Next Monday it will be six years since Judge Robert Docherty of the 5th Judicial Court in Minnesota declared my daughter and me a legal family. For almost two years before that Lucia had been in and out of my home in foster care and respite care. These eight years, from age nine to seventeen, have been marked by a series of lettings-go. From having Lucia physically with me almost every minute she wasn’t at school or camp, to allowing her to spend a few hours home alone in the parsonage.

As I see the blooming tulip-trees around town I’m reminded of my favorite mnemonic device from my divinity school days: TULIP.

Total depravity;

Unconditional election;

Limited atonement;

Irresistible grace; and

Perseverance of the saints.

You’ve probably heard someone say, “I feel closest to God or most connected to the Holy or most spiritual or most centered _______________” . Fill in the blank at the beach, in the desert, in the woods, on a mountain, by running water. “ So I don’t need to go to church.” You may have said it yourself, sometime in the past or very recently. Lots of people say this.

Last week I reminded us that "wherever we go, there we are." Today I am going to add some nuance to that observation: "wherever we go, there we are–but sometimes we get lost anyway." Sometimes we lose track, not so much of where we are geographically or in physical space, but where we are, the us of us.

Do you remember this final Calvin and Hobbes comic strip? The boy and his tiger pal perched on their toboggan at the top of a hill of untouched, untrodden snow. The world looks brand new, the pair say, a new year…a fresh, clean start! It’s like having a big white piece of paper to draw on! A day full of possibilities! It’s a magical world, Hobbes, ol’ buddy! Let’s go exploring!

Surely there are cloudy Christmas Days, and snowy ones. And of course Christmas Eve lasts twenty-four hours, many of them in daylight. But in my mind Christmas Eve is always nighttime, and Christmas Day is always a sunny, sparkling morning.

Many years, especially as a new minister, at the approach of the Winter Solstice, as the days grew shorter still, the nights longer, and we waited, waited, waited, for the earth’s angle in relationship to the sun to shift, I would say, light-heartedly yet seriously, that Arlo Guthrie is right: "you can’t have a light without a dark to stick it in."

At a party the evening of my ordination a four year old friend stood by my side helping me unwrap gifts. We’d undo the wrapping paper and he would exclaim, “It’s a box!”. We’d open the box to see what was inside (the adults would ooo and ahh their surprise and approval). Then we’d move on to unwrap the next package. Again he would exclaim, “It’s a box!”

It is challenging–I was going to say interesting, but no, it is challenging–to explore the theme of courage in a month that encompasses both National Coming Out Day and Domestic Violence Awareness Month. Challenging to read piece after pieces in the SoulMatters resource packet defining courage, urging courage, as indeed my colleagues and I often preach.

This may sound like a bold or perhaps peculiar statement to make on Animal Blessing Sunday, but here goes: I don’t watch cute cat videos. Or cute puppy videos. Or avidly devour feel-good stories about animals saving lives or predicting the outcomes of elections or traveling thousands of miles to be reunited with their families

Our opening hymn is one that was carried over from the old blue Hymns for the Celebration of Life in our new–now 30 year old–gray Singing the Living Tradition. I’ve sung it most of my life, and it lives in my brain and in my heart.

Where and when, I wonder, have you felt the greatest sense of belonging in your life thus far. Perhaps here at UUCS. Perhaps in an educational setting. Maybe within your family of origin. Or perhaps in the family you married into or the gathered friends you’ve chosen as family. In a small town or in an urban setting.