The Beauty of No Two Exactly Alike

Some of you here today and others who sit in our sanctuary or attend our services on YouTube, like some folks who participate in other Unitarian Universalist churches, were raised in our tradition. Some small number were even born into it. Some smaller number even than that have or had parents or grandparents who were born into Unitarian or Universalist churches before the merger. But most Unitarian Universalists–I don’t know the current figures but it used to be five out of six adult UUs—most UUs came into this faith from some other religious background or no religious background. And these folks, maybe you’re one of them, who are here not because of family or heritage but because they have sought us out, often not knowing quite what they were seeking, will sometimes say, “I’m here because I want to be among people who are like me.” Or, “I want to be with like-minded people.” Some of you may have said something like this, when talking about why you’re in this church.

I understand that impulse. I have lived that impulse. I left the first divinity school I went to, after just a year, because of the sameness, and more significantly, the assumption of sameness of the student body. A sameness of Christianity that I didn’t fit into. My classmates, though one of them remains a dear friend and I hope she’ll participate in our installation in October, were like-minded in their faith tradition but I was not. So I left that school and went to a divinity school with a larger percentage of Unitarian Universalist students.

I found my likeminded people in my second school. Fellow students who became friends and colleagues, and even instructors who became colleagues, too. I fit better there, among like-minded people who were also preparing for ministry in Unitarian Universalist settings. But there was another, equally important reason I fit better at that school, why I was more comfortable at that school, why I think that school better prepared me for the Unitarian Universalist ministry. In addition to the numerous other UU students, there were students (and faculty) from many faith traditions–Christian and Buddhist and Jewish and various Native American traditions, to name just a few.

Some Unitarian Universalist ministers know that attending a predominantly Christian divinity school or seminary (including the one I first attended) was the ideal preparation for their UU ministry. Some UU ministers know that, for them, attending a UU affiliated seminary, with a predominantly UU student body and faculty was the ideal preparation. I can’t argue that one environment is better suited than another one to prepare all UU ministers across the board. Each person called to our ministry has different needs and different life circumstances, meaning the existence of different schools and different paths toward ministry are a blessing.

For me–I can’t even speak for my UU colleague/friends who received their theological education at the same school I did–for me, I went to that particular school seeking UU peers. I found them, and I found the unexpected blessing of an educational community within which it was impossible to assume sameness of any kind, impossible to assume likemindedness.

We weren’t the same. We were queer and gay and straight. All different genders. All different races. All different faiths. We were pursuing different degrees for different career goals. Even my Unitarian Universalist peers were all different–some were UU Christians. Some were UU Jews. Some were UU theists. Some UU humanists. UU atheists. Some of us were preparing for ministry, others for teaching. Some were adding an MDiv to another degree such as a JD or an MBA to broaden or deepen their impact in their chosen fields. Some were fresh out of undergrad programs, others changing career in midlife, others still after retirement. No two of us were exactly alike, but we were all, we Unitarian Universalist students, of like mind, with common values and principles, a common understanding of what it is to do and be the church, a common heritage and language, even if some of us were relative newcomers to the UU heritage and language and others of us had been raised within it.

Harvard Divinity School was for me an engaging and nurturing balance of “just like me” and “nothing like me”. And I am a more whole human being and a better minister for my two years in that place where I was neither an outsider to a predominant sameness nor an insider to a predominant like-mindedness.

At our Flower Ceremony we allow flowers to stand in for us, so that a bouquet created from the flowers contributed by members of a community becomes a visible representation of the beauty and variety of that gathered community. We might imagine any community as a bouquet, and each would be a different kind of bouquet.

Year ago I officiated at a wedding in which the bride and her attendants carried bouquets of tulips–all one color. They were elegant, lovely. I was quite taken with them at the time–such a contrast to the extravagance of most bridal bouquets, yet lush and intense in their own right.

In an episode of the television show Monk the title character attempts to bring a dozen long stem red roses to a woman on their first (and as it turns out, only) date. But by the time he arrives at her door there is only one rose left. He’d discarded all the others, one by one because they weren’t perfect matches each one to the others.

When we come into a church or any chosen community seeking the companionship of like-minded individuals or people with similar experiences or the same ethnic background or any kind of likeness, we could find ourselves in a community from which difference has been so ruthlessly pared away by pursuit of sameness that the result is as a single, albeit beautiful rose where there was meant to a dozen.

Or we could find ourselves in a community like the bridal bouquets I described–where all the flowers were of the same variety and the same color, but no two were exactly alike, differing in size, number of petals, degree of openness, perhaps.

Or we could find ourselves in a community like the UnitarianUniversalist Church of Savannah, wherein we hold common values and a common approach to the pursuit of truth, and a common faith heritage and language, even while our differences are as glorious as this bouquet. A community wherein instead of different varieties of flowers, of sizes, colors, numbers of petals and leaves, fragrance, we have different politics and accents and skin colors, different genders, different family structures and different primary partnerships and constellations, different strands of UU theology, and on and on. A community wherein we celebrate, on days like today, that we are neither outsiders to a predominant sameness nor insiders to a predominant like-mindedness that doesn’t allow the full and magnificent expression and growth of who each one of us is. A community wherein we rejoice and give thanks for the beauty of no two exactly alike–no two flowers, no two Unitarian Universalists, no two children of Creation.

Amen.