These are trying times. It doesn’t matter if you are liberal or conservative—a Democrat or a Republican—a DACA supporter or a southern border wall builder— our society is deeply divided on most issues. I’ve heard some folks take a historical view and say “it’s been worse.” I take little comfort in that perspective. It feels bad now, and thoughts about the past cannot give me optimism about today or tomorrow. I know things will change, but when? When? Isn’t counting on (hoping?) that things will change is a form of avoidance?

I see people coping as best they can, and many are giving up in their own way. They may deny the harm being done, or self-medicate to an altered state, or spew dismal rhetoric about the injustices to everyone within ear-shot. Too many are being worn down or reaching a state of “past caring” (a term I learned from my grandmother). There is a temptation to abandon your beliefs and just try to get by—taking the easiest path available. This giving up and turning away is captured in a great Christian concept called apostasy. Without getting too theological, apostasy means a willful falling away from, or rebellion against truth. For Christians, this truth is the Christian truth. For Unitarian Universalists, it means the truth that you hold and has sustained you. What truth do you hold that is slipping away? Seeing peace and justice in your lifetime? A universal belief in climate change? Welcoming immigrants? Nuclear disarmament? Reasonable gun regulation?

The value in looking backwards to see other epochs of human history, for me, is not to see that things used to be worse. The value is in how our ancestors HANDLED the tough times. What history teaches me is that the people who made it through the conflicts, wars, famines, and disasters were people who kept their faith. Certainly, many succumbed to the temptation of apostasy and lost their direction—gave up and quit. But those who survived can teach us the value of how to survive. The book “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl is receiving renewed interest. Frankl wrote of his experiences of surviving Nazi concentration camps in WWII. A somber recount of a past “worse” time for sure, but Frankl leaves us a message of perseverance and holding onto a meaning in your life. What is your life’s meaning? What is your bigger calling? Do you see that calling as requiring your sustained dedication and practice?

This is what the past can teach us: change only comes from those things which you repeatedly practice. I recently heard a Zen teacher say it this way:
“You sustain what you value.
You value what you hold sacred.”

Repeated practice is how you learn a foreign language, learn to play an instrument, lose weight, work through addiction, benefit from meditation, or learn a new skill. Change for the good only comes with repetitions and sustained practice. What do you sustain? Does that inform you about what you hold sacred? Or is your life filled with busyness that doesn’t seem to have any sacredness?
The temptation to give up—the temptation of apostasy—is ever present. It calls us to take the easy path—to give up—to give in—to shut up—to go along with the majority. Overcoming temptation can seem like a daily struggle—but that’s the struggle that a meaningful life makes every day—if not every moment.

Frankl made an addendum to his book in 1984: he added a concept called “tragic optimism.” He wrote “In other words, what matters is to make the best of any given situation. … hence the reason I speak of a tragic optimism … an optimism in the face of tragedy and in view of the human potential which at its best always allows for: (1) turning suffering into a human achievement and accomplishment; (2) deriving from guilt the opportunity to change oneself for the better; and (3) deriving from life’s transitoriness an incentive to take responsible action.”
These are trying times. My prayer is that you regularly practice your avoidance of temptations of apostasy. The only thing that is in the balance is the fate of the world. …….in shared ministry………Russ