First Unitarian Universalist Society of Albany

"Putting Our Values in Stone"

Rev. Samuel A. Trumbore, September 14, 2003

 

 

Sermon

 

The dream of expanding our building was brought to the test last week.  Last spring we voted to engage Paul J Mack and Associates to do a Capital Campaign planning study to see if we have enough enthusiasm and resources to proceed with expanding our facility.  The architectural plans presented to the congregation included building a new multi-function space that can serve as sanctuary or social hall at the other end of our building, adding more RE classrooms, installing an elevator, relocating and enlarging our kitchen, relocating and enlarging our administrative space, and relocating Stott lounge and the Joy Library.

 

Paul Mack sent Anna Angold to survey as many as sixty members of our congregation as part of the planning study.  The day after Labor Day she arrived, with letters of invitation ready for Al's and my signature and a streamlined version of our expansion plans to mail.  For the next seven days she saw 53 individuals and couples of the sixty invitations sent out.  On the last day she was here, I took her out to lunch.  As she and I walked to Ichiban’s, I slyly asked probing questions to see if she would give me any advance information or clues about what we might expect her report to contain.  She smiled coyly at me and revealed absolutely nothing.  “You’ll get the full report in the beginning of October,” she replied sweetly.

 

I regretted not being able to give this sermon before Anna started her work because I believe there is something of great significance happening right now in the expansion project.  The Albany office of Design Partnership of Cambridge, the architectural firm that presented us with our current plans included in Anna's case, has closed.  We must now find a new architectural firm and see if we can pick up where the others left off.  All we have now is a floor plan and no image or model of what this building might look like save a few sketches.  The rooflines, the window locations and the door placements aren’t set in stone yet.  And providentially, some new ideas have surfaced over the summer.

 

Architects Terry Way, a seasoned member of our congregation, and Scott Knox, a newcomer to our congregation, have expressed concern that our design work so far doesn’t have a guiding vision to unify it.

 

When I first heard these concerns I didn’t understand what they were saying.  By training I’m an engineer.  In school I learned how to take a requirements document and translate them into a functional design.  To design a widget that can do this, this and that for this cost, an engineer can come back with a schematic that accomplishes that goal.   Engineers don’t usually design the cover of the widget box.  Our expansion project has had me, and I suspect many of us, thinking like an engineers.  How do we arrange the blocks so we can fit in everything we want?  Scott challenged us to go to the next level, to be an artist.

 

Architectural design is a blending of art and engineering.  A well-designed building must be both functional, standing up to wind, weather and wear, and must also be beautiful.  And when entering the realm of designing a home for the celebration of life, it must also be inspirational.  One good path toward moving up to and achieving this level of inspiration is articulating a unifying architectural vision.

 

The evocative power of a structure comes from the ability for floors, walls, windows and ceilings to talk.  For preliterate children and illiterate adults in traditional churches, the statues, stained glass windows, and feeling of the space teaches them about their religion.  The material used in the flooring, the texture and placement of a wall, the size and orientation of the windows, the height and curve of the ceiling, the ornamentation, all these design choices individually and taken together communicate the values and beliefs of the designers.  Walk into a Gothic Cathedral and Christian messages are everywhere.  Walk into a Mosque and the absence of images speaks an intense commitment to resist imagining God in human form.  Synagogues all use their architecture to sanctify the east facing Ark, the home of the Torah.

 

A helpful way to unify the message a building speaks is by beginning with a metaphorical image that both communicates the heritage and values of an organization and can be translated into bricks and mortar.  Let me give you a few illustrations.

 

One of the most famous modern examples of a unified vision is Temple Beth Sholom in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright.  One of the early design ideas that Rabbi Mortimer Joseph Cohen shared with him in the folklore of the building was to say, "build me a mountain of light" along with build me "the quintessential American synagogue in a cradle of American liberty."  The end result was a massive synagogue of glass and steel that soars 110 feet in the air without any columns to support it.

 

As you may know, Wright, a Unitarian, also designed two Unitarian Universalist sanctuaries, one in Oak Park, Illinois, and one for his own congregation in Madison, Wisconsin.  In each one, he understood key elements in the identity of the congregation and shaped the design around them.

 

Closer to home, the First Unitarian Church of Rochester, New York's sanctuary was designed by the famous architect, Louis Kahn.  What Kahn recognized about that congregation was the centrality of questions to their pursuit of religious truth.  So he put the sanctuary in the middle of the building and arranged the classrooms around the outside so the shape of the facility viewed from above looks like a question mark.

 

Question mark?  Mountain of Light? What is the image that will convey who we are?  What do we want our walls say to the newcomer entering our sanctuary for the first time?

 

We haven't been thinking this way about our expansion project up until now because our vision of what we are doing has grown.  When the expansion project began again after my Start-Up Weekend in the fall of 1999, I think we were more focused on remodeling.  We've been rearranging the blocks to figure out how in the world to squeeze everything we want into this restricted facility.  We've been intensely focused on the engineering--not the art.

 

That began to change when we decided we wanted to see if we could build a 300-seat sanctuary/social hall at the other end of our building.  When the architects came back with a Gothic interpretation of what the new sanctuary might look like, the Architectural Committee immediately objected.  I realized our architects from Design Partnership really didn't understand who we were.  They needed to better understand our identity and mission translated into a metaphorical language that had a physical interpretation to begin to grasp the artistic dimension of what would inspire us.  Perhaps it's good we are looking for new architects.

 

Scott Knox understood this need from his professional architectural background and suggested the architectural committee call a special meeting this summer to see if we could distill a guiding phrase or at most a sentence that could guide our new architects.  We spent three hours wrestling with ideas but couldn't get beyond abstract concepts.  The closest we got was a list of five ideas:

 

  1. An architecture that reflects and promotes Community
  2. An architecture that expresses the Depths of mind and being
  3. An architecture that provides space for Reflection
  4. An architecture that Balances the rational and the spiritual
  5. An architecture that is Simply beautiful

Not finding that one evocative phrase at that meeting was very disturbing to me because I had already committed to doing this sermon.  I had planned to lift up that guiding phrase and present it to you today with flourish and fanfare.

 

For the last month since that meeting, I've been pondering exactly what metaphorical image might communicate the wholeness of who we are, what we value and want to become.  Today I'd like to offer you what I think is the best answer so far.  I don't think this is the only answer or even the final answer, but rather my best answer for you today.  Perhaps in you today lies the final answer that will emerge from hearing my words.  Listen to me now and also listen carefully to your own heart.

 

Three words have captured my imagination that I believe can guide both our architects and express a vision of our identity as a congregation.  Those words are "light", "beacon," and "mingling."  Let me explain each one.

 

The word that is easiest to grasp is light.  Many Unitarian Universalist sanctuaries built in the last 100 years have lots of big, clear windows.  Unity Temple in Oak Park has a translucent roof over the sanctuary to let in natural light.  The Fellowship I grew up in had floor to ceiling windows on both sides of the building.  The effect was to create the feeling of worshipping in nature as the building was located in a wooded area.  Think of the sanctuary in Schenectady that also has lots of floor to ceiling glass.  Look around us at these huge windows right here. We do not want to be enclosed in a gloomy space surrounded by stained glass windows.  We don't want to separate ourselves from the world, we want to remain connected to it.  For us, field and forest are just as sacred as this room.

 

Our understanding of sacred space is different from other protestant derived religious traditions.  We don't separate the sacred from the profane in the same way other religions do.  We want our architecture to bring us into the here and now, awakening and heightening our awareness of the present moment.  We are uninterested in architecture that beckons us to strive for a reward in some dreamy heaven realm.  We are uninterested in architecture that torments us for being human and fallible.  We want architecture that inspires us to see the greater, more lofty possibilities inherent in being human.  We want architecture that energizes us to believe in our capability to bring those possibilities to life.

 

My selection of the word beacon becomes clearer by exploring its definition.  Most commonly, we think of a beacon as a signaling or guiding device, such as a lighthouse.  Beacons are also the names for radio transmitters that emit a characteristic guidance signal for aircraft.  I gained a great appreciation for radio beacons during my first flight in a four seat Cessna 172.  My pilot and I were flying over the Gulf of Mexico.  There was no way to know where we were by looking down.  By tuning our radio to the frequency of the nearest beacon, we could orient ourselves and guide our flight.  I was extremely grateful that day for our nationwide network of beacons to show us the way.

 

Radio beacons make interesting metaphors because they are not coercive. Any beacon is useful only if you are tuned to its frequency. The pilot chooses which beacon will best guide the plane.    There are some messages we Unitarian Universalists broadcast here that many people in this country don't want to use for guidance.  If you want a religion that will tell you the one and only way to believe, this beacon will not guide you well.  If you want a religion that follows one and only one prophet or teacher this beacon will confuse you.  However, if you want a beacon that broadcasts the message of the inherent worth and dignity of every individual, you're tuned to the right channel.  If you want a beacon that guides people to justice, equity and compassion in human relations, you're flying this way.

 

An architectural interpretation of beacon actually came up while examining the early drawings for the new multi-function space.  The architects suggested building a translucent wall facing Washington Avenue that would both let in light during the day and radiate light out to the street at night.  While pondering this idea, someone suggested putting a chalice in that translucent wall facing Washington Avenue.  Anyone driving by at night would see that chalice, a beacon radiating our message symbolically to the community.

 

The last image may be the hardest to grasp: the word mingling.  I think it is a beautiful word to describe the process of liberal religious community.  The word has two contradicting yet complimentary definitions.  To mingle is to bring together in combination, without the loss of individual characteristics.  No homogenizing going on here!  We respect each individual's right of conscience.  We don't expect everyone to conform to the same beliefs.

 

And mingling also means, to mix so that the components become united and merge.  We do this by using the democratic process to define ourselves and find shared agreement.  As we mingle together we retain our individuality while at the same time finding common ground in our humanity, in our spiritual nature.  And every time we find that common ground, energy is released.  When we mingle and find our unity, that energy, that light is radiated out of us, powering this congregation's beacon of liberal religion for the Capital Region.

 

What, up till now, has been primarily a remodeling project to expand our building, is starting to give birth to a larger vision, a vision I'm casting today as a "beacon of mingling light."   Our Executive for the St. Lawrence District, Tom Chulak, was here on Thursday.  He encouraged our Board of Trustees to imagine how our congregation might lead in the Capital Region promoting Unitarian Universalist values.  He invited us to work with the St. Lawrence District on the growth of our movement.  Tom invited us to welcome every person who responds to our way of doing religion and to provide a way for them to gather, be it here in an expanded sanctuary or in a new congregation just outside our reach.  Tom encouraged us to pass on the flame from our chalice, from our beacon on this hill.

 

As we wait expectantly for a report from Anna Angold of our capital campaign study, let us reflect on whether we've been hiding our light under a bushel basket or putting it on a lamp stand, letting it shine out for all to see.  I believe we are at a critical juncture in the life of this congregation as this larger vision of who we can become emerges.  Today I feel great excitement about a "beacon of mingling light" as a metaphoric vision of both who we are and who we can become … that can be put in stone, concrete, wall board, and windows.

 

The success of our expansion program is strongly linked to getting to the heart of our willingness to share what we have found here.  Let us have the courage to love largely and pass on our flame.

 

 

Copyright © 2002 by the Rev. Samuel A. Trumbore. All rights reserved.