Excerpt #89 from my book, Religion, An Obstacle to Human Progress
At Harvard, I was in the three-year Master of Divinity program that prepared students to become ministers.
As I got full credit for my one year at Yale, I had only to do two years at Harvard.
The Unitarian Universalist principles mostly made sense to me:
We, the member congregations of the Unitarian Universalist Association, covenant to affirm and promote:
• The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
• Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
• Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations;
• A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
• The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large;
• The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
• Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.
The living tradition which we share draws from many sources:
• Direct experience of that transcending mystery and wonder, affirmed in all cultures, which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life;
• Words and deeds of prophetic women and men which challenge us to confront powers and structures of evil with justice, compassion, and the transforming power of love;
• Wisdom from the world’s religions which inspires us in our ethical and spiritual life;
• Jewish and Christian teachings which call us to respond to God’s love by loving our neighbors as ourselves;
• Humanist teachings which counsel us to heed the guidance of reason and the results of science, and warn us against idolatries of the mind and spirit.
• Spiritual teachings of earth-centered traditions which celebrate the sacred circle of life and instruct us to live in harmony with the rhythms of nature.
The more I studied, the more I realized I needed more than what Unitarian Universalist offered.
I required something more precise.
I was drawn to thinking along the lines of the Tao Te Ching, the way of life, written by Lao-Tzu.
That there is a way of life that is inviolable.
Violate it, and we suffer.
Honor it, and we prosper.
The Tao Te Ching led to the religion of Taoism.
Practically nothing is known about Lao-Tzu.
Possibly a contemporary of Confucius (551-479 B.C.E.), he left no traces except his book, Tao Te Ching, the classic on the art of living.
An excerpt from Stephen Mitchell’s translation:
“In harmony with the Tao,
the sky is clear and spacious,
the earth is solid and full,
all creatures flourish together,
content with the way they are,
endlessly repeating themselves,
endlessly renewed.
When man interferes with the Tao,
the sky becomes filthy,
the earth becomes depleted,
the equilibrium crumbles,
creatures become extinct.”
The above excerpt is extraordinarily insightful.
But the Tao Te Ching was written 2600 years ago.
Today, we know an enormous amount more about the “way of life.”
Faith is not wanting to know what is true. – Friedrich Nietzsche