I'm no proselytizer, but...........

................ I just have to share with you why this atheist attends church. You'll find it in the lead up to his sermon for this Sunday that the minister posted on my church's blog site.  Thrilling to me is also the great degree of social activism in this Unitarian Universalist church and the extremely large number of young people of all races, cultures, faith backgrounds and sexual orientation that are in attendance. I truly believe that this introduction to his sermon shares a needed balm and comfort to surviving our present American dilemma. A Great and Common Tenderness As we wrestle with our own fears and anxieties about the direction of our country and the future of our planet, many of us have asked the question, "What do we tell the children?" Here's the poet Rebecca Baggett's beautiful answer: Testimony (for my daughters) I want to tell you that the world is still beautiful. I tell you that despite children raped on city streets, shot down in school rooms, despite the slow poisons seeping from old and hidden sins into our air, soil, water, despite the thinning film that encloses our aching world. Despite my own terror and despair. I want you to know that spring is no small thing, that the tender grasses curling like a baby's fine hairs around your fingers are a recurring miracle. I want to tell you that the river rocks shine like God, that the crisp voices of the orange and gold October leaves are laughing at death, I want to remind you to look beneath the grass, to note the fragile hieroglyphs of ant, snail, beetle. I want you to understand that you are no more and no less necessary than the brown recluse, the ruby- throated hummingbird, the humpback whale, the profligate mimosa. I want to say, like Neruda, that I am waiting for "a great and common tenderness", that I still believe we are capable of attention, that anyone who notices the world must want to save it. I love the poet's reference to Neruda's "great and common tenderness." I'm waiting for that tenderness, too. My sermon this Sunday, "A Balm in Gilead," asks how, in this time of vitriol and scorn, we can treat one another with tenderness and compassion.  And we'll hear from the All Souls Choir, who will share the spiritual "Balm in Gilead" and other beautiful music. *********************************************** And before long I hope to share a major thought stream of mine regarding my 91 years experience in churches that has led me to becoming an agnostic atheist who finds hope in attending "thoughtful" churches.