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The Peace Within
Today I would like to talk about mysticism and the mystic experience, and why this matters to Unitarian Universalists. This will be the first of three consecutive sermons on mysticism. This morning I’d simply like to bring mysticism down to earth. I think we associate mysticism with esoteric robed monks meditating in the mountains, and because of that, don’t really relate even to the word. The premise that I bring to you and that I base this series on is that we all are capable of mystical experiences, and have them. We’re all somewhere on a continuum, some of us fed more by mystical insight than others, but all of us capable of and experiencing an occasional mystical moment.
Full-time mystics maybe do belong in the mountains. But, Theologian Henri Bergson, who wrote extensively on mysticism in “Dynamic Religion” The Two Sources of Morality and Religion, believed that mysticism is at the origin of great moral transformation. If that is true then it is important to have a grasp of what the mystic impulse is, and to be able to recognize it in ourselves.
All religions have their mystic strands. The Desert Fathers, St Teresa of Avila, St John of the Cross within Christianity, the Sufis and the Whirling Dervishes within Islam, the Jewish mystics who study the Kabballah, and Taoists and Buddhists who seek enlightenment.
As most of you know, our Unitarian Universalist Principles and Purposes acknowledge that our living tradition draws from many sources. The first of those listed is, “Direct experience of that transforming mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and openness to the forces that create and uphold life.” That direct experience we reference here is the mystic experience.
I want to share a side story with you. I often begin sermon-writing by consulting the dictionary on key terms, just to get my bearings. Now there was a Random House at arms reach, which I usually use, but instead I clicked Dictionary.com.on my computer. What came up was “Immediate consciousness of the transcendent or ultimate reality or God. / the experience of such communion as described by mystics.” Okay. But, even better, right next to the definition was a link to the “Ten most helpful sights on mysticism,” an offer I couldn’t refuse. It was the fourth that garnered my attention, “Find deals on mysticism at eBay. Sign up & bid today!” I was tempted to bid – but should I win I realized that I ran the danger of being too busy with my mystical experience to write this sermon!
A number of people here in this church throughout the years have confided in me that you aren’t really religious, and that’s why you come to a Unitarian Universalist church. I confess that I’m always slightly jarred by this. (I’m tempted to point out that Unitarian Universalism is a religion, and if you passionately embrace Unitarian Universalism you are religious – as Gen-X would say - helloooo) I’ve been surprised because most of you who’ve said this to me have a clearly visible religious sensibility in my view – you come to church regularly, are concerned about personal ethics and social justice, you respect the earth… non-trinitarian I can believe; non-Buddhist I can believe. But non-religious – far from it
But then I remember… when I first came into a Unitarian Universalist church and liked it, I was surprised to find myself becoming a church person. For the first time, really, I was being fed and encouraged to grow spiritually in a way that felt respectful of who I was and comfortable for me – I was being prodded to think how I might express my own beliefs in my own words. I was being challenged to find my own spiritual practice. Here I could feel humble before the mysteries of the universe without having to buy into dogma about its birth that I could not believe. I came to this church like a duck to water. I can remember getting together with college friends at that time and talking about church as a significant presence in my life and having someone say, “I didn’t know you were religious!” I ignored the remark saying something defensive like, “Unitarian Universalism is different,” because I didn’t think of myself as religious either.
That was years ago. Now I answer differently. Let me be bold. I am religious. Unitarian Universalism is a religion; it is a place of worship, a place of awe and wonder and transformation and love and growth. If you are a passionate Unitarian Universalist you are religious – not in the conventional way, but in a much more open and free religious environment than the norm. You may or may not use the word God, you may or may not use the word prayer – but if you are asked whether you are religious, I invite you to consider saying, “Yes, I am a Unitarian Universalist; my religion is different from yours, but I am very religious.” If we do not, then we cede religion over to everyone but ourselves. Religion, the meaning of what religion is and can be is challenged a bit, opened up by our presence among the religions. And I absolutely believe this is a good thing.
Frederick Buechner says, “Mysticism is where religions start. Moses with his flocks in Midian, Buddha under the Bo tree, Jesus up to his knees in the waters of the Jordan, each of them is responding to Something of which words like Shalom, Oneness, God, even, are only pallid souvenirs. Religion as ethics, institution, dogma, ritual, Scripture, social action, all this comes later and in the long run maybe counts for less. Religions start, as Frost said poems do, with a lump in the throat –to put it mildly-or with a bush going up in flames, a rain of flowers, a dove coming down out of the sky. “I have seen things,” Aquinas told a friend, “that make all my writings seem like straw.”
“Most people have also seen such things. Through some moment of beauty or pain, some sudden turning of their lives, most of them have caught glimmers at least of what the saints are blinded by. Only then, unlike the saints, they tend to go on as though nothing has happened.”
“We are all more mystics than we choose to let on, even to ourselves. Life is complicated enough as it is.” Frederick Buechner, Wishful Thinking
That lump in the throat that Buechner talks about – that infusion of meaning that goes beyond the ability of words – we are all to some degree familiar with it
Albert Einstein, who brought us E=MC2 and the theory of relativity, he was a man who had seen things. Einstein didn’t believe in a personal God and so many writers who wrote about him while he was alive called him a non-religious person. But he never thought of himself that way. Here’s why, in Einstein’s own words: “The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in primitive form – this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong to the rank of devoutly religious men.”
Let me unpack his words. Einstein said his religiousness comes from his experiences of awe and wonder and beauty. If I read him right he is saying that the emotions of awe and wonder and the recognition of beauty are portals to the mystic experience. It demystifies the mystical experience a bit if we say that the mystical experience is an experience of these feelings. My guess is he would say the stronger these feelings are, the more mystical is the experience. Einstein says all true art and science is powered by these mystic emotions – without them we are as good as dead. Strong words.
Einstein here wasn’t speaking as a scientist. He was, in very Unitarian Universalist fashion, speaking from a set of definitions that came from his own personal experience. My guess is that Einstein was by nature prone to awe and wonder. But if we are not, there are ways to open ourselves up and enhance our receptivity.
Bear with me; I’m going to get academic for just a moment. Psychologist Arthur Deikman, in a study called A Functional Approach to Mysticism, says humans have two forms of consciousness, an active and a receptive mode. The active mode is a state organized to manipulate the environment; the receptive mode is organized to receive the environment. We need both for balance. The problem is that our action mode is overdeveloped. We have been vigorously trained by everyday modern life to be busy, to solve problems, strive toward a goal, forcing the environment to yield to our wishes. Most of us find it very difficult to just sit and not do anything.
Few situations allow us time for the receptive mode; this is the state of mind that is highly defined in the mystic. We are only vaguely aware that another state of mind is even available to us. If we forget a name we’re apt to say, “It’ll come to me in a minute.” When the desire for the answer is let go – that is when can be realized. When I get writers block I know that if I sleep on it I’ll usually wake up with the insight I need. Again, this is the receptive mind at work.
One religion which consciously develops a form of this receptive mode is Taoism. Taoism’s primary text, the Tao Te Ching has been translated more often than any other book in the world except the Bible. Scholar of comparative religion Jacob Needleman, calls it a work of metaphysical psychology. The secret of living, according to the Tao Te Ching, is to open ourselves to the great flow of fundamental forces that constitute the ultimate nature of the universe – both to the movement that descends from the source and the movement to the return to the source. The Tao Te Ching is intended to be a practical guide to help a student see and accept this order or, in other words, to become one with the Tao.
Deikman points out that wrestling with the 81 short teachings in the Tao Te Ching develops our receptive state of consciousness. Huston Smith, writing about Taoism in his famous book World Religions, says, “Genuine creation, as every artist knows, comes when the more abundant resources of the subliminal self are somehow tapped. For this to happen the conscious mind must relax, stop standing in its own light, and let go.” Taoists call this condition, which we would call a mystic state, wu wei or creative quietitude.
Taoism isn’t so much something to think about but rather, is something to live or to be – but Taoism manifests itself in very real ways. Ones highest achievement is to identify with the Tao and to let it work its magic through you. Just to give one example, the insistence on harmony with nature affects Taoist architecture. Taoist temples don’t stand out from their surroundings; they nestle against the hills, back under the trees, blending in with their environment. Listen to teaching #8. Again, like all of these teachings, it is instruction in how to be.
(10,000 things, by the way is the Taoist way of referring to the multiplicity that is the universe in contrast to the Tao, which is one.)
# 8 Tao Te Ching
The highest good is like water.
Water gives life to the ten thousand things and does not strive.
It flows in places men reject and so is like the Tao.
In dwelling, be close to the land.
In meditation go deep in the heart.
In dealing with others, be gentle and kind.
In speech, be true.
In ruling be just.
In daily life be competent.
In action, be aware of the time and the season.
No fight. No blame.
Frank Lloyd Wright, one of America’s greatest architects of the twentieth century was inspired by Taoism. (Wright, btw, was an ardent Unitarian Universalist.) Larry and I visited one of his best known buildings, called Falling Water many years ago, maybe some of you have seen it. It is set into the hills of Pennsylvania and has a stream running right through it.
When I think of Taoism, and the desire to become one with the Tao, our Hymn #88 comes to mind. “Calm soul of all things, make it mine to feel amid the city’s jar, that there abides a peace of thine I did not make I cannot mar.”
Now I will read teaching #16 of the Tao Te Ching. Listen closely – I’ve chosen it because here, the essence of Taoism itself is distilled into 139 words:
Break into the peace within.
Hold attention in stillness,
and in the world outside
you will ably master ten thousand things.
All things rise and flourish,
then go back to their roots.
Seeing this return brings true rest,
where you discover who you really are.
Knowing who you really are, you will find the constant.
Those who lack harmony with the constant court danger,
But those who have it gain new vision.
They act with compassion;
Within themselves they can find room for everything.
Having room, they rule themselves and lead others wisely.
Being wise, they live in accordance with the nature of things.
Emptied of self and one with nature,
They become one with the Tao.
The Tao endures forever.
For those who have attained harmony with the Tao will never lose it.
Even if their bodies die.
I cannot do justice to Taoism today. My hope this morning was to place some value on another state of mind that is available to us and can be valuable to our spiritual development. Taoism encourages a more mystic, receptive relationship to life, one that facilitates direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces that create and uphold life. There will be more in the next two weeks.
CLOSING WORDS
Tao Te Ching
Teaching #1
The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.
The name that can be named is not the eternal name.
The nameless is the beginning of heaven and earth.
The named is the mother of ten thousand things.
Ever desireless, one can see the mystery.
Ever desiring, one can see the manifestations.
These two spring from the same source but differ in name;
this appears as darkness.
Darkness within darkness.
The gate to all mystery.