"Religion is orientation toward ultimate reality. Everyone orients their lives to some version of ultimate reality."
William Deming
"We (must) identify and name the idolatries, the false gods that our society worships. I was reading again recently Dennis Munby’s book ‘The Idea of a Secular Society’. Munby in the 1960’s advised us that a secular society was what a Christian ought to work for, and that one of its marks was that ‘there is no publicly accepted image of the good life’. If that is so, ours is certainly not a secular society. How absurd it would be to make such a claim when (according to published statistics) something like 90% of the population spends at least three-quarters of its free time glued to the television screen, hooked inseparably to those pictures of the good life which are being ceaselessly pumped into every living room in the country, the advertisements and the soap operas which provide an image of the good life more powerful than anything Islam or mediaeval Christendom every managed to fasten on an entire population. Ours is not a secular society, but a society which worships false gods"
Lesslie Newbigin
I think it's right to say that everyone is religious- everyone worships something (although many would deny that they do). Being religious does not mean following a strict code of ethics or offering sacrifices to statues- it means committing yourself- giving your entire life over to something/someone. Christians are not "archaic" when they talk about worship. They're just being honest about what everyone else is doing.
3 comments:
Quique,
I value all of your ideas. And I am proud of you for keeping up with your blog! Keep up the good work!
What is the Unitarian Universalist perspective on evangelism?
Great question. Its depends who you ask lol.
It reminds me of a speaker that came and "preached" one Sunday at my congregation. I would like to think of her as a "Unitarian Evangelist." She is so passionate about our faith. She described in her sermon a situation that morning when she was at a gas station. She went to pay for her gas and mentioned to a cashier that she was giving a sermon at church that Sunday. I think she was a bit nervous or upset that morning because the cashier lovingly told her to "give it up to Jesus!" And the speaker thanked her for the comment. Then she told us about a Muslim woman that she ran into. She began a conversation with her about religion. The Muslim woman told her that she wanted to find a place where she can meet people of different faiths and share her religion with them. Of course, the speaker knew of 8 churches in the Houston area where she can find a home! :)
"Evangelism" to this speaker is simply talking about and sharing what it means to be a Unitarian Universalist. To others, it could mean getting involved in social justice work and reaching out to people in the community. There can be a variety of ways that we Unitarians can share our faith with others.
Some Unitarians, however, would shun using the word "evangelism" to describe sharing our religion. That's because evangelism carries some negative connotations to alot of Unitarians.
Unfortunately, in my opinion, alot of us don't talk much about our faith. Its probably because we haven't given much thought to what our faith means to us.
I was at an interfaith luncheon where we had to dialogue with people on what our religious traditions taught about "death."
This took place after I received ashes from an ash wednesday service an hour earlier. When it was my turn to describe what my faith teaches on the subject, I got some perplexed looks when I, in a nutshell, told them "whatever you want to believe!" (And the ashes probably confused them even more!)
I don't know if that answered your question or if it also confused you even more! LOL. Maybe it would have been easier to say "Whatever you want to believe about evangelism!"
Let me know if you have more questions!
Magdiel
Oh, one more thing...
I will use my church for an example.
At my church, we have a welcoming committee that is in charge of making the Fellowship a welcoming place for visitors.
We have a desk in front of the sancutary by the entrance. Guests usually sign a guest log and recieve copies by mail or email of our biweekly newsletter. This newsletter has information about the denomination and the church in particular.
We also have phamplets and literature at the visitor's desk if visitors had any questions about the faith.
Right now I am involved in the Scholarship Committee at the Fellowship. We are using the scholarship to reach out to high school students and their parents at a particular school. This is a great way to let other people in our community know about our church.
Another example is that we rent our sanctuary to people who want to conduct weddings. Katy Haberman, a lady that marries people at our church, told us about a couple who rented the sanctuary for their wedding. The father of the bride was curious about the church and Katy told him about our faith. He was so excited about it that he took alot of literature home and said he might drop by one Sunday to check it out.
We don't go door to door or hand out literature like some faiths do. But we do talk about our faith when prompted or asked about it. Although I haven't had any training about Unitarian history or polity, its kinda hard for me to answer those particular questions.
A great website you should check out is www.uua.org. Check under the visitors section. It has alot of stuff there, including a description of different religious backgrounds and beliefs of our members.
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