"Organized religion is organized superstition."
I wrote that line in my Reflective Journal over 15 years ago, on Easter eve in 1986. That line was the culmination of my rejection of Roman Catholicism, and, seemingly at the same time, my rejection of belief in God – the Judeo-Christian one, anyhow – as so much mumbo jumbo.
I was born on the hottest day of 1961, right in the middle of the second Vatican Council, a meeting of Catholic leaders which was held in Rome in order to refine the teachings of the Roman Catholic church. Did Vatican II change my life any? I sincerely doubt it. But this was the church atmosphere into which I was born. My mother was a devout Roman Catholic; my father belongs to the Episcopal Church of America. Even in the 1960s, and possibly still today, the Catholic Church won’t approve of a mixed marriage, an "unequal yoke", unless the parents agree that their child will be raised as a Catholic. And so it was that I found myself going to some of the earliest Masses that were performed in English rather than in Latin, and exposed to (horrors!) folk Masses celebrated with guitars rather than the organ, and so forth. It was actually a somewhat exciting time to be a Catholic.
Once a year, on Thanksgiving morning, my mother and I would attend a service at my father’s church, Grace Episcopal in Rutherford, where he was a tenor in the choir. The ritual was eerily similar to what I was familiar with at St. Mary’s Roman Catholic Church, right down to the consecration of the Eucharist – but I never took communion there, and neither did my mother. She told me, "We’re not members here, so we don’t take communion here." Likewise, on the rare occasion my father walked into St. Mary’s, he didn’t take communion there. I just figured it was something you don’t do. It was many years later that I realized that for a Catholic to take communion at a non-Catholic church was a crime punishable by excommunication. And that’s probably when I began questioning my religion.
It didn’t hurt that, after eight years of grammar school in the Rutherford public school system, my parents sent me to St. Peter’s Prep in Jersey City for high school. If you’re not familiar with it, the school is run by the Jesuits – a Roman Catholic order originally formed about 500 years ago to assist with the Inquisition, but which soon turned to the formation of educational institutions. Their schools include well-respected colleges in the United States like Fordham, Holy Cross, and St. Louis University. At St. Peter’s Prep, I became well-grounded in critical thinking. Perhaps the Jesuits taught me too well, for they lost a member of the fold as a result.
For a good long time, I attended Mass faithfully every week, like a good Catholic should. I was even attending daily Masses for a while. But then I stopped going, and, as a good Catholic, I had to figure out a way to rationalize it. At the time of my Confirmation – the Christian service akin to the Jewish bar mitzvah and which Unitarian Universalist churches continue as Affirmation – my mother gave me The Jerusalem Bible, a 1950s translation which was well-annotated and documented. I pulled my Bible off the shelf and started reading – the annotations as much as the text. I already knew that Christmas was the "Christianization" of existing pagan holidays, and that Jesus was most likely born in the summer of 6 BC. One of the notes in my Bible pointed to the likely date of Jesus’ death as Friday, April 8, AD 30 – which made him 34 going on 35 when he became a martyr. The big question was, what happened Sunday?
I tend to think I’ve got a pretty good grounding in scientific principles. Could Jesus be born of a virgin? Highly doubtful. I’m reminded of an old joke. A young woman is at the doctor’s office with her mother, complaining of symptoms like morning sickness. The doctor examines the woman and says, "There’s a simple explanation, young lady – you’re pregnant." The girl looks at her mother and says, "Mama, you know I’ve never had sex in my life!" The doctor turned and started staring out the window. Mama said, "Doctor, is something wrong?" And the doctor replied, "No ... but the last time this happened, three wise men came from the East." I’ll never know if Joseph and Mary ever consummated their marriage, but someone got Mary pregnant, and I don’t suspect Divine Providence.
Then there’s this resurrection business. Did Mary of Magdala go to Jesus’ tomb that fateful Sunday morning and find the stone rolled back and no body in there? It could have happened. I have no idea how prevalent grave robbing was back in the first century. Their newspapers aren’t on microfilm at my local library. But as for Jesus rising from the dead and spending forty days with the Apostles before ascending to Heaven to be at the right hand of the Father ... hey, it makes a great story, and I don’t doubt the Apostles wanted to believe it because they were devastated. Still, I can’t wrap my scientific mind around the likelihood of its actually happening.
John Shelby Spong, the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Newark for 24 years, through 2000, wrote a book in 1998 called "Why Christianity Must Change or Die". In it, he wrote his theory of the Resurrection story, and it’s influenced my belief on this subject. On that Thursday night before his execution, Jesus knew the jig was up. He had been preaching for about three years, and he had marched right into Jerusalem at the beginning of that week and upset the Temple. To the high priests, this was the worst crime imaginable, but they knew their hands wouldn’t be clean if they put him to death themselves. Fortunately, they had a good working arrangement with the Roman governor, Pontius Pilate, and it seems Pilate owed the high priests a favor. So they made arrangements for Pilate to arrest, convict, and execute Jesus. Knowing this, Jesus told the Apostles, "My time is up, but every time you break bread, every time you drink your wine, remember what I have taught you."
Soon, all of Jerusalem was following the proceedings. Pilate still thought he had an out, because the Passover was about to start and it was customary to release a Jewish prisoner just before the holiday. But the crowd who gathered outside Pilate’s office was apparently planted by the high priests, and they called for Jesus’ head instead of a common thief Pilate would rather have seen executed. And so it was that Jesus went up the hill to Calvary, was nailed to a cross, and expired before sundown. With Shabbat about to begin, they wasted no time burying Jesus. So here are the Apostles, gathering Sunday evening for their meal and grieving the loss of their rabbi (and possibly aware that the grave had been robbed). "Where is our leader?" they moaned. Then one of them said, "Remember what he told us? Every time we break bread, every time we drink the wine, he is here with us. He is with us for all time. He is right here, in this room." And this is the story they spread to Jesus’ other disciples. Language, said Spong, made it more difficult to pass it along as a metaphor, and so the story got told as, quite literally, gospel truth.
After I had dismissed the Virgin Birth and the Resurrection, I started analyzing other religious stories. Some of the Bible is pretty good history, an accounting of the trials the Jews encountered as minority citizens of the Middle East. But was the world created in the time frame stated in the Bible? Rome wasn’t built in a day, so I doubt the world was created in a week, even by an omnipotent God. Most of the Bible stories come across to me as parables, things the human mind could have comprehended two thousand or more years ago – which puts them into the category of superstition. We believe these stories because we cannot comprehend the truth. Even today, in the face of scientific advances, Christians and Jews cling to these familiar stories. Fundamentalism, the movement that ascribes a literal truth to the Bible, remains strong today, even as the Roman Catholic Church acknowledges tradition as just as important as Scripture as the root of faith. But faith in what?
By 1986, I had pretty much decided that Christianity was hokum. It was a tool that people of modest minds apparently needed in order to live moral lives. I knew I could live a moral life, but I didn’t need the yoke of Christianity to do it. I decided that God, if he exists, is nothing more than the collective conscience of mankind. There was no doubt in my mind that man, individually and collectively, was in control of his own destiny. There was no God above pulling the strings of us puppets on earth, no God to judge us at the end of our lives and determine whether we would be condemned to hellfire for eternity or a life of eternal bliss at the right hand of the Father. In practical terms, I had become an atheist.
The trouble was, I didn’t like the term "atheist". I suppose it reminded me too much of Madalyn Murray O’Hair, who spent the latter part of her life on a crusade to evict God from the public square. I had a problem with her militant atheism. I knew that the Constitution of the United States guaranteed each of us the freedom to worship whatever Gods or Goddesses we choose, or none at all if we so desire. Besides, if there is a collective conscience of mankind and that’s what God really is, then how can I be an atheist? I believe in God, just not the same God that most of the country believes in. To make matters worse, I still loved Jesus. Not as the Son of God, but as a great teacher, the person who I thought was more effective than anyone else in teaching us to see through our differences and love one another. At one point in the 1990s, I wrote in my journal, "I’m a Christian who doesn’t believe in God." Now there’s a paradox.
Still, I was very happy being freed from the shackles of Christianity as I knew it. I mean, I didn’t have to go to church every Sunday morning. I got very lazy. Sure, I revisited my faith, or lack of it, on numerous occasions, but I never went looking for a church or other gathering with which to discuss my feelings about spirituality. In fact, I thought I had invented my outlook on life, so I gave it a name. I called it "Rundgrenism". The name came from the recording artist Todd Rundgren, who’s probably most famous now for that sports anthem "Bang the Drum All Day". But in 1977, he wrote a song called "Love Is the Answer", which became a hit for England Dan & John Ford Coley in 1979 and, for me, gave the same sort of message Jesus was trying to tell nearly two thousand years before.
So, anyway, here I was, going about my business, unchurched by my own choice, believing there was nothing out there for me. This might have been the result of fear as much as anything else. It was fear of my mother, who knew that I wasn’t going to church anymore, but who would have been utterly devastated to learn that I was considering something non-Christian. In early 1999, a friend of mine from outside Philadelphia mentioned to me that she was attending a Unitarian fellowship, and I said, "Uh-huh." I really paid it no heed. It so happens that in my 1986 journal entry in which I proclaimed myself a "Rundgrenist", I had also stated that I would respect all the religious holidays there were – so long as I knew about them, of course. Little did I know that respect for and tolerance of all the great religious traditions was a tenet of Unitarian Universalism.
Then in March 1999, my mother died. I went to her funeral service, and I broke down crying over the organ music, but as I listened to the priest give his homily (the word "sermon" doesn’t exist in the Catholic Church anymore), I sat there thinking, "Who really believes this crap?" Mourners came up to me and said, "She’s in a better place now." OK, so maybe she’s more comfortable – she hadn’t been well – but I can’t imagine that six feet under is a better place than still being on this earth. I don’t remember if I took communion that morning. I doubt it.
I was still adrift, unchurched, until February 2000, when I went to sign up a player to participate in the Rutherford Little League. I had gotten a phone call from Alex Thomson, who wanted to put his 6-year-old son into our Tee Ball program. So I stopped at their house. I observed the spelling of his last name and asked, "Any relation to Bobby Thomson, who hit the home run that won the 1951 pennant for the Giants?" He said he didn’t believe so. Then, as we continued to sit at their kitchen table, I noticed a letter from Central Unitarian Church in Paramus. I said, "A friend of mine outside Philadelphia told me she’s attending a Unitarian church. What, exactly, is it?" Instead of explaining it to me, Alex ran downstairs for a moment. When he came back up, he had produced one of those crimson-colored cards that says, "What do Unitarian Universalists believe?" I stood there for a few moments, pondering it, and then said, "You know, I could get into this!" At that point, Alex and Kristina invited me to attend the next Sunday’s service, which was February 27 at 10:30.
During the week before the service, I had a little bit of a conversation with my friend from outside Philadelphia, as well as with someone else, about UUism. Then Sunday morning rolled around, and with trepidation I walked through the Forest Avenue doors. (I know it was the Forest Avenue doors because I was attending for the first time and that seemed logical, and besides, I was late and the ushers wouldn’t have let me in by the side entrance!) Olivia Holmes was the minister at the time, and she gave a sermon entitled "Reverence for Life", about the life and times of Dr. Albert Schweitzer. I was blown away. Here was a preacher who was actually talking to me, rather than addressing some archaic concept from the Bible. That day, there was a visitors’ orientation, too. I came out of CUC that morning with a very positive feeling. I was already having that all-too-common reaction of people who are introduced to UUism: "I’ve been a Unitarian for years and I didn’t know it!"
That week, I got a few books out of the library – the John Shelby Spong book I referenced earlier as well as Jack Mendelsohn’s "Why I Am a Unitarian", from 1960. I devoured them, and came back to the church the next Sunday for another service. Olivia did it again, with a sermon called "Ouch-Lines". The week after that was Music Sunday, and it was the Duke Ellington tribute, and now I was really hooked. (Of course, that was followed by Stewardship Sunday ...) The main thing that had happened, though, was that I was really interested in coming to church and having my heart and mind touched every week, not only by the minister’s sermon but by the people I met. I had found a spiritual home. I attended a Summer Service in August and was told that the choir was forming the next night to rehearse for the Sunday after Labor Day, and so I came up to the rehearsal. I re-affirmed that the membership had overwhelmingly called Justin Osterman to its pulpit, and I said, "Well, my only remaining trepidation was regarding the new minister, but if people I already trust like him that much, he’s OK by me." And before that opening service in September, I sought out Martin Fechner and signed the membership book.
Since then, I’ve discovered that the road to enlightenment isn’t nearly as straight as Forest Avenue between CUC and Ridgewood Avenue. It’s a path that leads you down back roads you never knew existed. I’ve studied historic Unitarianism and Universalism, and I’ve found that I can work with our two faith traditions as a good foundation. But where Hosea Ballou argued in 1805 against the existence of hell, I turn around and say, "And heaven, too." I continue to revere Jesus as the first Universalist – a person who wasn’t afraid to preach that the God of the Jews was also the God of the Samaritans, who by their good works could also ascend to the right hand of the Father. But I don’t believe in that Father. Or that Son. I also don’t believe there’s a part of me that lives on after my death. The afterlife, reincarnation, etc., are all foreign concepts to me. I was born in 1961, and I had no existence whatever before my conception, except in the desires of my parents. I don’t know whether I’ll die tomorrow or fifty years from now, but when I die, I’ll be dead. I’ll have no existence whatever after that moment except in the memories of the people who knew me. My fate is to die. The only thing I can do while I’m alive is to attempt to improve the lot of those others who are sharing the planet with me. To do so, I call in part on that collective conscience of mankind which I’ve called God, and which some Trinitarians might characterize as the Holy Spirit. It is my calling to do right by all the citizens of the planet, to the best of my humble ability.
The fundamentalist Christians believe that salvation is gained by faith alone. "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved." I’d rather believe the words of Robert B. Thomas, who in 1791 compiled the first Old Farmer’s Almanac, for the year 1792. In a foreword to his work, he wrote, "It is by our works and not our words that we would be judged." The judging is not by some third-story Santa Claus watching over us and determining who’s naughty and nice. Our fellow men judge us, now and after our death. How would you like to be treated in life? The Golden Rule, which permeates all religions, gives us a good guideline. How would you like to be remembered in death? Follow the Golden Rule, and you stand a good chance of being respected – the ultimate "salvation".
I have other beliefs, too, regarding some of the hot-button issues in our society. Probably because of my Catholic upbringing, I believe that abortion is morally wrong unless the pregnancy being aborted was caused as the result of rape or incest. I attended a concert at Hawthorne Gospel Church (a fundamental Christian church) where the offering was being given to a "Christian adoption agency", meaning they take an anti-abortion stance. I had no problem with that. And I know I would never enter into intercourse with a woman without confirming that if a pregnancy resulted, we’d bring that baby to term and serve that child as its parents, with all the attendant responsibilities. But, that said, I also respect the right of a woman to do what she needs to do with her body. Sure, I’d like to see her bring the baby to term and then give it up for adoption if she can’t handle being a mother (especially if the father abdicates his responsibility). But some women can’t do that. If the woman can’t abide the fetus after 20 or 22 weeks, she should be free to seek out an abortion – and no Bible-thumping so-and-so should be allowed to stop her. Olivia put it best when I discussed this with her back in 2000: "Educate, educate, educate, educate! And then offer abortion as a last resort." Make the woman, and the man, know their responsibilities – but if that fails, leave all options open.
I don’t think I’ve ever had a problem with people of what are often called "minority races". Behavior, not color, has the greatest influence on my perception of a person. I’m as leery of the white kid in baggy pants hanging out on a street corner in Rutherford as I am of the black kid in baggy pants hanging out on a street corner in Newark. On the other hand, command respect and you get respect.
Where I did have an eye-opening when I joined CUC was in the area of alternative sexuality. I’m straight as they come – I just haven’t met Ms. Right yet. (Or perhaps I have, and I just don’t know it. It’s sort of like being introduced to UUism.) But I hadn’t encountered too many lesbian or gay people in my everyday life. Or at least I didn’t know it. Now I’m here, and I recognize more than ever before that these people are just like everyone else – they’re just lesbian or gay. It’s no issue. I believe that committed lesbian and gay couples should be afforded the same civil rights (and be subject to the same responsibilities) as married couples, including the right to "spousal" coverage on health insurance. I believe that in order to preserve these rights, these couples should have their unions certified by the state as well as by a cleric who is willing to solemnify it. I wouldn’t go so far as to call that union a marriage, as I recognize that "marriage" has for centuries implied the union of a man and a woman. Vermont calls it a "civil union", and I have no problem with that term. And as a marriage can end in divorce, a civil union can end in dissolution. This all must be made available, so that people in committed relationships are protected.
There is no doubt joining a Unitarian Universalist congregation, and CUC in particular, has changed my life for the better. I am richer for it, and for that I thank everyone there.