Thich Nhat Hanh is very big around UU. And so is Joseph Campbell. So it's only fitting that Unitarians try to tie the two together somehow.

During the last group meeting studying Joseph Campbell, the facilitator read this poem by Thich Nhat Hanh:

Please call me by my true names


Don’t say that I will depart tomorrow-
even today I am still arriving.

Look deeply: every second I am arriving
to be a bud on a spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with still fragile wings,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and cry,
to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death
of all that is alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing
on the surface of the river.
And I am a bird that swoops to swallow the
mayfly.

I am a frog swimming happily
in the clear water of a pond.
And I am the grass-snake
that silently feeds itself on the frog.

I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones,
my legs as thin as bamboo sticks.
And I am the arms merchant
selling deadly weapons to Uganda.

I am the twelve-year-old girl,
refugee on a small boat,
who throws herself into the ocean
after being raped by a sea pirate.
And I am the pirate,
my heart not yet capable
of seeing and loving.

I am a member of the politburo,
with plenty of power in my hands.
And I am the man who has to pay
his “debt of blood” to my people
dying slowly in a forced-labor camp.

My joy is like Spring, so warm
it makes flowers bloom all over the Earth.
My pain is like a river of tears
so vast it fills the four oceans.

Please call me by my true names,
so I can hear all my cries and laughter at once,
so I can see that my joy and pain are one.

Please call me by my true names
so I can wake up
and the door of my heart could be left open,
the door of compassion.

I really liked this explanation of spiritual literacy (kind of the 'theme' of this piece), given by Frederic and Mary Anne Brussat.

One of the greatest steps to enlightenment is realizing the interconnectedness of every single living thing in the universe. The realization that you do not exist in a void... you are not only you, you are everything. Everything is you and whatever you endeavor has consequences beyond your widest imaginings. No event or choice in your life stands on its own. So you are forever arriving and even in the moment that you truly feel you belong in a certain place is the moment you start leaving. The moment you feel you know everyone, you meet someone new. The moment you realize you have friends you become isolated. The instant you find true love you lose it. The recognition of yourself as a moving part of the universe - that when someone hurts you hurt too, that even if a tree hurts you hurt, that there is a universal pain, but also a universal joy. That pain and joy are so inextricable from each other that they can not exist independently. That laughing and crying are the same thing. You are the abused and the abuser. Then reality becomes clear and we recognize our responsibility to live, to make decisions, to be absolutely compassionate or be nothing.

Wow! I may not ever get there, but I can strive to get there, and by striving, I am there, right?