Dispatches from the Religious Left, edited by Frederick Clarkson, features essays from a wide range of religious leaders and thinkers. One of these essays is co-authored by my husband, Shai Sachs, and me. We give a practical introduction to using new media and explain how the Religious Left may find new media particularly useful.

Shai and I received our copies of the book a few days ago and I’ve enjoyed reading the essays by other contributors. Although contributors addressed a range of subjects and with different kinds of expertise, I noticed some recurring ideas about what the Religious Left is or should be:

1.The Religious Left is organized around religious ideas, leaders and institutions, as is the Religious Right. But unlike the Religious Right, the Religious Left does not and should not promote or any one religion. We can be deeply religious and deeply political, while also celebrating religious freedom and defending separation of church and state.

In his editor’s introduction, “A Religious Left for the 21st Century,” Clarkson highlights the Religious Left’s attitude towards separation of church and state as a key difference. Dispatches also features the essay “A Progressive Vision of Church-State Relations,” by Rev. Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

2. The Religious Left must recognize issues as interconnected. Several contributors urged against jettisoning issues such as reproductive freedom or BGLT rights from the Religious Left’s agenda.

Rev. Dr. Katherine Ragsdale in “Not by Outrage Alone” states, “we cannot talk adequately about reproductive justice without also talking about health care, child care, job security and safety from violence.”

Rev. Debra Haffner and Timothy Palmer make a similar point in “Toward a Theology of Sexual Justice” writing,

Pushing aside women’s reproductive rights and equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) persons would harm the very constituents that faith communities agree they are most called to serve — people in poverty and children.

3. The Religious Left must offer alternative theologies and frameworks for understanding events and issues. Multiple contributors expressed the importance of religious ideas and beliefs in helping shift the terms of political understanding, including Rev. Dan Schultz in “The Religious Left: Changing the Script,” Rev. Osagyefo Uhuru Sekou in “Who’s God? Faith, Democracy, and the Making of an Authentic Religious Left,” and to some extent Leo Maley in “Marriage Equality in Massachusetts: A Progressive Victory.”

It’s an exciting contribution to the development of a more mature and powerful Religious Left. The first point (we value separation of church and state) feels very fully developed to me. I think the message that progressives can merge religion and politics without advocating theocracy has already been well-articulated and modeled in practice. However, it’s a foundational message and one that may need repeating and further elaboration in some places. The second two points, the interconnectedness of issues and the necessity of theological engagement, seem to me less widely accepted and less fully lived-out. Those feel more to me like the cutting edge of development in the Religious Left.

There are two more issues facing the Religious Left, which were not discussed much in Dispatches, but which I think are highly relevant: the role of congregations and the challenges of building a religiously plural movement.

What role do congregations have in the Religious Left? Are they organizing units in the Religious Left or is their mission fundamentally different from that of non-congregational institutions of the Religious Left? (Or both?)

What are the challenges of building a religiously pluralistic movement? Are members of the Religious Left bound together only by our stands on social issues, or is there room for theological exchange and common ground?

P.S. If you’re in New York this Tuesday, you can hear from select Dispatches contributors in person, at the book launch celebration on October 14.

The Connecticut Supreme Court decided yesterday in favor of marriage equality! Here’s the story from the New York Times:

A sharply divided Connecticut Supreme Court struck down the state’s civil union law on Friday and ruled that same-sex couples have a constitutional right to marry. Connecticut thus joins Massachusetts and California as the only states to have legalized gay marriages.

Marriage equality has been a championed by many Unitarian Universalists and Unitarian Universalist congregations. We have been an important religious voice for marriage equality in Massachusetts, California, and around the country. In Connecticut, Unitarian Universalist minister Rev. Josh Pawelek leads the group Connecticut Clergy for Marriage Equality. Pawelek said yesterday:

…we have believed not in a God of hatred and exclusion and punishment, but a God of love. We have believed in a God whose love and care embraces every human being, a God who welcomes every human being.

Connecticut Clergy for Marriage Equality has also produced a “Religious Declaration on Marriage Equality,” which clergy from many different religious groups have signed. An excerpt:

As religious leaders we affirm and promote commitment and fidelity in the relationship of marriage. We value the holy covenant of marriage because it creates stable, committed relationships; provides a means to share economic resources; and nurtures the individual, the couple, and children. Good marriages benefit the community and express the religious values of long-term commitment and faithfulness. Civil Union cannot fully embody these values; only marriage can. There is no difference in marriages between a man and a woman, two men, or two women. As our traditions affirm, where there is love, God is in our midst.

As I attended my congregation’s new minister installation service earlier today, a reading of Luke caught my attention:

‘If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same. If you lend to those from whom you hope to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners, to receive as much again. But love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return. Your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for he is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. (Luke 6:33-36)

‘Do not judge, and you will not be judged; do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven; give, and it will be given to you…’ (Luke 6:36-38)

The passage as a whole contains a paradox. Jesus acknowledges that it is a challenge to treat others well, even when they do not treat us well. Our own good treatment of other people is not always transformative — we cannot always expect that when we lend of ourselves, we will be fairly repaid.

Most people are tempted then to take the more cautious route. Rather than indiscriminately giving ourselves to others in loans of love/trust/help/etc., we instead become more careful lenders, giving only to those who seem likely to repay our good will. And we try to give only what we can afford to lose.

This attitude of caution makes sense to me. And I’m guessing it did to many others when Luke was written.

But in Luke, Jesus doesn’t leave it at that. He says, “love your enemies, do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return.” The phrase “expecting nothing in return” may also be read as “despairing of no one,” according to the New Revised Standard Version.

Why? Why should I give abundantly, even as I know that I will not receive it in return?

The second part of the passage (Luke 6:36-38) seems to offer an answer, depicting a more balanced universe. If we forgive, we will be forgiven. And at some moments in life, this too rings true — sometimes love seeds more love. (Although it’s worth noting that Jesus describes God as “kind to the ungrateful and the wicked,” so those who are spiteful and unmerciful receive love too!)

In short, while each line of the passage seems to ring true, there is conflict among them. Although I am not a follower of Jesus, I am fascinated by the paradox and want to unravel it. I want to know: how can it be that even though we don’t always have our good deeds (or our bad ones) reflected back to us, it still seems that the goodness of those deeds can improve our experience of the world?

I’m of two minds on the meaning of the passage. Part of me believes that violence and other forms of wrongdoing can take a considerable toll on a person’s health and wellbeing — a toll that doing good cannot erase. But another part of me wonders if striving to be and do good can in someway immunize us from the deepest erosion of our soul that might otherwise result from the onslaught of wrongdoing in the world. By striving to treat others with love, do we keep a fire burning in our soul that cannot be extinguished by the cruelty of others, but that keeps us warm and ready to receive love if and when it is returned?

In her book One Perfect Day: The Selling of the American Wedding, Rebecca Mead examines the wedding industry and argues that it has exploited the vacuum of meaning around contemporary American weddings. With gender dynamics changing and religious institutions decreasing in influence, American weddings have taken on a plethora of meanings, many of them determined by commercial interests rather than by more substantive concerns. Mead recounts asking a group of brides “What is a wedding for?” She reports:

All wanted their weddings to be significant; and all were searching to identify the metal of that significance, seeking to burnish it until it glowed. But there was no consensus on where that significance lay; indeed, there were contradictions. A wedding was a celebration of family; a wedding was a celebration of self. It was a religious sacrament; it was an excuse for a big party. It was an expression of personal taste; it was an enactment of tradition. What a wedding was for, it seemed, was up for grabs.

A few days after the finishing Mead’s book, I was sitting on a bench on Boston Common, enjoying the park on a sunny a day. One bench over sat three women in their early twenties.

One, who worked in the wedding industry (I’m guessing as a wedding planner), remarked to her friends, “I never wanted to get married before. But now, seeing all these brides, I’m like, ‘I want a wedding. I want to have a big party. It’s so fun.’”

“Yeah, but it’s a lot of work,” another commented.

“I know,” the first replied, “and sometimes they say to me, ‘I just can’t wait for this be over.”

“But then what happens when it’s over?” the third woman asks, rhetorically.

“It’s like a big let down,” the second adds.

“No, then you get to decorate your house!” the first replies.

What comes after the wedding? The marriage, of which home decorating is only a very small part. If this fact has been obscured by the wedding industry, Mead argues, it’s because a vacuum of meaning exists and the wedding industry rushes in to fill it.

This vacuum is one that religious institutions can seek to fill. Here I part ways with Mead: She implies that the power of congregations and clergy lies mostly in their ability to carry on wedding traditions. So if a couple chooses not to follow the traditional liturgy of their religion(s), then religious institutions have lost out on their chance to give meaning to the wedding.

I disagree. Unitarian Universalism in its contemporary form does not place a heavy emphasis on wedding traditions; most Unitarian Universalists probably do not consciously strive to imitate early Unitarians or Universalists in their wedding liturgies. In addition, we have reconsidered the scope of marriage and now advocate for marriage equality.

It’s not through a re-enactment of religious tradition that we have developed a meaningful vision of marriage, but rather through a reconsideration of tradition.

Unitarian Universalists have officially supported marriage equality for over a decade (see the Unitarian Universalist Association’s 1996 Resolution of Immediate Witness), and through our activism on this issue have explored the meaning of marriage. We’ve officiated and celebrated marriages and commitment ceremonies between members of the same sex, preached about the meaning of marriage, and been active in the public square and in the voting booth to support marriage equality. Unitarian Universalists have explored both the sacred and the civil meaning of marriage; we’ve discussed marriage and support for marriage equality as a celebration of love, while also recognizing and advocating for the many legal benefits that come with marriage, and which all committed couples deserve.

Within Unitarian Universalist congregations, we also have interfaith couples (like my husband and I), agnostics, atheists, and other constituencies that may challenge popular notions of who has a religious wedding and what a wedding in a church should mean or include.

The freedom that exists within Unitarian Universalism for couples to develop their own wedding ceremony, with the support of clergy, is an advantage. Creating a custom wedding ceremony, when done in a way that reflects the deepest values and experiences of the couple, can be a meaningful opportunity to explore the significance of the wedding and of marriage.

Unitarian Universalist individuals, clergy, and congregations have an ongoing opportunity to engage with the questions of “what does a wedding mean?” and “what does marriage mean?” In addressing these questions, we may not find a one-size-fits-all message, nor will our answers necessarily accord with earlier Unitarian and Universalist traditions. However, we can offer answers that are meaningful and that provide a definitive counter to the industrial view of wedding and marriage as solely commercial ventures.

Yesterday was the seventh anniversary of 9/11, a time for remembering the lives lost on that day and for reflecting on the course that our country has run since then.

This year’s 9/11 falls at a time of heightened political anxiety, with the presidential elections fast approaching. For many Americans, myself included, this election is a seemingly rare opportunity to pull our country out from the shadows of the past seven years.

In the past seven years, Americans have had cause to mourn not only those who died on 9/11, but also American soldiers killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, and innocent civilians murdered in both of those countries. We’ve had cause to mourn the torture by our fellow Americans of prisoners of war, to mourn the deprivation and endangerment of refugees fleeing their war-torn countries. And to mourn the impact of government policies on our country, as we consider the number of children without health insurance, immigrants without legal protections, and workers without fair compensation.

And as we have mourned, difficult moral and theological questions have been raised, and groups across the religious spectrum have attempted to address these questions. Americans have had a public dialogure over questions like: Is one religion inherently more peaceful than another? When — if ever — is war justified? What moral obligations do we as the instigating party have once we are engaged in such a war? What about torture, is that justified in some circumstances? Or do people have certain inalienable rights that should never be violated? Is the pursuit of safety worth sacrificing certain freedoms?

As we wrestle with these questions, it seems to me that the link between religion and politics has only become clearer.

To those who call for a complete separation of religion and politics, I say it’s never going to happen, nor should it. The results of politics are life-and-death, and we should never make life-or-death decisions for ourselves or others without considering carefully our moral and spiritual convictions (and for most religious people, those convictions are directly influenced by their religious community and/or tradition).

But there is something to be said for the desire to see our religious life not be overrun by politics. Religious and political conservative David Kuo aptly illustrated this in his Tempting Faith: An Inside Story of Political Seduction. A former high-level employee in the Bush administration’s Office of Faith-Based Initiatives, Kuo describes how the Religious Right became so entangled with Bush and his supporters that many conservative religious leaders were unable to advocate effectively for their values.

When a religious group becomes over-identified with a particular party or politician, the focus on the religious group’s values itself can be lost. There I think is the danger. Religious communities should always be first and foremost places where participants explore their values, over and above any candidate or party. And religious communities should be places where participants live out those values, in their treatment of one another and of the larger community. Religious communities where participants focus on the values of love and respect — and live out those values in every facet of their lives — are powerful and sustainable forces for change.