The Larger Hope

April 23, 2000

There is a story told about the great Universalist preacher Hosea Ballou, how, after hearing him speak for the first time, a man came up to him and said, "Brother Ballou, I'm worried about my son."

Ballou asked, "How old is your son?"

"Twenty-three," the man replied. "He spends every evening at the tavern with his friends. I'm afraid he's going to go to hell."

"Friend, I think I can help you," said Ballou. "Tonight, let's you and I hide around the corner from the tavern. When closing time is near, we'll prepare a roaring fire. Then, when your son comes along, we'll jump out, grab him, and throw him into the fire."

"Are you crazy?" said the man. "I could never do that to my own child!"

"God couldn't either," Ballou replied. "God couldn't either."

I tell this story as a way of explaining what early Universalists meant when they spoke of "the larger hope." They didn't believe in hell. They believed in a God of love and forgiveness. They believed that everyone would eventually be saved, that is, that everyone would be returned to a state of wholeness and health. They believed in ultimate reconciliation.

We modern-day Unitarian Universalists don't believe in hell, either. Hallelujah! We are free to believe in God or not, depending on how our intellect or our heart leads us. But those of us who do believe in God still believe in a God of love and forgiveness, a God of all people. And we are free to believe in an afterlife or not--we express no certainty on the matter. But we believe in the possibility of redemption for every human being, whether in this life or beyond. We still believe in ultimate reconciliation! We're a bunch of ever hopeful optimists. Hallelujah!

Even orthodox Christians, which by their definition we aren't, have difficulty with the resurrection. The Rev. Richard Spalding, co-pastor of the Church of the Covenant in the Back Bay, was quoted in an article in the Boston Globe last Easter as saying, "To believe in the Resurrection stretches credulity, everything. To me, it is the Mount Everest. It doesn't get any higher than that." A member of Spalding's congregation, Betsy McAlister-Groves, said, "I don't believe in the bodily resurrection, but I believe in the symbol and power of the story." She still believes that she is a Christian, and so do I. Sam Lloyd, rector of Trinity Church in Boston, said flat out, "Christian faith does not require Jesus's physical body to be reassembled." Wow. That's a relief.

Even St. Paul, who believed in the resurrection, seemed unsure what form it would take, coming down finally on the side of a "spiritual" resurrection. His defense of the resurrection in 1Corinthians 15 is one of the great equivocations of all time.

Does this mean that there is no resurrection? I don't think so.
Like the member of the Church of the Covenant whom I quoted before, I don't believe in a bodily resurrection, but I do believe in the symbol and power of the story. Though I believe that any speculation about an afterlife must remain just that: speculation. The afterlife, if there is one, remains wrapped in mystery, and that's fine with me. Like the contemporary singer-songwriter Iris Dement, I'm satisfied to "let the mystery be." I'm content to rest in the mystery. Why this obsession with answers? The great Christian mystic Julian of Norwich put it best: "All shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well." It was her hope and her faith. She didn't need to prove it.

What I do believe in, unequivocally, is the possibility of resurrection, renewal, and rebirth in this life. Hallelujah! And with my Universalist forebears, I believe that it is available to all of us. Life is the greatest gift, after all. And if there is an afterlife, I believe we will all share it. None shall be excluded. Hallelujah! I hope there is an afterlife, but if there isn't, I can live and die with that.

The late Tracy Pullman, a great Universalist minister whom I had the privilege to know in his later years, once gave the following explanation of Easter. He said:

Life springs eternal. There is something movingly dramatic about this annual rebirth. No matter how rigorous and cold and severe the winter, always there is the expectation and the assurance that eventually life will come into its own.

We have just this same faith with regard to human life. No matter how encrusted our lives may become, not matter how beaten into conventional moulds and practices, no matter how indifferent to the spiritual demands of life at its best, yet within every one, we have faith to believe, there dwells the spirit and the power to lay hold on new energies, to define new visions and to exhibit greater strength.

That, in a nutshell, is the larger hope: the power to lay hold new energies, to define new visions and to exhibit greater strength. It is a hope that is for every one of us, and it is hope that is for now. Hallelujah! No one, as my friend Scott Alexander proclaims, no, not one, shall be excluded from God's table, set with the finest silver and china and linen. The hope of resurrection is for all of us, and we needn't even wait. As the poet Wendell Berry instructs, we can and should "practice resurrection."

None of us shall escape death and suffering. Sorrow and loss are realities of our living. But as the contemporary novelist Bernard Malamud puts it so truthfully, "Life is a tragedy filled with joy." In spite of the tragic quality of life, there are moments of transcending beauty and truth, moments when personal actions rise above selfishness and egotism, moments when adversity is overcome and humanity stands triumphant against the forces of evil and death, moments of love and moments of ecstasy and moments of joy. Hallelujah!

What is important is the quality of our living now, since the present moment is the only thing about which we can be absolutely certain.

You know, it has been my observation that, when they get right down to it, most people are less concerned with death than with finding justification in the lives which they have lived on this earth. People want to be assured that life has meaning, that their individual lives have meaning, not that they will escape death. Because this life is what is really important to most of us, and we had better be about the living of it.

In spite of all the emphasis in religion which has been put on overcoming death, I repeat: most of us are more concerned that our lives have some redeeming value in the great scheme of things, or even just in the lives of those we love. Have I made a difference in someone's life? Over my years as a minister, I have had far fewer questions about the meaning of death than I have had about what life is all about.

If, in order to live, we must have assurance that death is an illusion, then I say that our condition is hopeless. But I don't believe that, any more than I believe in hell or in a God who would send me there. Hallelujah!

You see, I believe that most of us can live with death. For, if one believes in the life that triumphs over, and in spite of, death, then there is hope for everything and everyone. If doing the right thing by our fellow human beings, if seeking the good and the true, if striving for self-improvement, if living life to the fullest can give our lives meaning, as Universalism has always said that they do, then there is cause for hope. Then there is triumph over death! Then there is life eternal which far transcends my personal continuation after death. Then there is no need for hell, for all shall be redeemed. Hallelujah!

On this Easter day, let us look backward to that remarkable optimist, John Murray, the founder of American Universalism, the progenitor of the larger hope, who said, "You may possess only a small light, but uncover it, let it shine, use it in order to bring more light and understanding to the hearts and minds of men and women. Give them, not Hell, but hope and courage." Hallelujah! So be it. Amen.

The Rev. Harold E. Babcock