Thank you for being here…and to those listening at home!
Who? What? When? Where? Why?
These are the questions drilled into a journalist when trying to report a story. At least that is what I was taught in journalism school more than 50 years ago. Good questions, right?
But behind those or any questions must be a curiosity…a desire to know and to understand your subject. Did you know a 4-year-old is reported to ask 300 to 400 questions a day? This inquisitiveness is important to their understanding of the world.
I was this kind of inquisitive kid. My parents divorced when I was four and I spent weekends with my father. We had a family pew at the First Christian Church, Disciples of Christ, in Mattoon, Illinois, a community of about 20,000 people in the middle of cornfields. My father made sure we went to church every Sunday. And I must have been full of questions, maybe even demanding some answers, because evidently one of my Sunday School teachers saw a need to call my father after one Sunday session. As reported, the next Sunday I marched up to her, hands on hips and with all the authority of a six-year-old, said…”My father told me to tell you I’m sorry!” She knew that was the best she would get. Another teacher quit teaching when she became pregnant, reportedly because she didn’t want to face my questions. But this strategy, along with a strong streak of stubbornness, were survival skills for me getting through a tough childhood. Church for me was mostly social and it’s where I learned leadership skills being active in a youth group and where I found my first role models. All my life I have sought out role models and mentors and have been fortunate to have many who have given me excellent guidance.
Let’s fast forward to college where I went to the University of Missouri to study journalism. Journalism students were encouraged to take a broad range of subjects and the University had a School of Religion so I took some religious and philosophy classes. It was in one of those classes that I was introduced to the writings of a philosopher that gave me the foundation for the beliefs I still hold today. Reverend Jack has spoken about Martin Buber. Buber was a theistic existential jewish philosopher who wrote a book in 1923 called I/Thou (that’s an English translation of his German writing). There is a lot of depth to Buber’s writings, but I’m only going to share what spoke to me and has stayed with me through the years.
Buber believed that people have two approaches to seeing the world: I-It or I-Thou. The I-It is an approach that is most common. It is utilitarian and what we do to get what we need from someone or something. We treat our subjects mostly as objects. We use a person or nature for our own needs. We do it every day, most of the time without thinking.
The other approach is an I-Thou. This is much more complex. It is when we enter into a relationship with all our vulnerabilities and truly attempt to see another person. We are in their presence for only that purpose, without preconceptions and not to judge or analyze.
Let me give you an example that might help with an experience perhaps you have had. Have you ever been at a concert when the music completely envelopes you and you are so immersed in the experience that you lose awareness of where you are or the time passing? This would be an I-Thou experience. With a person it might be a moment when you truly connect and understand and see the person you are with and you appreciate/even love them for who they are.
To Buber, God was the Eternal Thou. And we come to know God through our I-Thou experiences. To my 20-year-old self this answered so many questions of what I couldn’t see, hear or feel about God. If I were to know God, it would be through my relationships with people, nature and the world. That just made sense to me.
When I was 25, I had another experience that profoundly affected how I view the world and what I believe. I spent 9 months with a backpack traveling around the world, visiting 25 countries. I learned about Buddhism in Thailand, Hinduism in India, Islam in the Middle East and Judaism in Israel. I also came to appreciate more fully the freedoms I had in this country but I also learned that our country does not have all the answers and we can learn so much from other countries and cultures. I was exposed to different peoples, food, history, cultures and ideas. It instilled a love of travel that is still a priority in my life. And it taught me to fully believe in Mark Twain’s quote: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.”
SO — does God exist? I don’t know. I wish sometimes I did. I also sometimes wish I had the strong, quiet faith of my mother, who kept a Bible beside her bed. But I don’t. My analytical mind and all my questions don’t give me an easy answer. I do believe there are many good teachings of Jesus in the Bible, but I can learn from them without believing that he is the son of God. And I ask, would it really make any difference in how I act or who I am? I don’t think so.
I would like to believe that there is a Creator God for all this incredible universe, still I’m not sure. But what about an Intervener God? It’s hard for me to believe that some super power intervenes to help the Vikings win the Super Bowl or prevents someone I love from dying or helps me win the lottery. Why, if we were created with a conscious, a brain, a soul, would we not use those gifts rather than turn our life over to an unseen deity.
In times of darkness, despair and distress (kind of like right now), we often call upon our “faith” to help sustain us. How does what we believe help us? You may be familiar with the writer Barry Lopez.
In an essay entitled “Love in a Time of Terror” he addresses our current time of darkness and despair. He writes, “If we are to manage the havoc (he names several — you can fill in your own specific concerns) we have to reimagine what it means to live lives that matter or we will only continue to push on with the unwarranted hope that things will work out. We need to step into a deeper conversation about enchantment and agape, and to actively explore a greater capacity to love other humans.”
In Martin Buber’s words, we need to form more I-Thou relationships.
And pursuing those relationships can, at least hopefully, give our lives purpose — whether it’s with family, friends, strangers you meet, actions you take, prayers you pray, meditations you immerse yourself in. Let your faith, whatever it is, hold you strong.
I’d like to conclude with one of my favorite plays/also made into a movie — Les Miserables, based on the book of the same name written in 1862 by Victor Hugo. If you haven’t seen, I highly recommend. The closing number has a line I want to close with. It is my interpretation of Martin Buber’s I-Thou and the foundation of my faith.
“And remember the truth that once was spoken . . .To love another person is to see the face of God!”