Out Loud

Here we are, gathered together in this sacred hour,
within the sheltering walls of this blessed place. We give thanks for the abundance of joy, grace and possibility, while holding within us the sorrows present.

Within these walls is where we bring our losses, shedding tears in the presence of our holy community.
Here, is where we bring our aching hearts, and have them tenderly received.

Here, is where we bring our joys, and know they will be unconditionally celebrated. We take time to deeply listen to each other, to offer each other the healing balm of care and love. Here, is where we experience our faith in community.

Beyond Sundays, there are so many things pulling us this way and that, clamoring for our attention. Beyond our community, at the grocery store, on the bus, at our workplace, we may not see those in pain. We might forget that our attention multiplies the joy of another, and helps ease disappointment.

May the care and love we show each other here on Sundays be what we offer to those beyond our walls between Sundays.

May we lean into our faith when we feel distracted, trusting in our faith, letting it guide us toward love, guide us toward hope, guide us into being in relationship with those who are struggling. This is our faith manifesting in the world.

Though this past week we may have overlooked those who are weeping, we are grateful that life lets us be cleansed over and over again. We are grateful we can start anew. Amen.

Spirit of Life and Love, God, Divine Reality: We are holding much within our lives today. Some of us are doing fine right now. But some of us are sitting in this sanctuary with one of the most fundamental sources of suffering: being, or loving, or knowing someone whose expression of their biological, gendered self  is being denied by family, colleagues, and community.

We are an embodied expression of the Holy. Our world struggles to create a safe space for all the many-splendored expressions of our humanness.  Who amongst us would knowingly dim the light of another? Who amongst us would rather have another tell us who we are, what we should be called, who we should love, how we should live? Who amongst us would choose to be seen in black and white and gray when, in the privacy of our homes, we give off all the colors of the universe, the hues spinning and splashing through us and around us?

What glory is cloaked now under the weight of our assumptions about each other?

Sometimes the stress in our own lives requires extraordinary energy, leaving us depleted in what we may offer others. But it is in these moments that we must turn to faith to guide us. May we remember within the sanctity of our hearts, with the acts of our daily lives, through our voice, that we support one another in our free search for truth, not because we are told we must, but because we have freely chosen to be people of the Unitarian Universalist faith, because we know that feeling and acting out of love and compassion for each other is the only way we can change the world. So may it be.

* Note: This prayer accompanied Rev. Bill Sinkford’s “Continuing the Welcoming Congregation Journey” service on transgender identity and inclusion. The service was a continuation of Saturday’s half-day workshop on the same topic, which included a presentation by UUA’s Alex Kapitan.