"Hope Springs Eternal."

Rev. Dr. Morris Hudgins.
April 16, 2000.

Introduction
I love spring: the re-emergence of color, especially green, the sounds of birds in the early morning, the reminder of hope even when life is fragile and delicate. It is not coincidental that Easter and spring come at almost the same time. Easter for me is synonymous with the celebration of spring. These two concepts are brought together in a poem by May Sarton titled, "Easter Morning." It goes like this:

The extreme delicacy of this Easter morning
Spoke to me as a prayer and as a warning.
It was light on the brink, spring light
After a rain that gentled my dark night.
I walked through landscapes I had never seen
Where the fresh grass had just begun to green,
And its roots, watered deep, sprung to my tread;
The maples wore a cloud of feathery red,
But flowering trees still showed their clear design
Against the pale blue brightness chilled like wine.
And I was praying all the time I walked,
While starlings flew about, and talked, and talked.
Somewhere and everywhere like spoke the word.
The dead trees woke; each bush held its bird.
I prayed for delicate love and difficult,
That all be gentle now and know no fault,
That all be patient—as a wild rabbit fled
Sudden before me. Dear love, I would have said
(And to each bird who flew up from the wood),
I would be gentler still if that I could,
For on this Easter morning it would seem
The softest football danger is, extreme. . .
And so I prayed to be less than the grass
And yet to feel the Presence that might pass.
I made a prayer. I heard the answer, "Wait,
When all is so in peril, so delicate!"

May Sarton is a person who fought depression much of her life. She expresses in this poem her joy with the return of spring. She, like me, found solace in nature, in wild rabbits, fresh grass, gentle rain, the sound of birds, the Eternal presence that nature brings.

There is much to be anxious about in our world. Last week I followed my doctors advise and had a colonoscopy, a procedure that I recommend if you have cancer in your family and/or you are over 50. I do not have cancer in my family but I was still anxious once I had the procedure done, after a year of putting it off. The doctor suggested I call his office on Thursday to learn of the results of the biopsy done on two polyps.

I did not realize that I would not sleep well on Wednesday night. I did not realize that I would be frustrated when the office did not answer at 8:30 a.m. I did not realize that I would be so relieved when the nurse reported that my biopsy was negative. All was benign in my world, if not the world at large. I let out a yell that could be heard from Winton Ave.

Not everyone experiences the joy that I received on Thursday. I wonder about those that were told the test results were not benign. That must have been the same feeling of sadness and loss that the disciples of Jesus felt when he was killed by the hands of humans. Even those who claimed to follow him denied him. The book of Mark says the disciples were dumb, they were fools. The book of Luke says these men lacked trust.

Humans all are we—fools who do not see divinity when it is in front of us. We don't trust ourselves and we don't trust others. Alexander Pope writes that even with all of these shortcomings: "Hope springs eternal in the human breast." ("An Essay on Man", l. 95) My sermon today is meant to encourage each of you to believe in spring, and hope, and joy even though reason and doubt may tell us not to feel these things.

I remember the worst service I ever designed. It was probably the worst service every designed by anyone. It was written in the midst of the gas shortage, when people were lining up at the pumps to buy what gas there was. I chose to plan a service on Christmas that year designed to explain the gas shortage. I wanted people to know why they had to wait in line for gas. I wanted them to understand the dilemma we had created for ourselves. It was a great idea. The timing was horrible.

This year I am not going to make the same mistake. Yes, I want you to understand what is happening to the stock market. Yes, I want you to know why we are paying more for gas this year. But I am not going to do it around the Easter holiday.

I come to encourage you to welcome spring, to feel hope, and to feel joy in your life. Herman Melville once wrote: "If we bend down our eyes, the dark vale shows her mouldy soil; but we if we lift them, the bright sun meets our glance halfway to cheer." My desire is to celebrate human potential, to lift the dark vale of life, to meet the glance of the bright sun and to cheer.

Meanings of Hope
Like most philosophical concepts hope has different meanings. We often think of hope as a sort of magical dream that will occur at some future time by outside intervention. In this hope the present is considered futile and insignificant. The future is emphasized as the answer to all of our problems. Oftentimes hope is a form of dreaming and has no foundation in reality. George Herbert wrote in the 17th century that "Hope is the poor man's bread" (Jacula Prudentum, 1651). Matthew Prior wrote that "Hope is but the dream of those that wake" (Solomon on the Vanity of the World, 1718).

The Unitarian Universalist hope is different from magic and dreams. Hope can he grounded in fact, in the experiences of our past and our knowledge about the possibilities of the future. Hope says Sydney Smith is the " . . . belief, more or less strong, that joy will come; desire is the wish it may come." Ambrose Bierce combines these two. He says, "Hope desire and expectation rolled into one."

The Eastern religions given us a concept of hope based on the unity of the divine within nature. Tagore expresses this philosophy: "Within us we have a hope which always walks in front of our present narrow experience; it is the undying faith in the infinite in us."

Emil Brunner wrote:

Hope. . . is one of the ways in which what is merely future, and potential is made vividly present and actual to us. Hope is the positive as anxiety is the negative, mode of awaiting the future.

For Christians hope is the belief in the presence of Jesus after his death. That is the hope of Easter, that Jesus will continue to be present among his followers. For most Christians, including many Unitarian Universalists, this is a spiritual presence, not a physical presence.

Unitarian Universalist hope can also include a belief in the presence of a person after their death. I promote this in every memorial service I conduct. Our hope also lies in our potential to make the future what we wish it to be. Hope is present not future. It is not a dream. Hope is grounded in action. If we cannot act, we cannot choose. We have no hope. Norman Cousins wrote:

The question is not whether humans beings are prepared to do these things. The question is whether you, the individual, are prepared to do it. You have the gift of free will. You can make choices. So long as the ability to choose can be matched with options of consequence, there are strong grounds for hope. There is hope that enough individuals will use their free will to make the life-giving and life?sustaining choices." (p.69)

Hope must be grounded in our ability to know and to act or it is magical hope.

Hope, Mortality and Death
One of the most common contexts for hope is that in illness and death. Such hope can be magical in some circumstances. It can be a way of avoiding the final end of life. Many religions have the belief that there can be hope in death because there is something on the other side that is even better than what we are now experiencing. This is not my view of hope or death. With Socrates I can say:

I do not know what lies in the beyond, but I go forward with courage and hope, and I shall find out in good time.

Also, with Norman Cousins I can say: "The tragedy of life is not in the fact of death, but in what dies inside us while we live" (p. 31). Immortality and Hope exist for me because I can know, I can choose, I can act. One writer expresses it this way:

The days they pass so quickly now, the nights are seldom long, time round me whispers when it's cold. The changes somehow frighten me. Still I have to smile. It turns me on to think of growing old, for tho my life's been good to me, there's still so much to do, so many things my mind has never known. (Anonymous)

Hope in Community
There is another aspect of hope. It has to do with the fact that as individuals, we a part of a community. This is an important part of the Unitarian Universalist mind?set. By coming here we wish to be a part of something larger than ourselves. We gather together for some common purpose. We can celebrate our lives-our hopes and dreams. We can discuss the problems of the world. We can share our personal concerns, our failures, our disappointments, our most inward emotions. All of this occurs because we are part of a community.

You do not have to be a member of a church to be religious. You do not have to have your name on a membership list in order to be an ethical person. But as Unitarian Universalist we join because we are affirming that this community gives us some hope. It provides us an opportunity to act. It gives us a chance to meet other people that go can enjoy, love, be with, care for, share with.

Conclusion
Yes, Unitarian Universalism is a religion that has a positive view of life. It is a religion that gives us hope—in this world and in our lives. It tells us that we can make a difference. We are unique but we are part of a community. Hope is the ability to know, to choose to act. It is looking forward to accomplishing those things we so desire as long as we choose to live. Hope is existing in a community of caring people.

Goethe has said: "It would appear that our nature is not, for any length of time, capable of perfect resignation. Hope will make its own way into the mind, and with hope activity, and with activity, the realization of hope. Yes, "Hope springs eternal in the human breast." Hope overcomes anxiety. Hope leads to action. Action leads to satisfaction and more hope—another of those circles of life.

I began this sermon with May Sarton talking about how delicate life is. Sarton also talked about the bird as one example of this delicacy. I will close with the words of Emily Dickinson who uses the same metaphor:

Hope is the thing with feathers
That perches in the soul
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all
And sweetest in the gale is heard. ("Poems", 1830-86)

May we all look around us this spring, and see and hear the birds, and find the tune that may sing in our heart when we most need it.

May we welcome spring. May we have hope. Look up not down. Let us not look to the worst, but to the best. This is the message of spring. The birds are returning. The sound of cheer is in the air. Life returns when once it was barren. The leaves, flowers and buds are for all to see. Welcome spring. Hope springs eternal. Amen.