DEATH... AND TAXES....

a sermon preached by the Rev. Dr. Tim W. Jensen
at the First Religious Society in Carlisle, Massachusetts
Sunday April 15th, 2007

OPENING WORDS: "We probably could have saved ourselves, but we were too damned lazy to try very hard... and too damn cheap,” -- Kurt Vonnegut, Nov 11, 1922- April 11, 2007

READINGS: Mt 17:24-27; Mk 12:41-44; Lk 20:20-26.


When I first picked out the title for this sermon some weeks ago now, of course I had no idea that author Kurt Vonnegut would pass away just four days before I planned to preach it. I was a huge fan of Vonnegut’s when I was younger -- for a time I even tried to imitate his distinctive narrative voice in my own writing, and his inspiration certainly helped shape my life at a very impressionable age in ways I will probably never fully understand.

I once heard a literary critic describe Vonnegut’s fiction as “bitter coated sugar pills” -- a phrase that has obviously stuck with me, since at this point I haven’t the slightest idea who it was that actually said it, or where I heard it first. As the years went by, I grew less interested in Vonnegut’s fiction, and much more intrigued by what might be thought of as his “occasional” writings: lectures, essays and even at times a sermon or two on topics of social justice and public concern, and especially the issue of Freedom of Expression, which deeply concerns him personally since his novel Slaughterhouse Five was and remains one of the most frequently banned books in America.

A notorious infidel and freethinker as well as an iconoclastic curmudgeon, Vonnegut sometimes liked to quip that he was not raised in any organized religion; that his father was a Unitarian -- an allusion to the fact that the family occasionally attended services at the All Souls Unitarian Church in Indianapolis when Vonnegut was a boy.

And I actually met him in person once, at a booksigning at the 1986 General Assembly in Rochester New York, where Vonnegut had been invited to deliver the Ware Lecture. I remember getting there early and standing in line for over an hour waiting for him to show up, because my wife was also a big Vonnegut fan I was still feeling a lot like a newlywed, and wanted to have the book inscribed to her for our first anniversary later that week.

And then when he finally showed up, and it was my turn in line, I handed him my book and a pen -- a cheap promotional pen I’d had made up to publicize the Unitarian Universalist Church of Midland Texas -- and he inscribed the book for my wife like I’d asked, and then he looked at the pen, read it...and kept it! I didn’t really mind; I had lots of others, and I’ve liked to imagine over the years that he took it home with him and wrote all sorts of amazing things with it...although I kind of doubt it, since it really was a pretty cheap pen, and probably didn’t last him through the end of the day.

But the best thing that happened to me that day is that while I was waiting in line I met one of Kurt’s High School classmates from Indianapolis, the author Dan Wakefield, who IS a Unitarian Universalist, and has written several very good books of his own, including one about “Writing Your Spiritual Autobiography” (which we used here for an Adult Religious Education class not too long ago), and also this book: The Hijacking of Jesus: How the Religious Right Distorts Christianity and Promotes Prejudice and Hate.

This really is a book you can pretty much judge by its cover, especially if you flip it over and read the blurb Kurt Vonnegut wrote for the back of the dust jacket. “Dan Wakefield has had a long career of fair-minded, important, and meticulously researched journalism. And he crowns that career with as complete an account and analysis as one could wish of the capturing of Jesus Christ as a totem for a few powerful Americans, intent on becoming powerful all over the world, and by violent and corrupt means which are anything but Christ-like. The very last words in this fine book are not by Dan Wakefield, but Jesus, his Sermon on the Mount, not what you would want to call Pat Robertson or Dick Cheney stuff.”

The passage Vonnegut refers to reads like this:

Most of the world’s Christians believe that one of the principle gifts of their faith is the message that Jesus gave to the multitudes on the mountain -- a message that many on the Religious Right have declared is no longer a part of their belief:

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven

Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are they that do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.

Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy.

Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.

Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.


And now, like the author of these words, and the authors of so many inspiring words before and since, Kurt Vonnegut is dead, and only the words themselves survive as his legacy. And yet the words themselves evoke the spirit of their author whenever we repeat them, and in that way they truly do embody a tangible manifestation of immortality.

We often think of death as a tragic loss -- and often it is, even when it also often means release from prolonged emotional suffering and excruciating physical pain. And I also think it’s significant that we should speak of death today in the same breath that we welcome and recognize two relatively new-born children as part of this community, and dedicate ourselves to sharing with them the enduring values and heritage of our faith tradition.

Transitions can be stressful even in the best of times. Often we hear things like “the only thing constant in life is change,” while in the next moment being told that “the more things change, the more they remain the same.” We realize, for example, that death comes to every living thing, as the inevitable final stage of life which can neither be avoided or changed...and yet death also changes everything: not only for the deceased, but for all of their friends and loved ones as well.

We fear death because it represents in a profoundly disturbing way both the unknown and the unknowable, the uncontrolled and the uncontrollable; while at the same time we learn to accept (and even embrace) death as the common, universal fate of us all. And so we mourn, we grieve, we lament our losses...recognizing that every loss or disappointment is like a “little death,” a manifestation of change which in some significant way is beyond our ability to shape or control.

And then there are taxes. It was Ben Franklin who observed that “in this world, nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes.” And taxes are certainly on a lot of people’s minds this time of year, especially as those of us accustomed to waiting until the very last minute scramble to fill out our State and Federal income tax forms. Here in Carlisle though, it seems to be the local property taxes that folks are most concerned about. I have kind of an unusual perspective on this whole issue, since because I live in a church-owned parsonage rather than owning a home of my own, neither the church or I pay any property taxes on the assessed value of that house. I guess it’s just one of those odd little quirks in the tax code that goes back to the good old days when clergy were also considered town employees, whose salaries were paid out of local tax revenues.

Of course, not being either a taxpayer or a town employee didn’t keep me from reading with great interest and almost voyeuristic curiosity the front page article in Friday’s Mosquito comparing School Superintendent Marie Doyle’s new compensation package with the paychecks of Concord/Carlisle High School Superintendent Brenda Finn, Carlisle Chief of Police John Sullivan, and Carlisle Town Administrator Madonna McKenzie.

For those of you who didn’t read the article, Doyle’s base salary is now $130,636 a year, along with six weeks paid vacation and another four weeks of sick leave and personal time; while Finn makes $160, 414 to go with her five weeks vacation and 20 personal days. Both superintendents also have a budget of $2500/year for professional travel expenses.

Chief Sullivan earns a total of $102, 025 plus a $2000 allowance for uniforms, and the personal use of a police vehicle, since (according to his contract) he is “always on call in the event of an emergency.” Town Administrator Madonna McKenzie only earns $93,000 a year at the moment, but her salary is scheduled to increase to $105,000 by October, 2008, and she also enjoys an expense allowance of $4000/year, and is reimbursed for the use of her car for work-related travel.

And of course, all of four of these important public servants, as they deserve, enjoy generous pension and medical insurance benefits.

Now obviously, I don’t know how these numbers measure up to what any of you may be earning in your current employment (and I’m not really sure why we’re reading about them in the newspaper either, unless it really is just to get us wondering whether or not our taxes are too high).

But I do know how these salaries compare to mine. Anybody want to hazard a guess at the amount that shows up at the top of my W-2 form was this year? [For God’s sake don’t just blurt it out; just think quietly to yourself about what it might be].

$31,648.82.

Now admittedly, this number is a little deceptive, since I also get to live in the parsonage -- tax free (which of course is very convenient when I happen to be called in an emergency); and I also contribute in addition a fairly significant amount to my pension fund each year (to make up for all those years I was in graduate school earning a PhD, and therefore contributing nothing), which would have otherwise been paid to me as salary. I get four weeks of vacation (provided I take them in the summer), plus another four weeks of “parish leave,” (which means that I am theoretically free of my “routine” pastoral duties can go and do whatever I want, provided I come back at my own expense in the event of a pastoral crisis). And I’m even entitled to at least one Sunday a month out of the pulpit, and can pretty much take a personal day whenever I like...provided that the sermon is ready on Sunday morning, and people can still reach me if they need to.

But here’s the more important question. Why the big disparity? Is it that I’m not as skilled or well-qualified as these other important public servants? I’d be happy to compare my resume to any of theirs, but maybe it has more to do with something about supply and demand, or how much we each contribute to our respective bottom lines. Is it just that I don’t work as hard, or that I am somehow less productive than they are? After all, we all know perfectly well that clergy really only work an hour a week. Or perhaps I simply have fewer, and less-important responsibilities; this is, after all, a tiny little church in a tiny little town, with only a few hundred members and friends, only a fraction of whom show up on any given Sunday.

But whatever the reason, society has come to value the kind of work that I do less than it does the work of these other skilled and dedicated professionals, and this is reflected in the compensation we receive. Two hundred years ago, back when the churches were still tax-supported (and there was no such thing as “public” education), the minister would have doubtlessly been both the best-educated and one of the most highly-compensated individuals in the community. But those days are long behind us.

And just to broaden our perspective for a moment, why do we pay lawyers and physicians so much more than we do schoolteachers and soldiers? Is it simply that we pay the latter less because we can, and the former more because we have to? And never mind the ongoing controversy over the sky-high compensation of certain corporate CEOs.

It’s easy to be concerned that our taxes are too high, or worried that we aren’t earning enough money to make ends meet. But we also want good schools for our kids, safe streets and reliable roads, access to health care when we need it (and for everyone who needs it), clean air and clean water, and a multitude of other public services which we have come to think of as the fundamental benchmarks of life in a modern, civilized society. And the only way we can have these things, is if we all do our share to pay for making them happen.

And as for the value of my work, and that of my colleagues who do this work with me, I doubt that we will ever enjoy again the kind of status, prestige and compensation that clergy here in New England did in the days of the Puritans. The values of humility, service, obedience and sacrifice are so deeply woven into public perceptions of the ministry that even a hint of personal ambition or avarice seems almost to disqualify an individual as an authentic spiritual leader, someone whose interests and attention should be focused on the transcendent rather than the material.

And yet, I also like to think that the work of ministry has an inherent worth and an intrinsic reward which transcends the value of money.

A friend of mine sent me a poem the other day by the Canadian poet Oriah Mountain Dreamer, and I’d like to wrap up by sharing it with you now:

The Invitation

It doesn’t interest me what you do for a living.
I want to know what you ache for
and if you dare to dream of meeting your heart’s longing.

It doesn’t interest me how old you are.
I want to know if you will risk looking like a fool
for love
for your dream
for the adventure of being alive.

It doesn’t interest me what planets are squaring your moon...
I want to know if you have touched the centre of your own sorrow
if you have been opened by life’s betrayals
or have become shrivelled and closed
from fear of further pain.

I want to know if you can sit with pain
mine or your own
without moving to hide it
or fade it
or fix it.

I want to know if you can be with joy
mine or your own
if you can dance with wildness
and let the ecstasy fill you to the tips of your fingers and toes
without cautioning us
to be careful
to be realistic
to remember the limitations of being human.

It doesn’t interest me if the story you are telling me
is true.
I want to know if you can
disappoint another
to be true to yourself.
If you can bear the accusation of betrayal
and not betray your own soul.
If you can be faithless
and therefore trustworthy.

I want to know if you can see Beauty
even when it is not pretty
every day.
And if you can source your own life
from its presence.

I want to know if you can live with failure
yours and mine
and still stand at the edge of the lake
and shout to the silver of the full moon,
“Yes.”

It doesn’t interest me
to know where you live or how much money you have.
I want to know if you can get up
after the night of grief and despair
weary and bruised to the bone
and do what needs to be done
to feed the children.

It doesn’t interest me who you know
or how you came to be here.
I want to know if you will stand
in the centre of the fire
with me
and not shrink back.

It doesn’t interest me where or what or with whom
you have studied.
I want to know what sustains you
from the inside
when all else falls away.

I want to know if you can be alone
with yourself
and if you truly like the company you keep
in the empty moments.

This is the work of a Parish minister, and the work of ministry which we all share. To stand with others in the center of the fire and not shrink back, to feed the children, shout “yes” to the moon, dare to dream, feel the pain, remember our limitations, and know that we truly like the company we keep when we are alone with ourselves in the empty moments...