Unitarian Universalism and Evangelism

by Jennifer Lynn Dalton

I still remember a conversation my husband and I had before I started graduate school. I was talking through the reasons I wanted to be a minister. I told him I wanted to let people know that life wasn’t all about money and stuff that they were not alone in wanting something more. I wanted to share that the world can be a better place. I wanted to share that there are places where people gather and find peace and community and others to share their passions with.

After an extremely long-winded, idealistic speech, he replied,
“Huh, so you want to be an evangelist.”
I answered,
“You take that back.”
He looked at me and said,
“An evangelist is someone who shares the good news. That’s what you want to do.”
I replied,
“What part of ‘take that back’ do you not understand?”

I had a pretty clear and narrow view of what it means to be an evangelist. I pictured the “evangelicals” from my youth that I never felt connected to. I pictured televangelists with bad ties and red faces. I pictured people who flood parking lots with pamphlets filled with fire and brimstone. The only good news I found in those pamphlets was the news they could save me from a hell I didn’t even believe in.

Imagine my chagrin four years later when I found myself accidently taking Evangelism 501 in my third year of divinity school. It really was a personal oversight. Candler requires a concentration. I fell in love with mystical and medieval theology. After using my electives for courses on mystical and medieval theology, I realized that the only concentration I was close to was entitled “Word and Witness”. I had thoroughly covered word. I hadn’t even touched witness. Nor had I any plans to.

The first day, the professor caught my attention. He shared that evangelism does not equal evangelical. Perhaps, one of our first jobs would be to attempt to define evangelism.

My husband was correct; evangelism is the act of sharing the gospel. The gospel is the “good word” or the “good news”. Therefore, at its most universal level, evangelism is sharing the good news. An evangelist is one who shares the good news. Unfortunately that sounded like it could include those pamphlets in a parking lot.

As the class moved forward, we spent a lot of time talking about what the basis of evangelism was—and what evangelism looks like.

He taught us that Evangelism does not begin in talking about religion, rather, it begins by being formed in relationship. We do not create relationships to spread the Word. Rather, we enter into relationships, honestly with no hidden agendas. Then, we allow the relationship to develop naturally. Then someone may or may not become interested in our faith. To me, that, in the end, becomes the good news. The good news that we can meet people where they are, love them where they are, serve them where they are—and not expect them to join us.

I learned that many people who call themselves evangelists do not separate word and deed. Many of them consider the two inseparable. The word, the “good news”, whatever that good news may be, is unbelievable without action. Billboards and church signs, ads in newspapers—they all fall upon deaf ears and blind eyes if they are not bound in relationship and bound in service to the greater community.

That speaks to my highest ideals and the core of my faith. In my ideal world, we reach out to one another and we celebrate the inherent worth and dignity of every person by loving them. Loving them not as an adjective, but as a verb, loving through our actions.

And I think back on my own reaction to the word evangelism, a reaction shared by many of my classmates, I get angry.

I get very ANGRY. Years ago I read a book by Bruce Bawer entitled “Stealing Jesus”. He argued that liberal Christianity had allowed the Moral Majority to control the conversation about what it means to be Christian. They stole Jesus. They stole the good news. They stole the faith. They left liberal Christians almost ashamed of using the word Christian. They left liberal Christian apologizing for their faith. Really? 2000 years of tradition scrapped—because liberal Christians allowed Conservatives to take control of the conversation.

But what does this have to with Unitarian Universalism? This is a Christian issue, why should UU’s take on another faith’s fight? Admittedly, UU’s have Christian roots that go as far back as the fourth century. But that’s no reason to pick up a fight that isn’t ours.

And is there anything to be angry about? The truth is the right wing is doing an amazing amount of good in the world. The Catholic Church, in many areas of Africa, serves not only as the church, but as the school, as the doctors and the only source of social service these areas have. There are numerous ministries in Atlanta: for drug addicts, abused women, the homeless, for those who are struggling simply to survive—all run or heavily supported by conservative congregations, even right wing evangelical congregations.

So maybe, there is no reason to be angry. Maybe I should just be grateful somebody is there.
And I am.
But there is some anger too.

When the Moral Majority movement arose, they didn’t just take Jesus: they began to own the conversation on faith and what it means to be a faith community. And people joined them because of belief, but they also join because part of the “good news” these church’s share is that there is a community that will welcome them, embrace them, and be present to them.
And many of those people, many people in general, still don’t know there are liberal Christian churches, non-denominational churches. Many people don’t know there are Unitarian Universalist Congregations—all of whom would welcome them into community.

This isn’t about other faiths filling up faster or having better numbers. And it certainly isn’t about having a bigger budget because there were more people to put more dollars in the plate.

It’s a moral issue.

I have no problem with people choosing communities that best feed their spirituality, that best inspire them to lead better lives, that best reflect their image of God or the Universe.
But I do have a problem with people living without a community BECAUSE the doors they know are open don’t reflect their beliefs or their life experiences.

People living without a community because they don’t know there are other options.

Every day, I meet people in the hospital with no family, no community.
I have seen people die with no one the hospital could call.
NO one, except a chaplain, a doctor, and a few nurses were there to mourn their passing.

Last night in Atlanta, I guarantee at least one person lost someone they loved dearly and had nowhere to turn.
I guarantee you people are dying in hospitals with no one to love them.
People are hearing the words they never wanted to hear—the diagnosis, the 2 a.m. phone call, reading the notice that announces they no longer have a roof over their head. And they have no one and no community to turn to.

In this church, I have often heard the last candle lit for the joys and concerns that lie silent in our hearts and for those who have no community to share their joys and concerns with.

But how many of us ever imagine what that might feel like? What it might feel like not to have a community to share the job promotion, the new grandchild’s birth—not to have a community to share that your daughter left for Afghanistan and is never coming home.

BUT, hey, Maybe evangelism isn’t just about community . . . it’s about some secret good news. And maybe UU’s don’t have any good news. Maybe, only Christian churches have good news. Maybe, the good news is solely the property of Christian churches and UU’s should leave them to it.

SO, THEY OWN THE GOOD NEWS?

Many Christian churches have a lot of good news– I have seen them open their doors: open them to the disenfranchised; open them to seekers, pagans, the poor, the prisoners and addicts, the immigrants, who are trying to rebuild lives and who are desperately in need of a community.

Linton seemed a little shocked when we discussed the topic of this sermon. And I know he looked in several directions as he was writing his reflection. I didn’t read Linton’s reflection until 7:00 a.m. on the end of a long night shift at the hospital. And I wept. I wept because I thought no one could hear about Linton’s conversion experience and NOT know that Unitarian Universalists have good news.

In addition, Unitarian Universalists have been a major presence in civil rights movements, peace movements. Unitarian Universalists are responsible for the Girls Scouts, the Red Cross, and the ASPCA. Unitarian Universalist principles welcome all that would come in a spirit of love, seeking truth. That sure as hell sounds like good news to me.

But over and over, I have heard arguments about whether or not individual UU congregations should move toward being a beacon or a refuge. Whether to be a beacon to share the good news and do the good works or a refuge so that members can quietly feed their spirits in the midst of a crazy world.

In my own mind, the true answer appears to be: that it does not have to be an either or question. Churches can be both a beacon and a refuge.

And humans need both.

One of my all time favorite writers is Pope Gregory the Great. In the 4th and 5th centuries Pope Gregory the Great struggled. He was born privileged. He spent his inheritance building a monastery. His goal was to spend his life worshiping God and engaging in his own spiritual journey.

And this was not to be.

The Roman Empire was falling. The church was the only organized source of stability. And as is often the case, the man or woman who does not seek power, who does not want the job is often the best person for the job.

And so he would leave the monastery. He would return to serve the world. And eventually he would be pope. And he would make time to return to the monastery. But his writings reveal his struggle with the universe and the choices that presents.

Pope Gregory eventually wrote that in order to grow spiritually people have to pull away from the world, but to continue to grow, they must take themselves out into the world and share what they have learned. . .and then they can return to solitude to rest and study and prepare to enter the world again.

Pope Gregory understood that he needed a refuge and so did others–a place of peace and spiritual seeking, a place where he could study and learn and pray. But he also understood that he had responsibilities–responsibilities not just to the church, but to the society that was falling apart around him.

I have my own fear, a fear that I have heard shared by other UU’s that if the UU’s don’t create a larger presence in the world, the church will die. We will become a dying faith. Dying quietly tucked away in refuges. And that fear is not just about my love of the principles, it is truly rooted in the fact I believe in this faith.

I believe in UU diversity.
I believe in UU values.
I believe that UU’s can be the hands that do the work in the world.
I believe that UU’s can do the work and be in relationship with others, as they are and where they are.
And I believe that UU’s can also offer refuge and solace for one another.

I am an unapologetic Christian Unitarian Universalist. I know better than anyone that Christianity does not own mercy, does not own community, does not own action in the greater world, does not own love.

But if UU’s are not fully present and fully engaged in the world: with their minds, with their hearts, and with their hands—the good news of Unitarian Universalism will die quietly tucked away in refuges that don’t shed any light. People that could have been fed both physically and spiritually by the richness of this faith will be left alone because they never knew Unitarian Universalist congregations were even present.

So no, I don’t think Unitarian Universalist Evangelism is a contradiction in terms. I think that UU’s could call it Evangelism, but they could call it outreach, or they could call it a Labrador retriever. Because Alice was right, the word itself doesn’t matter, it can mean what we want it to mean, nothing more or less. The words are unimportant, the intention and the acts are priceless.

Amen.