A
Wrinkle in Time: How Faith Development Dispels the Darkness
a sermon preached by Tony Lorenzen
at First Parish Church in Weston
Sunday, November 26, 2006
I am a firm believer that all religion is based on stories. Our religion is defined by the stories we tell and donÕt tell. Our inner lives, the landscape of our hearts, are mapped out in great part by what stories resonate with our being. We are storytellers and religion is the story we tell that explains ourselves to ourselves, that gives meaning to existence, that helps us figure out how to be and act in this world.
When I was ten years old I read a book that had a profound affect on me at that age and continues to explain my religious world-view. Published in 1962, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine LÕEngle is a tale about the power of love wrapped up in a science fiction story told through the metaphors of religion and literature. It is a story that explains to me why I am religious; why I am a Unitarian Universalist, and defines for me what William Ellery Channing would call the great end in religious instruction. To think I got all that out of a few hours in the Leominster, Massachusetts Public Library.
A Wrinkle in Time is the story of how three children save a famous scientist from the powers of darkness. Dr. Murray, a famous astrophysicist consulted by presidents, disappears while working on a secret project involving intergalactic time travel. Unknown to his family he is dying, a captive of the evil powers of IT on a planet named Camazotz, that has fallen to the powers of darkness. Meg Murray, her little brother Charles Wallace, and MegÕs boyfriend Calvin are called upon to save Dr. Murray by three extraordinary, extra-terrestrial beings that they call Mrs. Who, Mrs. Which, and Mrs. Whatsit. These three characters take the shape of old ladies while on Earth. Once the action moves out among the stars, they reveal their true nature to the children.
Now donÕt be
frightened, loves, Mrs. Whatsit said. Her plump body began to shimmer, to
quiver, to shift. and suddenly before the children was a creature more
beautiful than any Meg had even imaginedÉa marble body something like a horse,
and a head resembling a manÕs, but a man with perfection of dignity and
virtueÉFrom the shoulders slowly a pair of wings unfolded, wings made of
rainbows, of light upon water, of poetry.
Calvin fell to his knees.
ÒNo.Ó
Mrs. Whatsit said. ÒNot to me, Calvin. Never to me. Stand up.[1]
Mrs. Whatsit is very explicit; she is not to be worshiped. That is reserved for God. An unnamed God, but not an unknown God. For those of us familiar with PaulÕs trip to the Areopagus, the one god is familiar. Unitarianism can be boiled down to, stripped down to, the phrase ÒGod is one.Ó
As
much as we might be tempted to set up standards of belief, the first principle
in liberal religious education is creedlessness. Sometimes the temptation is to
put in our theological preference.
As todayÕs call to worship from William Ellery Channing noted, this is
also to be avoided in religious education, as the true end in religious
education is not to instill in others a doctrine or catechism, but to enable
them and ennoble them to find the calling of their own heartÕs spirit.
Mrs. Whatsit and her fellow noble creatures bring the children to meet a character called the Happy Medium in order to take a look in on the Earth. They see their home planet covered in shadow. Calvin demands to know what the evil shadow is. Mrs. Which answers him,
ÒYou have said it. It is evil. It is the powers of darkness.Ó
Meg is
frightened. She asks, ÒBut what is going to happen?Ó
ÒWe will
continue to fight!Ó
ÒAnd weÕre not
alone you know, children,Ó came Mrs. Whatsit, the comforter. ÒAll through the
universe itÕs being fought. I know itÕs hard for you to understand about size,
how thereÕs very little difference in the size of the tiniest microbe and the
greatest galaxy. You think about that and maybe it wonÕt seem strange to you
that some of our very best fighters have come right from your own planet, and
itÕs a little planet,
dears, out on the edge of a little galaxy. You can be proud itÕs done so well.Ó
ÒWho
have our fighters been?Ó Calvin asked.
ÒOh,
you must know them dear,Ó Mrs. Whatsit said.
ÒAnd
the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.Ó
ÒJesus!Ó
Charles Wallace said. Why of course, Jesus!Ó
ÒOf
course!Ó Mrs. Whatsit said. ÒGo on Charles, loveÉ
ÒLeonardo
Da Vinci?Ó Calvin suggested Òand Michelangelo?Ó
ÒAnd
Shakespeare,Ó Charles Wallace called out, Òand Bach and Pasteur and Madame
Currie, and Einstein!Ó
Now
CalvinÕs voice rang out with confidence, ÒAnd Schweitzer and Gandhi and Buddha
and Beethoven and Rembrandt and St. FrancisÓ[2]
By the time I first read A Wrinkle in Time, IÕd had a short lifetime of Gospel stories and a few years of formal Catholic religious education behind me, but it wasnÕt until Mrs. Which and Mrs. Whatsit explained it to Meg and Calvin and Charles Wallace that I finally understood what it was all the religious grown-ups in my life had been trying to explain to me. Yes, there is darkness. But it can be overcome. The world, your life, is full of examples of light for you to see by. When the student is ready, so the saying goes, the teacher arrives.
The Sanskrit word guru or teacher comes from two words meaning Òremove darkness.Ó Mrs. Which, Mrs. Who and Mrs. Whatsit are gurus of the highest order. They teach Meg, Calvin and Charles Wallace that although there is darkness in the universe, that it can be, and indeed is, overcome. They equip the Murray children with all the means they need to overcome it, and then send the children to find and rescue their father from the evil IT on Camazotz. IT captures Charles Wallace during Dr. MurrayÕs rescue. Before Meg goes back for Charles Wallace, Mrs. Whatsit reminds her that as strong as IT is, Meg has something IT does not possess – LOVE. It is to such as these, children like Meg and Charles Wallace, that the kingdom of God belongs.
That we will fight the darkness – oppressions and isms, denial of freedoms of thought and conscience, violence and war, poverty and disease – is given. How do we equip ourselves for the battle against the darknesses that confront us? I think we begin with the time we make for such a purpose. The title A Wrinkle in Time comes from the way the extra-terrestrial angelic beings travel. They ÒtesserÓ or wrinkle through time. Mrs. Who explains that a straight line is not the shortest distance between two points. Taking a length of her skirt she holds it straight to denote linear time and then folds it together by bringing her hands together, explaining that this is how she and her companions travel. They tesser or wrinkle through time and space. Instantly it seems, they leave one time and place and appear in another. What a great trick for our hectic lives!
But what happens inside the wrinkle? Is time suspended? Is there a Sabbath of indefinitely suspended time for those traveling inside the tesseract; inside the wrinkle in time? I hope so.
Sophia Lyon Fahs, the great Unitarian religious educator said, that ÒLife becomes religious whenever we make it so.Ó Just as it is important to see the entire world and our entire lives as opportunities to learn about our deepest values and put them into practice, we also need to make taking time out to devote to developing our faith life a priority, not an afterthought. Not just for children, but for people of all ages.
Before Mrs. Which, Mrs. Who and Mrs. Whatsit sent Meg, Calvin and Charles Wallace to Camazotz to rescue Dr. Murray, they prepared the children with various lessons and instruction, but they took them to no classrooms, gave them no lectures, required of them no reading, gave them no tests in the traditional sense. Although learning was required to save Dr. Murray and fight the darkness, additional schooling was not.
From George OrwellÕs goodspeak in 1984 to George LakoffÕs DonÕt Think of an Elephant people have taught us that how we term and name something has the power to limit or open our thinking. With this in mind, I think the time has come to say good-bye to the term Sunday School. There is enough school Monday through Friday.
School implies a place with grades and grade levels, pencil and paper tests, and most importantly of all it implies graduation. Faith is something we wrestle with for a lifetime. Most Unitarian Universalist congregations end formal religious education programs for young people at middle school, and many young people end their formal engagement with our church at that time. Some go on to participate in youth groups and youth ministries, but many do not. Life Span Faith Development is more than just a new name for religious education, it is a more accurate description of whatÕs going on in peopleÕs lives when attention is given to the life of the spirit and religion is taken seriously. Leaving behind the term Sunday School allows us to unwrinkle the stolen moment in time, and expand it again in new ways. Leaving behind Sunday School helps us to envision Religious Education as Lifespan Faith Development and realize that faith development is something for people of all ages and something that doesnÕt have to happen only on Sunday mornings.
A Wrinkle in Time has been so appealing to so many readers for the last 40 years because it covers so much ground. It deals in science and religion, morality and the arts; children as well as adults hold central roles. Racism, politics, poverty, education, all get their treatment. There is something going on at the surface of the story – a science fiction tale, and much is implied by its storyline, characters, and quotes from science and literature. The story covers a great deal of the emotional, spiritual, social, political and even scientific landscape, but like any work of art, however grand in scope, it couldnÕt cover everything. Even this magnificent tale left things out.
Educator
Elliot Eisner has noted there are always three curricula active in an
educational setting: The explicit curriculum, the implicit curriculum and the
null curriculum. The explicit curriculum is the official and taught curriculum.
It is the curriculum outlined in syllabi and explained in school
prospectuses. The implicit
curriculum is what a school (or church) teaches because of what kind of place
it is; its approaches to teaching and learning, rewarding, organizing, even the
physical layout of the building.
Eisner says these are the Òpervasive features of schooling and what they
teach may be among the most important lessons a child learnsÓ [3]
The most powerful of all curricula, argues Eisner, is the null curriculum. The idea
behind the null curriculum is that what we do not teach is as important and as
powerful as what we do teach.
The explicit, implicit, and null curricula all apply to
faith development and the life of the church as well, where we not only have
curricula in faith development, but explicit, implicit and null theology. What
we never mention, what is never seen, and what is never heard is learned much
more powerfully than a lesson repeated a dozen times, a hymn sung every week,
or a sermon preached unceasingly.
The
implicit and null curriculum or implicit and null theology help us to consider
that everything about church is religious education and related to faith
development, not just for the young, but for the not so young as well. How do we sit? What music do we hear? How
participatory is our worship experience?
How participatory is our decision making process? Where are the young
and old during coffee hour? Where are the faces of color? Where are our gay and
lesbian brothers and sisters?
At
one point in A Wrinkle in Time, Meg is
thoroughly depleted from her encounters with IT and the forces of
darkness. The three Mrs. deliver
her to the care of a nurse being on a strange planet. The nurse being is gray,
covered with fur and has indentations instead of eyes or ears, and tentacles
instead of arms and legs, with still more tentacles in place of hair. Meg comes to call this nurse Aunt
Beast. At first the humans and the
beasts frighten each other – as all ÒothersÓ do – they donÕt know
each other and have trouble communicating. Yet, they engage each other and learn about each other,
their common enemy, the evil darkness, much more important than the differences
that separate them. They do not
learn about each other in books, they do not listen to sermons or stories about
each other, they do not send money to a beast fund or a human fund. They are forced by circumstance into
direct contact, the best way to learn about any other you wish to know. Their
learning is face to indentation, hand to tentacle, beast to beast.
In a world where a CNN news reporter can question the patriotism of newly elected United States congressman Keith Ellison simply and only because he happens to be Muslim, the importance of liberal religious education has quite possibly never been greater. In the story A Wrinkle in Time, the ability of Meg and Charles Wallace to use love to over come the powers of darkness is a matter of life and death. ItÕs temping to say itÕs just fiction, a fantasy, a story - itÕs not the real world. But darkness, evil, poverty, war, disease, and racism – these things are all too real. Fortunately, so too are light and love.