Text Box: Interfaith Celebration Gathering Sunday, September 24, 2000 Interfaith Celebration Gathering Service Service agenda: Opening Prayer Readings Message OPENING PRAYER: Dear Mother, Father, Great Spirit, God, please hear my prayer. Please help me to understand my relationship to my brothers and sisters. Help me understand that the separateness my ego would have me believe is there is only a mirage. I ask this knowing that all I need do is ask and it is granted. AMEN READINGS: Psalms 103: 1—4 Bless the Lord, O my soul; and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits. Who forgives all your iniquities, who heals all your diseases. Who redeems your life from destruction, who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies. Nelson Henderson The true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade you do not expect to sit. MESSAGE: Connected I heard a story today that has left me shaking my head in wonder. It seems there was a man in Roanoke, Virginia this past week who announced to all his friends and neighbors that he felt gay people did not deserve to live. So, he went down to a gay bar in Roanoke last night and began shooting. He killed one person and wounded a number of others. You will never guess what this man’s last name was—it was ‘Gay’! This story reminds me of the religions who proclaim that people who are gay are sinners, and therefore should not be allowed in church. I have only one question for these folks—who belongs in churches, then? If people who make mistakes (also known by some religions as sinners) do not belong in church, then all the churches will be empty. There is no one of us who is perfect. Of course, I personally do not believe choosing to share love with a person of the same sex is either a mistake or a sin. Love is love, however it is shared. I see no rationale in condemning a person because of his or her sexual preference. The kind of thinking that leads people to do what Mr. Gay of Roanoke, Virginia did is separatist thinking. This is the kind of mindset that ignores the fact that we are all interconnected. This mindset does not acknowledge that we are all part of the ‘body of Christ.’ We are limbs on the same tree. When we condemn, criticize, or hate someone else, we must remember that this person is merely another limb on the same tree that sustains us. We are all part of the circle of life that sustains every living thing on this planet. At the center of this circle is our Creator, a God of love. A God of love who loves even Mr. Gay, as Mr. Gay sits in his Roanoke, Virginia jail cell awaiting a trial by a jury of his peers. Whenever we, as God’s creations, make mistakes, God does not cease loving us. God’s love is unconditional, everlasting. Would you cut off your finger if it behaved in an aberrant fashion? Of course you wouldn’t. You would nurture it back to health. When I first went to the Virginia Correctional Center for Women in Goochland, Virginia to do workshops for the inmates there, I was apprehensive about how these women would accept the workshops. I had had no prior experience with incarcerated persons. What I found in this prison and later in Nottoway prison for men in Virginia was that the people in prisons are just like you and me. They hurt, worry, cry, and laugh just like we do. After a few weeks of workshop sessions, the thought that came most frequently to my mind was how lucky I was to be able to walk out that door every time I walked into the prison, and how that was actually the main difference between me and them. I could leave and they could not. The mistakes I had made in my life just happened to violate none of mankind’s laws. These inmates, who had at first seemed so different, were not so very different after all. As I listened to them talk about their crimes, I realized how one fork in the road on our life’s journey can make the whole difference between who is incarcerated and who is free. One momentary lapse in judgment can change our future. We are all part of the great I AM. It is time we stopped seeing ourselves as separate from each other. We are connected. We must continue to love our brothers and sisters who have forgotten who they are, like Mr. Gay seems to have. We must hold them in the light until they, too, can remember that they are a part of the body of Christ, the great I AM. Likewise, we must hold each other in the light with love, even when we disagree. After all, while we might disagree with what another person says, we cannot disagree with the fact that he or she is a part of us and we are a part of him. We are not separate creations of God’s. We are all facets of the same creation. We come from the Oneness into human form, and we return to the Oneness from human form While we are here, we must always strive to remember who we are. We are not separate beings with no connection with each other or the earth on which we live. Our bodies hum with Divine energy—the same Divine energy that flows through every living creature, creating a web of life. Let us pray for the day when we all remember who we are. May God add a blessing to these humble words. AMEN © 2000 Rev. S. Suzanne Fisher