RevCyn

This week's Time Magazine cover of a woman breast-feeding her 3-year-old son sure has a lot of people talking.  My own feelings about the Time cover are conflicted.  On one hand, I think Time is making an important point, and the controversy surrounding it is ridiculous.  I vigorously defend the following ideas: Breast-feeding is normal and healthy.   Breast-feeding is normal and healthy for toddlers, including 3-year-olds like this one. Breast-feeding is normal and healthy for boys, not just girls! It is okay and normal to be a sexy woman and also breast-feed your child.  Women can be both mothers and sexual beings at the same time. There is nothing wrong with breast-feeding standing up, either! This cover does not show anything inherently sexual or abnormal or unhealthy.  The fact that so many people have looked at this cover and had an immediate negative reaction is about the ways we have hypersexualized women in this society, and see br...

Several people asked me if I would post my sermon from this past Sunday online.  I post it with some reluctance, because I think it won't hold up on paper as well.  It's a performance piece -- part of what made it so well received, I believe, came from the surprise of it, and the novelty of having the entire sermon in verse.  Once you have a chance to think about the fact that rhymed "lightbulbs" with "entitled" -- a rhyme so slanted it falls over -- you might think twice about my poetic ability.  And the meter is certainly a bit forced in multiple locations.  Actually, it's just completely uneven throughout.  But it was great fun to do, and something I've been wanting to try for a long time.  It's hard work to write an entire sermon in verse, because it is such a long piece when written that way.  I found that I had to write much more than I usually write in prose, because the rhyme and meter keep me reading it at a pretty good clip.  What ...

Heartland Unitarian Universalist Ministers’ Statement on Trayvon Martin Case March 29, 2012 Unitarian Universalist ministers from the Heartland District (covering parts of Michigan, Indiana, Ohio and Kentucky) gathered in Lansing, Michigan today and, joining with our Florida colleagues , issued the following statement regarding last month’s tragic killing of Trayvon Martin in Central Florida. Whereas serious questions remain about the events of February 26 and the investigation into those events; and Whereas the public outrage surrounding this case is reflective of deeper issues in our society and the lived experience of many of its people of color; and Whereas these individual incidents are not isolated occurrences but rather are fueled by consistent messages of fear and division in our national and political discourse; and Whereas all people deserve the full blessings of justice, equity, and compassion in our society and in our justice system; We therefore call for a thor...

         I was deeply disturbed when Caylee Anthony went missing and mourned her death.  I know why, too.  She was of a similar age to my own daughter, and at least one person told me that Caylee reminded this person of my own daughter.  Caylee's big brown eyes, in particular, do have a resemblance.          I cried when I read about Christina Taylor Green , who was 9 years old when she died in the shootings in Tucson.  She, too, reminded me of my daughter, a precocious, politically-involved, brown-haired, brown-eyed girl.           I know why I mourned these little girls who, for a moment, caught our nation's attention.  They were innocent, beautiful, and gone too soon.  And they were in the media spotlight -- beautiful little girls -- white little girls.  Their deaths were horrible, outrageous, and made us sad and also furio...

So if living as if there is no God doesn't mean living immorally, what does it mean?  Without threat of eternal damnation, it means that we must take seriously the consequences of negative behaviors during our time on earth. Without threat of eternal rewards, it means we must live life to the fullest, appreciating the beauty, love, and kindness that we experience now, and share it with others. Without a God to make the rules, it means we must pay attention to our rules, create our own moral codes as individuals and a society and justify our behaviors as moral to the larger community.  With this as the only world we will know, it means that we must take care of it, and make ensure that our planet is livable for generations to come. Without a God's love and support, it means we must love and support one another. Without a God to blame for negative things happening, it means we must work to make a world where people are cared for in the best way possible. Without a God to...

A Christian colleague ran across the term "Practical Atheist" recently and brought it to a group I'm in for definition and discussion.  I wasn't familiar with it, and as probably the only thing close to an Atheist in the group (for the record, I call myself an Agnostic), offered up that it might be about a distinction between declared Atheists and default atheists (those who have not made a sort of declaration of atheism, but have no belief in God).  Other Christian colleagues in the group went with a definition of those people who might profess a belief in Christ, but live a Godless lifestyle.  Turns out, it seems they were right according to some definitions.  And that makes sense, because it's not a term that would make sense within the Atheist community, but makes sense in the Christian community.  And no term is likelier to drive Atheists hopping mad, now that I understand it better. So here's the Wikipedia definition , which would be closer to my defin...

The UUA President, the Rev. Peter Morales published a working paper titled "Congregations and Beyond" last week.  It's available in its entirety here .  In it he says, "I am realizing in a profound way that congregations cannot be the only way we
 connect with people." and "We have long defined ourselves as an association of congregations. We need to think
 of ourselves as a religious movement."  The Rev. Morales says, "
Congregations as local parishes arose in a different era. They arose in a time of limited
 mobility and communication. Most members lived within a couple of miles of their
 church."  This is something that I've been thinking about recently, as well.  The time that the church is where you go to in order to hear the latest ideas or even the latest gossip is a time that's behind us.  The church is no longer the central, or even a central, hub for how people get and exchange information and ideas.  There are still thi...