First Parish Bedford UU

“Kind Regards”

A sermon by Rev. John E. Gibbons

delivered on Sunday, December 6, 2009

at The First Parish in Bedford, Massachusetts

This is a sermon about kindness. I am in favor of it.

A few years ago, our former minister Dave Weissbard was here reflecting upon his Bedford ministry in the 60’s and 70’s. He said, in retrospect, that the worst sermon he had ever preached here was on the topic of safe driving. He was in favor of safe driving. I have some apprehension that my sermon on kindness could be equivalent to his endorsement of safe driving.

And I also recall that Calvin Coolidge returned home from church one Sunday and his wife asked what the minister had preached about. “Sin,” he said succinctly. “Well, what did he have to say about sin?” she persisted. “He was,” Coolidge explained, “against it.”

So this is a sermon about kindness and I am in favor of it. So let me tell you how I have come to this radical position.

I am, as you know, on the board of the UU Service Committee and I get a lot of email every day about matters great and small, everything from human rights in Darfur and crises around the world to problems like “Who put the dish soap in the UUSC dishwasher that caused it to overflow and make such a mess?”

I get a lot of email from a woman named Constance Kane who is their COO; she came to UUSC a little less than a year ago. Invariably, every one of Constance’s emails is signed “Kind regards, Constance.” And frequently in her emails she makes requests, “Kindly do this…kindly do that…kindly, kindly, kindly.” At first I would sort of roll my eyes at all these bland and seemingly-rote kind regards and kindly words. I never thought that Constance was insincere; it was more like a verbal tic and it was just a little cloying, a bit sappy and saccharine.

It’s interesting, by the way, to note how people close their letters. I’ve made a list of ones I’ve received:

goodbye ?* sincerely ?* later ?* God bless?* Godspeed?* take care?* love ?* talk to you later?* best * best wishes ?* kind regards?* with love?* fondly * yours sincerely?* yours faithfully?* yours truly?* yours ever?* yours respectfully ?* hope to hear from ya soon? * onward and upward?* peace?* smell ya later?* later alligator?* cheers?* salutations?* shine on (hey, I kinda like that one!). I will often close my letters jauntily, Looking forward! And then there’s always * your humble servant * and May I always live to serve you and your crown.

Well, you probably think I’m being an over-critical and ungenerous guy, but all of Constance’s “kind regards” were getting to me. As time has passed, however, my opinion is changing. I now begin to suspect that there is a kind of subliminally subversive genius to Constance’s salutation. Because here’s the thing: Constance, as I said, is the chief operating officer of UUSC and – for all the truly profound social change and human rights work that UUSC does – the internal organizational culture is, well, challenging.

While the staff is highly skilled and hugely committed – starting at the top with their CEO Charlie Clements, they truly have some world-class experts and advocates and activists and UUSC really does change the world and make us proud – but their internal culture can sometimes be fragmented rather than unified, untrusting, unsupportive and dispirited. Job dissatisfaction and turn-over is too high.

Some of this negativity has been part of UUSC’s scrappy activist culture for decades but this economy has certainly exacerbated it with lay-offs and furloughs and cut-backs. Somewhat unusually for a non-profit, it’s also a unionized staff and, for all my solidarity with labor, this also may contribute to a more adversarial atmosphere.

Well, it is not my intent to air UUSC’s dirty laundry and I must quickly say that UUSC’s management and staff and board are all working very hard to change and improve things – and, indeed, I believe that the culture is already changing and I am quietly confident that it will continue to improve.

While changing an organization’s culture requires some big things like restructuring and re-focusing, this morning I also want also to credit the subliminally subversive and infectious spirit of “kind regards.” It’s not, of course, just a matter of how one signs one’s emails but small acts and attitudes of kindness can have large consequences. By her words and her deeds, Constance constantly plants seeds of kindness.

It was Albert Schweitzer who said, “Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.”

I preach in favor of kindness because when I look around I see a lot of people stressed and struggling and tired. The internal culture of UUSC aside, we all live in a culture that is challenging, too often dispiriting. The challenges are immense: climate change; nuclear proliferation; health care; wars of uncertain merit and certain consequences. And, personally, who does not feel challenged? Each of us – in the privacy of our hearts and families and relationships – each and all face profound challenges.

This is why I favor kindness.

“Be kind,” said Plato, “for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.”

An Arab proverb: ?”Blessed is the person who speaks a kindness; thrice blessed is the person who repeats it.”

And in the Talmud it is said, “Deeds of kindness are equal in weight to all the commandments.”

I preach in favor of kindness because, despite the immensity of our challenges, kindness can be a very small thing and, in fact, it may always be a small thing, something so small that whatsoever our stressed and exhausted condition we all can be kind.

Somehow in the course of thinking about kindness I found myself thinking about Fred Rogers. You know: Mister Rogers. I was not a regular viewer of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood but nevertheless that guy somehow got into my head. I think about kindness when I think of Mr. Rogers – and I think about how easy it is to satirize both kindness and Mr. Rogers. Do you recall Eddie Murphy’s classic impersonation on Saturday Night Live?

There was something quintessentially kind about Mr. Rogers:

It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood, 

A beautiful day for a neighbor, 

Would you be mine? 

Could you be mine?

The very word “kindness” derives from kin, kinship, family, living together with an awareness that we are related and share the human condition, that we are all neighbors in one neighborhood.

Several years ago, there was an essay in Esquire Magazine all about Mr. Rogers, titled “Can You Say…Hero?” I want to read you two excerpts that illuminate kindness.

“On December 1, 1997--oh, heck, once upon a time--a boy, no longer little, told his friends to watch out, that he was going to do something "really big" the next day at school, and the next day at school he took his gun and his ammo and his earplugs and shot eight classmates who had clustered for a prayer meeting. Three died, and they were still children, almost. The shootings took place in West Paducah, Kentucky, and when Mister Rogers heard about them, he said, "Oh, wouldn't the world be a different place if he had said, 'I'm going to do something really little tomorrow,'" and (Mr. Rogers) decided to dedicate a week of the Neighborhood to the theme "Little and Big." He wanted to tell children that what starts out little can sometimes become big, so they could devote themselves to little dreams without feeling bad about them.”

The article also describes how Rogers resisted the fragmentation of things in a 24-hour electroculture, the sound bites and disorienting cuts and edits, and he insisted on filming his show without edits.

“When television handed him its highest honor, he responded by telling television--gently, of course--to just shut up for once, and television listened. He had already won his third Daytime Emmy, and now he went onstage to accept Emmy's Lifetime Achievement Award, and there, in front of all the soap-opera stars and talk-show sinceratrons, in front of all the jutting man-tanned jaws and jutting saltwater bosoms, he made his small bow and said into the microphone, "All of us have special ones who have loved us into being. Would you just take, along with me, ten seconds to think of the people who have helped you become who you are ... Ten seconds of silence." And then he lifted his wrist, and looked at the audience, and looked at his watch, and said softly, "I'll watch the time," and there was, at first, a small whoop from the crowd, a giddy, strangled hiccup of laughter, as people realized that he wasn't kidding, that Mister Rogers was not some convenient eunuch but rather a man, an authority figure who actually expected them to do what he asked … and so they did. One second, two seconds, three seconds … and now the jaws clenched, and the bosoms heaved, and the mascara ran, and the tears fell upon the beglittered gathering like rain leaking down a crystal chandelier, and Mister Rogers finally looked up from his watch and said, "May God be with you" to all his vanquished children.“

Fred Rogers was, after all, a minister.

And I have one more thing to say about Mr. Rogers. Actually, I asked our other minister Megan Lynes if, growing up, she had watched him. And to my surprise she said, “Oh, he’s the reason I became a minister.” Whaaat? Really? And when I asked her to explain, Megan wrote me this paragraph:

“He was a children’s minister to so many of us, when we didn’t have that straightforward kind of talk in almost any situation, not even in church. I remember when I was about five or six, my dad would come home from work, pull me onto his lap and we’d sit and watch Mr. Rogers together for a little while. Even though some people said he was cheesy, he wasn’t cheesy to me, because I could see right into his eyes and his heart, and I knew he meant what he said. He looked directly at me, sitting down to do it, talking carefully and respectfully with me about things I cared about. He had a habit of asking questions, and then pausing long enough to let me think about my answer. His kindness was like a balm to me. I think my dad even learned new ways of parenting from him. Sometimes, I’d be sitting there snuggled up on my dad’s lap and Mr. Rogers would look right at me and say “I like you just the way you are…” My dad would hug me tighter and whisper into my hair, “me too…” and for one long ecstatic moment the whole world was just right.”

That Megan! She manages to preach the best sermon of the morning, and she’s not even here!

But Megan caught what I too am trying to say. Signing your emails with “kind regards” can seem cheesy but we should never underestimate the transforming power of small kindnesses.

Among the many world-changing things that UUSC is doing is working in Darfur and training the UN peacekeepers. A huge responsibility! But, consistent with its methodology of looking at human rights through a lens of race, class and gender, UUSC is also raising awareness of gender discrimination among the Darfuris where there are serious problems of domestic violence directed against women. One place they begin is by encouraging Darfuri men to get up in the morning and say to their wives, “Good morning.” What a radical thing! But saying “good morning,” they know, is the place to begin if you’re promoting human rights and trying to get men to regard their wives as fellow human beings, as people deserving of respect, as people to be regarded kindly, as kin.

Like “kind regards,” saying “good morning” is a small hint of how we would want all people to relate to one another.

Bill Schulz used to preach a sermon about the power of the trim-tab on a boat. A trim tab is some very small surface gizmo thing attaches to the rudder of a sailboat and adjusts the pitch to counteract the hydrodynamic forces and stabilize the boat’s motion. Or something. I think Bill suggested that Unitarian Universalists are the trim-tabs of civilization, or that our influence is greater than we imagine…and I’m relatively confident that Bill wouldn’t know a trim-tab if it bit him in the rear, nor would I, but Bill and I do know that if we can change some small things, the consequences can be enormous.

I preach in favor of kindness, not because I believe in happy talk or the power of positive thinking or because I aspire to live in a “complaint-free” world (that’s the name of a fad that’s going around). No I’m not always happy; sometimes I’m outraged. And I see a lot around us that inspires some deservedly negative thinking. And, as far as I’m concerned, there’s plenty we can and should complain about. I preach in favor of kindness, rather, because kindness is helpful and healing in a bruised and hurting world.

Anything we do that restores awareness of our essential kinship is a good thing.

I’ve got one more cheesy thing to say to you. Newspaper advice columns are dependably cheesy and yet last week there was something in the Dear Margo column that was, well, wise. Quoting someone else named Gretchen Rubin, she listed “23 Phrases to Help You Fight Right.’’ These too illuminate kindness, real kindness, the kind of kindness that matters because we live in a world that is challenging and full of conflict.

Here are the 23 phrases you can kindly helpfully use the next time you are in conflict – and when this sermon is printed up you’re going to want to make a copy of this list because they’re so commonplace and small and forgettable and cheesy …and essential.

23 Phrases to Help You Fight Right:

Please try to understand my point of view.

Wait, can I take that back?

You don’t have to solve this - it helps me just to talk to you.

This is important to me. Please listen.

I overreacted.

I see you’re in a tough position.

I can see my part in this.

I hadn’t thought of it that way before.

I could be wrong.

Let’s agree to disagree on that.

This isn’t just your problem; it’s our problem.

I’m feeling unappreciated.

We’re getting off the subject.

You’ve convinced me.

Let’s take a break for a few minutes. (If you can remember to do this, it’s extremely effective - especially if you’re having a big fight. After a break, it’s almost impossible to go back to yelling.)

Please keep talking to me.

I realize it’s not your fault.

That came out all wrong.

I see how I contributed to the problem.

What are we really fighting about?

How can I make things better?

I’m sorry.

I love you.

You know, almost any of these would be good closing salutations for our letters…or maybe my sermons:

Wait, can I take that back?

I could be wrong.

You’ve convinced me.

That came out all wrong.

I’m sorry.

I love you.

But for now, I’ll just say, “Kind regards.”

Benediction:

It was William James who said:

“Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.”

And…drive safely!