FROM THE MINISTERS Rev. Kelly Crocker, Co-Senior Minister
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t's easy to find stories of generosity. It's the photo on Facebook from the coffee drive-thru window with a "pay it forward" latte. It's a six o'clock news story about a local child who made blankets for the animal shelter. Sometimes, the story is on a grander scale—the funding for cancer research or paying off the mortgage for a family at risk of becoming houseless. Generosity, it seems, is what makes for feel-good stories.
mountains. He was hungry, and she was happy to share her food. But as she opened her bag, the man saw the stone and he knew with this stone he would be able to eat all his favorite foods. His mouth watered imagining all the incredible flavors, all the ways his life would be filled with so much goodness. “Instead of the food,” he asked, “can I have that stone?” The woman looked at him: “of course.” And just like that, it was his. The man was so happy! He ran quickly away, afraid she would change her mind. A few days later, however the man appeared again, carrying the stone in his hands. “Take it back” he said. “Instead, I hope you can give me something even more precious than this precious stone. I hope you can give me whatever it is within you that made it so easy for you, when I asked, to just give it away.”
We need these stories. In a world where wars rage on, where loneliness is an epidemic, where bitter ideology tears us from each other, where fear makes us hoard resources, we need the simple and grand scale of generosity. But more than stories, we need the spirit of generosity--to give without feeling entitled to a return on our investment. It is no coincidence that nearly every major spiritual tradition promotes a life of generosity because, at a fundamental level, we understand that we need each other. As Unitarian Universalists, generosity challenges us not only to give from a place of abundance, In an essay on generosity, author Marilynne Rob- but to take a kinder and more compassionate apinson attempted to define the term only to con- proach in a harsh world. We are trying to learn clude that it “must be not to destroy. On a large how it is – when we are asked – to trust, to love, scale, what is not to be destroyed includes the to give of ourselves, to share our blessings, that peace of those who are deprived and exploited. It we can say an easy and great yes, to each other, includes the health of individuals and populations to ourselves, to this life we share. As the spoken whose share of the earth’s good things is wast- word poet Andrea Gibson writes: ed or corrupted because of gross inequalities of “I know most people try hard wealth, and also the health of the earth itself. It to do good and find out too late includes the integrity of any culture, especially our they should have tried softer.” own, which is presently afflicted with a crude and pointless cynicism, to the detriment of the whole May the spirit of generosity soften our hearts and world.” Generosity, it seems, isn’t just found in spread like wildfire in this hardened world.◊ giving but also an act of preserving. There is a story of a wise woman who travelled all through the mountains. One day, she found a precious stone in a stream. She was so happy, and grateful. It could change her life. The next day she met a man traveling just like her through the SEPTEMBER 2023 NOVEMBER 2023
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