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By Dr. Bruce T. Marshall
February 21, 2010
Reading: Everyone Welcome – Even Now
“Shall we meet hate with hate?” That has been a recurring question
throughout history and, recently a personal one for me. On a Sunday
last July, a man walked into the sanctuary of my church, took a
shotgun out of a guitar case and opened fire on a room of unarmed
men, women and children. Two precious people, Greg McKendry and
Linda Kraeger, lost their lives. Six others were injured. Our entire
community was traumatized.
According to a manifesto in his handwriting, the alleged assailant
reportedly wrote of his hatred for liberals, whom he believed were
soft on terror. He was in for a surprise. Members of our
congregation rushed forward and tackled the shooter. Others acted
instantly to guide children to safety, call police and emergency
assistance, care for the wounded and counsel those in grief and
shock.
This misguided man may have picked our congregation because we call
ourselves a liberal church. In our church, the word “liberal” is
meant to describe whom we include, not whom we exclude. The children
in our congregation say these words in chapel services: “Ours is the
church of the loving heart, open mind and helping hands.” Sadly,
though, the word “liberal” has become demonized. The man accused of
the shootings owned books by popular media personalities who vilify
liberals as evil, unpatriotic, godless and treasonous. I think our
country needs to reclaim the word from those who defame it. Far from
being evil, we liberals aspire to overcome evil with good. If you
walk into a liberal church and open fire on its members, we will
still defend your right to due process, access to an attorney and a
fair trial....
Of course, the question keeps coming back: “Shall we return hatred
for hatred?” Anyone who has endured a brutal act of violence will
know the temptation. Our congregation’s experience, however, offers
a cautionary tale. The man who brought violence to our church hated
liberals. But in his desire to defeat terrorism he became a
terrorist himself….
Since that terrible day, people have flooded our church with
immeasurable amounts of love. Postcards, letters, banners and
artwork have come to us from across the nation and from many other
countries....On the night after the violence there was a gathering
in the Presbyterian church next door, where we were hugged and held
by our neighbors of all faiths and convictions—Protestants,
Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, rationalists and more.
For years, there has been a sign at the entrance of our church that
reads EVERYONE WELCOME, and we do mean everyone. All God’s children.
The sign is still there.
Members of my congregation have been hurt. But we have also been
healed by the feeling that there is a love greater than our
theological differences, a compassion that is not limited by the
boundaries of any creed. I firmly believe, now more than ever, that
love is stronger than death. Love is more powerful than hate.
Rev. Chris Buice, Minister
Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, Knoxville
Originally published in Newsweek, January 19, 2009
Sermon: Lessons From Knoxville
Two months to the day after the shooting in Knoxville, I was in that
city to take a temporary position as consulting minister to the
Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church, more commonly known
as “TVUUC.” In response to that tragedy, many people and
organizations from all over the country had made contributions;
those funds supported this ministry. From September until March of
last year, I commuted between Washington and Knoxville to help that
congregation recover from the violation that had occurred in its
sanctuary.
This was a very focused ministry with two aims. One was to provide
additional pastoral services to the congregation as they dealt with
the trauma of the shooting. The other was to create a lay ministry
program so that they could continue to care for each other after my
time with them ended. TVUUC has a long history of involvement in
social justice concerns in Knoxville—just about every local
organization in support of human rights and human dignity has ties
to the Knoxville Unitarian Universalist church. But the congregation
was not as effective at providing personal support for each other.
They were good at caring for others; they weren’t real good at
caring for themselves. My role was to help address that need.
The title of this sermon, “Lessons from Knoxville,” comes from
questions I ask myself. What did I learn from my involvement in that
extraordinary situation? What applications might that experience
have to situations beyond Knoxville? Most of us at one time or
another in our lives encounter trauma. Might there be lessons from
Knoxville that help when our worlds come under attack.
I have lived with these questions for a year now. This morning I
would like to offer a response.
• • •
When I went to Knoxville, I had some assumptions about what I would
find. I imagined that the mood of the congregation would be subdued,
that a kind of mourning would set in—as at a memorial service when
there has been a sudden and unexpected death. I thought that
participation in the church would decline and Sunday morning
attendance would suffer as people sought to distance themselves from
the tragedy. I thought that I might be able to sense a mood of
caution and fear among those who had gathered.
I was wrong about all of this.
When I walked into the church on my first Sunday morning there, I
was struck by the number of people already present and how noisy it
was. There was conversation and laughter, which wasn’t quiet at all.
And the busyness—my heavens, people were rushing around doing all
manner of things. I didn’t know what they were doing, but they
certainly were busy. There was more than the usual amount of hugging
too. Someone would walk into the front door and immediately: hugs
all around.
The service that Sunday was presented by the congregation’s LGBTQ
task force. That is, the group within the church focusing on
concerns of the lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender community. Several
people told their stories: of struggling with questions of who they
were, of rejection when they were honest, of the gratitude they felt
when finding people and a community where they could be accepted for
who they are.
I have attended services like this before, and they are always
powerful, particularly the stories told by people struggling with
the essence of their identity and their being. But this one was
different—not because of the content but because of the emotional
intensity that rippled through the congregation. When someone said
something funny, the laughter was louder than you would expect. When
there was quiet, a deep silence enveloped the sanctuary. And the
attention given to the speakers was just about total. Two months
before, this congregation had been attacked because this was a place
where people were encouraged to be who they are—and to be proud and
public about it. There were still holes in the walls in the
sanctuary and on an exit door from the shots sprayed by the gun.
Everybody in attendance was aware that just being there was an act
of defiance and affirmation. Defiance of the terrorism attempted by
the gunman, affirmation of the power of the human spirit to overcome
whatever challenges it.
The closing music was a piano solo, “Somewhere Over the Rainbow,”
played simply and softly. “Somewhere over the rainbow, Skies are
blue, And the dreams that you dare to dream, Really do come true.”
And then—I didn’t hear the transition but the young man at the piano
was playing “Tomorrow, tomorrow,” the theme from the musical,
“Annie,” which was being performed by the children of the church the
morning the gunman entered the sanctuary. As we in the congregation
realized what we were hearing, I felt an emotional wallop like I
have never before experienced in a church service. There was
absolute quiet, and you knew that the pain carried by these people
had been encountered.
The young man who played piano that day was so stunned by what he
set off as a result of his improvisation that he didn’t return to
the church for more than a month. It wasn’t that anybody was angry
at him—indeed, many expressed their gratitude. It was, rather, that
he couldn’t handle the intensity of feelings that appeared.
There is something alluring about such intensity that draws people
to it. I learned that after a tragedy, strangers show up and live
off the energy it produces—they are sometimes called “trauma
groupies.” And I too found it almost pleasant, a kind of high. It
was great to be in a community with such energy, laughter and tears,
loud conversation and hugging. But I also thought, “This cannot be
sustained. We aren’t built for this. It won’t go on.”
Well, it did go on awhile, and a lot of that intensity was channeled
into the Obama presidential campaign in Tennessee, where it didn’t
really help, and in North Carolina, where it did. But immediately
after the presidential election of 2007, the helium went out of the
balloon: everything sagged. Attendance at church dwindled,
committees neglected to meet and several disbanded, things that
needed to be done weren’t done, and then people started getting
sick.
Stress, I think, affects us in highly specific ways. Each of us has
areas of vulnerability, and stress bores into these. So respiratory
infections spread throughout the congregation. And flu. People with
a history of cancer who had been in remission saw it return. Several
new cases of cancer appeared. Some developed heart problems, high
blood pressure. There was depression, an up-tick in interpersonal
problems. And also people started to die. From about mid-November to
mid-January, there were one to two deaths a week—far more than would
have been typical for a congregation of its size. People who were
ill but seemingly had been doing well, suddenly died. And there were
also a few completely unexpected deaths. During that period, the
congregation’s minister, Chris Buice, spent much of his time on
memorial services: sermon preparation and memorial services—that’s
just about all he could do. The widow of the man killed by the
gunman saw a return of her cancer; she later died. The husband of
the woman who had been killed suffered a heart attack.
We carry memories of trauma in our bodies, the stresses of our lives
take up residence within. Several people told of going along, doing
just fine, but then something brought it back—like a loud unexpected
noise. A woman told of being startled by a stray firecracker, and
she crumpled to the ground. Another told of attending a symphony
concert where a quiet meditative section was interrupted by the
sudden banging of a kettle drum; she said she just about jumped out
of her seat. One Sunday a year ago January, I was giving the
service—I was well into the sermon—when the church’s fire alarms
went off. I could see the expressions on people’s faces: surprise,
shock, panic, “oh no, here we go again.” Quick thinking on the part
of our ushers nailed down the cause before anybody left. Teenagers
in an RE room had lit a very smoky flaming chalice, which tripped
the fire alarms. We took a few deep breaths, and the service
continued. But afterwards and for the week that followed, people
kept coming to me. “You know,” each said in one way or another,
“when the fire alarm went off, it took me right back to that Sunday,
like I was there again.”
• • •
Lessons from Knoxville. What did I bring back from that experience?
What elements might apply to anything else in our lives? I’d like to
try to address these questions on two levels. One is the personal
level of response to trauma. The other level has to do with the fact
that this was a hate crime. This Unitarian Universalist congregation
was targeted because of what it stood for, and it wasn’t just the
Knoxville church; it was all of us.
First of all: the personal level. One lesson from Knoxville for me
was something I already knew but tend to forget. That trauma lives
in us—in our bodies and our minds—for a long time. Many of
us—probably most of us—carry memories of things that have hurt us.
Mostly, we are not aware of these: we’re doing just fine. But then,
something unexpected happens and the memories come flooding back. I
need to remember that because in the everyday push and pull of life
in the church and beyond, things can get heated and people react
more strongly that would be indicated by the matter at hand. My
experience at Knoxville counsels me to patience, to avoid jumping to
conclusions, and to try to be kind.
Another lesson from Knoxville is that what helps in response to
trauma is really pretty simple. You don’t need a fancy degree to be
of service. Because what helps most is basic human care, concern,
being present. That’s what I heard time and time again from people
who had shared in that terrible day when a gunman entered their
sanctuary: that in the weeks and months later when they felt things
were falling apart, what helped was someone there just to be with
them. To listen, to offer their concern. So in the lay ministry we
created at Knoxville to encourage the congregation to take care of
each other, what we mostly did was train them to be more effective
listeners. To offer the gift of care and concern and
presence—because that’s what helps.
Yet another lesson: anxiety breeds anxiety. Calm breeds calm. In
ministry we sometimes speak of what we call the “non-anxious
presence.” That is, in a difficult situation where everyone is on
edge, you can do the most good by offering an alternative way of
being. Instead of feeding the anxiety, you offer a non-anxious
presence. I think my main job at Knoxville was to be calm: in a
situation where just about nobody else was—and thereby encourage
people to step back a bit, breath deeply, quiet the waters.
It’s not just ministry: in all manner of situations, the non-anxious
presence can make a contribution. Running a business, parenting,
social work, administration. Bringing down the level of anxiety so
that we can be in more control. Some of you may remember the book
and the radio show and the movie, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the
Galaxy.” The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy was said to be a
resource those who hitchhike throughout the galaxy, offering advice
for whatever situation you might encounter. An enormous amount of
information was compiled in that volume but, according to the story,
some people bought it simply for the two words that appear on the
front cover, which is all they ever read and all they really needed.
Those words, “Don’t panic.”
Don’t panic. It doesn’t just apply to those hitchhiking through the
galaxy; it’s a pretty good guideline for a lot of things, including
responding to trauma. I’m thinking that if I were ever to get a
tattoo, this is what it should be, simply the words, “Don’t panic”
inscribed upon some visible part of my body—so that I would have
immediate access to that reminder whenever and wherever.
So: be open to what might be going on under the surface, practice
patience, express care and concern, listen, manage your own anxiety,
don’t panic. Those are my lessons from Knoxville on the personal and
the ministerial level.
• • •
But what about the socio-political level? How do we respond to
hatred? What lessons might we draw from the Knoxville experience?
There is a history of violence against people on the property of
religious institutions: churches, synagogues, mosques, temples. But
mostly this is personal violence. That is, somebody gets mad at
somebody else and chooses the religious institution as the scene for
his or her revenge. That’s not what happened at Knoxville. This
violence was impersonal, not directed against any individual but
against a group of people who were not even known to the assailant:
in this case, liberals. That is to say, it was a hate crime.
Other groups have been the target of hate crimes: African Americans,
Jews, Japanese Americans. Given the tenor of life in our country
today, Muslims too must always feel vulnerable. Hate crimes are
driven by the demonization of groups. Depersonalizing
individuals—making their membership in a group more important than
who they are as people.
Today we live in an era of divisions. Democrats and Republicans
can’t work together. Religious groups withdraw into themselves.
Neighborhoods wall themselves off to keep out intruders—real or
imagined. People attack those who might be different, without even
making an attempt to understand. There’s a huge media market for
those who deal in caricatures, in simplistic dismissals of anybody
who might have a different experience of life than their own. In
this current climate, you can make a lot of money tearing down other
people.
It doesn’t have to be. That’s another lesson from Knoxville. After
the shooting, there occurred one of those remarkable moments in
which people laid aside what divides them—in which they came
together to affirm our common humanity. People from throughout the
Knoxville community turned up to help. Piles of food appeared. There
were concerts to raise money, worship services from across the
theological spectrum, Knoxville Unitarian Universalists reported
they received calls from friends or work associates—they were
stopped in the street by those who were not Unitarian Universalists
and who just wanted to say how sorry they were at what had happened.
I heard this over and over: how grateful and even overwhelmed
Knoxville Unitarian Universalists were at the response of the larger
community.
One of the first religious groups to be present, to offer support
and food, was a great big fundamentalist church in Knoxville—the
kind that we usually feel miles apart from. But they were there,
from the beginning. Several months later on a Sunday morning, TVUUC
members went to this fundamentalist church with bagels to share,
offered in thanks for their kindness. I heard about this later: one
of their members who had gotten to know one of the TVUUC members
said to her, “You know, we’re not that different.”
Remember 9/11 and what happened right after that? For a while, it
didn’t matter what religion, race, ethnic heritage, economic
standing we were. It didn’t matter if we were urban or suburban or
rural. It didn’t matter if we were men or women, gay or straight,
black or white or brown, Christian or Muslim or Jew or Buddhist or
no religion at all, young or old or somewhere in between. We were
just Americans. What united us was more important than those
divisions. That lasted for a while—just a little while, really—and
then some politicians and some so-called social commentators
realized that there was a short-term advantage to be had in driving
wedges between groups of Americans—in blaming one side or another.
And the country broke down into warring groups, which is where we
have been ever since.
The challenge for Unitarian Universalists in Knoxville—and all over
the country—has been to not do that. To resist the temptation to
return hate with hate. To seek a different way. As Chris Buice,
minister at TVUUC, put it, to try to live by “a love that is greater
than our theological differences, a compassion that is not limited
by the boundaries of any creed.”
And so a few months later when anti-Semitic graffiti appeared on a
synagogue located just down the road from TVUUC, the Unitarian
Universalists were present to be with them, to show solidarity
against hate.
• • •
A strange thing happened after the shooting at TVUUC—something else
I had not anticipated: the church started to grow, significantly.
Even with the stress and the trauma and the illnesses that afflicted
the congregation, new people turned up and made the commitment to
join with this congregation. Some of those new members were folks
who for years had said something like, “Well, if I’m anything, I’m a
Unitarian Universalist”—but who hadn’t actually attended. Now, with
the church under attack, they decided it was time to take a stand.
“If not now, when.” Other new members hadn’t known much about us,
but with the publicity that came out after the shooting, they
learned something about who we are and what we stand for.
• An association of congregations for whom human rights and human
dignity are at the center of our concerns.
• Congregations that reach beyond our differences and seek to find
what we hold in common—that seek to unite rather than divide.
• Religious communities that are guided by the simple affirmation
that our children learn, “Ours is the church of the loving heart,
open mind and helping hands.
That’s another lesson from Knoxville—the last one I’ll do this
morning: that we have a message people want to be part of. That the
hatred that so often divides us in this nation, in this day, does
not have to be.
We choose the lessons we find in any event. People go through
similar experiences and come out with entirely different meanings.
For me, the lessons from Knoxville to reach toward were very well
summarized by Chris Buice in his Newsweek article—and they apply to
situations in our lives that take us beyond this one tragic event in
Tennessee.
That is, very simply, “Love is stronger than death. Love is more
powerful than hate.”
So be it.
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