The sweet (or is it sweltering? sweaty?) June days have come again (this is
a hymn, written by Longfellow, in our gray hymnal, #63. Maybe we should
write a version for Floridians!). Whatever the weather, we had a beautiful
Flower Communion this morning!
As I was preparing this year’s service, I was looking back on previous
services to get me started. Sometimes I reread my sermons (or
sermonette, in this case) and just think, eh, it was ok. But when I read my
words from last year I thought oh, I actually needed that! I had forgotten my
own message and I needed the boost. So, I thought I’d share it with you for
this month’s Ponderings because I want you to know that you really are
unique, you have beautiful gifts to offer, and you are loved!
And, coincidentally, this message jives nicely with the small group I led
during our last community Sunday–Awakening Curiosity through
photography by trying out new perspectives. Tom M, Oliver, Dave, and I
had a fun little adventure trying out worm’s eye and bird’s eye views!
From Flower Communion 2025:
Have you ever had the feeling that you are, well, different? Have you ever
felt like maybe your differences meant you didn’t fit in?
I spent a lot of my life feeling that way. And I did a good job of hiding it, just
trying to blend in, or even disappear. I was an usually quiet child and I
preferred not to stand out. And that means I was too afraid to share myself
with others.
When I was about 25 years old, I decided to take a life detour. Inspired by a
photography professor I encountered at the local community college in
Boca Raton, I signed up for the Art program at Florida Atlantic University
and began a short journey into the world of photography and design.
Although I didn’t finish the program, thus my reason for describing this as a
detour, I learned invaluable lessons about myself. Because in art classes,
you have to share your work.
This particular photography professor I had, Mr. Novak, also taught photo
and design at FAU. I took every one of his classes as I found him to be not
only amazingly supportive of my work, but he also challenged my

perceptions and taught me to look—visually and intellectually—at the world
in different ways.
So, in Mr. Novak’s classes, you were given an assignment each week and
the following week you would come in and hang it on the wall for the entire
class to review. How terrifying. Not only was I still trying to hide myself, but
I really had no prior art experience. I only knew deep inside me that I
wanted to be creative.
And so it was, every week, I would hang my work on the wall with the
others, and every week it would just look so completely different than
everyone else’s that I felt super uncomfortable and wondered what I was
doing wrong. I wanted to hide. But that Mr. Novak, he insisted on using my
work as an example—as a good example—on a regular basis. I was
unable to hide. And I began to realize that what was happening was that
my unique creative approaches were significantly contributing to the
classroom community to help us all learn and grow. I was truly astounded
each and every time.
We all have thinking patterns that are ingrained in our way of being in the
world. I spent the first 25 years of my life fearing my differences, my
uniqueness, my own creativity. But I learned, on this 2 year detour into the
art world, that differences, uniqueness, and creativity are a gift. And when
we don’t use them, we deprive not just our own spirits, but the growth of all
those we are in community with. When we do not honor our diversity, we
do not evolve.
When the Japanese Zen master Roshi Soen Nakagawa wrote: “in a
blossoming universe, we are all flowers,” he seems to have understood that
we are all a part of the patterns of nature–patterns and processes that
create us each in unique ways but also make us vital and sacred beings in
the interdependent, ecological communities into which we are born. Each
flower, and each of us, is beautiful and unique, but yet cannot exist outside
of our relationships with all the diverse beings in our ecosystems. We exist
in a network of complex and dynamic relationships. We must show up just
as we were created to be.
Unitarian Universalism is a faith in which we recognize this. UUism has
long had a commitment to a freedom of belief for each individual and an
orientation toward interdependence and pluralism. In the UUA’s Widening
the Circle report it is stated (Widening the Circle p10):

Each flower, each person, is unique but we can’t survive without our
ecological community
Our Shared UU Value of Pluralism states that:
● We celebrate that we are all sacred beings diverse in culture, experience,
and theology.
We covenant to learn from one another in our free and responsible search
for truth and meaning. We embrace our differences and commonalities with
Love, curiosity, and respect.
We humans are a part of the diversity of nature–this is the very spirit that
we need to get in touch with so that we can live our faith on this great
Earth. And so the Flower Communion, a ritual that celebrates our diversity
and our unity, feels like an important spiritual practice that helps us erase
boundaries of separateness from nature, and separateness from each
other.
You Are Loved, You Are Worthy, and You Are a Blessing!