Enlarge the Site of Your Tent

There are any number of memories a grown man might harbor from his college days. Some of them, in fact, might not be suitable for print or public lectures. That being said, I will take the risk of sharing with you one of my most vivid recollections. It happened, actually, off campus, at the corner of South Aurora and East State Streets, right at the bottom of South Hill, going into town. It was thirty-three years ago, I believe, at the end of 1972 (though some of the specifics, I must admit, have faded from my memory cells). I was a part of a group of students and faculty from the IC campus, marching in protest to the Viet Nam war (as I recall, it was over the bombing of Hanoi). We held a rally out in front of the Campus Center (Egbert Hall) and then we marched together down the hill. And as we reached that corner of South Aurora and East State, there to our right was an even larger group of students and faculty marching down the hill from Cornell. And there to our left was another group of citizens of Ithaca and we merged together into a single crowd, and continued on, somewhere, for a joint rally together. But what I remember most vividly is when the three groups merged at the bottom of the hill. Wrapped up into that moment were so many cross currents of my life: my values, my faith, the meaningful relationships in my life. And also my vocation. But above all, it was a moment for me of enlarging the site of my tent.

Before explaining more about that, please let me pause and express how grateful and humbled I am by this invitation to return to IC, to share some thoughts with you this evening, in the form of an inaugural offering in the George Clarkson Lecture Series. When I received the letter from Dr. Willard Daetsch, telling me about the action of the Board of the Ithaca College Protestant Community to establish the series, I was delighted to learn about it, and I gave three cheers. Little did I know that it would turn out to be one more homework assignment given to me by my one time, much beloved and respected German professor. (Herr Doktor!) Danken Sie Gott, the assignment was not to deliver this lecture auf Deutsch.

Over the following weeks, I was blessed to come to know Allison Stokes and also Lisa Maurer - with whom I have corresponded and Lee Bailey, whose religion class I crashed earlier this morning. And this whole event has brought about a sort of a mini-reunion for a number of us who came to know one another thirty five years ago as a part of what was then called the UCF - the United Christian Fellowship (a pre-cursor to the present day ICPC - Ithaca College Protestant Community).

And, of course, it has occasioned a reconnecting with this remarkable couple, Elizabeth and George Clarkson, who have so deeply touched my life and the lives of literally hundreds of others, some in this room this evening and many more, now scattered no doubt around the planet. Who knows where seeds once planted may bear fruit?

Also in this room is a one-time colleague of George's, a young Episcopal curate (or assistant) on the staff at St John's Church, downtown. Ted Jones, who was a member of the UCF Board and who periodically came up to the campus to offer Bruce Smith and me (and perhaps one or two others) a series of seminars about theology and the Episcopal Church. (Bruce is here as well this evening, and he, too, has ended up as an Episcopal cleric.) I remember us sitting in George's office over in the basement of Rowland Hall in the Upper Quad and Ted was pouring over his seminary class notes as we took our own copious notes trying to soak it all in. Thank you, Ted, for that offering, and thank you for joining us this evening. (Maybe you'll learn more tonight what damage you did - getting me started down this path.)

What can I tell you about the United Christian Fellowship, back in the early 1970's? As I have mentioned, the offices were in the bottom floor of Rowland Hall in the Upper Quad. You could enter from the north end of the building, and as you walked down the hallway, there was a Coffee House on the left.

Now, in those days, a Coffee House wasn't a Starbucks or a Central Perk, like in Friends. It was, by the early 70's, a bit of an anachronism, left over from the dipsy 60's. It was an open room, with comfortable chairs in a circle and a rug and some heavy curtains so the place was kept mostly in the dark. Real mellow. Cool. A place to just hang out and maybe listen to poetry or folk guitar music or have a rap session. That was the way you did campus ministry back in the '60's. Though, even by the early 70's, truth be told, we used it more as a meeting room, and for other small group gatherings. I can't actually remember drinking any coffee in it - but never mind. As a Coffee House, per se, as I've said, it was a bit of an anachronism.

Further down the hall, over on the left again was George's office. His door covered with cartoons and silly jokes. Then there was a central, open office for a receptionist (if there was one) and off to the right and straight ahead were the offices of the Roman Catholic Chaplain, Phil Lioi, and the Jewish Hillel Chaplain (who was there more part-time, as I remember it). You see, there was no Chapel. We held our Sunday morning services in the Choral practice room in the Music Building, Ford Hall.

And, truth be told, there were very few of us. It was on the tail of the tumultuous 60's, you see, and there was a fierce anti-establishment spirit in our generation - a predisposition that certainly extended to attitudes toward the Church, including campus ministry. It was counter-cultural for those of us who actually attended worship services to do so. We had a number of mid-week activities - from prayer to study to social action of various sorts.

I must say, for example, I remember one particular effort on our part to extend a pastoral hand to our classmates. We agreed that we were not comfortable with the heavy hitting proselytizing techniques of the Campus Crusade for Christ group (also active on campus at the time), so we had a number of buttons printed up which carried the inviting message: "If you need me, let me know". I remember a couple of our more attractive female members, in particular, finding their Christian charity stretched to the limits by certain over-eager underclassmen who were most anxious to take them up on their offer. But we tried.

We also tried a few other outreach and evangelism projects. Marty Nott (who is also here this evening) co-hosted with me a Sunday morning radio show on the campus station and Bruce Smith helped us with the production. I can just imagine how many students were up and listening to that one. But we tried.

Then, after the great Hurricane Agnes swept through central New York, especially damaging to the south of us, we took some work crews of students down to Elmira, to help with the clean-up. We really did try. And we all learned and grew from it.

And in the midst, and at the heart of this small worshiping and ministering community was George Clarkson. Such a remarkable presence. Such a remarkable man. Many times, when you dropped by, it was hard to get to see him, because of the steady stream of students who came to him for counseling.

As I've mentioned, his door was covered with cartoons and one-liner jokes. Something for the next student waiting for counseling to read. And that humor spilled over into every aspect of his life.

Marty Nott and I both remember a book George handed around. We can't remember the name of it, but it was a picture book with sketches and captions of an assortment of Pious Pigs, each with his or her own page, and shown in various costumes and positions representing certain theological and philosophical traditions. For example, Marty (who had been raised Methodist) remembers the one of the Methodist Pig, having his heart strangely warmed (a reference to Charles Wesley's description of his personal conversion experience).

I can't actually remember what the Episcopal Pig was doing, (although I think there was some lace in the picture, somehow), but as a Philosophy major, I do remember the one of the Heraclitan Pig, trying to step in the same river twice. Heraclitus, an early Greek philosopher, claimed that change is the one constant in the universe, and that you can never step in the same river twice, since between your first and second step, new water has flowed by, and it is a new river you're stepping into. So in George's book, this resolute Heraclitan Pig was standing in a river, defiantly trying to plant a foot in a strategic point in the passing rapids.

Anyway, perhaps you get the idea. At least, you can be sure that George's amazing sense of humor kept us all in stitches, and offered a great measure of grace in the midst of his pastoral counseling and marvelous leadership of our group.

As a part of his graduate studies with Paul Tillich, George had done work on William Law. William Law was an English theologian of the 18th Century who was heavily into the Church of England establishment. His main contribution had been a very heavy tome entitled A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life. Whoo boy! As thick in sentence structure and vocabulary and moral imperative as the title suggests. But then in later years, Law had a kind of a personal conversion, and he switched his entire focus away from ascetical rigorism towards the principles of Love at the heart of the Christian faith. During these later years of his life and ministry, William Law wrote these words:

You have not the Spirit of Love till you have this Will to all Goodness, at all Times, and on all Occasions. You may indeed do many Works of Love, and delight in them, especially at such Times as they are not inconvenient to you, or contradictory to your State, or Temper, or Occurrences in Life. But the Spirit of Love is not in you till it is the Spirit of your Life, till you live freely, willingly, and universally according to it. For every Spirit acts with Freedom and Universality according to what it is. It needs no command to live its own Life, or be what it is, no more than you need bid Wrath be wrathful. And therefore when Love is the Spirit of your Life, it will have the Freedom and Universality of a Spirit; it will always live and work in Love, not because of This or That, Here or There, but because the Spirit of Love can only love, wherever it is or goes or whatever is done to it. As the Sparks know no Motion but that of flying upwards, whether it be in the Darkness of the Night or in the Light of the Day, so the Spirit of Love is always in the same Course; it knows no Difference of Time, Place, or Persons, but whether it gives or forgives, bears or forbears, it is equally doing its own delightful Work, equally blessed from itself. For the Spirit of Love, wherever it is, is its own Blessing and Happiness because it is the Truth and Reality of God in the Soul, and therefore is in the same Joy of Life and is the same Good to itself, everywhere and on every Occasion.

Sometime before we knew him, George had traveled to England to research William Law, and while there, he had visited Law's home in Kings Cliff - a dwelling which Law had designed for himself. This is a picture of it, which George gave me over thirty years ago, when I was a student here. It shows the courtyard in the back of the house. And the little door in the center is the beggar door. And above that door is an alcove, on the second floor, and that was William Law's study, where he wrote his many volumes of books and treatises. Through that door, down on the first floor, Law kept a huge pot of soup or stew, always ready for beggars coming by, looking for a meal. And, you see, the idea was that William Law wanted to be disturbed by the beggars. It was important to him that basic human need was not pushed aside by the busyness of his work. There were those who criticized William Law for being naive; for being taken advantage by the panhandlers. That didn't matter to Law. What mattered to him was being filled and guided by that Spirit of Love at all times, and upon all occasions...

If you're wondering why I still have this picture, it's because ever since my graduation from IC in 1974, this picture has hung over my desk - in New York City, in Vermont, in Oklahoma, and now in Northern Michigan. You see, this is the kind of lasting influence this man has had on me. It was those pigs...

And there is another feature to George's leadership and guidance for which I will be forever grateful. Actually, it was kind of a passive, sneak attack. And it went like this: On the first Sunday morning, when you showed up for worship, you noticed that George and Elizabeth were sitting in the congregation along with everyone else (which meant they were sitting in the circle of folding chairs set up on the open floor of the choral practice room). Then, when it was time to begin, one of the students got up and led the service - prayers, music, sermon and all. The next Sunday, when you came back, it was another student who got up and led the group. Then, the next Sunday, when you came in, you discovered the chairs arranged differently. And a different student led the worship with a completely different style. Gradually, you realized that the Methodist students were sharing from their Methodist prayerbook, the Presbyterians were using their traditions, and so with the Episcopalians, the Congregationalists, the Seventh Day Adventists, the Unitarians, and so on and so on - including the Quakers, drawing upon Elizabeth's tradition (which was increasingly George's as well). By the fourth or fifth Sunday you came, you found yourself leading the worship, including the sermon. We all took turns. We were each received and honored as having gifts to share. And the diversity - the variety - was not tolerated. It was embraced. It was celebrated. The shepherd was getting the sheep to share in the shepherding. Amazing. Counter-cultural, in the Church. And the interesting thing is that this, in fact, has become my own life-long vocation: to transform congregations from being communities gathered around a minister into becoming themselves ministering communities. That's the work I do in small, even sometimes tiny congregations, in rural America.

But enough about that. And enough about George! If I don't stop praising him, the guy will start floating up into the rafters. Or maybe his head will explode. But I did think that the inaugural George Clarkson lecture should tell you something about this fellow, who has so deeply touched my life and the lives of so many others...

Let me return to the recollection I offered at the start of this talk: about the day I shared in the march and rally down the hill and into the downtown. Because, you see, it has so much to do with the theme I wish to explore with you: "Enlarge the Site of your Tent".

If you don't recognize those words, they come from the 54th Chapter of Isaiah. When the prophet is addressing the people of Jerusalem, who had watched their city decrease and diminish, especially through the desolation of the Exile. It's a promise of re-gathering and rebirth of the Holy City. Re-capturing the sense of mission and the delightful work which God was intending to do in the midst of the people and in the midst of the world at the hands of God's people. The image is of a nomadic family, whose matriarch has been childless. The passage promises her that she will soon have many children, that new life will be conceived:

Sing, O barren one who did not bear;
    burst into song and shout,
    you who have not been in labor!
For the children of the desolate woman will be more
    than the children of her that is married, says the Lord.
Enlarge the site of your tent,
    and let the curtains of your habitations be stretched out;
    do not hold back;
        lengthen your cords and strengthen your stakes.
For you will spread out to the right and to the left,
    and your descendants will possess the nations
      and will settle the desolate towns.

Those are the first three verses of the 54th Chapter of Isaiah (also known as Deutero-Isaiah) and although, like every passage in Scripture, it comes out of and speaks to a certain culture in a certain moment in history, it offers us a marvelous image to play with as we explore the connections between faith and daily life, particularly through the college experience, and in our contemporary society.

The prophet is telling the barren woman and her family to get ready - to make space in her dwelling for many children about to be born. It was a message of hope to a people in exile - and it remains a message of hope and promise to future generations, even our own, in this very different time and place. Surely it goes without saying that the experience of leaving home and moving into campus life in a place like Ithaca College also brings a promise of expansion - of new ideas being conceived; new learnings being received; exposure to such a variety of people; differing races and cultures; differing faiths and core values; differing visions for what it means; to live a rewarding and fulfilling life on this planet. Expand the Site of Your Tent? You'd better believe it! Just by coming to live in a community like this.

I've tried to describe how George and Elizabeth Clarkson brought that gift to me, and to all of us who have been blessed by their lives and ministries. This is what the UCF - the United Christian Fellowship - offered to us, those several decades ago. But the interesting thing about it, is that the opening image I described, of our peace march merging with others at the bottom of South Hill is that it didn't directly involve George Clarkson, or the UCF. It had to do, in so many ways, for me, with enlarging the site of my own tent even beyond the site staked out for me on this campus. Let me try to describe what I mean.

First of all, one thing I didn't mention before is that I was in fact myself one of the leaders of the event. Flash back several days before the march itself, and you would find me in a room filled with campus radicals, all stirred up to a fevered pitch about the news coming out of Southeast Asia - about the continuing war there, and the stepped up bombing - now reaching into the northern city of Hanoi. I shared the passion of this group. I wanted to be a part of some action, even symbolic, taken in response to what I saw to be an atrocity. And as the rhetoric increased around the room, I suddenly became aware that, while I did share the passion of everyone else in the group, I did not share the politics and world view and even the values of some of them. Some there were advocating violent protest. Some were pushing for actual revolution - bloody revolution right here in the US. Yes - those were interesting times. And I remember, at some poignant moment in the discussion reaching under my shirt and pulling out the cross I always wore (and still wear) on the chain around my neck. And I remember saying, "We are all here for differing reasons, I'm sure. This is why I am here" (then holding up the cross) "It's because I follow the one who was and who is the Prince of Peace for this universe". (Well, I'd like to think I was that articulate. I probably stumbled around a bit more - but that is what I was trying to say.)

I wasn't sure if, after that, they'd ask me to leave. But they didn't. In fact, when the day of the rally came, they asked me to MC the whole thing (no doubt because I was square, or establishment enough, they hoped, to give the rest of them some credibility) That was my suspicion, anyway.

I remember introducing as one of the speakers that day one of my Philosophy professors, Linda Finlay, who in fact is here tonight.

I am most grateful that, unless there's a tape in some Homeland Security file in Washington DC somewhere, there is no recording of what I said that day on the podium, I was so nervous and naively idealistic - even if sincere - but, you see, it was because of the opportunities George and the UCF had given me to begin to dabble with public speaking that I had found the courage even to get up and try.

It was expanding the site of my tent. And, as I have said, the whole event had very little, if anything, to do with the UCF, officially. But in another way, the whole enterprise was spurred on by my faith. You can't hear and preach the gospel (in any context) without it beginning to lay claim to you in some way which calls you to get involved with all that is happening in the world far off and close by at hand. And it shapes our basic values in life.

The word "religion", you know, comes from the same root word as does the word "ligament". (I think Ted Jones may have first taught me that.) It all has to do with holding our lives together.

A few Sundays ago, we, in the Episcopal Church, heard again the story from Ezekiel about the Valley of Dry Bones. It is the description of a vision which the prophet Ezekiel had when he looked into a vast desert valley, and he saw a bunch of dry, scattered bones. And while he was watching, there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones started to move, and they came together, bone to its bone, until they were laid out like skeletons, but they still were not alive. First, there had to be sinews (ligaments), and then flesh, covering them - and then the Breath of God came into the Valley and brought those old bones to life.

This is the miracle of life, and also a reality that we sometimes forget: that our bones only support us when the ligaments are in place to support them. And our religion, our religious faith, is what holds it all together (like ligaments) and gives the breath of life to our mortal bones.

Well, that all sounds well and good, and especially to us religious people - but then why is it that so many people (and in increasing numbers these days, it seems) are absent from our churches, from our faith communities, when we gather? As an old mentor of my brother used to say, "The people are staying away in droves..." As I have told you, there were very few of us coming to Protestant Worship services back in the early 1970's. Just a handful, some Sundays. And on that day I marched down the hill in the Spirit of the Prince of Peace, there were many there with very different motives, but relatively few, I suspect, who would use anything like traditional religious language to put those motives into words.

Still, we know, that each and every person who lived on campus in those days, and each and every person in that march that day had a faith by which their lives were being held together. They might not have articulated it that way -but there's no denying the fact that each of them - each of us struggles with questions about life and death and good and evil and the purpose for our lives here and what gifts we've been given to share and how we might use our days to bring some measure of compassion and kindness to those with whom we share this journey. Even if it's just reacting to the headlines of the tabloids, the stories about Terri Shiavo, and the Pope's dying, and the war in Iraq, and the last election, and steroids in baseball, and so on and so forth - whatever the current preoccupation of the media. And so much more with the matters of life and death, of meaning and purpose, of honor and dignity and respect - even reverence for one another and for all aspects of Creation within the context of our daily lives and within the familiar, intimate circle of our dearest friends and family, and even those to whom we may not feel so closely connected but with whom we spend so many of our waking hours as colleagues, acquaintances, co-inhabitants of our hometown, our work place, our island planet home. Matters of health and material welfare and emotional tides and spiritual journey and our relationships of all sorts - all of these sometimes rich and rewarding and sometimes broken or impaired or struggling. We are all of us juggling these many dimensions of our lives, and struggling, somehow, to hold it all together. Don't you think?

It isn't always and only our familiar institutional religious structures which serve as the ligament for many people's bones. I know that is true. It has been true for me my whole life, since I happen to have been born into a generation for whom the traditional, conventional mechanisms of religious expression don't seem to carry the allure they did for previous generations. But, still, there is a way even in such an environment, is there not, that we might have faith and that our faith might still make sense out of it all - might hold it all together for us - or at least offer a framework for the search for meaning to which every one of us is drawn?

So many people are searching these days, some turning to new forms of spirituality or to old ones from other cultures which seem to offer a freshness because they have not yet grown old and overly familiar. That downtown march so many years ago offered to me a clear connection between my faith and the rest of my life. It was precisely because it was anything but a religious event that it carried such power for me as an expression of my faith. It was a way I could declare some basic truths about what I believe. Each of us, of course, must sort these things out for ourselves, and what a blessing it is when we find ourselves connected with a community which affirms the same insights and assumptions which govern our lives.

For me, these are fundamental principles, made clear by my faith - yet not (I know) shared by everyone. They include what I might try to identify as the following spiritual disciplines: To understand and accept that our disagreements and power struggles in this world and in our lives cannot be resolved by force and domination but only by the dynamics of reconciliation and peace; to experience the power of forgiveness (not retribution) in the face of betrayal and interpersonal failings; to embrace the diversity of human expression not as a threat to our familiar ways of life but as a delightful chemistry which brings variety and new creation all around us and in our midst; to respect the dignity of every human being, even those we once found easy to dismiss or to judge as unworthy; to insist on justice in the face of preferential treatment of the powerful; to discover the transforming grace of self-examination and renewal, and the honest acknowledgment, each of our own responsibility for ways we have erred and strayed from the path of health and wholeness and an acknowledgment of our own need for repentance of those ways.

All of these things, and more, are wrapped up inside the mystery of God's Word - Christ's gospel, I would say in my tradition. But how do we share them in our own day, in this culture we have been given as our home? There is no easy answer, but it is clear we are given the challenge in our generation to reach beyond the old familiar symbols, images, and vocabulary to carry ancient truths and the lasting insights of our religious traditions into this new millennium.

Now, let me return to one more feature of the day I enlarged the site of my tent by joining in the anti-war march into downtown Ithaca. Please know that this protest was not an altogether popular thing for me to do amongst all of my friends - and even all of the members of the UCF. Certainly not amongst all of my sisters and brothers in the Episcopal Church, with which I was still very active and whose seminary in New York City I was about to attend. What does it mean to us in the Church, within our communities of faith, when we disagree?

No doubt, there are some here tonight who would not appreciate my past anti-war activity. Can we still be brothers and sisters in Christ? There has never been a generation when these questions have not resurfaced. For my grandparents' day, for example, the Episcopal Church supported the rights of workers to organize to obtain a fair wage. It was a time when that was an extremely unpopular notion. In my parents' day (and during my own early years), the Episcopal Church opposed segregation and supported civil rights when that meant some would risk their lives for the sake of the gospel. In my lifetime, in the years following - as I have already described - there was the peace movement and other movements of liberation for those once oppressed. For example, my own Episcopal Church in the mid-70's, finally authorized the ordination of women and encouraged their leadership in congregational life still at a time when that meant the disdain of many. And now, in my children's lifetime, (and still in my own) the Episcopal Church is discerning God's will regarding issues of human sexuality.

You see, it has always been true, and no doubt always will be that each generation, including our own, has faced a threshold to cross, which has required tremendous personal and institutional courage. Back to the Heraclitan Pig - trying to step into the same river twice but to no avail. The only thing constant is change itself. Yet each generation acts and believes as if change is something new or unusual.

What are we to make of it? In truth, the crossing of these frontiers generation after generation has always invited opportunities for us to clarify our vision and to renew our faith. But none of these opportunities has come without a cost.

What are we to do about the fact that faithful people can and do disagree about such matters, related to social change? And usually with a fierce intensity which seems to belie the compassion which we claim to undergird our faith.

And then, there is the bitter truth that even the courageous and dramatic strides taken by one generation almost never solve these issues in any definitive way, so that still today the matters of a fair Living Wage and workers rights and civil rights and militarism and women's rights are every bit as much a going and growing concern as ever.

What are we to make of it?

Still, it is true that each generation is given its own cutting edge, and that is no less true for our own day. I was elected Bishop of Northern Michigan in 1999. Four years later, in the Diocese of New Hampshire, a good friend of mine, whom I have known for almost 30 years, a New Hampshire priest named Gene Robinson, was elected to be their Bishop. The following summer, as is required by our national canons, our Triennial General Convention was given to vote whether or not to consent to New Hampshire's election. No doubt, you have seen and heard a great deal about it on the news (much of it distorted, I might add).

The fact that Gene is gay, living in a committed relationship with his partner, Mark Andrews, for the past 17 years, has set off quite a firestorm in our Church and throughout the Anglican Communion. I won't attempt to address all of the nuances of these events within the context of this talk, though I'd be glad to answer questions about it in conversation later, but allow me to share with you an insight I have gained through all we have been living through over these past couple of years.

Actually, it comes in the form of a story told by Gene Robinson himself the Sunday after he was ordained bishop in a glorious liturgy I attended on Nov 2nd, 2003 in Durham, New Hampshire. He told the story during his sermon as he was making his first official Visitation to a parish of the Diocese. It's the story about a man who died, and when his family took his body to the local Church to be buried, the priest explained that since the man had once been divorced, he would have to be buried outside the Church cemetery in the field just beyond the fence. No matter that this man had been a faithful member of the parish for years and years - this was the custom and tradition of that parish - and that was that. Many years later, some descendant of that man was doing a genealogical study and came to find the grave of his ancestor. He knew the story - that his great-grandfather had been buried outside the cemetery, so he walked all around the perimeter and looked for the gravestone but to no avail. Finally, he gave up and went to find the parish priest. The priest took the man directly to the grave of his ancestor, but it was located just within the outer fence. "What happened?" asked the man, "did they move him?" And then the priest explained that some years before, the congregation had talked about it and agreed that they no longer could live with the custom they had inherited. So they moved the fence. They moved the fence to include those who once were excluded. And this, you see, is what our Church is doing today.

That was the story told by Gene Robinson the Sunday after he was ordained Bishop in the Episcopal Church. He was talking about enlarging the site of the tent. It is a development which some of us embrace, and others in our community do not. Now, given the fact that the issues related to human sexuality happen to be the contentious issues of our day, I would expect that even in the midst of the group gathered here tonight there may be some considerable disagreement about these things.

I do not intend to invite a debate about that this evening. But I do want to hold before us the reality that there is a division of opinion about very important things in the midst of every community of faith these days, just as there has been, I would contend, in every generation before us.

The question of faith is not how we will come to unanimity or uniformity of belief. The question is how we will find the grace and the discipline to embrace those differences, while still honoring the dignity of one another - and, in fact, of every human being. And more than that, in the face of these differences, how will we hold fast and keep focused upon the mission with which we have been entrusted: to carry the vision and to be ambassadors and agents for a world in which all people live together in peace and in harmony with all of creation, where all can contribute and the gifts of all are joyfully received, nurtured, and supported, where our diversity is celebrated in community and every creature is recognized as having eternal significance.

Now, how can we say that in a way that connects? In our time? In our generation? In a way that invites others to embrace with us this sort of vision, for this sort of quality of life? In a way that holds our bones and our lives together? In a way that enlarges the site of the tent, so new children can be born and welcomed into our household?

I don't think George Clarkson has had it figured out any better than any of the rest of us, but I will tell you this: He and his remarkable life partner, Elizabeth, have certainly had that Spirit of Love on all Occasions. And I am honored to be asked to be here this evening with them, and with you. And I thank you for your kind hospitality.