Expanding Horizons

Things that make you go Hmmm-400 Rugs!

An address by the Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday,14th July, 2019 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.
A very chilly and wet Adelaide winter morning provided an appropriate backdrop for the second address by Rob on the "Things that make you go Hmmm". So it's fitting that we celebrated our Unitarian Ruggers making their 400th rug for the charity "Wrap With Love".
Val, a member of our Unitarian community - and organiser of our Ruggers Group outlined the history of the Church Ruggers Group who, for a decade - have sent their rugs to the Charity, Wrap With Love - whose motto is "providing warmth for cold humanity" and who distribute rugs to over 75 countries.
Rob used the work of our Ruggers to show how we might build a community that supports each other's free, individual, spiritual paths…each other's free individuality without resorting to dogma.
He distinguishes between promoting -
- individuality, a healthy personality trait and part of the process of maturing - a growth stage but not an end in itself - and -
- individualism - where individuals focus on getting what they, themselves want.
Rob warns that Individualism may easily morph into dogma - despite Unitarians priding themselves in being free of it.
The answer for churches, Rob suggests - is exemplified by our Ruggers growing in connectedness and mission and collectively engaging in service to needy others.
Listen on!

Things That Make You Go Hmmm

An address by the Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 7th July, 2019 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide. Rob's address today is all about canvassing members on the hard questions of Life and is using the July newsletter to identify issues that make us go "Hmmm..." - questions we get stuck on - that "bug us" - that keep us awake in the wee small hours and which we never seem to get resolved. Rob is not suggesting that he can provide neat and ready answers to perennial and intractable problems but is seeking direction from us on those relevant and important issues we might want looked at through the lens of our Unitarian Principles.
Rob asks "How do we move forward as a church in changing and challenging times?". He suggests that part of the answer lies in a story - "The Stone Soup" - first told to him by his Grandmother and carried down through the generations from his Great-Great-Grandmother. It is set during the Irish Potato Famine.
At least some of the answer lies in the development of a "We Consciousness" which is the very essence of the Kingdom of God - here on earth. Rob closes with a benediction of some new and relevant beatitudes for a Unitarian Church like ours, seeking to stay and grow together during times of challenge and change.

The Leaf Meditation

An address by the Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 30th June, 2019 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.
As a prelude to today's address, Rob's uses a meditation "Looking at a leaf" from the Play - Mnemonic, with the express permission of its writer, Simon McBurney of The UK-based Theatre Complicite. The music in the meditation is by local musician and composer, Stewart Day and is also used with his express permission.
Rob explains that the branching, dendritic pattern of the leaf, is referred to as the "Constructal Law" of Flow Systems and is repeated in its many forms throughout animate and inanimate nature and in the structure of the Universe. Rob then uses this leaf analogy and some simple mathematics to show the interrelatedness of all people and to expose the mythology of Race and its invention by racists.

The Holding Place

An address by the Rev. Nicholas Rundle - recorded on Sunday, 23rd June, 2019 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide. Nicholas is the Uniting Church Chaplain in the high tech, robotised Royal Adelaide Hospital. In the context of the Winter Solstice as marking a turning point in the seasonal calendar, Nicholas uses an unpublished poem, "Breathing Underwater" and the analogy of the sea and its ambivalence as a place of solace and of storms to describe the hospital as a "holding place" where the human hand - despite all the technology - is still paramount in healing. Hands are used to "hold" and to heal - in surgery and in nursing - and also in providing spiritual support to patients and their families, and where - in the adversity which comes to us all, we are helped to "breath underwater".

Wu Wei aka "The Poo Way"

An address by the Jenny Dyster - recorded on Sunday, 16th June, 2019 in the Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.

Drawing on the Taoist principle of Wu Wei, an extract from A.A. Milne's "Winnie the Poo" - today's Story for all Ages and Benjamin Hoff's "The Dao of Poo", Jennie provides some good, practical advice - in her own inimitable way, to guide us whenever we are faced with human conflict and angst.

We Become What We Do - 3

An address by the Minister, Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 2nd June, 2019 at The Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.
In his third address in our Unitarian Month of Discernment, Rob reflects on the third UU Principle: "acceptance of one another" and "encouragement to spiritual growth". Rob briefly recaps the previous two weeks and reminds us that we are already half way into the time neuroscientists say it takes to embed new habits of mind - to effect neurological change through neuroplasticity which will lead to lasting spiritual growth. Rob then examines the nature of the human "spirit", "soul" or "essence"- "who you truly are in yourself". He outlines the traditional (religious) notion of the human soul as something "ab initio" - separate from the human body and somehow transcending it when we die - as well as a more "nuanced", Unitarian understanding of "soul" as a seed with the potential to grow spiritually. To help in our of spiritual growth, Rob introduces us to the concept of "Metacognition" - "thinking about thinking" - a conceptual tool that that helps us reach beyond ourselves and into the "quiet centre" within each of us where spiritual growth takes root, grows and thrives!

We Become What We Do - 2

An address by the Minister, Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 26th May, 2019 at The Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide. Rob sees the spiritual disciplines exercised during Ramadan and Lent as analogous to the benefits of interval training in developing athletic and sporting skills, or practising scales in developing musical and instrumental skills. After exercising sporting, musical or spiritual discipline for a month, brain neuroplasticity becomes part of our physical, musical or spiritual "metabolism" enabling change in ourselves. While our feelings often prompt us to change how we act, our actions also change how we feel and help us to grow spiritually. "If you Act the way you would like to be, soon you will be the way you Act." All change begins in gesture. We are free to develop the spiritual nature we want - "hacking" our minds by actions we may not feel like - but discipline our minds to do in order to reach our highest spiritual aspirations. This is the challenge facing us in our spiritual growth.
A buzz session enabled us to share in our spiritual aspirations and experiences of our first week of spiritual discernment and growth.

We Become What We Do - 1

An address by the Minister, Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 19th May, 2019 at The Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.
In this address, Rob uses the examples of the current Muslim observance of Ramadan and the recent Christian observance of the 40 days of Lent - to focus on ways in which we Unitarians might develop a heightened awareness of our individual spirituality. He observes that "we become what we do" - and challenges us - "to become more than what we are".
Rob suggests mindful daily spiritual practices for our Unitarian Universalist "Month of Observance". A buzz session focusses on the many ways in which we might choose a new challenge that might help us to become "more than what we might otherwise be" - in striving to be our" Truest, Best self", thereby helping us to grow, spiritually.

Adani, the Twin Towers and the 7th Principle

An address by our Minister, Rev. Rob MacPherson - recorded on Sunday, 28th April, 2019 at The Unitarian Meeting House in Adelaide.
Tragic and dramatic events like the recent Notre Dame fire, the collapse of its spire - linked by Google - algorithmically - to the 911 collapse of the Twin Towers in New York, distract us from the looming crisis of climate change and loss of biodiversity - far more crucial to the future of life on this planet, and vastly more real and threatening to all life on earth. The Global threat of Climate Change is kept - intentionally - just out of the frame by those with the wealth and power to shape the media and public policy for their own ends. With reference to our Unitarian Universalist 7th Principle: "….Respect for the interdependent web of all life", Rob throws out a challenge. What can we Unitarians do about this? He introduces us to three possibilities for action: Quietism, Activism and a middle path - Voluntarism.

The Flower Communion of Norbert Čapek

We Unitarians celebrate our diversity this Easter Sunday in our annual Flower Communion, held against a backdrop of rising xenophobia within Australia - by Neo Nazis - and also abroad. Ironically - terrorists in Sri Lanka were, on this very day, also seeking to homogenise their society by bombing Sri Lankan Christians attending Easter church services and hotels where tourists were being targeted. The Flower Communion was first held by Unitarian minister, Norbert Čapek in Prague, Czechoslovakia in June 1923. Each person would bring a flower to the church. In today's Flower Communion - our children gathered up all our flowers which were then placed in a large central vase and redistributed by each of us to another during the service so that we, each took home a different flower from the one we brought. This Flower Communion symbolises the uniqueness of each individual, and celebrates our coming together in communion to share and celebrate our uniqueness and diversity.
In 1942, Norbert Čapek was charged with listening to foreign broadcasts, an offence punishable by death. Norbert Čapek was taken to the Dachau concentration camp in 1942, imprisoned, tortured and eventually gassed late in 1942 - a Unitarian martyr who left the Flower Communion to us as his lasting legacy.