Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters – 10/3/24

Musical Prelude: Schubert: Minuet and Trio in B flat (played by Andrew Robinson)

Opening Words: ‘We Are Here and All Are Welcome’

We are here and all are welcome as you are
before the mystery within and the mystery beyond.
Come let us gather, in person and online,
just as we truly are in all our diversity
with our blessings and imperfections,
with aching hearts and weary bodies,
rekindled by joyful moments, our stories
and memories even if they sometimes seem illusive.
May we take to heart that in all our diversity –
with the gifts and challenges it brings –
we are all more human than otherwise.

Words of Welcome and Introduction:

These opening words welcome all who have gathered for our Sunday service. Welcome to those of you who have gathered in-person at Essex Church and also to all who are joining us via Zoom from far and wide. For anyone who doesn’t know me, my name is Michael Allured, and I’m Minister with Golders Green Unitarians. I’m delighted to be leading your service today.

This morning’s service is titled ‘Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters’ – a saying that may be familiar to most of us from the much-loved hymn ‘We’ll Build a Land’ which we’ll be singing later on – and we’ll be using this phrase as a starting point for our reflections on the topic of justice and equity.

Chalice Lighting: ‘A Safe and Sacred Space’ by Jane Blackall

Let’s light our chalice flame now, as we do each week. This simple ritual connects us in solidarity with Unitarians and Unitarian Universalists the world over, and reminds us of the historic religious tradition of which this gathering is part.

(light chalice)

The lighting of this chalice calls us to attention –
…to make this a safe and sacred space for prayer and sharing
in which we can re-connect with life’s depths and our highest aspirations –
a community of solidarity and trust to nurture and strengthen us for the days of our lives.

May this candle be a beacon that lights the way,
guiding us through these still-uncertain times,
and inspiring each of us to paths of peace, justice and love.

Hymn 21 (purple): ‘Come and Find the Quiet Centre’

Let’s sing together now. Our first hymn is number 21 in your purple hymn books, ‘Come and Find the Quiet Centre’. For those joining via Zoom the words will be up on screen. Feel free to stand or sit as you prefer. Hymn number 21.

Come and find the quiet centre
in the crowded life we lead,
find the room for hope to enter,
find the space where we are freed:
clear the chaos and the clutter,
clear our eyes, that we can see
all the things that really matter,
be at peace, and simply be.

Silence is a friend who claims us,
cools the heat and slows the pace;
God it is who speaks and names us,
knows our being, touches base,
making space within our thinking,
lifting shades to show the sun,
raising courage when we’re shrinking,
finding scope for faith begun.

In the Spirit let us travel,
open to each other’s pain;
let our lives and fears unravel,
celebrate the space we gain:
there’s a place for deepest dreaming,
there’s a time for heart to care;
in the Spirit’s lively scheming
there is always room to spare.

Candles of Joy and Concern:

Each week when we gather together, we share a simple ritual of candles of joy and concern, an opportunity to light a candle and share something that is in our heart with the community. So we’ve an opportunity now, for anyone who would like to do so, to light a candle and say a few words about what it represents. This time we’re going to go to the people in the building first, and take all of those in one go, and then I’ll call on the people on Zoom to come forward.

So I invite some of you here in person to come and light a candle and then if you wish to tell us briefly who or what you light your candle for. Please do get up close to the microphone as that will help everyone hear (including the people at home). You can take the microphone out of the stand if it’s not at a good height and have it microphone pointing right at your mouth. Thank you.

(in person candles)

And if that’s everyone in the room we’ll go over to the people on Zoom next – you might like to switch to gallery view at this stage – just unmute yourselves when you are ready and speak out – and we should be able to hear you and see you up on the big screen here in the church.

(zoom candles)

And I’m going to light one more candle, as we often do, to represent all those joys and concerns that we hold in our hearts this day, but which we don’t feel able to speak out loud. (light candle)

Time of Prayer & Reflection: based on words by Alex Brianson

Let’s take those joys and concerns into a time of prayer. You might first want to adjust your position for comfort, close your eyes, or soften your gaze. Whatever works for you. Do whatever you need to do to get into the right state of body and mind for us to pray together now. (pause)

Spirit of Life, God of All Love, in whom we live and move and have our being,
we turn our full attention to you, the light within and without,
as we tune in to the depths of this life, and the greater wisdom
to which – and through which – we are all intimately connected.
Be with us now as we allow ourselves to drop into the
silence and stillness at the very centre of our being. (pause)

Spirit of Life, you who animate the Universe.
Help us to remember the gift that is a human life.
With our consciousness and senses, we can touch, taste, see and feel.
So much that is good, and alluring, and enticing.

Spirit of Life, some of us here today may be thinking
of concerns more than joys, of loss rather than enjoyment.
For those of us we ask for healing and restoration.
To those of us we pledge our aid.
Just as cares arise, so shall they pass.
Just as grief pains, new joy beckons.
Spirit of Life, may we remember that life is a dance.
And may we ensure that we move to the rhythm divine. (pause)

So in a few quiet moments let us take some time to pray inwardly the prayers of our own hearts;
calling to mind all those souls we know to be suffering this day, whether close to home, or
on the other side of the world. Let us hold all these sacred beings in the light of love. (30s pause)

Let us also pray for ourselves; we too are sacred beings who face our own struggles and muddle
through life’s ups and downs. So let us take a few moments to reflect on our own lives, and
ask for what we most need this day – comfort, forgiveness, or guidance – to flourish. (30s pause)

And let us take just a little longer to remember the good things in life and give thanks for them.
Those moments in the past week where we’ve encountered generosity, kindness, or pleasure.
Let us cultivate a spirit of gratitude as we recall all those moments that lifted our spirits. (30 pause)

Spirit of Life – God of all Love – as this time of prayer comes to a close, we offer up
our joys and concerns, our hopes and fears, our beauty and brokenness,
and we call on you for insight, healing, and renewal.

As we look forward now to the coming week,
help us to live well each day and be our best selves;
using our unique gifts in the service of love, justice and peace. Amen

Hymn 198 (purple): ‘We’ll Build a Land’

Let’s sing again. It’s number 198 in the purple book, ‘We’ll Build a Land’. The words will be up on screen as usual. Hymn number 198.

We’ll build a land where we bind up the broken.
We’ll build a land where the captives go free,
where the oil of gladness dissolves all mourning.
O, we’ll build a promised land that can be.

Come build a land where sisters and brothers,
anointed by God, may then create peace:
where justice shall roll down like waters,
and peace like an ever flowing stream.

We’ll build a land where we bring the good tidings
to all the afflicted and all those who mourn.
And we’ll give them garlands instead of ashes.
O, we’ll build a land where peace is born.

We’ll be a land building up ancient cities,
raising up devastations of old;
restoring ruins of generations.
O, we’ll build a land of people so bold.

Come, build a land where the mantles of praises
resound from spirits once faint and once weak;
where like oaks of righteousness stand her people.
O, come build the land, my people we seek.

In-Person Reading: ‘Healing’ by Adam Lawrence Dyer (read by Jeannene)

Don’t speak to me of “healing” racism,
or “wounded souls” or the “painful hurt”
until you are willing to feel the scars
on my great-great-grandmother Laury’s back.

Don’t speak to me of “values”
or “justice” or “righting wrongs”
until you are able to feel the heartache
of my great-grandfather Graham
whose father may have been his master.

Don’t speak to me of “equity”
or “opportunity” or the “common good”
until you are able to hear the fear
from my grandmother Mae
as the only black woman in her college.

Don’t speak to me of “passion”
or “longing” or “standing on the side of love”
until you know the shame
felt by my mother Edwina
mocked by teachers for the curve of her back.

Don’t speak to me of “together”
or “understanding” or “empathy”
until you know my rage
as a young actor hearing the direction
to “be more black . . . more male.”

The pain you are trying to heal has no real name.
This “pain” you speak of has no story;
it is anonymous, vague, and empty.

Don’t speak to me of “healing”
for I heal the second I am ripped apart.
My wounds self-suture,
and like the clever creature I am,
I just grow new legs to outrun the pain ever faster.
It is something I have had to practice for generations,
that feel like an eternity.

So, please don’t speak to me of “healing”
because you cannot know what healing means
until you know the hurt.

Meditation: Quotes on Justice and Injustice

Thanks Jeannene. We’re moving into a time of meditation now. I’m going to share a selection of quotes in relation to our theme. This will take us into 3 minutes of silence which will end with a bell. Then we’ll hear music for meditation from Andrew. So let’s do what we need to do to get comfortable – adjust your position if you need to – put your feet flat on the floor – maybe close your eyes. As we always say, the words are an offering, you can use this time to meditate in your own way.

I am no longer accepting the things I cannot change.
I am changing the things I cannot accept (Angela Davis)

I sit on a man’s back, choking him and making him carry me,
and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him
and wish to ease his lot by all possible means—except by getting off his back. (Leo Tolstoy)

If one really wishes to know how justice is administered in a country,
one does not question the policemen, the lawyers, the judges,
or the protected members of the middle class. One goes to the unprotected –
those, precisely, who need the law’s protection most!
– and listens to their testimony. (James Baldwin)

If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have
chosen the side of the oppressor. (Desmond Tutu)

Poverty is the worst form of violence. (Mahatma Gandhi)

It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power,
is the most ferocious enemy justice can have. (James Baldwin)

Period of Silence and Stillness (~3 minutes) – end with a bell

Interlude: Bach: Siciliano (played by Andrew Robinson)

Address: ‘Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters’ by Rev. Michael Allured

‘Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.’

These words from the Book of Amos in the Old Testament (5:24) were paraphrased by Martin Luther King in his ‘I have a dream’ speech. He dreamt of the day when injustice and unfairness had been washed away; when understanding among the peoples of the Earth had grown deeper.

Today, some 60 years later, it’s a work that remains very much in progress. Yes, we’ve taken strides forward. Yet in some respects our willingness to embrace and live by the concepts of justice and equity has gone backwards.

The philosopher A. C. Grayling made an observation about how the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights has been diminished since it was born from the ashes of World War Two.

A noble principle: this idea of universal human rights: this principle of unqualified equality for anyone, anywhere in the world before properly constituted and administered law.

He goes on to observe, however, that ‘About the only thing now universal about human rights is the irritation they prompt in governments’. They’re inconvenient, they think, and they protect the undeserving.

It’s not difficult to see the basis for his line of argument. We live in troubled times and a globalised world that is more complicated to navigate than it once was.

Getting justice and equity for all is a noble aspiration and turning the principle into reality sometimes feels impossible, not least because we human beings – you and I – are labyrinths of contradictions.

Over laying and influencing our own contradictions of heart and head are everyone else’s contradictions: in families, work places, communities, countries and continents.

Our desires, passions, power struggles, fear of losing the power we have: competing and all the while manoeuvring for what we want. Do we recognise this going on at every level of human interaction?

From this reality where is the hope for change, the strength to change things we might ask ourselves? Why even bother?

Three suggestions for giving us hope, courage and persistence.

First: the idea of justice and equity is a religious one that’s integral to our spiritual growth. We wouldn’t want to be treated unjustly or unfairly ourselves so why should we think it’s all right to show others injustice and unfairness?

The foundation for human relations in all the major world religions is this golden, sometimes called platinum, rule. God expects our manifestation of justice to reflect how we treat each other.
Justice is mentioned nearly 160 times in the Bible. While most are retributive, a lot of the references are rooted in concepts of justice and fairness. Isaiah 10: 1: 2: for instance:

Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees, to deprive the poor of their rights and withhold justice from the oppressed.

This religious idea of fairness, of justice, speaks to us through the hymn we have just sung, based on the words of Isaiah and Amos. The prophet Amos lived in Israel at the time of King Jeroboam II (786 to 746 BCE).

His reign was marked by great economic prosperity but the rich were getting richer and the poor poorer.

Social injustice ran rampant in the land. [There was national apathy towards suffering and injustice.]
The economically weak could find no redress in the courts and no one to champion their cause—until the coming of Amos. He pointed out the contradictions between the status the nation took to itself as God’s chosen people and the reality.

Secondly, the pursuit of justice and equality is in our own interests. If we all have sufficient for our needs it is less likely there will be unrest.

The feeling that we are being treated unfairly – as a commodity – as something less than a sentient being who has the same basic human feelings and needs as our perceived oppressors breads resentment.

The feeling of unfairness may begin as a seed. The seed may grow in the hearts of parents with three children when the breadwinner on the living wage waits 62 days for treatment to begin after a cancer diagnosis. The parents, the children, the community may ask:

‘Is it so unreasonable for us to feel there is injustice in the world that because we are not multi-millionaires we cannot begin treatment within the week of diagnosis?’

From the resentful seed may come stronger feelings hatred when the family lose their home because mum or dad are too ill with the cancer and delayed treatment to work. Then comes the violence. Then the fear and retaliation.

And then an escalation in violence, deepening hatred and an overwhelming desire to crush the perceived or real threat to our survival.

How recognisable is the pattern I describe? It’s one we can surely trace through the story of humanity and inhumanity across time and place?

Where then is the hope we cry out for? It’s here. Now. All around us in this space and online. It’s in our minds and in our hearts. When we recognise what is unjust and unfair we do a great thing. That is the first step towards justice and equity.

We may feel helpless in the face of global forces in play. How can we challenge injustice? Maybe that’s how the poor in Israel felt until Amos gave them a voice?

Amos was a shepherd from Tekoa in Judah who also said that he was “a dresser of sycamore trees”. Amos was no professional prophet or a member of a prophetic guild. His example reminds us that we’ve got more power than we may initially believe to nudge life towards justice.

Justice and equity are gifts that we give to the Cosmos and to ourselves. At the heart of our Unitarian foundations are a free and inquiring religion and the service of humanity. Across the pond our Unitarian Universalist sisters and brothers are guided by the Seven Principles.

The first is the inherent worth and dignity of all.

The second asks us to aspire to justice, equity and compassion in human relations.

The last invites us to belong to that interdependent web of existence of which we are all part.

It is this, the interdependent web, that shows us why justice and equity are the way.

Together, emboldened by our collective strength and hope, may we continue our journeys in the complicated quest towards how we reach that promised land. Amen.

Hymn 36 (purple): ‘For Everyone Born, A Place at the Table’

Time for our last hymn, it’s number 36 in your purple books, ‘For Everyone Born, a Place at the Table’, and the words will be up on screen. Please sing up and let’s enjoy our closing hymn 36.

For everyone born, a place at the table,
for everyone born, clean water and bread,
a shelter, a space, a safe place for growing,
for everyone born, a star overhead.

Chorus: And God will delight
when we are creators of justice and joy,
yes, God will delight
when we are creators of justice,
justice and joy!

For woman and man, a place at the table,
revising the role, deciding the share,
with wisdom and grace, dividing the power,
for woman and man, a system that’s fair. (chorus)

For young and for old, a place at the table,
a voice to be heard, a part in the song,
the hands of a child in hands kind and wrinkled
for young and for old, the right to belong. (chorus)

For just and unjust a place at the table,
abuser, abused, how hard to forgive,
in anger, in hurt, a mindset of mercy,
for just and unjust, a new way to live. (chorus)

For everyone born, a place at the table,
to live without fear, and simply to be,
to work, to speak out, to witness and worship,
for everyone born, the right to be free. (chorus)

Announcements:

Thanks to Michael for leading a lovely service today. Thanks to Ramona for tech-hosting. Thanks to Sonya for co-hosting and welcoming everyone online – if you’re joining on Zoom please do hang on after for a chat with Sonya. Thanks to Jeannene for reading. Thanks to Andrew for playing for us and Benjie for supporting our singing. Thanks to Pat and John for doing coffee today. For those of you who are in-person – please do stay for a cuppa after the service – that’s served in the hall next door. And why not join us for our Sunday Conversation, exploring the service theme, which Jeannene will be hosting in the church from 12.30-1.30pm.

There are various other small group activities that you can join during the week: This coming Wednesday we have community singing once again, at 7pm, that’s been a roaring success and we had 30 people join us a few weeks ago, so come along and join the fun. And Sonya will be here as usual for her Nia dance classes at lunchtime on Friday. We also have our regular online ‘Heart & Soul’ Contemplative Spiritual Gathering on Friday at 7pm, this week’s theme is ‘Visitations’. We gather for sharing and prayer and it is a great way to get to know others on a deeper level. Email our minister Jane if you’d like to book your place for that and get the link.

If you want to join in with our ‘Better World Book Club’, which takes place online, the next gathering will be on Sunday 24th March at 7.30pm when we’ll be talking about ‘Laziness Does Not Exist’ by Devon Price.

And a date for your diaries: We’re going to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the founding of this congregation on Sunday 14th April – me and Sarah will be co-leading a special service – and there’ll be a congregational bring-and-share lunch after. Save the date and look out for me (Liz) with a sign-up sheet so you can let us know what food you’re planning to contribute.

Next Sunday at 11am our minister Jane will be back to lead our service on ‘Friendship’ – this is going to be a two-parter exploring this theme – the following week will be an interactive/congregational service exploring the same theme – so do plan to come along on to both Sundays if you can.

Details of all our various activities are printed on the back of the order of service, for you to take away, and also in the Friday email. Please do sign up for the mailing list if you haven’t already. The congregation very much has a life beyond Sunday mornings; we encourage you to keep in touch, look out for each other, and do what you can to nurture supportive connections.

I think that’s everything. I’ll hand back to Michael for our closing words.

Benediction: based on words by Adam Slate

Be kind. Be brave. Be just.
Be merciful. Be hopeful.
This is how we keep the chalice flame burning
until we are together again to light it anew. Amen.

Closing Music: Mendelssohn: Spring Song (played by Andrew Robinson)

Rev. Michael Allured

10th March 2024