliness.We all suffer unjustly.We all long for what we do not have.We all seek freedom from pain.

The result of this kind of self-revelation and active listening is a depth of intimacy the group members may not even share with their own families.It creates a strong sense of connection that bonds people together in a way not possible during coffee hour on Sunday morning or at a committee meeting.

These groups allow our congregation to get smaller and more connected thus permitting it to grow bigger and more diverse.They allow newer members of our congregation to make strong connections with our more seasoned members.They also help older members who have lost contemporaries to renew their circle of relationships with the next generation of FUUSAns.

Does it work?Here are a few testimonials from evaluations:

·I got to know some people that I would not have gotten to know in this way.I also liked sharing things about myself that I would not have shared. 

·I think it is an excellent vehicle for bringing older and newer members together and provide a bridge for newer members to become more active in FUUSA

·I am not a good "small" talker and don't like coffee hours for that reason.This program helped me feel a part of FUUSA.

·What was most useful to me was being part of a structured group where we talk about feelings and life without judging each other.

·I felt there was a real spiritual and personal component to the sessions.It helped me in my spiritual search.

·This is what I really need to grow, to befriend others, to realize an authentic self.

Whenever we survey the congregation to find out what is most important function of FUUSA in people’s lives, the answer comes back, community.In every service, we affirm the importance to us of sustaining a vital and nurturing religious community, exciting the human spirit and inspiring its growth and development.And for many of us, our public relationships are the stimulating tool we use to inspire our growth and development.

Developing public relationships within the context of a vital and nurturing religious community is, I believe, our core spiritual practice.It is through these relationships, intentionally nurtured and developed, that we gain a glimpse of the love humanity is capable of embodying.We, as human beings, embody the greatest development, so far, of the potential of life.In each other’s eyes we get a hint of the greatness of what lies beyond us, the greatness of life’s potential.One powerful way to deepen our spiritual life is to deepen our relationships with each other.

My life has been transformed by participation in different kinds of small groups.I first glimpsed the power of small groups as I observed their process during leadership school.My spirit was fed singing in the First Unitarian Church of Oakland’s chancel choir.My decision to enter the ministry was inspired by a skillfully run small group studying dreams, led by Jeremy Taylor. I know from personal experience, small groups can change us forever and I invite you to expand your public relationships as a way to inspire your own growth and development.

Benediction

There is not just more love somewhere,

It is potentially everywhere we turn.
The light of love is the eternal flame burning in our hearts.
May our skillfully cultivated relationships
Help lead us to this great truth,
Fill us with happiness that knows no boundaries
Bring us peace that cultivates a holy stillness within
Free us from our suffering that clouds our minds
And lead us to a expansive sense of gratitude for this precious gift of life.

Copyright ©2004 by Rev. Samuel A. Trumbore.All rights reserved.