Our Theological House:
Eschatology: Are You Ready for the End of Time?

A sermon written to be delivered at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation (Blacksburg, VA), January 14, 2007, by the Reverend Christine Brownlie. This sermon is the fifth in a series called “Our Theological House.” The metaphor of a theological house comes from a series of lectures by the Rev. Rebecca Parker, President of Starr King School for the Ministry in Berkeley California. (Starr King is one of our two Unitarian Universalist seminaries.) You will find a fuller description of Rev. Parker’s thoughts in the first sermon of the series, “Our Theological House: A Tour of the House,” which is on our congregational Web site at this URL.

“Eschatology” … My preaching professor would call this a “five dollar word.” It means ideas about the end of time, or the last days of history, or of existence. It can refer to the end of the universe and everything in it, or to the end of my life, your life and what happens in that moment of ending. Sacred scriptures of all faiths speak to both types of eschatology. When a scripture refers to the end of cosmic time, there is a prediction that a powerful figure — usually male — will come and set off a series of events that will lead to a great battle or the day of judgment, or a time of universal liberation. From ancient times to our times, people have been fascinated by this idea. Look at the popularity of the series of Left Behind books by Timothy Lehay. I recall the bumper stickers I saw when I lived in Texas that said.

“In case of rapture this car will be unoccupied.”

I’ll confess that I loved the bumper sticker that responded,

“In case of rapture, may I have your car.?

We rational UUs aren’t too worried about the sudden appearance of a savior or teacher who comes to earth with a mission of saving us or bringing us to a promised era of peace and wisdom. Our sense of the end time is more likely to be based on worries about global warming, overpopulation, or a massive epidemic. Our Universalist and Unitarian forbears did not seem to be very interested the predications of the end of time either. But they did think about the questions that all people ask about the end of human life, and about what comes next.

Everything that has a beginning, also has an end. This seems obvious to most of us. We experience both beginnings and endings over and over again as we go through life. At some point in our lives, we realize that this cycle of beginning and ending applies to us and to those we love. I wonder if you can remember that moment when you realized that you would someday come to an end, and so would everyone else you knew. I was five or six when this moment came to me. My two younger sisters and I had all contracted measles at the same time, and my poor mother was worn to a frazzle taking care of us. I’m sure that no one said anything about the possibility of death, but somehow the idea took hold and grew in my own mind. I was afraid to say anything to anyone — maybe because I thought that if I said something out loud, it would happen, and I really really really didn’t want that to happen!

What did happen iss that I became fascinated with thoughts about what happens to us after we die. I’d been attending Sunday school for about a year, and I knew about heaven and “the other place,” as we called it. This heaven and other place seemed to be very important. In fact, it seemed that everything else I learned in Sunday school was connected to helping us to get to heaven and avoiding the other place. And for some reason this bothered me … a lot!

I’m not sure why, but from early childhood I always believed that what religion taught us was how to be good people right here on earth, and that whatever happened to us after we died would be OK. Through all the years of my Sunday school and Youth Group experiences, this belief grew stronger and stronger.

Today, as an adult I believe that this life is what is most important. While I’ve read accounts of “near death” experience that describe encounters with beloved family members and angelic guides, I choose to live for this world and for this life. I’m not at all convinced that there is some essence of me that will continue after my physical being ends. Whatever remains of me will be in the memory of those who knew me and cared about me. And I know that there will soon come a day when even that has vanished. None of that bothers me.

This is my own personal eschatology — my belief in what will happen when my time on this earth has ended. I’ve come to this through my own reason and experience. Your personal eschatology may be very different from mine. You may believe in heaven and hell or reincarnation, or something else. You may have communicated with someone who died or had an overwhelming sense of their presence that has led you to believe that in some way or form, they live on. That’s fine, and I would not want to demean your beliefs in any way.

I don’t think it’s overly bold for me to say that most UUs today would agree with my take on this subject. This take on what happens when the end of life arrives is called “realized eschatology.” What this bit of theological jargon means is that if there is a goal in human life to strive for— a life is some sort or paradise, or achieving spiritual perfection, or communion with the divine — it will happen here, on this earth, here and now. As Jesus is reported to have said, “The Kingdom of heaven is among you, it is within you. It is spread out before you. But YOU don’t SEE IT.” Our meditation reading this morning from Richard Jefferies tell us the same thing:

“It is eternity now. I am in the midst of it. It is about me, in the sunshine, I am in it as the butterfly is in the light laden air. Nothing has to come, It is now. Now is eternity, Now is the immortal life.”

This “realized eschatology” could be seen as a new addition to our theological house. I say that because there was a time when most Unitarians — and all Universalists — believed that the human essence (soul ,or whatever you call it) continued on after death.

For the first 150 years of their existence as an American denomination, Universalists believed that after death the soul of every human being was destined for heaven. Some claimed that even the soul of the most wicked person was washed clean by God’s abiding and abundant love and was admitted to paradise as quickly as the soul of the most saintly person we could imagine. Others believed that the soul might need some time for reflection and even penance before it was worthy to stand before the throne of God. But eventually — in God’s good time — through God’s great love, all of creation would be reconciled to God. Heaven would a paradise of peace and love where all would enjoy the presence of God.

As Universalism evolved into a “universal religion” — one that embraces the best teachings and beliefs of every faith — it also embraced a naturalistic understanding of the state of the human soul after death. The teaching was revised, that heaven and hell were divinely ordained places or states of being that were created for eternal reward or punishment. Now the idea was that human beings created heaven and hell in this world; yet another version of realized eschatology.

Our Unitarian forbears also believed in a traditional Christian concept of heaven and hell. The Rev, William Ellery Channing was one of the first Unitarian ministers who attempted to fully develop and explain the unique tenants of Unitarianism. Channing believed in the perfectibility of the individual human soul, and he claimed that our great work as human beings was to work toward this goal of perfection — even though we would never achieve it. In his earliest writings he said that the soul was not naturally immortal. This gift, which is shown to us in the resurrection of Jesus, was given by God. Not every soul would receive this gift. In his later sermons, there is a shift in his thinking. Channing now believed that the universe itself is rational, and that there is a potential for immortality in the human soul, which is rooted in human nature. Those who were steadfast in the pursuit of moral perfection and the development of their talents and gifts, were also developing the traits of the soul that would be accepted into the presence of God where they would know a state of intense bliss. The progress of their soul will continue toward perfection.

But those who lived a life of sin, which Channing defined as “voluntary wrong-doing,” would suffer the wrath of God. Channing said that it was irrational to believe that heaven and hell existed only on this earth, or that we suffer for our sins only during our earthly life. Heaven, Hell, and divine judgment were all real. How we chose to live our lives mattered. A moral God would judge and would inflict punishment. It’s not clear if Channing thought that this punishment would continue for eternity, but he was certain that bad living came at a heavy price.

Today most of us don’t share Channing’s ideas about the afterlife and a God who judges us after our physical death. But we do believe that how we live our lives is important, and that the goal of developing our gifts and talents in the service of other is worth pursuing. We believe that as human beings, it is our responsibility to do all the good we can: not only for the people we love, but for people we’ve never met and will never see. This morning we collected your contribution to our UU Service Committee. I’m certain that not a one of you believes that your generous gift is going to help you get to heaven or save you from the bad place. Your prayer and hope is that your donation will do some good in this life and in this time, and that hope — in and of itself— is enough reward.

I must warn you that this understanding of life, death, and the meaning of it all are very foreign and even baffling to most people. When I explain my personal eschatology to other people, they are stunned. Usually their response is just as stunning to me. “So you think that this is it? This is all there is, no heaven, no hell? Well if I thought that I’d do whatever I wanted. I’d steal and I’d be sexually promiscuous and I’d ENJOY LIFE!!! Because if there’s no heaven or hell, then my life doesn’t mean squat” — or words to that effect.

Does my life — or your life — have meaning because we believe in a promise of something better or worse in some other realm that we will come to after our death? Well, I can’t speak for anyone else, but for me I hope that I will choose the good and true because I want my life and the lives of others to be better today than they were yesterday. And I believe that my small act of kindness or generosity or forgiveness is a bit of light that will inspire someone else in their moment of decision, and that my small light will kindle that bit of light in another person’s heart so that the light of kindness and truth and love will grow now — today — in this world. And that this will make a better world for me, for you, and for other people — even if we never know their names or see their faces.

Today we remember the life and the courage of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He was a committed and faithful Christian. I’m sure that this deep faith led him through trials and challenges and terrors that you and I cannot imagine. His life touched mine — a little white girl growing up in Minnesota, a little girl who watched his actions and heard his words and thought about them. He changed my life, he changed the lives of millions of people, and he continues to do so today. I’ve studied his writings and his speeches, and I can’t recall reading the words “rewards in heaven” in any of them.

I suspect that Dr. King believed in heaven, but I am convinced that what inspired his work during his lifetime was his desire to transform this life and this world from a hell of fear and oppression to something closer to the paradise of love and equality that Jesus envisioned when he spoke of the Kingdom of Heaven.

I know that I will never be as well-known and admired as Dr. King, and that’s just fine. I know that my life and my words will not be studied or celebrated years after my death. That doesn’t bother me. What I hope for my own life is that I will love and live for the good and that what is good in my brief, finite life will offer hope and courage to those who will come after me. Not that I would have them follow in my footsteps, or even look to me as an example, but that my actions might awaken their own inner desire to serve, to create, and to live by their own highest aspirations. I believe that in this way our common human life and our larger world will offer joy, peace, and deep fulfillment to all people.

I will close with these words by the Rev. Mark Morrisson-Reid.

We are all dying, our lives are always moving toward completion. We need to learn to live with death, and to understand that death is not the worst of all events. We need not to fear death, but life – empty lives, loveless lives, lives that do not build upon the gifts that each of us have been given…lives that are like living deaths…lives which never take the time to savor and appreciate…lives in which we never pause to breathe deeply. What we need to fear is not death, but squandering the lives we have been miraculously given.

Let us live in the hope and the challenge of our life-affirming and demanding faith. Let us choose the good not in fear of an eternity of hell, but in love for this life and for all who share it with us as brothers and sisters of the same flesh and blood, the same needs and hopes, the same dreams, and the same vision of a better world here-now.

May it be so?

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