Saying Goodbye
a sermon given by Rev. Cricket Potter
on Sunday, June 3, 2007
at The First Parish in Lincoln
Click here to listen to this sermon
“Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending.”
~Lazurus Long
READINGS:
1. Our first reading is from the Zen Buddhist tradition. It is a poem called “Xinxinming” -- which translates as “trust in enlightened heart and mind.” It was written in the 7th century, and it is a long poem – five pages in length – filled with wisdom and guidance on the Great Way or the steps toward attaining enlightenment. Its overarching themes include the oneness of all things, the peace to be found in acceptance of things as they are, and the suffering and emptiness we experience when we cling to our opinions and our emotions. Because it is such a long and dense -- though beautiful -- poem, I am sharing only a small portion of it this morning. Here is that excerpt:
The Great Way is not difficult
for those with no preferences….
If you wish to see the truth,
then hold no opinions for or against anything.
To set up what you like against what you dislike
is the disease of the mind….
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject
that we do not see the true nature of things….
At the moment of inner enlightenment,
there is a going beyond appearances and emptiness.
The changes that appear to occur in the empty world
we call real only because of our ignorance….
Just let things be in their own way,
and there will be neither coming nor going….
Doubts and irresolutions vanish
and life in true faith is possible.
2. Our second reading is W. S. Merwin’s poem entitled “Just Now.” Merwin was best known early in his career for his anti-war poetry of the Vietnam War era. He later took a great interest in Buddhist philosophy, and his poems since the 1980’s often evoke an abiding gratitude for life’s fullness.
In the morning as the storm begins to blow away
the clear sky appears for a moment and it seems to me
that there has been something simpler than I could ever believe
simpler than I could have begun to find words for
not patient not even waiting no more hidden
than the air itself that became part of me for a while
with every breath and remained with me unnoticed
something that was here unnamed unknown in the days
and the nights not separate from them as they came and were gone
it must have been here neither early nor late then
by what name can I address it now holding out my thanks
In seminary, one of the first things my homiletics professor said to us students
(homiletics is just a fancy word for preaching) was,
“Preachers preach the sermon they need to hear.”
The next thing this professor said was,
“Never preach about anything that you are personally experiencing at the moment.
It is too fresh, too close, too vulnerable-making for you as a minister to share.
Get through the experience, resolve your feelings about it.
Then you can speak about it.”
Now, flash forward some twenty years to my ordination service right here just two weeks ago.
My long-time mentor Gary Smith preached a sermon about the meaning of ordination.
What are ministers are actually called to do?
For part of his answer,
Gary turned to a passage from Barbara Brown Taylor’s most recent book, Leaving Church,
a passage in which Taylor, an Episcopal priest,
reflects back upon what ordained ministry has meant for her.
Taylor writes, “Being ordained is not about serving God perfectly but about serving God visibly,
allowing other people to learn whatever they can
from watching you rise and fall.”
And, as the rector at her seminary pointed out to her all those years ago:
“You probably won’t be much worse than other people, and you probably won’t be any better,
but you’ll have to let people look at you.
You will have to let them see you as you are.”
Serving God visibly.
Allowing other people to learn whatever they can from watching me rise and fall,
knowing all the while that I won’t be much worse than others and I probably won’t be any better.
I admit that these words offer me both a deep comfort and a very humbling reality.
In my ministry, I need not and cannot aim to serve perfectly.
Yet, I do need to – as Gary Smith put it – let others observe and learn from
my finding life, losing it, and finding it again.
So, with this my last sermon as your student minister,
and with Gary’s words and those of Barbara Brown Taylor fresh in my mind,
I want to set aside my homiletics professor’s warnings about being too vulnerable
to fully embrace the process of leave-taking with you today.
I feel I owe that honesty to you –
you who, as a community, have been so honest and sharing with me.
I want to honor all that you have given me and all that I have learned from you.
I want to preach the sermon that I, too, need to hear about saying good-bye, what that means to me,
and how hard it is and yet how important it is.
After all, life is full of good-byes.
With summer fast upon us –
with school and camp, trips and reunions,
with all the beginnings and endings we will face --
many of us will need to say good-bye numerous times.
And, as I have learned in my training for parish ministry and in my years as a hospital chaplain
one of the greatest gifts that we can give others when we must part
is an intentional and genuine good-bye.
Done well, a good-bye provides the opportunity to reflect, acknowledge, give thanks, and bring closure.
A good-bye avoided is an opportunity missed – an opportunity for growth and even healing.
I know because I am as guilty as the next person
of wanting to avoid the emotions and the awkwardness of it all.
Before seminary, I was the ultimate escape artist, always finding a way out of good-byes.
I so dreaded good-byes that, one time in my twenties,
I actually feigned sickness to get out of a good-bye luncheon
that my work colleagues wanted to give me after four years of being with them.
(Thank God I have had the opportunity to outgrow some of my immaturities!)
It was just after that embarrassing disappearing act that I entered seminary,
and thankfully, began to learn some new ways of being.
During one year of chaplaincy training, I learned a lot about saying good-bye.
Initially, it was something many of us students failed miserably at in our work with hospital patients.
As we reflected upon our patient visits,
we realized that many of us didn’t even say the word good-bye
when our visits with a patient came to an end.
We often settled for more innocuous phrases like “See you later” or “Take care.”
We were all quickly admonished by our supervisor, a seasoned Jesuit priest,
for not truly saying good-bye.
We were told that we were not honoring the time we had shared with a patient
or the connection we had made, however brief or long.
We needed, instead, to leave time and be emotionally present for a genuine good-bye.
We needed to bring closure to any significant time spent with a person
by giving thanks for what we had shared and naming in a good-bye the end of that time shared.
So, I went back to my patients and tried to be more present to it all.
With time, I learned to reflect back what we had shared together
and to say good-bye in a way that honored the time we had spent together.
And as I got better and more intentional about saying good-bye,
I found that the people I visited responded in their own way.
Particularly for some who were quite sick or dying, it seemed to be a relief
that someone was comfortable with endings
and with giving them the space to name what was ending
and to admit that it was indeed ending.
At the close of that year-long chaplaincy training,
we seminary students also had to say good-bye to one another
and honor the many intense and emotion-filled moments we had shared.
The ten of us sat in a circle on our last day.
With a lit candle glowing at the center of this sacred space we had created together,
we spent the morning offering prayers of thankfulness and prayers of hope
for every one in the group.
It was a powerful ritual that encouraged us to reflect upon
what we had gained from our time with each person
and what we hoped for one another as we continued on with our journeys.
Those prayers we offered to one another were a gift shared with tears and hugs and laughter.
Then, our supervisor blew out the candle to symbolize that our time together had come to a close.
And, we went around the circle one last time with each one of us saying to the group,
“With gratitude and love, I say good-bye.”
With gratitude and love, I say good-bye.
How much better that felt than all the other good-byes I had run from or through before that experience.
Out of fear of the emotions or focusing on the loss rather than the gifts of the time spent with someone
or perhaps out of simply not knowing what else to do,
some of us do run in the other direction.
I think back to that good-bye luncheon I so lamely got out of and the quick good-byes that resulted
as I gathered my things to leave my last day.
I did a huge disservice to my four years with those colleagues and to the relationships we had formed.
Yet, even with that awareness, I still struggle with saying good-bye.
It is never easy.
And so, I think of the wisdom and the sentiment in our readings for this morning.
The poem “Xinxinming” speaks of the Great Way –
the way of enlightened mind and open heart,
the way of acceptance and peace
the way in which we experience the fullness of all things.
I quote:
If you wish to see the truth,
then hold no opinions for or against anything.....
Indeed, it is due to our choosing to accept or reject
that we do not see the true nature of things....
At the moment of inner enlightenment,
there is a going beyond appearances and emptiness....
So simple and yet so profound.
Hold no opinions for or against anything
because it is in our opinions that we lose sight of the true nature of things;
It is in seeing things neither as good or bad, but simply as they are,
that we discover something deeper and richer.
We go beyond appearances and emptiness to something much more lasting and real.
For me, this means that even as I leave you, a part of you will always be with me.
W.S. Merwin’s poem “Just Now” speaks of that same named and unnamed,
intimate yet far-reaching “something.”
Merwin writes:
In the morning as the storm begins to blow away
the clear sky appears for a moment and it seems to me
that there has been something simpler than I could ever believe…
no more hidden than the air itself that became part of me for a while
with every breath and remained with me unnoticed
something that was here unnamed unknown in the days
and the nights not separate from them as they came and were gone…
For me, that “something simpler that I could ever believe
(and) no more hidden than the air itself that became a part of me for a while”
is what I have felt so profoundly in my time here with all of you.
I call it love, community, relationship, trust, and compassion.
And, I have felt it as something that you all have offered in abundance to me --
something that will stay with me always.
Like the poet, my response is to hold out my thanks.
Of late, with your cards and gifts, our conversations after church
and the time many of you have made to meet with me for a walk or a last visit,
you are showing me the open heart and depth of community I came here seeking.
I remember standing right here and being introduced to all of you two years ago on Mother’s Day.
I remember looking out at all of your faces,
wondering about your stories and your lives,
and looking ahead with great anticipation to how our worlds would intersect and connect,
how we would nurture and challenge one another in our two years together.
I had no idea back then just how much you would embrace me as your student minister
or how much you would welcome me into your lives.
Your generosity of spirit as a community,
your big tent openness to so many viewpoints,
your ability to stay with one another and your ministers through the uncertainties
(and, I might add, through your senior minister’s 3-month sabbatical)
have all left a powerful stamp on me.
I came here wanting more than anything to learn more about community and right relationship.
And by that, I mean relationship that is mutual, trusting,
and honoring of the stories we each have to share.
I learned all that and so much more thanks to all of you and to Roger and Claire.
You have shown me the depth of ministry and opened me to my own ministry.
I took my daughter Haley to see the musical “Annie” over the winter.
At one point, Annie who is an orphan, must say good-bye to Daddy Warbucks,
the person she had come to trust and love as a father figure.
With the inimitable wisdom it seems that only children can have, Annie says,
“How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard.”
How lucky I am to have something that makes saying good-bye today so hard.
You have welcomed me.
You have helped to shape and encourage me as a minister in the making.
And two weeks ago, I experienced the honor and joy of having you ordain me.
This is not easy.
It’s not meant to be --
my experience tells me that’s the power of it.
So, with much love and gratitude, I say good-bye.
You are in my heart.
Amen.