Browse Items (7 total)

In this final sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman finishes with the prophet's dream of lion and lamb lying down together. Thurman says that those who dream of utopia and community often make them on the basis of discrimination – there are insiders and there are outsiders who stand as threat to community. For this reason, Thurman says that the dream of community must extend to all living things, a dream in which no manifestation of life will be a threat. In this sermon, Thurman…

In this sixth sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman explores the ideas that influence our search for community. There is the idea that the meaning of human life is to be found beyond humanity, in the God that both moves in history and transcends history. Thurman says that this idea inspires our belief in universal order and the infinite worth of human beings. This is the foundation of democracy and our dreams of utopia, but Thurman says that this belief is disintegrating in society.…

In this fifth sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman reads from several pieces, each pertaining to the realities of war and the nuclear arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. Thurman says that, for the first time in human history, a single man could extinguish the entire human race, even accidentally. Religious tradition has always kept alive the possibility that, even with great destruction, some human remnant would pick up the pieces and continue the redemptive…

In this fourth sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman talks about the notion of the Self. At some point in our development, we begin to discriminate between ourselves and the rest of the world. When we build the bounds of Self, we also meet the social community in which our Self is embedded. We have a deep, original need for the fulfillment of community. To develop the Self in community is to reclaim this sense of inner wholeness in which we find ourselves as a part of the whole of…

In this third sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman illustrates what it means to be a living creature. According to Thurman, life is always unfolding towards the fulfillment of community. Looking at human beings, Thurman sees that there is an organic harmony in our bodies, each organ working towards biological community. The mind, however, has been separated from this harmony, and must learn again how to be at home in the body. By this, both mind and body together can fulfill the…

In this second sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman delves deeper into innocence. We are born innocent, with a sense of inner wholeness; however we eventually lose this innocence and find ourselves between our highest ideals and the reality of our lives. This tension between who we are and who we strive to be creates an inner need for balance. Thurman says that this is the nature and fate of human beings: to seek the redemption of wholeness after this loss of innocence. In this…

In this first sermon on "Community and the Will of God," Thurman describes community as a structure and a goal that is inherent in life. Everything is striving to fulfill itself in community. This movement towards harmony is what binds and interconnects the lives and actions of living beings. With this intertwining comes the reality of personal responsibility. To know that we are connected to others in this way is to lose a degree of innocence. Drawing on the story of the Garden of Eden, Thurman…