"We, the members of [name of congregation] do covenent together in the spirit of love and in the knowledge that we are all related in the interdependent web of life, to walk together in compassion, holding ourselves and each other accountable to the ever-renewing revelation that leads us to becoming our best selves, nurturing the beloved community, and creating a just world."
The covenants created by our forebears in puritan New England of the 16th century frequently included the phrase "in the spirit of our lord jesus christ." I updated this to "in the spirit of love." Many early covenants also included a reference to a creedal statement about God or the scriptures. I replace this with the phrase about the "Interdependent web of life" and specifically included the word "related" to evoke feminist theology of relationship and the indigenous theologies made famous through the phrase "all my relations."
Most of those early covenants spoke of walking together. That metaphor still expresses a visceral truth for me. We do not need to think alike to love alike and we do not need to agree with one another in order to walk side-by-side. This reminds us that this is a covenant: a promise to behave in a certain way, not to believe a certain thing. This phrase reminds me of the art installation at the civil rights museum in Atlanta, celebrating the walk to Selma: People of all shapes and sizes, on crutches, in wheelchairs, carrying babies, leaning on a neighbor, walking together in a common cause.
Compassion and Accountability are the twin items that come next. Compassion is needed lest we lose our respect for the inherent worth of every being. Accountability is needed to guard against the excesses of compassion that Rabbi Edwin Friedman so eloquently warns against.
Ever-renewing revelation reminds us that we seek insights from the past, but cannot rest from our seeking. There are many truths and we are all able to provide a piece of the truth. The commitment then is to becoming the best selves we can be, to nurture a beloved community, and to create a just world.
You are invited to help to form what we become:
ReplyDeletehttp://groups.yahoo.com/group/seerseeker/
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Aquarian Dreams
Open your third eye
And your fourth
And your fifth
Make a wish
And wrap it up in bubblegum
Stick it to your bedpost
To dream itself awake
Into your dream
That is your life.
There are wishes made of water
Waving out to sea
Caught up in grievery
Cat-tails weeping
Weaving eerie reverie
Into the evening
Into the night
All through those dreamy,
Unaware of the hours days.
There are prophetic dreams.
They haunt or
Creep upon conscious walls.
Tell all is not
As simple as it seems.
There are reasons, portents, allies.
There are dreams
That wishes would simply die for.
They take us out of bounds
Into faery realms and more.
Sprinkling gold spun out of
Shining love and merriment.
Yes! The very mint
That stamps us sold,
That fulfills our greatest hopes,
Flies us to heights above
The most benign of clouds,
Sets our spirits free.
There are dreams
That bind
Define identities
Expose deformities
Deny extremities
Create barriers and rifts
Look to differences
As definitions
Defend what they define.
There are dreams,
There are dramas,
There are visions.
Tell me yours,
I'll tell you mine.
(c) Feb. 4, 2006 Laurie Corzett
Laurie Corzett - libramoon42@mindspring.com
http://emergingvisions.blogspot.com
http://lunaramble.blogspot.com