Education is a funny thing. I was an educator in a few different capacities before I became a minister, and it always irked me that schools seem to spend so much time trying to get certain information into children’s heads, yet kids were rarely given an equal amount of time to share their critiques or opposing views or feelings, as well as their questions and wonderings. Many of us probably have at least one example of a “lesson” we were taught in school, that made us go “Hmmm, I wonder if that’s true?” or “I wonder if that’s the whole story.” In school and elsewhere, we learn a lot of stories; tales of historical events and figures - things that we’re supposed to commit to memory because they are “important”...but we never seem to discuss whose version of the story we are learning. As we get older, and we hopefully engage more critically with these stories and other Big Ideas or Truths (with a capital T), we might get a chance to ask some good questions like “Who decided that THIS was the way we should think about this?” and “Whose voices are we NOT listening to?” When we ask these kinds of questions, even of something that we’ve long thought to be true and absolute, and accepted as is, we begin to see and hear multiple perspectives. And our world gets changed.
I’m especially reminded of this at certain times of the year, and November and the coming of Thanksgiving sets off all kinds of alarm bells for me. As a country, we are preparing to celebrate a holiday that perpetuates one version of a story, that at best, is a mishmash of half-truths and at worst, pure mythology; a mythology that has inaccurately passed on ‘facts’ and feelings, a mythology that tries to paint a pretty picture, a mythology that the historically silenced voices have repeatedly told us is inaccurate, harmful, and an unfair portrayal that erases other more valuable truths. The images that surround Thanksgiving, and the practices we’ve made tradition - including costume-laden reenactments and inaccurate menus of foods - perpetuate the mythology, making it really hard for other voices - voices carrying different truths - to break through.
I sound like a real downer, don’t I? We all like to take time off from work and school to gather together with family and eat too much and maybe watch football or some kind of parade…. And maybe that’s the good part for some people - the together part, the gratitude part, the resting part. But, just because there may be a “good part” doesn’t mean we can ignore the rest of the story. Here’s something I learned 25 years ago when I was teaching at the American Indian Heritage School in Seattle, Washington. One of my dear friends and colleagues, the late Robert Eaglestaff of the Lakota Sioux tribe, introduced me to a powerful teaching: “The hurt of one, is the hurt of all.” “The hurt of one, is the hurt of all.” So, if someone, anyone, tells us that our words or actions or holidays or “re-enactments” or celebrations or stock-stories or teachings of policies, hurt them, erase them, damage their spirits, their people, their stories, then we must reconsider them. For many native people, Thanksgiving is a ritual of mourning...but lots of us can’t understand this because we never learned the rest of the story; A story that includes massacre, denigrating language, a presidential attempt to unite the nation, and ultimately, a decision to find a way to “Americanize” and control new immigrants which gave rise to the sanitized, peaceful, faux-history of the meal that inspired Thanksgiving, the holiday. Sean Sherman, an Oglala Sioux tribal member, professional chef, and author, wrote this about Thanksgiving: “Thanksgiving really has nothing to do with Native Americans, and everything to do with an old (but not the oldest) guard conjuring a lie of the first peoples welcoming the settlers to bolster their false authority over what makes a “real” American.” So, you see, when we do a little digging, we find deeper truths.
My concern is NOT with setting aside one day to give thanks. I think we should find a time each day to give thanks and I know that many of my faith-based siblings believe and do the same. All religious traditions have some form of a gratitude practice and even science has proven that living life with gratitude is really good for our brains, our health, and our general spirits. My concern is that setting aside an official day of thanks that erases many truths can do more harm than good.
But here’s why we - all of us who get to gather in thoughtful interfaith spaces like this - are lucky. We have the ability to put ourselves in other people’s shoes. When we put ourselves in the shoes of “the other”, we can change our perspective. We can learn. We can give up the notion of a “single story” and see that history and belief are far more complex and nuanced, and thus richer and more inviting and engaging. And, how best to do that? By Listening. We are living in a time when more and more truths are being unearthed and shared. In reality, those truths have always been there, but now, just maybe we are finally letting the under-heard voices come through. Are we listening? Are we able to hear? Are we willing to think about that other person’s (or an entire group of people’s) perspective?
When we listen to other people’s truths, we are invited into the beautiful space of transformation. Just think about it for a minute: isn’t it lovely when you get to share something deep and meaningful with someone and they hear you, really hear you and maybe say something like “Wow, I never thought of it like that before.” Just think what it would be like for all of us to find a way to talk to one another like that. To hear people’s truths - their stories of pain, of being pushed aside, or of being shamed for who they love or how they dress or what they believe or what they look like. For ages, humans have grappled with the questions of truth: both the Big T Truths - the ultimate questions, the ground of being - and the little t truths - the myths, the stories, the histories, the how-we-fit-in tales. It might help us understand the Big T Truths better if we can listen to one another’s little t truths.
In Unitarian Universalism, we draw from six diverse sources - too much to mention here tonight - but I do mention it because it makes it harder for us UUs to just go along with the single-story idea. You see, people who are part of my faith community come from all walks of life, and religious backgrounds, and have so many different beliefs I sometimes don’t know how my Sunday services will land! For many of us UUs though, our desire to understand one another and to understand “truth” calls us on an exploration that requires us to examine Big Ideas from multiple perspectives. Our faith is also guided by Seven Principles, the 4th of which is the Free and Responsible Search for Truth and Meaning. I like the “Free” part - and our multiple sources allow this “search” to be free and open, but I particularly like the “responsible” part. We can all go seeking truth and maybe offend or hurt people along the way. But, if we are seeking truth responsibly, then we can listen, we can hear other truths, we can limit the harm.
And here’s the thing, it takes nothing away from us to listen to someone else’s truth, to observe, honor, listen, and absorb someone else’s experience that’s very different than our own. On the contrary, it actually can enhance us. Listening with open hearts and open minds will help us grow, will help us expand our understanding, will help us recognize that there are other ways of being in the world - that there isn’t just one story and we don’t necessarily own the story - and ultimately it will help us see that maybe the story is bigger, much bigger than we were told. And living like this can not just change us, it can impact our congregations, our communities, our countries, and our world, ultimately helping us get to a place of greater understanding, of reconciliation, and of healing. When we enter into this kind of covenant, a covenant of listening - with both our hearts and our minds, then we can build the Beloved Community.
