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Anchor Report - Spring - 2002

"Poetry and Religion"

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Anchor Report by William Gardiner
April 28, 2002

The topic for the meeting was “Poetry and Religion”.

We welcomed Kendra Ford and Tracey Sprowls as invitees to our group.

During the check in people shared the complexities of their lives and ministries.
We heard about the blessings of family, successful church canvasses, the beginning of new ministries, the revival of old congregations, the beginning of work in new churches, fulfilling sabbaticals, and the completion of a doctoral program. We also shared our experiences of loss and grief involving the aftermath of 9-1, 26 memorial services in one congregation, and losses in our families.

Frank Carpenter presented the opening paper entitled Unitarianism as Poetry. In his paper, Frank provided a historical context for our topic. He noted that the Unitarian movement in New England was literary and religious rather than theological. In order to revive religion the Unitarians of the `19th century turned to literature as a new way of expressing religion. For our Unitarian forbearer’s poetry was a way of describing the sacred dimensions of life. Poetry for them was the voice of the soul. Frank noted that for Emerson, the poet and the mystic dipped into the same spring.

In her response to Frank’s paper Lucinda Duncan highlighted the shifts that Channing made in making the Bible comparable to other scripture and broadening the definition of what constitutes religious literature. Lucinda invited us to consider a third shift, which came from Thoreau and his view of nature. For Emerson nature was a direct route to eternal ideas. But Thoreau emphasized the concrete details of life forms in nature. Thoreau emphasized the fundamental worth of every living form, each plant, each fungus, each algae.

The group had an intense discussion in the group of the idealism of Plato and Emerson and the realism of Aristotle and Thoreau. Do we go from the universal to the concrete or from the concrete to the universal? But let’s remember Blake’s poem that brought the two perspectives together in four lines:

To see the world in a grain of sand
And heaven in a wild flower
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand
and Eternity in an hour

Cynthia Ward in her paper on The Power of Oral Poetry shared some wonderful poems by Jane Kenyon, Mary Oliver, Adrienne Rich, Anne Sexton, Joy Harjo, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Martin Luther King and Richard Gilbert.

In his response Tom Chulak read poems by Rainer Maria Rilke, Audre Lord, Gerald Jampolsky, William Wordsworth, Starhawk, Rumi, and William Blake.
Two of our members talked about the experience of writing poems. They noted both the spontaneity and the difficulty of the writing process.

Some folks expressed an appreciation for hearing the poems read and for having Frank Hall’s CD of readings.

At the 9:30 Chapel, Rev. Bob Thayer shared his experience of being involved in the Ecumenical movement in Framingham, Massachusetts back in the middle sixties.
He shared some interesting and disturbing stories of involvement with the Marist Fathers.
We can remember the connections that were made in support of the struggle for integration.

Fred Gillis gave a wonderful sermon for the morning chapel on the theme of Praise
in which he spoke about the many things in life that we can be thankful for.

Frank Hall presented a paper on The Uses of Poetry in Ministry that was lucid, passionate, compelling, and transformative. Reflecting on his own personal odyssey as a person and minister he shared with us the many ways he uses poetry for personal inspiration, as a preacher, and as a pastor.

His commentary on poetry was filled with cogent remarks about parish ministry. Note these keepers:

The first lesson of ministry is: I can take care of myself.

Every person is a challenge and a potential teacher.

Our most difficult lesson as ministers is to learn how good fences make good neighbors

I learned that for Frank poetry is not a “frivolous frolic into the playground of words” but an invitation to reference one’s full life experience.

As a group, we expressed our profound thanks to Frank for this outstanding paper and the powerful presentation of it.

Anita Farber Robertson, in her response, observed, “poetry provides the word tools that can open the spaces into which the divine call can creep and dwell.” And she reminded us that while there is a power in words, there are also limits to words and we need other means like music, dance, and mediations to evoke the spiritual.

Martha Niebanck and Rosemarie Smurzynski shared with us how they use poetry as a spiritual practice. In moments of “mental traffic jam” and the busyness of life, Martha will open a book of poetry. In such a moment she found a Rumi poem entitled Zero Circle, and its words illuminated her path. We can learn from what Rumi says:

“So let us rather not be sure of anything
Beside ourselves, and only that, so
Miraculous beings come running to help

In other words, we need to be confused and out of control together if we are to be creative and see things in new ways.

Rosemary uses poetry s a form of prayer. Why use poetry as a prayer she asks?
Poetry is a form of prayer because poetry helps us to see. It enlarges our world. It employs metaphors that transform our lives.

The group has an intense discussion about the issue of whether the use of poetry is elitist.
Among the points of view shared about this topic were the following:

There is a potential poet in every person.

Poetry can express the hungers for democracy.

We need to be open to poetry form people of all races, classes, and walks of life.

We have to speak with authenticity about how a poem speaks to a deep place within us at the same time that we speak within the context of our community so the people we are speaking to can hear us.

In the afternoon we reflected in small groups on David Whyte’s poem Self Portrait.

In the evening, for esthetic relief, we saw a Japanese horror film called Gamera, which inspired the following poem:

Gamera
Fierce but compassionate
Returns when needed
Hero

And these powerful words

Three huge nasty Gyaos birds.
Bird Turd, Death, and Destruction.
Nice Turtle Saves the World.

In the evening chapel, Paul Mueller inspired us with the image of the Kingfisher.

In the morning Susan Suchocki Brown led a May Day morning chapel reminding us of a minister who supported her call to ministry, relating the story of the
Green man, and giving each one of us a lovely May Day basket.

We closed the program with a group discussion on Wednesday morning.
These were some of the points that were made.

Poetry has a paradoxical nature. Just because it is words doesn’t mean it is words.

We can use Native American poetry to lift up the prophetic dimension of life.

The poetry of Mary Oliver is very important to several of the participants in the group.

Poetry is a pointer to the mystery but not the mystery itself.

Many of the readings in the back of the new UUA hymnal are poems.

We need to see the flow of the soul that are beyond the words.

Do we as a culture value our poets? Do we as a nation value poetry?
Some of us appreciate poetry because of the financial sacrifices
made by the poets.

There is spiritual nourishment in poetry.

After the poem is written it belongs to the people.

Even great poets write poor poetry.

We closed the program by thanking our moderator, Charles Stephens, for his excellent facilitation of our discussion process.

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