Rev. Babcock's sermons in 2005

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DATE	SERMON TITLE	Notes
12/25/2005	O Magnum Mysterium!
12/18/2005	The Power of Darkness	This week we celebrate the winter solstice: the shortest day of the year and the official beginning to the season of winter. The sermon will investigate "the power of darkness." The Christian mystics speak of a "dark night of the soul" as part of the mystical experience. This has led some to speak of a "dark night spirituality." At this darkest time of year, the sermon will investigate some of the compelling aspects of darkness.
12/4/2005	Be of Good Courage!	One of the themes of the Advent season is the renewal of courage in the face of despair. Often it is in our lowest and most despairing moments that we find our courage reasserting itself. Peter Gomes, minister at Harvard's Memorial Church, calls such an experience "an anticipation of the final and ultimate expression of peace and justice and mercy," or an "anticipation of the un-experienced." Advent is, metaphorically, a season that takes people from where they are and moves them toward where they want to be. Sounds good to me! The sermon will investigate.
11/20/2005	Gratitude	Please join us for our Thanksgiving Sunday service! My sermon will be on the topic of "gratitude." There will be a brief presentation about the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee's Guest at Your Table (GAYT) program, and the GAYT boxes will be handed out. The Young Church Choir will sing. As an old gospel hymn says, "Count your blessings, / Name them one by one. . . ."
11/13/2005	Belonging	This morning we will once again welcome new members, those who have decided to become legal voting members of our congregation and who have submitted an Application for Membership-into the fellowship of the First Religious Society in a Ceremony of New Member Recognition. The sermon will investigate the various ways that church membership and participation can provide a sense of belonging. I look forward to seeing you in church!
11/6/2005	The Partner Church Experience (MP3 Sound File)	This morning I will be joined in the pulpit by members of our youth contingent to Romania this past summer, sharing a few of their experiences on the UU Partner Church Youth Tour of Transylvania. Their four-day visit in our Partner Church village of Ujszekely as part of that tour coincided with the visit of Michael Fosburg, Barbara Owen, Max Russell, Sabrina Babcock, Russell and Rochelle Perry-Platine, and me. Together we attended the tenth anniversary of our Partner Church minister Zsolt Jakab's ministry in Ujszekely, and the rededication of the church's renovated organ, a project spearheaded by Barbara Owen. The Teen Choir will sing this morning. There will be no young church classes today, but there will be childcare provided in the nursery.
10/23/2005	From Nationalism to Globalism	This Sunday is traditionally celebrated as United Nations Sunday. The sermon will explore our collective need for a more global, less nationalistic vision for our world. Nationalism continues to fuel many conflicts around the world. Unless we can learn to live together as one people, it is hard to see how we can continue to survive on our ever-shrinking planet. The sermon will investigate.
10/16/2005	Intelligent Design?	Freelance writer David Holahan writes, "We can trace our iffy evolutionary tree back 20 million years. The cockroach, by comparison, has a pedigree of 250 million years and will almost certainly survive us at the rate we're abusing our habitat. Is this any way to design a universe?" The current debate going on in our schools and courts is about teaching evolution versus "intelligent design." But don't be fooled: it's the same old debate between science and religion. The sermon will investigate.
10/2/2005	Our Liberal Faith	This Sunday is Worldwide Protestant/Orthodox Communion Sunday. It is also the Feast of St. Francis, and Tuesday is the first day of the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashana) and the first day of the Islamic season of Ramadan. I believe that Unitarian Universalism has something important to add to the ecumenical conversation. The sermon will investigate our liberal faith in the context of a world of competing religious traditions.
9/25/2005	The View from Europe	This summer Sabrina and I, along with Russell and Rochelle Perry-Platine, traveled to Vienna, Austria, Budapest, Hungary, and the Romanian region of Transylvania, where we spent nine days visiting in our Partner Church village of Ujszekely. There we met up with Michael Fosburg, Barbara Owen, Max Russell, and eight youth from our congregation. We celebrated the 10th anniversary of our Partner Church minister's ministry in Ujszekely and the rededication of the church's restored pipe organ, and attended the "World Gathering of Unitarians" in the city of Szekelyudvarhely. The sermon will reflect upon our travels and experiences, and attempt to give at least a partial view from Europe.
9/18/2005	The View from the Heartland	This summer my son Ben and I took a road trip out to the Badlands and Black Hills of South Dakota, where we camped and hiked. Along the way, we visited friends and spent part of a day exploring around my first church in Minnesota, where Ben was born. This fall Ben is starting his teaching and coaching career at a private school in Connecticut, so this was an opportunity for us to spend some time together before he headed off to his new life. The sermon will reflect upon those experiences, as well as upon some of my thoughts about the "heart" of America.
9/11/2005	Coming Home	Author and poet Alice Walker has written in a poem ("When We Let Spirit Lead Us"), "All we can hope / Is that / We are going / Home / That wherever / Spirit / Takes us / Is where / We / Live." The sermon will investigate that hope as we re-gather our worshipping community from the summer hiatus with an intergenerational family service. There will be a procession of flowers, so please bring a flower to share during the service.
8/28/2005	Slow Down, You Move Too Fast	Preached at Hampton Falls, NH
6/19/2005	No Greater Love	Seventy years ago today a father and his two sons perished while sailing in a transatlantic yacht race to Norway. I grew up with their story, and knew their wife and mother. It is a story as inspiring as it is sad. As it is written in the gospel of John, "No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends." The sermon will investigate the truth of this claim.
6/5/2005	Taking Darsan in Minnesota	My sermon this morning concerns a special way of seeing. The Hindus call it "darsan," or seeing the divine image. There is nothing quite like it in the western religious tradition, except perhaps in Orthodoxy. But maybe we can learn something about "seeing" from our Hindu friends. The sermon will investigate the possibility of "taking" darsan in Minnesota, or anywhere else, for that matter. I hope to see you in church!
5/29/2005	Memory as Prayer	The poet Marge Piercy has written that "Memory is the simplest form of prayer." On this Memorial Day weekend, my sermon will investigate the truth of her claim, with which I happen to agree. As this is also the weekend that my oldest son Ben graduates from college, I expect to be taking a few journeys down memory lane. See you in church!
5/22/2005	Not Far from Buddhahood	The privilege of selecting this morning's sermon topic was purchased by the Turner family at the 2004 church auction. They asked me to consider "a conversation between Jesus and Buddha." Is there any single principle that Jesus and Buddha might have agreed is at the heart of all? I do not claim to be an expert on Buddhism, but I will attempt to discover teachings, or at least a spirit, that may be held in common between Jesus and the Buddha. As the Zen teacher Gasan said after hearing read some of the sayings of Jesus, "That is excellent. Whoever said that is not far from Buddhahood."
5/1/2005	A Faith for All Seasons	This morning we will once again welcome new members-those who have decided to become legal voting members of the congregation and who have submitted an Application for Membership-into the fellowship of the First Religious Society in a Ceremony of New Member Recognition.
4/17/2005	The Spiritual Life
4/3/2005	Returning, Again	"To repent does not mean to feel really bad about sins; rather, it means to embark upon a path of return," writes biblical scholar Marcus Borg. All of us, whether in our individual or our corporate lives, have a need for "returning." As author Dan Wakefield writes, "[Returning] is not a comfortable excuse for hiding out in old certitudes, but rather a constant pushing forward to test one's belief and use it. . . ." I wonder if, at this particular time in its history, our nation does not need to do some serious returning. The sermon will investigate.
3/27/2005	The Two Ways	"I call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse; therefore choose life, that you and your descendents may live. . . ." Thus spoke Moses to the Israelites shortly before his death. The ancient Israelites didn't believe in an afterlife, but they believed in the life that is, and in the responsibility to live it well. This is not "life" in the abstract. The failure to live well is the way of death. None of us knows what happens after we die, but all of us have choices about how we will live the lives we have been so miraculously given. By popular demand, the turtle will make its annual appearance. The Teen Choir will sing. There will be no Young Church classes this morning, but there will be child care provided for the little ones. I look forward to seeing you in church!
3/20/2005	The Virtue of Generosity	My colleague and Harvard Divinity School classmate Silvio Nardoni has written that, "For my money (pun intended), I believe we should focus on the virtue of generosity more than any other message . . . The goal is to manifest to the world a faith that by gathering together in free religious communities we also gather the financial, moral and spiritual resources to accomplish great things." How committed are we to the virtue of generosity? When Jesus went up to Jerusalem on the original Palm Sunday, he was committed to a message of radical social and religious change. He really wanted to change the world. It cost him his life. That's about as generous as it gets. How committed are we to our liberal religious message of freedom, reason, and tolerance? Our generosity is a pretty good indicator. How much are we willing to give? As it says in the Bible, "By their fruits you shall know them." The sermon will investigate.
3/6/2005	Strange Ancestor	Unitarian Universalism has often been described as a religion of spiritual seekers. My sermon this morning will investigate the life of one of the most controversial spiritual seekers our movement has ever known. Orestes A. Brownson was born in Stockbridge, Vermont, in 1803. In the course of his life he was a Congregationalist, a Presbyterian, an unbeliever, a Universalist preacher, an independent preacher, a Unitarian preacher, a Transcendentalist, and finally and most adamantly, a Roman Catholic. Along the way he managed to provoke to anger almost everyone in each of these fellowships. The sermon will consider this "strange ancestor."
2/20/2005	Letting Your Life Speak	Recently I was asked to address the students and faculty of Governor Dummer Academy as part of their series on spirituality. I chose to speak on the question of "vocation" as posed in the question, "What shall I do with my life?" The sermon will investigate my learnings from that experience.
2/13/2005	The Fear of Strangers	My colleague Edmund Robinson in Belmont recently preached a wonderful little sermon about hospitality at a Unitarian Universalist Partner Church Regional Meeting that several of us attended. In his sermon, Edmund pointed out the relation between the Greek word for "hospitality" in the New Testament, philoxenion, and its opposite, xenophobia: the fear of strangers. Unfortunately, and ironically given our history, xenophobia seems to be growing here in the United States, especially in what author William Gass once called "the heart of the heart of the country." The sermon will explore "the fear of strangers."
2/6/2005	The Transylvania Connection (Redux)	Sermon preached at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Phoenix, Paradise Valley, AZ
1/30/2005	Standing on the Edge of the Roof	My sermon this morning is inspired by a little quote from the Sufi poet Rumi: "Sit down and be quiet. You are drunk, and this is the edge of the roof." What good advice this is: so much in our lives and in the world threatens to send us over the edge. We are intoxicated by all that curses or blesses our lives. Sometimes, we simply need to stop what we are doing and be still. The sermon will investigate.
1/9/2005	Time and Chance