A COMMUNITY OF WHOLENESS: THE UNITARIAN FELLOWSHIP OF PETERBOROUGH April 2019 JOURNEYS Monthly Theme “Un-Pack-It” A COMMUNITY OF WHOLENESS THE UNITARIAN FELLOWSHIP OF PETERBOROUGH WONDERINGS on the theme of WHOLENESS From Rev. Julie From the folks at Soul Matters than rubble” is not the only counterintuitive thing our faith tells us Early in my time in Peterborough, I said Transition and change rule the flow of about wholeness. It also urges us to something that got some pushback. life. The wholeness offered us is not that “Crack wider!” While I can’t remember verbatim details, of returning our lives to some original I certainly remember the gist of it. My state but of working with what remains As odd as it sounds, we become more words implied that we need to to make something new. Our broken when we are broken, broken open to be improve/to get better. Those who pieces are not something that needs to exact. Over and over again, our faith pushed back felt I was implying that they be put perfectly back together, but are reminds us that protecting our personal weren’t good enough just as they are. more like building blocks waiting to be wholeness is only half the game. To be honest, I fear that I DO lean more molded into a yet-to-be-imagined form. And, the equally important part of life’s heavily on the side of ‘improvement’. It’s To be made whole is to be reorganized, journey is to let in the wholeness of in my DNA. But I think we do well to not restored. world. It’s about cultivating cracks on remember the word AND. We are Another way to put this is to say that purpose. It’s about becoming broken AND we are whole. In fact, our there is freedom in the breaking. The intentionally exposed. As Leonard brokenness, as well as our ability to cracks make room for creativity. That’s Cohen famously put it “Cracks are how improve, repair and restore ourselves, is not to minimize the pain, or to justify the light gets in.” what makes us perfectly whole just as tragedy as “destiny.” Rather, brokenness So, in the end, maybe that’s our most we are. is a call for us to perceive our lives as important “wholeness question”: How Wholeness is not about perfect health or more than justIssue a pile of worthless Date and are your cracks inviting you to become right behaviour. It’s not about never ruined rubble. “Look closer,” says our larger? What cracks do you need to making mistakes, or always feeling faith, “that ash, if worked with, can give cultivate on purpose? confident. Wholeness as human beings birth to a Phoenix.” Monthy is about embracing the whole of what it So, what piles of rubble in your life need means to be human…which is to be to be revisited? What longing for what constantly learning, constantly slipping was needs let go so a new wholeness can up, constantly dreaming. It’s emerge? To receive these monthly packets experiencing the full range of what it And how might you break open even by email, sign up to be on UFP’s means to be alive…wholly human. further? Because that’s part of this too, email list. Send a request to You are whole and you are holy. isn’t it? “Your broken pieces are more [email protected] A COMMUNITY OF WHOLENESS: April 2019 2 A STORY about WHOLENESS The Complaint against the Stomach ~ A Story from Greece and Hands have finished your A certain man had a dream in which he work, we take the food you give heard his Hands and his Feet, his Mouth us. We chew it and mix it with and his Teeth all scolding his Stomach. saliva and prepare it, so that it can "You are fat and lazy," said the Feet to be enjoyed. Then it all slips down the Stomach. into that fat, lazy Stomach and we "You get all the food and yet you do get nothing at all." nothing. Think of all the walking we In the dream, the quarreling went have to do, going back and forth to town on like for a long time until finally to buy food. Yet in the end you, greedy the Feet said: "Let's all together Stomach, get all the food and we get refuse to do any work for the nothing." Stomach." "We agree," said the Hands. "Think of all "Good idea!" cried the Hands and the hard work we do, hoeing and Mouth and Teeth and Tongue. weeding the garden, gathering the food, "Then greedy Stomach will find the Foot. "In his quiet way Stomach has cleaning it, cooking it and all that, and out how important we are, and will have been doing work for us all the time." yet in the end we get nothing and you, to divide some of the food with us." greedy Stomach, get it all." "How silly of us to think Stomach was All this while, the Stomach lay quietly in lazy just because he was quiet," said the "Hear! Hear!" called the Mouth and a corner. He said nothing. He really was Tongue. Teeth and Tongue all together. "How fat and round and he seemed very lazy "Yes," said the Hands, "we thought could any food be bought in the market and satisfied. at all if it were not for us. After you Feet Stomach here was getting all the food, So the Feet and the Hands and the but we see now that he had his own DEFINITION Mouth and the Teeth and the Tongue special ways of sending most of it back made an agreement with one another. to us." whole·ness The Feet promised not to walk. The Stomach smiled when he heard his /ˈhōlnəs/ Hands promised not to carry anything. companions speaking in this way. The Mouth promised not to open and noun "Let's all begin working together again," 1. the state of forming a complete and shut. The Teeth promised not to chew, and the Tongue promised not to talk. said the Mouth and Teeth and Tongue harmonious whole; unity. all at once. Everybody agreed and the Then morning came. The man thought 2. the state of being unbroken or Man woke up. he had awakened but he was still asleep undamaged. and dreaming. To his surprise he found To his surprise, he found his Feet could 3. the quality or state of being without he could not walk. He could not carry walk again. He found his Hands could restriction, exception, or qualification anything in his hands. He could not open carry things again. He found his Mouth 3. the condition of being sound in body his mouth. He could not chew or even could open and shut and his Teeth could or mind talk. He felt very sick. chew and his Tongue could talk. The Man began to feel better right away. Our understanding of “whole” comes This condition seemed to last for several As he ate his breakfast, he remembered through the old Germanic and Norse days. Each morning the man felt weaker his dreaming. He thought to himself, languages: hal, haila which give the and thinner. He did not know what to "Each part of my body needs every other sense of entire, unhurt, uninjured, safe; do, for he knew that if this sickness part. They all work together—my Feet healthy, sound; genuine, continued, he would starve to death. and Hands and Mouth and Teeth and straightforward, undamaged, complete. Finally, after many days, the dreaming Tongue and Stomach. If any one of them Our word for health has similar roots. man saw his Feet and Hands and Mouth stops working, they all have to stop and I and Teeth and Tongue and Stomach all become sick. When each does what it synonyms: absoluteness, wellness, lying around on the floor scarcely able to knows how to do, I am well and strong. I completeness, entireness, entirety, move, and much less able to quarrel with can do things, too, and I am happy." fullness, verdure, soundness, one another. perfectness, health, healthiness, From Fah’s “Long Ago and Far Away” He heard a weak small voice speak. It heartiness, robustness, sap, (online, pg. 121) was one of his Feet trying to talk. "We wholesomeness https://tinyurl.com/yxhlqf3v must admit we have been foolish," said A COMMUNITY OF WHOLENESS: April 2019 3 INSPIRATIONS on the theme of WHOLENESS It is easier to live through someone else As a Unitarian Universalist, I have come I find I am constantly being encouraged than to become complete yourself. to see that universal salvation is not just to pluck out some one aspect of myself and present this as the meaningful ~ Betty Friedan for all of us but for all of me. There is no whole, eclipsing or denying the other The thing that grounds you, and the crevice inside of me that love cannot touch. ~Paula Goldade parts of self. ~ Audre Lorde thing that really gives you a sense of wholeness, is your family, friends and Those who love you are not fooled by Know that however ugly the parts your community. Those are the things mistakes you have made or dark images appear the whole remains beautiful. that can mirror you hold about yourself. They remember ~ Robinson Jeffers back to you your beauty when you feel ugly; your To be in harmony with the what you're wholeness when you are broken; your wholeness of things is not experiencing, innocence when you feel guilty; and your to have anxiety over and can affirm purpose when you are confused.