Atlanta Unitarian

  I am 52 years old now, likely at the peak of my career. I work as a teacher, a mentor, an academic. I strive to be a dedicated father, husband, brother, and serve my Fellowship. I have done a decent enough job at these things, yet in some ways, I think I missed the boat or, to use another metaphor, served the wrong master. Much of my life, I have thought about justice, the public good, and the potential for improvements to public policy. This was something that was encouraged by my birth family, by my own inclination, and by my elite college education. I was taught, perhaps in a style adapted and updated from Aristotle, Plato, Thoreau, and Dr. King, to reason about the good society and act in a way to reform my society. Perhaps it is living in a young country, one that not too long ago had racial discrimination written into its laws, that made this task seem urgent and proximate. But I have lived and worked long enough, committed myself to justice work long enough, to reali...

Life is short, art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgment difficult. -Hippocrates ... or in modern terms... Life is what happens while you are busy making other plans. -John Lennon

One of my life-long struggles is finding appropriate and meaningful channels for my desire to serve. I feel passion in my heart, I envision various and wonderful possibilities in my head, but when my hands get to the work of service, I find myself stymied, bored, frustrated, and unsatisfied. One of the problems is that the reach of my mind (same as any educated person's mind) is so much greater than my capacity to influence. I see the importance of addressing global warming, but I feel powerless to make a difference. I've reduced my carbon footprint and signed various petitions online, watched "Inconvenient Truth," followed the issue in the news. But what more can I do, as one individual with no particular power or influence? There are so many issues I care about so deeply. I feel so helpless to make a difference. What I do almost always feels like a drop in the bucket. Just off the top of my head, I am concerned about torture and human rights, ending the Iraq w...

It's not a new idea, and it's not an original idea, but I'm very enamoured with this idea that has been rekindled in me recently thanks to the help of a dear friend. The idea is to find our vocation or calling by seeking where our personal gifts happen to meet the worlds' needs. It's a balancing act - looking outside to see what the world is needing, but also looking inside to see what it is you have within you that is inherently generous. I like this idea so much because it's a concept of service that is based on abundance rather than guilt or obligation. I think there is a natural abundance of the spirit that overflows and creates great gifts if we cultivate it. It's very important that we pay attention to the world, that we see it clearly, so we can see the great needs that are out there to be met. We do have an obligation to see the world clearly and not in a self-serving way. But we serve the world best by listening to our own inner needs for self-...