THE BELOVED

Towards a Unitarian Universalist Language of Reverence

Erik William Resly

When Carolyn McDade approached her piano to prayerfully compose “Spirit of Life,”

she could hardly have anticipated that her refrain would become the de facto anthem of Unitarian

Universalism. “No other song, no other prayer, no other piece of liturgy is so well known and

loved.”1 McDade had not intended such repute. “Spirit of Life” grew out of her activist fatigue at

a particularly personal and vulnerable moment in her work for Central American solidarity in the

early 1980s. Out of the depths of despair, McDade summoned the presence of the divine. Hers

was a devotional petition for liberating strength:

Spirit of Life, come unto me. Sing in my heart all the stirrings of compassion. Blow in the wind, rise in the sea; Move in the hand, giving life the shape of justice. Roots hold me close; wings set me free; Spirit of Life, come to me, come to me.2

In six short lines, McDade managed to capture the contemporary Unitarian Universalist

imagination in all of its promise and in all of its paradox. Her hymnic prayer yearns for an

intimate experience of the divine, yet it addresses its apostrophe to a curiously abstract and

diffuse presence: the Spirit of Life. That epithet, so beloved in Unitarian Universalist circles,

evokes an image of the holy that indwells in creation, but in a rather impersonal way. It remains

amorphous, hard to pin down, and therefore difficult to engage in meaningful, heartfelt

relationship the way I would a companion or a lover. The Spirit of Life might endow me with a

rush of courage in times of fear, but it won’t take my hand. When I muster the strength to push

through, it is unlikely that the Spirit of Life will let out a deep sigh of relief. As much as I might

try, I struggle to form a close attachment to anything imagined as a “spirit.” In my devotional

life, by contrast, intimacy defines my relationship with the sacred.

1 French, Carolyn McDade’s Spirit of Life, 2007. 2 Reprinted in: French, Carolyn McDade’s Spirit of Life, 2007. See also: UUA, Singing the Living Tradition, #123.

What quality of spiritual connection might a more personal language of reverence

describe, or even create? What might it accomplish? In this paper, I introduce a new religious

moniker to the contemporary linguistic landscape of Unitarian Universalism. I argue that the

impulse towards divine immanence and personality in the appellation “The Beloved” provides

Unitarian Universalists with a language of reverence that holds profound devotional and

liberationist potential.

I proceed in four steps. The first section of the paper discloses the discursive power

enfolded within any description of the divine. It then demonstrates how Unitarian Universalism

presently lacks a formal language of reverence yet relies on a functional dialect that envisages

the holy as a “benevolent force.” The second section turns back to mid-nineteenth century

Massachusetts to resurrect a long forgotten theological current within Unitarian tradition. In so

doing, it supplements the more popular taxonomic axis of divine transcendence-immanence with

that of divine impersonality-personality. The third section identifies the impulse towards divine

immanence and personality in both liberal and liberation theologies alike. It shows how

formative voices in both traditions privilege this theological approach for different reasons:

liberals often stress its devotional advantage, while liberationists frequently highlight its

emancipatory promise. In the fourth and final section, I propose the reverential epithet “The

Beloved” as a viable and valuable description for Unitarian Universalists of an immanent and

personal experience of divinity. I conclude by raising and addressing possible concerns that this

language of reverence might spawn.

1. TALKING ABOUT GOD

It matters how we choose to describe the divine. In her prayerful petition, McDade

appeals to a presence that she terms the “Spirit of Life.” Other names, like “God” or “the Lord,”

similarly point to that which exceeds all naming. McDade presumably avoided these appellations

in favor of an image that better encapsulated her cognitive and affective understanding of that

which she so desperately sought to summon. Hers was a deeply personal decision that over time

has gained considerable influence and reach. What is at stake in how we talk about mystery?

Gail Ramshaw coins the phrase “liturgical language” to describe those words employed

by a religious community in the corporate enactment of their faith. When a practicing Catholic

attends Sunday mass, for example, she not only hears, but also actively participates, in the use of

liturgical language. At the very outset of the service, for example, she responds to the priest’s

greeting by crossing herself in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Throughout the mass, she returns to these, and other, expressions of reverence. They structure

her worship experience and inform the way she understands her faith.

In categorizing these rhetorical habits as liturgical language, Ramshaw alerts us to their

symbolic nature. God-talk is necessarily metaphorical. No human word can fully contain or

wholly exhaust that which lies beyond human cognition. To name the divine is to merely point

towards it. Still, religious communities rely on the symbolism of liturgical language because it

“contains many layers of meaning simultaneously.”3 Religious metaphor can be interpreted in

different ways and accessed from different points of view.

To counterbalance this hermeneutical freedom and avoid theological anarchy, faith

traditions leverage the second aspect of liturgical language: its social currency. Ramshaw 3 Ibid, 8.

observes how “[o]ne way or another, a canon of words will be approved for corporate worship

and will constitute the liturgical language of that community.”4 Invoking the divine as Subduer5

would seem foreign to Catholic audiences, but it is actually quite common in Muslim circles.

The uniqueness of each religious community is premised on and perpetuated by concrete

decisions about liturgical language. These choices cycle over time and throughout the year.

According to Ramshaw, the “whole body of liturgical language is less like an index, a list of

words in alphabetical order, and more like a tree, with some words as essential as the trunk, and

others as seasonal as autumn colors or as short-lived as that one single leaf.”6

The words circulating in religious communities hold discursive power. Liturgical

language is not neutral. It shapes the theological tools for making meaning and structures the

theological space for being together in community. Liturgical language thus carries great

promise and great peril. Feminist theology has poignantly and provocatively illustrated the high

stakes of such an enterprise. Since religion fulfills “deep psychic needs,” Carol Christ observes,

its symbols and rituals communicate implicit assumptions about human worth and dignity.7

Consequently, liturgical languages that privilege “a male God create ‘moods’ and ‘motivations’

that keep women in a state of psychological dependence on men and male authority.”8 Masculine

symbols legitimate male-dominated social structures as well. Mary Daly insists that “[i]f God in

‘his’ heaven is a father ruling ‘his’ people, then it is in the ‘nature’ of things according to divine

plan and the order of the universe that society be male-dominated.”9 To dismiss liturgical

4 Ibid, 5. 5 Translated from the Arabic, Al-Qahhār. 6 Ramshaw, Liturgical Language, 6. 7 Christ, Womanspirit Rising, 274. 8 Ibid, 275. 9 Daly, Beyond God the Father, 13.

language as mere poetics is to ignore the profound influence that religious symbols have on

personal experience and social structures.

Unitarian Universalism showcases many images but formally commits itself to none.

“Bring many names,” we sing.10 Unitarian Universalists welcome religious pluralism and

achieve theological consensus locally, if at all. For example, the members of First Parish in

Milton (Massachusetts) underwent a rigorous process of renewing their covenant while I served

the congregation as intern minister. They eventually voted on a revised version that replaced the

reference to Jesus with mention of the “God of limitless love in whom we are one.” Few would

question the ‘religious’ quality of this liturgical language, and it functioned, as Ramshaw would

have it, as a socially constructed symbol easily woven into “corporate praise and prayer.”11

The same cannot be said, however, of the covenant that binds congregations together on a

national scale. William G. Sinkford, former president of the Unitarian Universalist Association

(UUA), made this observation almost a decade ago in his reflection on Unitarian Universalism’s

“language of reverence,” or lack thereof. Mounting the pulpit at First Jefferson Unitarian

Universalist Church in January 2003, Sinkford opened with a confession: “I realized that we

have in our Principles an affirmation of our faith that uses not one single piece of religious

language. Not even one word that would be considered traditionally religious.”12

Sinkford admitted that this rhetorical anemia poses serious challenges and worrisome

concerns. He wondered “whether this kind of language can adequately capture who we are and

what we’re about.”13 Beyond strengthening our sense of identity as a denomination, Sinkford felt

that a shared language of reverence would deepen devotional practice: “I would like to see us

10 UUA, Singing the Living Tradition, #23. 11 Ramshaw, Liturgical Language, 5 12 Grodzins, A Language of Reverence, 2. Italics his. 13 Ibid, 2

become better acquainted with the depths, both so that we are more grounded in our personal

faith, and so that we can effectively communicate that faith – and what we believe it demands of

us – to others.”14 In helping Unitarian Universalists to discern social responsibility, a language of

reverence would also empower activists to explore the “ability of humans to shape and frame our

world.”15 Interestingly, most critics did not take issue with Sinkford’s analysis. It was not the

summons but the solution that concerned Unitarian Universalists at the time.

Unitarian Universalism may lack a formally sanctioned liturgical language, but it seems

to display a functional one. In a 1987 survey conducted by the Unitarian Universalist

Association, only four percent of Unitarian Universalist respondents described the divine in

terms of a “supernatural being who reveals himself in human experience and history.”16 By

contrast, over three fourths of those surveyed referred to the divine as the “ground of all being”

or “some natural processes.” I am convinced that these unspoken yet pervasive theological

commitments persist to this day. I recently asked a fellow seminarian about her exposure to God-

talk within Unitarian Universalist congregations. She offered up the phrase “benevolent force” as

a term she frequently hears applied or alluded to in the religious circles she frequents.17

Mark Morrison-Reed initially described this same rhetorical impulse as “neo-deist,”

although he later dropped that term from his own vocabulary.18 Nevertheless, the thrust of his

observations remains compelling and, in my experience, accurate. He submits that most

Unitarian Universalists “don’t believe in a personal God…At most we will cede that the Divine,

being synonymous with the natural order, works in and through us.”19 Morrison-Reed ties this

14 Ibid, 4 15 Ibid, 5 16 Gilbert, The Prophetic Imperative, 75 17 She attended a mid-sized urban church before joining a small fellowship-style congregation during college. She now serves a self-identified Christian Unitarian community. 18 Morrison-Reed, “Dragged Kicking and Screaming into Heaven,” 2008 19 Morrison-Reed, “Dragged Kicking and Screaming into Heaven,” 2009

prevailing language of reverence to the religious culture out of which it originates and which it in

turn fosters: “Our God is more abstract and less personal, more a symbol and less a felt presence,

more in our heads and less in our hearts, an idea we argue about rather than an intuition we rely

upon.”20

Despite his academic acumen, Morrison-Reed struggles to connect to this theological

brand of cosmic formlessness. I suspect he is not alone. Morrison-Reed confesses that “UU

abstractions of God simply don't meet my emotional needs or take me to that sacred place.”21 He

yearns for a God who drags the last, unrepentant sinner into heaven – a God who “talks to you

when you are in doubt, rejoices with you when times are good, or carries you through life’s

trials.”22 Unfortunately, Morrison-Reed finds little room for this language of reverence in

Unitarian Universalism today. His experience begs the questions: Is there precedent for this type

of divinity within our heritage? Does Unitarian Universalism have a historical as well as pastoral

responsibility to make space for Morrison-Reed’s God?

In the following sections, I answer these two questions with a resounding yes. Out of

profound respect for Unitarian Universalism’s investment in non-dogmatic religion, I would

never want to impose a liturgical language ‘from above.’ It would be inappropriate for the UUA

to mandate one way of describing the divine. However, it is both my hope and my conviction

that the language of reverence advanced in this paper could take hold ‘from below.’ That is to

say, we must not only make space for it, but we should remain open to the possibility that it

could create a sacred space in which Unitarian Universalists of diverse stripes can take spiritual

refuge. Admittedly, it offers a strong counterpoint to the “benevolent force” rhetoric. Still, I

suspect that it will resonate with, or at least creatively challenge, the experiences of many who

20 Ibid. 21 Ibid. 22 Morrison-Reed, “Dragged Kicking and Screaming into Heaven,” 2008

find themselves in that metaphysical camp. In general, I would like to see Unitarian Universalists

achieve greater consensus in our liturgical language and I believe that the way forward ultimately

lies in looking back.

2. REVISITING DIVINE IMMANENCE AND PERSONALITY

The language of reverence that captured Morrison-Reed’s soul represents an oft forgotten

theological current within Unitarian Universalism. Its origins go back at least to the nineteenth

century, specifically to the work and world of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Much as William Ellery

Channing had delivered the theological manifesto for the first wave of Unitarianism in May of

1819, Emerson articulated the Transcendentalist program of Unitarianism’s second generation in

July 1838. Acclaimed by some and harangued by others as “the American apostle of self-

religion,”23 Emerson invested great faith in the active power of the human being to exhibit self-

possession and enact self-determination. He exhorted his ministerial colleagues to risk ignoring

tradition in order to “acquaint men at first hand with Deity.”24 Consequently, Emerson played a

pivotal role in moving Unitarianism away from its roots in the rational supernaturalism of

Channing’s liberal Christianity.

Emerson’s religious shift towards the autonomous and empowered seeker carried

enduring theological implications. In his “Divinity School Address,” which he delivered before a

graduating class of seven and a gaggle of Boston’s most prominent Unitarian scholars, Emerson

emphasizes the spatial immanence of the divine. He opens his discourse with florid images of the

“refulgent summer” in an attempt to poetically illustrate the “indwelling Supreme Spirit” that

23 Dorrien, The Making of American Liberal Theology, 59 24 Emerson, “Divinity School Address,” 1838

saturates the natural world.25 Human nature, in particular, harbors this Spirit in the form of “laws

of the soul.”26 To perceive this “law of laws” is to “awaken[] in the mind a sentiment which we

call the religious sentiment, and which makes our highest happiness.”27 While Emerson does not

deny the eternality of these laws beyond space and time, he is insistent on their ready availability

to humanity through the soul in the throes of everyday life. He challenges his fellow Unitarians

to “live after the infinite Law that is in you, and in company with the infinite Beauty which

heaven and earth reflect to you in all lovely forms.”28

Emerson also emphasizes the temporal immanence of these eternal laws. The divine is

not only present in the world, but, above all, present in the world today. Emerson bemoans the

fact that “[m]en have come to speak of the revelation as somewhat long ago given and done, as if

God were dead.”29 The figure of Jesus, heir to the true race of prophets, refused to silence the

revelatory voice of God. According to Emerson, he “estimated the greatness of man” by boldly

proclaiming that “[t]hrough me, God acts; through me, speaks.”30 True Christianity, thus, does

not seal the divine up in ancient scripture, but rather releases the divine to build up “the

infinitude of man.”31 To this end, Emerson reminds his ministerial colleagues that “[i]t is the

office of a true teacher to show us that God is, not was; that He speaketh, not spake.”32

While Emerson’s impulse towards immanence was noteworthy, it was not new. A decade

earlier, Channing had bequeathed humanity a “likeness to God” that encouraged immediate

“connexion between the Divine and the human mind.”33 Similar to Emerson, and possibly even

25 Ibid. 26 Ibid. 27 Ibid. 28 Ibid. 29 Ibid. 30 Ibid. 31 Ibid. 32 Ibid. 33 Channing, “Likeness to God,” 1828

endorsed by him, Channing argued that “religious instruction should aim chiefly to turn men's

aspirations and efforts to that perfection of the soul, which constitutes it a bright image of

God.”34 The two men differed, however, in their conception of that divinity – not where it was

located, but how it was present. While Emerson defined the divine abstractly as “the individual’s

own soul carried out to perfection,”35 Channing directed his devotion towards an “all-

communicating Parent” whom worshippers praised as “our Father.”36 Emerson would have likely

taken issue with this representation of the divine. Distancing himself from historical

Christianity’s “noxious exaggeration about the person of Jesus,” Emerson firmly held that “the

soul knows no persons.”37 The distinction between Channing and Emerson is at once semantic

and significant. The two languages of reverence evoke, at least for me, markedly different

affective responses.

There seems to be something more at work in the “Divinity School Address” than a shift

towards divine immanence. Henry Ware, Jr. described it as a loss of divine personality. “[T]here

have been those,” and Ware was almost certainly thinking of Emerson, “who hold that the

principles which govern the universe constitute the Deity.”38 Ware brandished such a language of

reverence as un-Christian and inhumane. He attributed its popularity to the machinations of

philosophy, which “steps forth and insists that the soul is to be satisfied with abstractions. As if

human nature were anything without its affections! As if a man were a man without his heart!”39

Ware held potent fears about the resulting sense of cosmic isolation. To depersonalize divinity

indefinitely was to destroy the “relation of man, in his weakness and wants, to a kindred spirit

34 Ibid. 35 Cited in: Dorrien, The Making of American Liberal Theology, 61 36 Channing, “Likeness to God,” 1828 37 Emerson, “Divinity School Address,” 1838 38 Ware, Jr., “The Personality of the Deity,” 1838 39 Ibid.

infinitely ready to aid him.”40 It was to take a little boy away from his mother and insist that he

be satisfied with the idea of her.

Ware countered by championing divine personality. He was careful, though, to avoid

accusations of extreme anthropomorphism. By divine personality, Ware did not intend to make

God’s substance into a person. Rather, he hoped to make God’s nature personal. Ware’s “idea of

personality”41 depicted the divine as “one who thinks, perceives, understands, wills, and acts.”42

Shape and form were less relevant. It was “consciousness, and the power of will and of action”

that mattered.43 In common parlance, the term “personal” often stands in for individual or

singular. We imagine the faithful praying to a personal God in the cloistered confines of their

own room and heart. I cannot imagine that Ware would have reproached such solitary practice,

but he also would not have wanted the concept of personality to be cornered into exclusively

private spaces. The personal God was unabashedly public – the “Father of the universe.”44

Returning to this single moment in Unitarian history reveals at least two axes that define

any language of reverence. The more common axis is that of divine transcendence and

immanence. It asks the theologian to consider where the divine is present. While maintaining

other-worldly coordinates, Emerson moved divinity towards immanence, that is, in the direction

of this-worldliness. He stitched the “law of laws” into the human soul and its natural

surroundings. In so doing, however, Emerson made another wager. He leaped across the second

axis of liturgical language, namely that of divine personality and impersonality. This second axis

measures how the divine is present. Ware accused Emerson, even if indirectly, of replacing the

intimacy of personality with the indifference of abstract principles. Personally, I am not

40 Ibid. 41 Ibid. 42 Ibid. 43 Ibid. 44 Ibid.

convinced that Emerson abandoned personality to quite the same degree that Ware alleges.45 His

“infinite Law” pulsates with virtue and can “uplift and vivify.”46 It is far from cold, though

impersonal in its impartiality. I think it is more accurate to suggest that Emerson initiates, rather

than consummates, the impulse in Unitarian Universalism towards divine impersonality. In this

way, Ware represents the counterpoint, tugging tradition back towards a language of reverence

founded on divine responsiveness to, interaction with, and investment in the trials and triumphs

of creation. The oft forgotten theological current within Unitarian Universalism is this latter

impulse towards divine immanence paired with divine personality.

3. RECLAIMING DIVINE IMMANENCE AND PERSONALITY

To suggest that there is a present pastoral need and a past theological precedent for reclaiming an

immanent and personal conception of the divine is not yet to exhaust the motivation for this

alternative language of reverence. Throughout the nineteenth century, liberal theologians

repeatedly stressed the devotional advantage of divine personality. They felt it evoked an

affective response that was necessary for meaningful religious worship. By the mid-twentieth

century, liberation theologians emphasized the emancipatory advantage of an immanent and

personal divinity. They yearned for divine solidarity amidst the perilous struggle for equal rights

and equal opportunity. These two traditions deserve a fair hearing, as their respective insights

speak directly to the hopes that Sinkford articulated for Unitarian Universalism today.

As suggested, liberal theologians expressed concern that an impersonal divinity could not

command the requisite worshipful attention to maintain healthy and holy religious communities.

45 Of course, Ware never confronts Emerson by name in “The Personality of the Deity,” so his most biting critique may be leveled at other Transcendentalists. 46 Emerson, “Divinity School Address,” 1838

In his treatise on divine personality, Henry Ware, Jr. not only argued for the metaphysical and

biblical limitations of the “set of principles” position, but he addressed its emotional deficiencies

as well. From the vantage point of the devotional life, Ware opined, “the difference between

conformity to a statute and obedience to a father is a difference not to be measured in words, but

to be realized in the experience of the soul.”47 He felt that an impersonal God might evoke

reverence, but it simply could not command worship. Abstract laws do not bring devotees to

their knees, or inspire rousing hymns, or direct heartfelt prayers. They can serve as the object of

praise, but they fail to participate in it. This dynamic of interaction defined the very meaning of

worship for Ware: “It is praise, thanks, honor, and petition, addressed to one who can hear and

reply. If there be no such one – if the government of the world be at the disposal of unconscious

power and self-executing law – then there can be no such thing as worship.”48

Decades later, Unitarian broadchurchman Frederic Henry Hedge similarly probed the

devotional paucity of an impersonal divinity. His foil was not Emerson but the influential critic

Matthew Arnold, who drew literary inspiration from Emerson all the same. To Hedge, Arnold

typified the theological camp that “would have everything rationalized” into “scientific

statements” and “abstract formulae.”49 These, he countered, belonged to science and not to

religion. The latter realm of human experience did not concern “philosophic perceptions” so

much as “sentiment and imagination.”50 Hedge’s reproach to Arnold was more than a taxonomic

issue of accurate categorization, though. To render “philosophic perceptions” religious was to

threaten the very fabric of worship. In contrast with Arnold, who dismissed a loving and thinking

God as “a magnified non-natural man,” Hedge declared its necessity: “The God of our devotion,

47 Ware, Jr., “The Personality of the Deity,” 1838 48 Ibid. 49 Hedge, Personality and Theism, 17 50 Ibid.

if devotion is to have a definite object, must be in some sense human.”51 Hedge reasoned that in

order for devotees to connect with the divine, they had to in some way to identify with it. His

was a “God who sees and hears, and thinks and loves, and pities and approves.”52 Such God-talk,

Hedge admitted, entails anthropomorphisms, “[b]ut I maintain that they are necessary

anthropomorphisms; religion cannot do without them.”53

These two liberal theological voices bear witness to the devotional significance of a

personal divinity. Admittedly, most contemporary readers will balk at the androcentric language

of reverence that Ware and Hedge employ. But one need not reject the type of intimate

relationship they describe on account of the masculine God they acclaim. In fact, some of the

most outspoken voices within the feminist backlash to this brand of sexist God-talk preserved

similar aspects of divine personality even as they re-gendered it. Roman Catholic theologian

Elizabeth Schüssler Fiorenza, for example, contends that “the Goddess of radical feminist

spirituality is not so very different from the God whom Jesus preached and who he called

‘Father.’”54 Divine personality can surface in patriarchal and egalitarian communities alike; in

both cases, it appears to answer a deep human yearning for spiritual relationship.

The rise of liberation theology in the 1960s disclosed yet another advantage of an

immanent and personal liturgical language: its capacity for political transformation. The

turbulence and radicalism of the mid-twentieth century served as a fertile breeding ground for

these theologies, which challenged racial injustice and the economic status quo. This newfound

cultural consciousness did not emerge ex nihilo, however. Ware, in fact, had gestured towards

the precarious social implications of Emerson’s “set of principles” a century before, insisting that

51 Ibid, 18 52 Ibid, 18 53 Ibid 54 Christ & Plaskow, Womanspirit Rising, 138

an impersonal God cannot uphold human responsibility: “the idea of responsibility implies

someone to whom we are responsible, and who has a right to treat us according to our fidelity.”55

Liberation theologians built upon this premise by radicalizing the meaning of fidelity. It was not

sufficient, they argued, to merely believe in the Kingdom of God; one was responsible for

actively working towards it in this life. The divine participates in that process.

I have chosen three liberationist theologians, each working in a different social context,

to illustrate the appeal of divine personality across regional, cultural, and gender divides. I begin

with James Cone, an African American theologian affiliated with the African Methodist

Episcopal church, who was one of the first and most formative voices to leverage Christian

theology in the fight for Black Power. Cone mediated between anti-Christian advocates of Black

Power and practicing Christians who emphasized love to the point of propagating Christianity as

the oppressor’s religion. The balance Cone struck was that of reconciliation: “Christianity is not

alien to Black Power; it is Black Power.”56

At the heart of this theo-political fusion looms the figure of Jesus Christ. Drawing on the

Christocentrism of Karl Barth, Cone insisted that Jesus Christ functions as the “special disclosure

of God to man, revealing who God is and what his purpose for man is.”57 In the perseverance and

passion of Jesus, who lived in solidarity with the oppressed right through his crucifixion and

subsequent resurrection, God is revealed as an immanent divinity invested in the human struggle

for justice. The New Testament depicts a God who descends “into the very depths of human

existence for the sole purpose of striking off the chains of slavery, thereby freeing man from

ungodly principalities and powers that hinder his relationship with God.”58 The theological

55 Ware, Jr., “The Personality of the Deity,” 1838 56 Cone, Black Theology & Black Power, 38 57 Ibid, 34 58 Ibid, 35

imagery that Cone encountered in Christian scripture bears little resemblance to the abstract

indifference of Emerson’s “law of laws.”

Cone refused, though, to confine Jesus to the pages of ancient texts. Like Emerson, Cone

conceived of divine immanence in both spatial and temporal terms. He turned to Christ as “our

contemporary.”59 Unlike Emerson, Cone described the divine as a personal power that takes

sides, picks fights, and struggles in the midst of misery and humiliation. Christ resides “where

the oppressed are and continues his work of liberation there.”60 Cone invented a language of

reverence to depict this divine activism: “Christ is black, baby.”61 It appears that black liberation

discovered a God with whom it could identify in its march towards emancipation, much as

Hedge felt devotionally sustained by a conception of divinity that was “in some sense human.”

Gustavo Gutierrez led the first wave of vanguard liberationism in the Latin American

context. Writing within the Roman Catholic tradition, Gutierrez tapped the Church’s post-

Vatican II social teaching and took up the theological fight against poverty. His weapons were

biblical and his God near. While Cone rooted himself in the New Testament, Gutierrez plumbed

the Hebrew Bible for clues about Yahweh’s shekinah, or divine indwelling in history. One

particular passage caught his attention: “the theophany in the storm on the mountain does not

keep Moses from speaking frankly to Yahweh and experiencing Yahweh’s intimate presence.”62

The biblical God, Gutierrez concluded, seeks communion with creation by coming to the people.

That God of scripture is still alive today. Gutierrez witnessed firsthand how “the process of

59 Ibid, 38 60 Ibid. 61 Ibid, 69 62 Nickoloff, Gustavo Gutierrez, 133

liberation that is now going on in Latin America is pregnant with new forms of closeness to the

God of life and to the poor in their situation of death.”63

Gutierrez’ penchant for divine personality is evident not only in his theology of God, but

also in his theology of evil. While Emerson exhorted Unitarians to sever the soul from its

connection to persons, Gutierrez judged such a detached soul to be sinful. Individuals commit a

sin, he reckoned, when they break off their “friendship” with God and other human beings.64

Such disconnection forms “the ultimate root of all injustice and all division among human

beings.”65 While Emerson and Gutierrez would likely agree on the moral duties befalling social

relationships, Gutierrez refused to separate the social from the sacred. Alienation from either

results in “an interior, personal fracture.”66 The human being cannot achieve wholeness until it

restores a personal relationship with both. Hence, the struggle for justice is intimately bound up

with reconciliation: “[t]he entire process of liberation is directed toward communion” – among

humans, with the divine.67

As an important complement and counterpoint to Cone’s black Christ and Gutierrez’

biblical God of communion, Kwok Pui-lan applies a postcolonial feminist critique to the

traditional theological trappings of Christianity. She asks: “How is it possible for the formerly

colonized, oppressed, subjugated subaltern to transform the symbol of Christ – a symbol that has

been used to justify colonization and domination – into a symbol that affirms life, dignity, and

freedom?”68 After all, the image of Jesus introduced by white missionaries to the Third World

mimetically resembled the colonizers themselves, replete with blue eyes and a straight nose.

63 Ibid, 219 64 Ibid, 231 65 Ibid. 66 Ibid, 232 67 Ibid, 234 68 Kwok, Postcolonial Imagination and Feminist Theology, 168

Against the backdrop of oppression perpetuated by this Aryan ideal, postcolonial feminist

theologians have looked to more contextual depictions of God, often integrating Christianity into

local mythological traditions or diffusing the divine into the natural world. Asian feminist

theologians, Kwok notes, often “have an intimate sense that God is immanent in nature,

sustaining and replenishing creation.”69 It is widely believed that human history and the

cosmological realm are mutually penetrating and reciprocally reinforcing.

Amidst the multivocality of Asian theological discourse, Kwok discerns a trend towards

divine immanence that exhibits unmistakable marks of divine personality. Theologians writing in

the Asian context incline towards a “compassionate God [who] listens to the cries and

supplications of the Asian people, as God listened to the slaves in bondage during Moses’

time.”70 The yearning for such an invested form of divinity derives in large part from the

desperate socio-economic conditions of a people who cannot afford the luxury of an abstract or

impersonal God: “In a continent where many people are struggling to acquire basic necessities

and human dignity, God is often seen as the compassionate one, listening to the people’s cries

and empowering them to face life’s adversities.”71 The divine is not merely an intellectual

postulate, but the very promise of liberation. Subaltern populations access an intimate God who

“brings peace amidst ethnic strife, alienation, and oppression.”72

Kwok shows how gender distinctions inform conceptions of divine personality as well. In

Korea, many Christian women endow Jesus with healing powers typically reserved for the

priestess class. Kwok invokes the Korean word han to describe the deep feeling of hopelessness

and unresolved resentment that many women experience at the hands of patriarchy and

69 Kwok, Asian Feminist Theology, 74-75 70 Ibid, 77 71 Ibid, 66 72 Ibid.

persecution. Traditionally, when riddled with han, Korean women would seek out a spiritual

salve available through lower-class female shamans. Over time, some women have ascribed this

role to Jesus, bestowing him with the title “priest of han.”73 As immanently accessible as

Emerson’s “infinite Law,” yet strikingly more responsive, the divine becomes a “shaman who

consoles the broken-hearted, heals the afflicted and restores wholeness through communication

with the spirits.”74

Whether immanent or transcendent, personal or impersonal, all depictions of the divine

are of course just that: sketchy rhetorical paintings of “a bird in flight.”75 Kwok reminds us that

“[t]he purpose of theology is not to define God, but rather to express a sense of wonder, awe and

grace in the presence of the living power and energy of the divine.”76 Liberal and liberation

theologians of divine personality testify to the devotional and liberationist vitality that results

from intimate relationship with that “living power.” The God that meets them while praying and

joins them in picketing is not only present but participatory – at once their “refuge and

strength.”77

4. TOWARDS A PERSONAL LANGUAGE OF REVERENCE

Unitarian Universalism could reawaken the impulse towards divine personality that lies

dormant within its own heritage. Morrison-Reed has sounded the pastoral call. Ware and Hedge

have expressed the devotional need. Cone, Gutierrez, and Kwok have hinted at the emancipatory

73 Ibid, 88 74 Ibid. 75 Barth, Evangelical Theology, 10 76 Kwok, Asian Feminist Theology, 69 77 Psalm 46:1

potential. The issue is no longer why, but how. What would such a language of reverence sound

like? How could it, in Sinkford’s words, “adequately capture who we are and what we’re about”?

The popular phrase “Spirit of Life” moves us in the right direction. An authentically

Unitarian Universalist liturgical language will have to leave Christological commitments behind.

However we choose to categorize present-day Unitarian Universalism,78 almost all will agree

that Jesus no longer figures prominently in our religious imaginary. Clothing Christ with black

skin or the garb of a han priest would make little sense to Unitarian Universalist communities.

The appellation “Spirit of Life” also proves compelling in its theological shift towards

immanence. Most Unitarian Universalists, in Forrest Church’s experience, refuse to “put this

world down” in favor of the heavenly, believing that other-worldliness “leads us away from our

ethical imperative, from expressing our ultimate concerns in ways that are redemptive in this

world and in our larger neighborhood.”79 A “Spirit of Heaven” would fail this test.

Still, the moniker “Spirit of Life” evokes a qualitatively different affective response than

the image of a divine companion. It is resolvedly non-human, unacquainted with human sweat or

tears. I cannot picture a Spirit leaning over to whisper in a young boy’s ear during prayer, or

offering the downtrodden a shoulder to lean on in times of trial, in large part because I have a

hard time picturing a Spirit at all. It remains a blind force – blind to my mind’s eye and, by

extension, to the eye of my heart. This ambiguity, of course, is not necessarily false from a

metaphysical perspective, but it falls short of depicting divine personality. Ware knew a God

who could sing, Cone a God who would suffer.

78 Some describe Unitarian Universalism as “post-Christian” or “historically Christian.” I prefer the category “Abrahamic,” since the present-day denomination largely retains its Christian ethics and liturgy, yet shares striking theological similarity with progressive Judaism and joins Islam in nurturing a strong social consciousness. 79 Church, The Cathedral of the World, 173

I propose the epithet “The Beloved” as an alternative expression of divinity.

Etymologically, the phrase connotes that which is thoroughly loved. As such, it implies

proximity – a divine presence in relationship, unambiguously immanent in the world. It shares

this sense of connection to creation with the more abstract value of “Love.” Both require

creaturely subjects to make the conceptual principle manifest and meaningful. Unlike “Love,”

however, “The Beloved” entails a level of specificity and definition that allows for true

connection. “The Beloved” is not a diffuse love, nebulously pervading the universe like a

“benevolent force,” but rather a directed love. It is “Love” in some form. It is “Love”

transmitted, received, and actualized. When we speak of the “The Beloved,” we testify to being

in a relationship, bound by love, living ‘religiously’ in the truest sense of that word.80 We are

intimately invested in the divine. We have dropped below our mind into the belly of our heart,

where cries of despair are heard and pleas for companionship granted.

The epithet “The Beloved” conjures a rich affective response because it conveys divine

personality. The title describes an experience of closeness, analogous to the feelings that Ware

and Hedge expressed for a God who hears and replies. We trust in and rely on our “Beloved,”

much as Cone, Gutierrez, and Kwok turned to God as co-sufferer in the face of oppression and

violence. That which we call “The Beloved,” by definition alone, warrants our faithfulness. We

want to praise it in worship and we pledge to defend it through social action. The real benefit of

“The Beloved” in Unitarian Universalist circles is that it describes this intimate human

orientation towards the divine without eclipsing freedom of belief. When we refer to the divine

as “The Beloved,” we are making a confession that we love, not about what we love. A self-

identified UU-Christian may conceptually conceive of the appellation differently than a

80 Etymologically, the word “religion” derives from the Latin “religare,” meaning to bind together.

practicing UU-Pagan. In this way, “The Beloved” embodies a spiritually bold, yet theologically

broad, liturgical language.

Of course, this definitional broadness is also the term’s greatest vulnerability. Human

history is replete with monstrous examples of people wholeheartedly devoting themselves to

dangerous idols. It is not hard to see how “The Beloved” could serve as a substitute for

“Mammon”81 or the autocratic “rule of the strong.”82 To refer to the divine as “The Beloved” is

to say little about who the divine is and how the divine responds. Blessedly, as Ramshaw

suggests, all liturgical language is contextual. It is the faith community that assumes the

responsibility for setting parameters on what “The Beloved” will mean and how it will function.

The epithet “The Beloved” already offers Unitarian Universalists an advantage in this

regard. It implies a reciprocity of love. We certainly hope that our “Beloved” will care for us in

return. The historic testimony of Unitarian Universalism posits precisely this all-loving, or

omniagapic,83 divine reality. Our Unitarian forbearers confessed a love of the divine contingent

on the divine being wholly loving. As Channing noted, “[w]e venerate not the loftiness of God’s

throne, but the equity and goodness in which it is established.”84 Our Universalist precursors

experienced this all-giving love in the divine promise of universal salvation. Articulating the

Universalist position of her time, Olympia Brown described a God who “can never be alienated

or estranged from any; who ever seeks the means for the salvation of the world from sin, and

who will ultimately bring every wandering soul home, reconciled and confirmed in the good.”85

We must, and we can, guard against the perilous misuse of the title “The Beloved.” Unitarian

81 Ballou, Practical Christian Socialism, 156 82 Burleigh, Sacred Causes, 197 83 The coinage is mine, inspired by the distinction that C.S. Lewis draws between four kinds of love: Eros (sexual love), Storge (familial affection), Philia (friendship), and Agape (charity). Of these four, “Agape is the best because it is the kind God has for us and is good in all circumstances.” See: Lewis, Letters, 438. 84 Channing, “Unitarian Christianity,” 1819 85 Brown, “Christian Charity,” 1872

Universalist communities that understand the divine as omniagapic reference a type of spiritual

power vastly different than that of money or political might.

In the depths of desperation, McDade cried out to the “Spirit of Life” in hopes of

summoning the intimate presence of the divine. I want to believe that “The Beloved” answers

such a cry. Not only for her, but for all. Almost three decades after McDade’s musical petition,

Unitarian Universalism finds itself similarly yearning for richer sacred connection. Sinkford

alerted us to the power of a shared language of reverence. This paper has articulated the

devotional and liberationist advantages of a liturgical language premised on divine immanence

and personality. The appellation “The Beloved” satisfies both criteria. Additionally, it

evocatively gives voice to the spiritual experience described by past witnesses and present

practitioners of this faith.

To join in worship of “The Beloved,” to labor for justice alongside “The Beloved,” is to

discern that which is worthy of love and to devote oneself wholeheartedly to it. As James Luther

Adams reminds us, “we become what we love.”86 It is my sincere hope that “The Beloved” will

not only transform our language of reverence, but that it might transform our lives. That it might

reorient our very being-in-this-world, so that some day we might join Sikh poet Bhai Vir Singh

in confessing:

Wherever I look, there is my Beloved: Here in a blade of grass, there – in that big forest.87

86 Adams, On Being Human Religiously, 53 87 Adapted from Singh, Cosmic Symphony, 37

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