Unitarian Coastal Fellowship
May 4, 2003
© Rev. Sally B. White

Come. Sing a song with me, dream a dream with me, walk in rain with me. Come share a rose with me, that I might know your mind.

These are words from a hymn that we will sing later. Words of invitation and openness, words of promise and welcome.

This morning, for me, they are so much more than just words.

Gordon McKeeman tells us they are a litany of the work of ministry. I tell you they are a litany of the things we have done together during the past week. And I tell you, it’s been quite a week!

During this Candidating Week we have gathered in large and small groups on no less than 15 occasions. In meetings and private conversations, over potluck dinners and picnic tables; in gardens and on beaches, in your homes and right here in church we have sung and we have dreamed. We have walked – although mostly it didn’t rain. We have shared azaleas and petunias and wildflowers and even roses. We have talked and talked, and we have listened carefully to one another. We have looked into one another’s eyes, and recognized there all that love demands: openness and honesty, humility, vulnerability, joy and pain. We have been searching to know one another’s minds – and more. With infinite care and the greatest respect, we are reaching to begin to know one another’s spirits, and souls and hearts.

We have brought to these meetings that quality of relationship that beckons forth hidden possibilities from you and from me. In these meetings, we have felt the stirrings of lostness found, fragments reunited, wounds beginning to heal, joy shared. We have been practicing ministry, together.

For, even though I stand here today as your candidate to be your first full-time called minister, I affirm what you already know: that ministry is all that we do, together – and ministry is what we all do, together. Each of us brings our own special gifts to this common enterprise, and the shape and character of our ministry reflects the particular gifts that we bring – each and all.

What are the gifts that we bring? Let me tell you about what I have seen and heard during this week, in this congregation and in myself.

Let me tell you about generosity of spirit. In this week, I have seen a nearly boundless generosity of spirit in this Coastal Fellowship community. Again and again, in meetings and conversations, I have heard you lifting up one another’s skills and accomplishments– praising the work of this committee or that group, praising the leadership of particular individuals. With selfless pride, enthusiasm, and trust, members of this congregation celebrate each other! In a world fraught with insecurity, jealousy, and competition, this is a rare and precious gift, and it makes the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship a spiritual oasis; a source of new energy in the lives of individuals and renewed hope in the life of the larger community. Generosity of spirit fosters a sense of abundance and opportunity. It greets the newcomer with optimism and the new idea with the promise of a "yes" that truly beckons forth hidden possibilities, summons us to our better selves, invites us to be more than we ever thought we could be.

Generosity of spirit directed inward within this gathered community is experienced as hospitality. It weaves and sustains the network of connections and relationships that supports individuals in their spiritual journeys, in the face of confusion or challenge, in times of pain, misery, or grief. I have heard about visits to homebound members, dinners delivered to overburdened families, care circles and on-call pastoral-care providers, home repair and construction projects, church repair and construction projects. I have met members in their 80s who know the names and appreciate the personalities of children and teens, and members who founded this congregation in the 1980s who know the names and embrace the talents of visitors and friends, of novices and newcomers. I have heard longtime leaders talk thoughtfully of rotating out of leadership roles, volunteering to mentor new leaders, seeking resources for leadership training, searching for ways to affirm and support the work of new volunteers already busy with jobs that demand and families that deserve more time than there seems to be in a week.

Generosity of spirit directed outward beyond this gathered community generates a sense of mission, a search for ways of reaching out to invite people in, or to share the riches that bless this congregation. I have heard no less than five calls for finding opportunities for members to participate in community service or social action projects. These calls come from members whose faith longs to be put into action; whose spirits cry out for embodiment in compassionate hearts and helping hands. And they are carefully tempered with respect for individual conscience and diversity of opinion and conviction, with concern that the Fellowship not speak with a single voice that might silence some members, and with awareness that there must be a balance between social action and spirituality that sustains and deepens the religious life of the Fellowship. There were other conversations, with members who know the needs in the surrounding community – needs which range from homeless housing to grief support groups to making our presence known as a "listening congregation" in the midst of so many "telling congregations" in the town and the region. I have heard members talk thoughtfully of campus ministry and outreach to young adults and families with children, who may hunger for affirmation that their religious questions are valid – no, vital! – and who long for companionship on their spiritual journeys.

I tell you, it’s been quite a week!

Let me tell you about clarity of vision. In this week, which Rev. Rudi Gelsey described as "a time of courtship when the congregation and the candidate explore together how good a fit exists between the two parties before committing to marriage," you might expect that everybody would be putting their very best foot forward; that weaknesses, flaws and shortcomings might be carefully hidden. In this week, I have seen clear-eyed commitment to honesty and full disclosure. With gentleness, care, and thoughtfulness members of this congregation probed beneath the surface, reaching for honesty with me and with themselves. (Now, I have to give the search committee credit for a reluctance to talk about mosquitoes, hurricanes, and venomous snakes, but when we asked, they graciously answered our questions!) Clarity of vision empowers you to tell of what works and what needs work, what fits and what feels too tight, and where the growing edges are, in you, in the Coastal Fellowship, in this part of Eastern North Carolina.

I have heard pride in your voices as you showed me the work you have done to restore and maintain this beautiful building. And I’ve heard those same voices dreaming ways of making more space for coffee hour and children’s classes and adult religious education. There are places where this building already feels too tight, and I see you looking clear-eyed at ways and means and possibilities for growth. I have heard sadness in your voices as you have told me of unmet needs in the Morehead City area for meeting-spaces and gathering places – and I have heard the sadness give way to excitement as you brainstormed ideas for coffee-houses and classes and community forums meeting at the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship, bringing life into Fellowship and community alike. I have heard enthusiasm build in your voices as you began to talk about what "worship" means to you and I’ve seen your eyes begin to glow as you explored possibilities for more music, more silence, more congregational participation in worship services; as we discussed the pros and the cons of meditation, closing circles, worship associates and lay-led services.

I tell you, it’s been quite a week!

Let me tell you about the power of untapped potential. Again and again this week, as conversations have lengthened and trust has deepened, you have told me of untapped potential for the ministry of the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship. I’ve heard you talk of gifts and talents within the congregation – members and friends who may just be waiting to be invited to share their expertise with others, to make a useful contribution to the fellowship, to join in a new way in the weaving of that fabric of community that makes us a church. I’ve heard you talk of the creativity and spirit of youth in this congregation, and the depth and excitement they might bring to congregational worship and congregational life. I’ve heard you talk of the energy and power of groups in the larger community – caring and committed people who may just be waiting to be invited to share with this fellowship in exploring their faith, in living their faith, in the synergy and growth that can emerge from shared effort and mutual respect. I’ve heard you talk of the power of the Fellowship’s beautiful website, and all the ways that this and other tools for outreach may be used to invite and involve fellow-travelers to join in the journey of speaking and living the best we know that is the ministry that we do together, and that we know – to our frustration and to our joy – is never quite enough.

I tell you, it’s been quite a week!

In this week of exploring ministry together, you have invited me again and again to walk with you, not in the rose-petal-strewn path of "making a good impression" but in the honest path of love. Again and again, you have risked the honesty and vulnerability of telling the truth as you see it, with generosity of spirit and clarity of vision and excitement about the power of untapped potential. Together, we have beckoned forth heretofore hidden possibilities in you and in me.

Let me tell you about what I have seen and heard in myself this week.

I’ve been imagining myself as your minister, and I believe I can see it!

I believe I can see spiritual growth. I can see us gathering here week after week, weaving worship out of words and music and silence and the wisdom that you and I can bring to celebrate and consecrate the common endeavor which is the ministry of this Fellowship. I can see us crafting intergenerational services that may become our new rituals: Gathering of the Waters and Blessing of the Animals and youth-led worship and our own unique Christmas Eve. I can see us gathering and enlarging a circle of kinship in which our hearts’ own songs rise together in harmony and counterpoint and spirit-filled cacophony. I can see us daring to plan for expansion of our circle and our space. I can see us celebrating together, mourning together, learning and teaching together for years to come.

I believe I can see outreach. I can see myself meeting with the local ministers’ group and building bridges over divisions of theology and gender. I can see myself visiting patients at Carteret General Hospital and offering a listening ear or a compassionate prayer in spite of differences in faith and practice. I can see myself meeting with students at the marine labs or the Community College to explore and engage in campus ministry. I can see myself as the public face and the public voice of the Unitarian Coastal Fellowship and Unitarian Universalism in Carteret County – the point person and even the lightning rod – because you will be there to ground me! And, like the family in our story, when the work proves hard, I can see you there to get me going with a helping hand and a variety of talents and a familiar song!

I believe I can see transformation. I have heard in your stories that moving here from the San Francisco Bay area will not be easy – not for me, nor for Emily, nor for Jim. We would leave much behind – family, friends and colleagues; a faster pace and more diverse neighbors; exotic restaurants and bookstores and amenities. I have heard in your stories that many of you have made similar moves, and they bring a sense of dislocation that lasts for a long time. I see that you are here – through the dislocation, the discombobulation, and the transformation that is the legacy of struggling through the first two. I believe that you would know what we would be experiencing – and I can see you here with a helping hand or the space for us to grow through this in our own way. And I know that when I was a college student, I grappled with the sense of dislocation and isolation that came from attending a very small residential college on the outskirts of a small Indiana town. While my friends at the large state universities talked about the well-known music groups and sports teams that came through their campuses, and the ever-changing array of entertainment on offer in their large university towns, I learned to explore and appreciate the quieter pleasures that my friends and I made together, and that offered deep and long-lasting satisfaction. That lesson has stood me in good stead for all the years of my adult life, and it is how I know that the legacy of dislocation is indeed transformation – if we stay with it and engage in the struggle.

I tell you, it’s been quite a week!

A week of invitation and openness, promise and welcome, and all that we have done and can do together. The ministry that lies before us has room for all the gifts that all of us may offer. Your gifts of generosity of spirit and clarity of vision and untapped potential. My gifts of spiritual growth and outreach and transformation. It invites us all to walk and talk and share the good times and the hard times together. It "invites us into deeper, more constant, more reverent relationships."[Gordon McKeeman] It welcomes everything that we can bring to it, even knowing that it is never quite enough, and it invites us, in the face of all that life has to offer, to join our gifts and our voices together.

Come, sing a song with me.

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