Our Search for Meaning

Rev. Peter A. Friedrichs

January 4, 2009

Those of you of a certain age will remember the lyrics to an old Burt Bacharach song that's been running through my head this week: "What's it all about, Alfie? Is it just for the moment we live? What's it all about, when you sort it out Alfie? Are we meant to take more than we give?" Whether you recall the 1966 version starring Michael Caine or the more recent remake starring Jude Law, "Alfie" tells the story of a man living life like a stone skimming across the surface of a lake. He skips from woman to woman in a series of empty relationships, living just for the moment, focused only on his own pleasure. And he's happy. For a while. Until something happens that shows him there is another way to live.

What's it all about? That's a good question, isn't it? Perhaps it's the most pressing question we face as human beings. We can phrase it in a number of ways: Why are we here? What is our purpose in life? What gives our life meaning? You can probably come up with a few of your own. I'm sure that, at one time or another, we've all asked ourselves some variation on this question about the meaning of our existence. That's why I thought I would kick off this sermon series that I'm calling "Big Question Sunday" with perhaps the biggest question of all.

Before I dive in, let me offer up a few disclaimers. First, for those of you who actually think I have "the answer" to this existential question, or to any of the other "Big Questions" I'll be addressing in the coming months, I'm sorry to say that you're going to be disappointed. I am not the proverbial guru sitting on a mountaintop, prepared to dispense the wisdom of the ages and the secret to life. I do not hold myself out as having some special knowledge about these things that has remained hidden throughout history, nor have I received any revelations from a divine source. My intention today, and with each "Big Question" that we encounter, is simply to share my own thoughts and reflections, and to open up a dialogue with you. Because I know that you have just as many "answers" to these questions as I do. And this church is a place where we are committed to searching for truth and meaning. So I'd like you to accept my remarks as an invitation. An invitation to talk with me and to talk with each other about your own perspectives and experiences, and how they relate to these topics. I'll put in a plug here for our Small Group Ministry program, because these small groups provide the perfect forum for engaging with each other on these topics. If you want to find out more about Small Groups, look for folks with name tags that say "I love my small group" after the service, and come to our service on Sunday, January 25th. I plan to write a discussion topic for use in our small groups for each "Big Question" that we will be exploring.

And this is truly an exploration. I hope that we're embarking on a journey together, a journey of self-discovery and spiritual growth. It's a voyage that will continue, I hope, for the rest of our lives. I will confess a somewhat selfish motive to these "Big Question" Sundays: they give me an opportunity to develop my own sense of self, my own theology, to dig down and discover what it is that I believe about the spiritual aspects of my life. I'm grateful that, as your minister, you encourage me to think about these things and to offer my thoughts to you. By sharing my discoveries with you, perhaps I will encourage you to venture forth on your own expedition.

Finally, I want you to know that I don't intend to try and condense all my understandings about each "Big Question" into a single 20 minute sermon. I suspect that we will delve into these topics, directly and indirectly, time and again over the course of our years together. And I expect that my perspectives and yours will shift and change over time as we learn and grow together. Let's consider these some of our first steps down these paths, knowing that the road is long and that we'll likely encounter many detours along the way. And so, we begin.

The place I start my reflections on the meaning of our lives is to consider the very unlikeliness of our lives in the first place. I've alluded before to the improbability of our existence, which was brought home to me by the remarks of Rev. Forrest Church at an address he gave at last year's General Assembly. Church asked us to consider the likelihood that the one particular egg of our mothers was fertilized by the one particular sperm of our fathers to result in the particular individuals that we are. Then, consider how many particular eggs and particular sperm had to come together to result in our mothers and fathers, grandmothers and grandfathers, down through the generations. The chances of our NOT being here, strictly from this simple biological basis, are staggering. Now add in the verities of life itself, all its dangers and diseases, which our forefathers and mothers faced and survived. Had just one of them succumbed in some past generation, before reaching puberty, you or I would not be here today. And all this is nothing compared to the preposterous chain of events that created the conditions that make life on earth possible, just the right mix of sun and water and air. As Church writes, "The odds against each one of us being here this morning are so mind-staggering that they cannot be computed…Mathematically, our death is a simple inevitability, whereas our life hinges on an almost infinite sequence of perfect accidents."^[1] Even if you're a creationist who believes that the Earth was formed by God only 6,000 years ago and that we all descended from the first couple in the Garden of Eden, it is far more likely that we would not be here than it is that we are.

And yet, here we are. By virtue of our very existence, we've already won the most outlandish of lotteries. Which leads me to the premise of my beliefs about our meaning and purpose in living: each of our lives is a precious gift. No matter how wonderful or wretched, regardless of our health, our wealth, our intelligence or our social standing, each of us has been given a gift of untold value, something that we did not earn of our own accord. While we may disagree over the existence or identity of a "Giver" (supreme or otherwise), our ability to walk and talk, to live and breath, to love and be loved, our very "us-ness" is a gift. And, as such, life, our lives, invite us to consider the responsibilities that a gift imposes upon the receiver.

The first, and perhaps most important rule of gift-receiving is to be thankful, and to express our appreciation for that which we've been given. Although "thank-you" cards have fallen out of fashion, we are nevertheless compelled to offer up our gratitude for any gift that we've received, particularly one of such magnitude. And in order to be truly thankful for a gift, we must accept the gift that's been offered, and not wish that it was something other than what it is. A good receiver does not look around and covet the gifts that others have received. Our lives as they are may not be exactly what we had wanted, and lord knows we're often handed things in our lives that we never would have asked for. Our own lives may be harder, or more complicated, or more uncertain than those of others around us. But that makes them no less miraculous or deserving of our appreciation. One of our human obligations is to cherish the gift of life and to offer up thanks for our being, regardless of our circumstances.

Another rule of gift-receiving is that we are called to put the gift to good use. A gift is not given so that it can be placed on a shelf or stored away in a closet. The giver intends for us to use it up and to wear it out, and to enjoy it as we do. And so it is with the gift of life. The wisdom of the ages tells us that we are to live life abundantly, not to hide our light under a bushel. This is the meaning behind the question asked by the poet Mary Oliver when she writes, "Tell me, what is it that you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" To live our lives fully and abundantly, we must be willing to take chances and to risk failure. To push aside our fears, our regrets and our pain, and to give ourselves over to life with open-hearted commitment.

And thus, a third rule of gift-receiving. Although a gift, by definition, comes with no strings attached, when we are given something of great value we are compelled toward generosity. When we receive something beyond our deserving, we embrace the notion of gift-giving itself, and yearn to become givers ourselves. And so it is with life. This great gift we've been handed, so unearned and without restriction, summons forth from us the urge to give. To give back to the Giver, to the Source, to Life itself. To give to others who share this life with us. As holders of a precious present, we are called to ask ourselves, "What can I give?" "What are my talents and my treasures, and how can they be put to use?" Marge Piercy tells us that "Greek amphoras for wine or oil, Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums. But you know they were made to be used. The pitcher cries for water to carry and a person for work that is real." If we appreciate the gift of our lives fully, we cannot help but feel compelled to become givers, too. Generosity begets generosity, and to receive is to be called to give.

So, is this all that there is to say about the meaning of our lives? That we are to be good gift-receivers? That we are to be grateful? That we must put our gifts to good use? That we are to become generous givers ourselves? I would say that that is quite enough, really. But as they say in the infomercials on television: "Wait! There's more!"

Viktor Frankl, the Nazi concentration camp survivor and psychiatrist whose words you heard earlier this morning, writes that "Man's search for meaning is the primary motivation in his life." And he goes on to say that "This meaning is unique and specific in that it must and can be fulfilled by him alone."^[2] Thus, according to Frankl, every individual has his or her own meaning, his or her own individual purpose to fulfill. There is no discernible global purpose for the universe of humanity, but a meaning for each individual in his or her own life.

Frankl's theory was, of course, heavily influenced by his concentration camp experience. He writes poignantly of his own personal transformation while imprisoned, and of that of other survivors whose inner resources enabled them to overcome brutal physical treatment by their captors. From his experiences, Frankl discovered that everything can be taken from a person but one thing, the freedom to choose one's attitude and approach to any given set of circumstances. He writes that "fundamentally, anyone can, even under such circumstances [of physical deprivation and threat], decide what shall become of him [or her] - mentally and spiritually."^[3] And here is the crux of Frankl's argument: the way in which we accept our fate and all the suffering it entails (because suffering is an essential part of life), shapes and determines the meaning that we bring to life. For Frankl, our lives are a series of tests and challenges, and we find meaning and purpose from the way in which we respond to them. Each circumstance is unique to each of us, and thus Frankl denies any universal concept of the meaning of life. He writes that "what matters is not the meaning of life in general but rather the specific meaning of a person's life at a given moment."^[4] His time as a prisoner of the Nazis taught him that "life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual."^[5]

At one level, Frankl's analysis provides us with a sense of relief. The burden of discovering some overarching meaning of life is lifted from us, and we are granted the freedom to make of our own lives what we can and what we will. It asks us not to pursue some vague notion of meaning that applies to all humankind. It forces us to focus on finding the meaning of our particular lives in our particular circumstances. Frankl's approach, of course, is borne out of the worst of circumstances, a situation that no human being should be forced to endure, and it is responsive to that situation. When we are confronted with a life-threatening situation, we are no doubt faced with specific choices that may mean the difference between life and death. And how we respond to such situations will tell us a lot about who we are and ultimately about the meaning of our lives.

I'll admit to you that I've been enamored of Frankl's conclusions since I first read his work several years ago. His story, and so his theory, is compelling and powerfully rendered. But today I find them too reactive, too situational. (Remember, I warned you that we're on a journey!) Are we not really able to generalize about the purpose of our lives, of all human life beyond our own particular circumstances? Frankl's theory seems to me to exist on a relatively low level of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. You may recall that psychologist Abraham Maslow set up a hierarchy of basic human needs and theorized that until we have satisfied our needs at one level we will not experience needs at the next higher level. Frankl's theory seems borne out of his concentration camp experience, where each day was a struggle for survival, where the basic needs for physical survival and personal safety were paramount. Yet, thankfully, most of us find ourselves in circumstances where these needs are met, and our search for meaning is conducted on a higher plane.

And so for me, and for most of us, the question remains: is there some common purpose, some common meaning that we pursue as a species, and if so, how might we describe it? Is there a single answer to the "why are we here?" question? In our unison reading this morning, we read these words of Annie Dillard: "We are here to abet creation and to witness to it, to notice each other's beautiful face and complex nature, so that creation need not play to an empty house."^[6] To abet and to witness to creation. Notice that Dillard does not invite us to be simple observers, members of an appreciative audience. She calls us to join with the creative forces of the universe, to observe their intricate interplay, and to give testimony to them. To notice and name the sacred, in all its manifestations, and to partner with it in the dance of creation. She encourages us to stand in awe of the powers of the Universe and, with great humility, to act in concert with them. This is the great human purpose of which Annie Dillard writes. Unitarian Universalist minister Rev. Bruce Southworth captured a similar purpose in a phrase he borrowed from the title of a children's book. He tells us that we are here to be "caretakers of wonder."

Proper receivers of the gift of life. Abettors and witnesses to creation. Caretakers of wonder. All of these are compelling visions of our life's purpose, of the very meaning of our lives. Yet still they don't get me all the way there. I'm not sure that I'll ever be able to pin it down, really. And here's what I think, at least today: I think that that's exactly the point. That maybe there's no "there" there. That perhaps our greater purpose and the place we find meaning in our lives is in the very searching itself. That we engage in the journey, using all of our gifts as thinking, feeling, spiritual beings is what, in the end, really matters. How we conduct ourselves along the way - as gift givers and receivers, as caretakers of wonder, as abettors to creation - are all critically important, but what lies at the heart of our quest is our participation on the expedition itself. May we journey forth together in hope, in faith and in love. And then perhaps, just perhaps, we'll discover that, as our closing hymn tells us, to question truly is an answer.

May it be so.

Closing Words:

^[1] Forrest Church, Love and Death, pp 101, 104.
^[2] Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning (4th edition) 105.
^[3] Frankl, 75.
^[4] Frankl, 113.
^[5] Frankl, 85.
^[6] SLT, 420.

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