PRELUDE TO THE 175TH ANNIVERSARY SERVICE

READING BEFORE SERMON
An excerpt from the autobiography of the Rev. Theodore Clapp, published in 1857.

…One day I was invited to take tea in a family of our congregation, and pass the evening with a small number of friends. Being called to attend a wedding, I did not reach the house till near 10 o’clock. Instead of a few persons convened for an hour’s conver-sation, there was a large, gay company, whose movements had resolved into a dance, and were directed by a band of musicians. Now, if I had followed the advice of my venerable instructors at Andover, I should have instantly retired, that I might not, even in appear-ance, have sanctioned for a moment a species of recreation so inconsistent with the dignity and seriousness of a Christian life.

But as I was politely conducted to a chair in the midst of a circle of ladies, who preferred looking on to an active participation in the festivity going forward, I determined to make myself at home, and commit what I had had been taught to regard as a heinous, unjustifiable indulgence, by witnessing an entertainment generally pronounced among Presbyterian clergymen as sinful and injurious. There was, however, in my heart no sense of violated duty, no feeling of guilt.

I spent an hour or more in this cheerful circle, where all things to the eye and ear were refined, orderly and decorous. Before me stood the young and happy, upon whose fates and fortunes the somber shadows of adversity had not yet gathered; their minds were bright and buoyant, their steps elastic, their ears opened to the melodies of sound, their eyes radiant with pleasure. As I was meditating upon those comely brows, flushed with the bloom of early life, the fair forms of feminine grace and loveliness, the dignified, accomplished manners of those more advanced in years, the music, sprightly conver-sation, wit, love, gaiety, and joyousness which characterized the whole scene – a sweet, profound, unwonted perception of God’s goodness captivated my soul.

Such intense feelings of piety I had never before experienced. I said to myself, “It has, indeed, pleased God ‘to make man but a little lower than the angels, and to crown him with glory and honor.’ If man is so beautiful here, what will he not become in that future state, where our loftiest ideals and actual attainments both will regularly advance in a progression that is infinite!” I was rapt in delightful visions of a spiritual world.

This thought took complete possession of my mind: God is too good not to provide for us something nobler, better, greater, more permanent, and more satisfying than the transitory possessions and pleasures of time. Can He present to us the chalice of existence, and then dash it from our lips as we begin to taste its joys? Is not God’s infinite love a pledge that He will never treat us so cruelly? Would a kind parent promise his children favors he never intended to bestow on them? Can God awaken irrepressible desires of continued, unending happiness, only to be crushed out and disappointed forever?

Nothing in mathematics is more certain than the doctrine that the inherent, essen-tial desires of our moral nature will be completely gratified. Can they be, if death is an eternal sleep?

If the Holy Spirit ever breathed on my heart, it was on that occasion, amid the music, thoughtlessness, levity, ceremonials, and sensuous attractions of an evening party. There, if ever, the inspirations of God touched and ennobled my soul. So ends our reading this morning.

PRELUDE TO THE 175TH ANNIVERSARY SERVICE
“The Heresy of Parson Clapp: The Promise of Our Own Longings”
A Sermon by the Rev. Melanie Morel-Ensminger
First Unitarian Universalist Church in New Orleans
Sunday, February 24, 2008

Today’s service acts as an introduction or prelude to next weekend’s celebration of this congregation’s 175th anniversary. The fun starts on Fri-day evening, February 29th with Greater New Orleans UU Night at the Hor-nets basketball game. A block of tickets has been purchased; if you haven’t gotten yours yet, contact Rev. Jim Vanderweele at Community Church, or call our church office. A special feature of game night will be Rev. Jim giving the Invocation before the game begins. Then, on Saturday, March 1st, our church will host an Anniversary Open House from 4 to 7 pm, with music, refresh-ments, history exhibits, and intergenerational fun for all ages. The anniversary weekend concludes with our Sunday service on March 2nd, which we will share with our friends at Community Church and a repre-sentative from the North Shore congregation, and our very special pulpit guest will be UUA Moderator Gini Courter. After the service, there will be a reception with drinks and some food provided, plus your potluck contributions. It will be a wonderful way to mark 175 years of Unitarian Universalism in greater New Orleans. Please join us for as many of these anniversary events as you can. (By the way, I did a little research and discovered that the Latin term for 175 years is quartoseptcen-tennial. Aren’t you glad the planning team decided NOT to use it for our anniversary?)

The official age of our church is actually somewhat debatable. Our congregation split off from First Presbyterian Church in 1833, in response to the vote of the Mississippi Presbytery to convict the Rev. Dr. Theodore Clapp of heresy in December of 1832. But First Presbyterian Church began life in February 1818 as First Congregational Church, and only became Presbyterian under Clapp’s ministry in 1823 – however, present-day First Presbyterian celebrated their 175th anniversary in 1993, which means they start the count at the first date. Written histories of our church always note the date 1818, and our connection with First Presbyterian and their founding minister young Sylvester Larned and his successor Parson Clapp, and usu-ally mark our official start with the congre-gation’s vote in late February 1833 to affirm Clapp as their minister despite his con-viction by the Mississippi Presbytery. It is an interesting historical irony that after Katrina, the minister and members of First Presbyterian Church reached out to us and gave us a place to hold worship before we were able to return here to our own building. They have also been generous in allowing our volunteers to use their showers when we have an overflow. I am glad our congregations have reconnected in this way.

What got Dr. Clapp into trouble was both simple and complex. Clapp had been raised from childhood as a strict Calvinist, believing in the doctrine of predestination, which teaches that Almighty God has determined from the point of creation which human beings were bound for heaven and which destined for hell. When a baby brother died in infancy, young Theodore was tortured with worries that the poor child was damned for all eternity. Maturity did not alter his views, but only solidified his doubts that a loving God could do such a thing. In his earliest ministry in New Orleans, Rev. Clapp’s ser-mons had shown a tendency toward softening or even denying Calvinist orthodoxy. This was never a problem with the New Orleans congregation, but it was with the Presbytery.

Another issue was that Clapp, while serving on the governing board of the College of Orleans, which later developed into Tulane University, allowed a group of slaves and gens libre du couleur, or free people of color, to hold dances on the property. This bit of progressive social thinking created a local scandal that also reached the ears of the Presbytery.

The final straw was when a newly invigorated Dr. Clapp began preaching a local brand of universalism, inspired by an experience he had, as we just heard, at a New Orleans social event at the home of a parishioner.

I have to tell you that I love this story. Ever since I first learned of it, when I was in seminary and doing research for a paper on the relationship between Clapp and his friend Judah Touro, it touched my heart. Where else but New Orleans could a person have a serious, life-changing spiritual revelation at a party?

You have to understand that in the 19th century, Christian orthodoxy insisted that earthly pleasures – pleasures of food, drink, music, dancing, playing cards, and so on – were more or less evil, at the very least they were considered pathways to worse things. In his retelling of the incident, Clapp himself says that if he had followed the advice of his strict seminary professors, on discovering what was really happening he would never even had entered the door of the home where the party was being held, so as to avoid even the appearance of impropriety of enjoying himself at such a “heinous, unjustifiable indulgence.”

But Clapp not only attended the event, he truly and deeply enjoyed himself, admiring the beauty, grace, and manners of the young and old partygoers, and, I’m sure, reveling in the delicious food and tapping his toes to the catchy music. He was having a fine old time indeed when the thought comes to him, as if in a flash, How can this be a trick? Are the pleasures we enjoy on earth just a nasty trap? If this is the kind of happiness we can attain on earth, can’t we expect that our happiness in heaven will be even greater? And how could a God who was all-loving let us experience happiness and pleasure on earth if they were all we were ever going to have? “Would a kind parent promise his children favors he never intended to bestow on them?” For Clapp, pleasure and happiness on earth only presaged the pleas-ure and happiness we would experience with God after death. In that mo-ment, he saw that our own longings – for real happiness, for love, for whole-ness – were a kind of promise. In that moment, Clapp decided that our hu-man desires for “continued, unending happiness” were a covenant that God fully intended to fulfill. It is quintessential Universalism, and in its day, it was considered not just a heresy, but a dangerous carte blanche to all those who would freely sin if they lost the fear of burning in hell. Clapp’s successor at the New Orleans Presbyterian church warned that “Universalism, as it exists in New Orleans, is not only at war with the Bible, but with philosophy; with morality and commonsense.”

Twenty-first century Unitarian Universalists have tended to ignore or put aside our ancestral Unitarian and Universalist theologies, acting as though they’re old news that no one needs or wants to hear today. But strip away all of Clapp’s 19th century language, and the message is clear – and it could not be more contemporary and relevant, especially to those of us dealing with the aftermath of Katrina. There is a promise in our own longings. What we yearn for with our highest moral sense will not be denied us; our most heart-felt hungers will be satisfied.
Parson Clapp’s heresy is actually a herald of hope and message of mission to us his descendants. His conversion to Universalism got him kicked out of Presbyterian ministry and propelled him into liberal ministry, and eventually into the American Unitarian Association. His heresy, and the vote of the congregation to keep him as their pastor, started this congregation and began the legacy of Unitarian Universalism in greater New Orleans, resulting in the 3 UU congregations who carry that banner today.

Even more importantly, our forefather’s heresy assures us that our ef-forts to revitalize our congregations and rebuild Unitarian Universalism in this area will bear fruit. It tells us that our heart-felt dreams of bringing the liberal gospel to more people in greater New Orleans, of being a force in this area for peaceful change and greater justice will be fulfilled.

On February 26, 1833, a congregational vote was held inside First Presbyterian Church of New Orleans. A majority of those present affirmed the ministry of their controversial pastor and decided to leave the Presbyterian denomination. Since they were a majority, they kept both the building and the communion silver. The minority left the congregation and re-established First Presbyterian in a different but close-by location. And now, here we are, 175 years later, bearers of his legacy, heirs to his precious heresy.

May we be worthy of the heritage we’ve inherited, and may we commit ourselves to the work of revitalizing our congregation, our religious movement, and our city. So might this be! AMEN – ASHE – SHALOM – SALAAM – NAMASTE – BLESSED BE!