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We come now to the Pagan holy day: Samhain. This is a time when it is said that the veil between world, the veil between life and death is the thinnest. You can see in your order of service insert, 13 family activities to celebrate this holiday, and some of the origins of our modern day Halloween.

At this time when the Veil is the thinnest, strange things can happen, momentous decisions can be made, mighty magic can be done.

Speaking of strange – I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of the Unitarian Jihad. A columnist reported on a letter from this group last April. (http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2005/04/08/DDG27BCFLG1.DTL)

Among other things the group proposes outbreaks of reasonableness, moderation, and random acts of kindness. The group espouses the separation of personal faith from political belief, and coordinated social action.

Sounds familiar. But later on, the UJ threatens direct action: "We will take over television studios, kidnap so-called commentators and broadcast calm, well-reasoned discussions of the issues of the day."

Uh-oh. They sternly admonish us that they may

...strike without warning. Pockets of reasonableness and harmony will appear as if from nowhere! Nice people will run the government again! There will be coffee and cookies in the Gandhi Room after the revolution.

The UJ says sincerity is not enough and that the world is not out to get us, “except in the sense that it is out to get everyone.” With that, the communique says

Brother Gatling Gun of Patience notes that he's pretty sure the world is out to get him because everyone laughs when he says he is a Unitarian. There were murmurs of assent around the room, and someone suggested that we buy some Congress members and really stick it to the Baptists. But this was deemed against Revolutionary Principles, and Brother Gatling Gun of Patience was remanded to the Sunday Flowers and Banners committee.

So, the UJ gets close to action, but they back off, and have another committee meeting, and they complain and take votes, but we’re not sure they are actually doing much. And off they go to have "coffee and cookies in the Gandhi Room" and wonder why people make fun of them.

You may be wondering if you could get your own Unitarian Jihad name. You can. Just google "Unitarian Jihad," and you'll find your way to an internet name generator.

My name is The Machine Gun of Moderation. That’s from the "Unitarian Jihad Name Generator" http://homepage.mac.com/whump/ujname.html. Or in case that is too heterodox, you can cruise over to The First Reformed Unitarian Jihad Name Generator. There, I am known as Brother Inspired Flame of Desirable Charity, http://www.elsewhere.org/cgi-bin/jihad.

The UJ mostly takes votes and issues communiques. I don’t think they’ve actually taken over any TV stations. But there is an online community of some 300 people who have addressed various issues: sex education, global warming, feeding the hungry, health services to children, literacy.

I don’t think any or many of them are actual UUs, in the sense that they belong to a congregation. But they like the “UU Way.”

One of the things that sometimes happens when the word Unitarian gets bandied about in the public square is that more people find out about us. But they also get the sense that we do a lot more talking than we do walking. So, there is a surprising number of people who consider themselves Unitarian but don't actually bother with checking out our congregations.

How many people are we talking about? The American Religious Identification Survey was conducted on over 50,000 adults in early 2001. It shows that 629,000 people, or about 3 tenths of one percent of the population, identify as UU. (http://www.congregationalresources.org/ShowOne.asp?RID=8870&TC=60)

Consider that the UUA listed only about 230,000 members in 2001. That's a difference of 270%. If we applied to Eliot, instead of 500 members, we’d have 1,350.

I bet many of those who identify as UU but aren’t here don’t imagine the reality of a congregation like Eliot – which is financially generous, socially active, places a premium on spiritual depth, and has a good time.

We Unitarians who actually belong to a congregation get misunderstood and pre-judged all the time. I got an email last week from a colleague I've known a long time. She's a UU minister in Brookfield, Wisconsin. She got a letter from a prison inmate in her state who wants to wear a UU chalice, since he identifies as a UU. However, it turns out that the local warden says UU isn't a real religion, so request denied.

We Unitarian Universalists try and accept gladly everyone to the Welcome Table that is our congregation. Everyone: black, white, brown, yellow, green, red. Everyone: atheist, agnostic, pagan, Christian, Jew. Even half-giants.

In one of the Harry Potter books, the Goblet of Fire, there is a character named Hagrid. And when it becomes public that he is half-giant, the larger social community of wizards and witches looks down upon him. Half-breed, they call him. He works as a grounds keeper at the Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

Harry Potter, Hagrid, and his friends are considered something of a bunch of heretics by the larger Wizarding Community. But at Hogwart’s, they feel right at home. As Hagrid says about the public disapproval of him being a ½ giant:

"But it's okay. You don't have to be ashamed of what you are...[Hogwarts lets] anyone in as long as they can do magic."

We Unitarian Universalists are considered a bunch of heretics by the larger orthodox community. But we heretics don’t have to be ashamed of who we are or what we believe here. We let anyone in – magic or not.

The story of Harry Potter is told in a series of 7 books, 6 of which have been written and published. It covers 7 years beginning at age 11 of an orphaned boy in England in roughly the present day.

Harry discovers that his parents were not killed in an accidental car crash but were murdered by an extremely powerful man – a wizard – who tried and failed to kill Harry, also. The evil wizard & his cohorts come back to wreak more mayhem.

Meanwhile, Harry Potter has a rotten childhood. His aunt, uncle, and cousin are unbelievably mean to him. And one day, he discovers he is special. He is unlike his relatives in almost every way, and he is whisked off to a community of people just like him.

He will learn to use magic, he will learn to come of age, he will learn to exercise his powers. But like all of us, he must grapple with his passions and his intuition.

Harry & his friends frequently act impulsively. They do not wait for backup. They do not form a committee to discuss situations. Harry in particular, is prone to be act rashly, and to get himself further in danger than he might otherwise get, had he heeded more prudent counsel.

Harry literally risks death, destruction, and madness – again and again. Both to try and save his friends, and in trying to "do the right thing." For example, in a wizard version of a triathlon, Harry stops to help out a competitor who is in trouble.

Harry is misjudged, misunderstood, and mistreated – by adults, by classmates, by fate. And yet, his determination, his passion keeps him going, it helps move him past seemingly insurmountable odds. Despite the odds, he does not die, get destroyed, or go mad.

But of course, Harry Potter's world is fiction. We know too well, that passionate youth sometimes do die, go mad or get lost in addiction or apathy. Many more youth and adults will end up like Unitarian Jihad instead of Harry Potter. Being Harry Potter is much more dangerous, much less certain.

Those of us here today have so far survived our youth, despite brushes with death. We have survived accidents or disease that could have killed us. And that can make us more cautious.

For some of us, it may seem as if our youthful passion a la Harry Potter, has turned into the idle threats of the Unitarian Jihad.

Harry Potter, by his circumstances, is forced to grow up. He has friends, he has people who try to help him. But ultimately, he is alone in facing the mystery of his existence. Harry goes from being an ordinary kid who just does not fit in at home, to a young person aware of his power, and he finds the hope and courage to exercise it for justice.

Many UUs have a similar story of feeling like they don't fit in. But they risk a spiritual search; they reach out; they find a congregation. They become aware of their power, and they find the hope & courage to exercise that power for justice.

Many and varied are the roads to Unitarian Universalism. I grew up UU, but as a young adult, I was only loosely connected with a congregation. After a brush with death, I woke up. And that awakening has led me here to be with you.

This story – of approaching the Veil between Life & Death – is more of a frequent theme in Unitarian Universalism than you might imagine.

452 years ago this week, Michael Servetus, was burned at the stake, with his books strapped to his thighs. He was condemned by John Calvin for his anti-trinitarian views.

But Servetus was even more passionate than Harry Potter, and he had few friends – none that he traveled with. He was a wanted man because of his heresy. They way he was finally caught was by attending a sermon John Calvin was preaching.

Servetus’ execution in 1553 really did begin to turn the tide against Catholics or Calvinists or anyone else – burning heretics. Servetus was one of the last ones. Very daring, maybe too daring.

Alice Walker, the African American poet writes: “It is true/ I’ve always loved/ the daring/ones. Like the black young man/ who tried to crash all barriers at once,/ wanted to swim/ at a white beach (in Alabama)/ Nude”.

It’s true. Our heros are the daring ones – people like Harry Potter – who with his friends battles ultimate evil even while he is mistreated and misunderstood. Or a hero like Michael Servetus, who published his heretical theology and who made important medical discoveries about the pulmonary system, and who risked his own Death for Truth.

But sometimes, we are not public heros. But we have to become the hero in our own life. I am reminded of an incident in the life of Rebecca Parker. She was here last month at our Bring a Man Sunday, and she is the president of a UU Seminary in California.

She too has looked through the Veil, and it changed her life.

In one of her books, she tells the story of how she had come to a very low point in her life. Her marriage had just ended. Because of that she aborted a pregnancy that she had really wanted. She became hopeless that anything would change her state and felt helpless to do anything about it.

One night, well after midnight, she walked down to a park. She knew that over a hill lay a lake with cold black water. She intended to throw herself into that lake and perhaps find peace there. She writes:

“Tears were streaming down my face as I came over the crest of the hill. At first I couldn't make out what I was seeing: between me and the water's edge there was some kind of barricade stretched across the length of the field. As I moved closer, I saw that it was a line of human beings kneeling and crouching over oddly shaped pieces of furniture that I then recognized to be telescopes. It was the Seattle Astronomy Club.”

One club member excitedly told her he had a spiral galaxy in focus. And so, before she could really take all this in, she found herself kneeling in wet grass after midnight, looking at a "glittering cluster, that curved and swirled like a sea shell."

At that moment she became connected with Mystery, with Divinity, with the possibilities of life. She says: "I was saved by the night sky, its beauty calling to me, and I was saved by the earth, the grass beneath my bended knee welcoming me like a child to home."

Rebecca Parker walked toward Death and found Life. She saw through the Veil. Her daring was different than the daring of Harry Potter or the daring of Michael Servetus, but it is the kind many of us have faced.

The reality is that daring is sometimes not as popular as deliberation.

When I performed the first public gay marriage in the Midwest a year and a half ago, it was daring. But there had been no public deliberation at Eliot about it in advance. A significant number of people were upset. We deliberated, we voted, we moved on.

But our story, our religion, seems to say to me, that we need both – deliberation and daring.

Deliberation – whether at a meeting or in the “Gandhi room with coffee & cookies” – is how we create unity out of diversity. It is our process, it is how we call each other into a family.

Daring – is how we risk what we are for the sake of what we can be. Daring reminds us to pay attention to opportunity.

On the holy day of Samhain, the Veil between worlds is the thinnest. We are called to look both backwards & forwards. We are called to make choices.

Heretics dare to choose. Throughout history they have dared to choose. Harry Potter chose good over evil. The Unitarian Jihad chose deliberation over apathy. Michael Servetus chose Truth over escape. Rebecca Parker chose Life over Death.

We choose daring and deliberation.

Since what we choose is what we are,

And what we love, we yet shall be,

The goal may ever shine afar –

The will to win it makes us free.

Let’s rise & sing it shall we? As a doxology.