Ken Burns, the historian and filmmaker, gave the commencement address for Brandeis University this spring. It is a remarkable address and offers warnings to us about our increasingly divided country and world.

I was especially struck when he quoted I.F. Stone who suggested that “history is tragedy, not melodrama.” Burns then elaborates: “In melodrama all villains are villainous, and all heroes are perfectly virtuous, but life is not like that.”

These sentiments resonated with so much of what is going on in our world, in our country, in the UUA, and in our congregation. In the midst of disagreements, conflict, and competing world views, we are prone to fortify our positions, to minimize other positions or ideas and, far too often, villainize each other. Too often, I fear, we all stumble into those behaviors.

As we approach our General Assembly meetings in mid June, online chatter has seen an increase in personal attacks on our elected UUA Board and President, the promulgation of conspiracy theories (for example, that the meetings are online only because of the fear of controversy at in-person meetings), and dire pronouncements of the collapse of our denomination.

A small group of UUs – both ministers and lay people – recently created a letter asking us all to be more conscious of that tendency toward melodrama, with villainous villains and perfect heroes. They then made a plea to restore civility to our interactions with each other. It was published on Sunday, with an invitation to ministers and lay people to sign on. As I write this on Tuesday, there are just under 600 signatures.

In addition to encouraging civility in our words and actions, they ask that:
– UUs not dismiss genuine, honest, respectful, and faithful dialogue;
– UUs not cast all of those with concerns about the proposed Article II into the same boat and insult them based on the slanderous activity of some.

And they offer this final plea to us all: This is the time for all UUs to be open and mindful about the complexity of what is before us. We invite us all to pause, listen, and reflect. We honor that we are a faith with deep theological differences among us, all of which cannot be reflected in any one document.

I have signed the letter and invite you to read it and take the message to heart. Sign it if you feel moved to do so. In times of stress and fear such as the times we are living through, we owe it to each other and ourselves to reclaim kindness and civility in our interactions with one another, and to live it out day by day.

I leave you with this song: “Kinder” by Copper Wimmin, one that is in regular rotation in my playlist of beloved songs. May it be a theme song for us all.