The Sand
Dollar Metaphor
I want to ask a few questions to see if I’m preaching to the choir here about our common bonds and our different approaches to social justice. Feel free to nod vigorously if your answer is “yes” or shake your head vehemently for “no”. Here goes—have you ever felt frustrated that you weren’t living out your principles? That you weren’t making a difference in the lives of those who have so little while you have so much? Have you ever thought to yourself—I am only one person and a busy one at that, what can I do? I’ll just leave well enough alone.
I have thought all of these things lately. So many relevant books have come into my hands like Soul of A Citizen, How Much Do We Deserve, Stranger and Traveler, and You can’t Be Neutral On A Moving Train. There were dozens of General Assembly social justice workshops on these topics. I've come to the conclusion that there must be something in the air we need to catch!
In college, I was drawn to all kinds of volunteer work because my advisor, Mackie Hamilton, taught me so much about issues like racism, sexism, and poverty. In fact, if you name a social justice issue, I can guarantee she addressed it. It was only natural that I began boycotting grapes and lettuce, picketing grocery stores, calling landlords who refused to rent to African Americans but would readily rent to me. I visited children who had eaten lead paint chips. I mentored a young girl labeled a juvenile delinquent. I often ask myself, where did those days go? Those who nodded your head when I asked my opening questions know what I mean— “transforming tears into doves of hope” is spiritual work that feeds our soul. It is never done.
I have three goals this morning. I want to look at the life of Dorothea Dix, and see how her example can inform how we live justly now. Then, I want to explore her sand dollar metaphor, and turn it over just like the real sand dollars churned by the ocean waves. Finally, I want to reinvigorate how we live our faith.
Dorothea Dix documented the conditions of the mentally ill in almost every state. Wealthy influential men emptied their pockets when she told them about the mentally ill. She had a way of describing how these people spent years in living tombs, with virtually no clothing, chains around their limbs, wallowing in their own waste. Though often physically sick, she would rest long enough to regain her strength. Then continue her work in other states, consulting with mental health experts.
She spent years getting a national bill passed that reserved millions of acres for the poor mentally ill. She traveled to various countries, unable to speak their language, studying their provisions for the mentally ill. She gained an audience with the pope and convinced him to build an asylum in Rome.
Dix was the confidante of presidents, poets, statesmen and ministers. She was the hope of thousands who could not advocate for themselves because of the fetters that bound them. She carried out her research and her campaign for the mentally ill for over forty years. Her story about the meaning of the sand dollar is a valuable metaphor for us as well as the Channing children.
Sand dollars have five holes, shaped like tears. Inside, there are five little pieces that Dix called the “doves that transform the tears”. It seems miraculous enough to me that such a delicate shell remains intact at all. Yet some do wash up whole and perfect on the beach. Could those perfectly round sand dollars be a reflection of the storms of life we all face? We too are whole in spite of the rubbing and scrubbing we receive. Sand dollars remind me now that others are in the maelstrom with few protections and little security. They speak of the religious journey we all share and how we can respond to the tears we see around us.
I received a copy of an article written by Paul Loeb, author of the book, The Soul of A Citizen. He finds fault with what he calls A Thousand Points of Hype. There are inconsistencies in the administration asking us to be a part of something much larger than our own selves while recommending policies that demonstrate a lack of compassion for low income children, health care for the uninsured, decent housing and a host of other people friendly programs. He is not against volunteerism, but he quotes another metaphor that I’d like to share. I quote the former director of the Boston City Year program for youth as he compares “…community service volunteers to people trying to pull an endless series of drowning children out of a river. Of course we must address the immediate crisis, and try to rescue the children. But we also need to find out why they’re falling into the river—if only because no matter how hard we try, we lack the resources, strength, and stamina to save them all. So we must go upstream to fix the broken bridge, stop the people who are pushing them in, or do whatever else will prevent them from ending up in the water to begin with.”[1]
Like Dix, Loeb asks us to look at the true cause of social problems. Dix never blamed the caretakers or those who denied food or shelter to the mentally ill. People believed the mentally ill could not feel the cold. Why provide them with warm clothes when they would just destroy them? Likewise, Loeb states we must feed the hungry but also look at policies that institutionalize hunger. Build Habitat for Humanity houses, but examine why homelessness, substandard and unaffordable housing is increasing. Most important, learn from the people directly affected. As Dix talked to the mentally ill who were freezing or suffering from intense heat, we must listen to those who suffer or are ignored. Then, we will find out how we can align ourselves with their needs, not imposing our values on them. Like Dix, we need to take one long, slow step at a time.
I
often feel humble when I read about people like Dorothea Dix. Loeb reminds us
that heroes and heroines seldom act alone.
Strides had been made in mental health in Europe and the United States
long before Dix came on the scene. We
often deify certain people and think we are not made of the same “stuff”. We have learned to feel helpless.[2] The truth is that one person, one
organization, or one church has made a difference and still can. The work is so
much more effective when we join together.
I
often ask myself “What can you do to feed your soul—to enact the sand dollar
metaphor?” I have found several
answers—first listen. What do we hear
from news reports, books, or movies that move us to tears, or outrage us? In conversations, what injustice do we want
to tackle? What can we do to not only
stem the tide of all those drowning in the river, but to look at the causes
further “upstream”?[3]
But
we can’t stop there. Awareness is
first, but then we need to join with like-minded people. Many groups sprang out
of the Social Justice Empowerment workshop we held here last March. We have a legislative task force here at
UUCA. There is Green Sanctuary, United
Nations, and the continuing efforts of Homework Haven and the mentoring program
plus numerous other social justice committees right here at UUCA. The national Unitarian Universalist office
in Washington sends out bulletins concerning national legislation and requests
for social action. Go online at uua.org
and look up the UUA Washington office.
Get on their e-mail list. Find out what you can do to make a
difference. Sometimes we think we don't
know where to begin. Remember that men
and women in our movement who worked diligently for social justice didn’t start
out knowing what issues would call to them. They found out as they went along.
Each
of us must pursue what is of ultimate value in our busy lives. At other times, we're tired and weary. Then, we need to rest on the beach and
collect those metaphorical sand dollars, restoring our energy for the long road
ahead. I close with these words from
John Wesley, founder of the Methodist denomination. His words are a reminder of what we are all called to do in our
search for the common good. In our
efforts to turn tears into doves of hope, “Do all the good you can by all the
means you can, in all the ways you can, at all times you can, to all the people
you can, as long as ever you can.” May
it be so. Amen and blessings be.
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