September, 2010

Where were you in 1967? Were you in San Francisco experiencing the Summer of Love? Or, if your coming of age didn’t correspond to that timeframe, would you have gone if you’d had the chance? Are you looking for utopia, non-violence, alternate realities, non-conformism, or just some flowers for your hair?

Redlands United Church of Christ experienced its own Summer of Love this year with our summer series. As far as I know, there were no illicit drugs involved, but there was some very good food and fellowship.

We started with the concept of loving God and loving our neighbors as ourselves.  Some of the discussions revolved around the unconditional love of others, as well as being honest with others. Loving someone doesn’t mean being willing to take whatever they throw at you. And sometimes, we need someone near and dear to us to call us out!

The next week explored the language of love. A short quiz helped us to get in touch with the ways we express (and receive!) love. It was eye opening to realize that we often show love to others in ways that we like to have it expressed to us. A good lesson for all of us, especially in our church community, is to realize that we need to look at what others truly need, not what we would like them to need.

Loving our bodies explored the concepts of food and exercise and how we often slip into patterns that are not healthy for us. We work too hard, we allow stress to run rampant, we get too busy for even brief periods of physical movement. We discussed ways in which we can help each other to love ourselves into long and happy lives.

Next, we brought our Epiphany words to explore loving our souls. How do these simple words, chosen at random each year, help us speak and understand the language of love? Is the Spirit speaking our word to us, and what is the Divine nudging us to do in response? What are the different ways each of us uses these words?

Lastly, we discussed using love to discern our path in the world. A short, entertaining video explored the concepts of an empathic civilization, growing from caring about small communities with blood ties, to business and commerce connections, to national pride and patriotism, to finally embracing all of humanity, indeed all living things and the earth itself as our home. Love can be the common language that helps us reach out to our increasingly interconnected world.

It turns out love has many languages and speaks to each of us in different ways. I think it’s inspiring that we are not taking it for granted. We know, very personally, that a God who loves us is also calling us to love others. We forgive each other and we trust that others are good people, each with their own story.

It’s not Haight and Ashbury, but Olive and Bellevue has proven that a brief season can turn into a year-round celebration of love, hope and acceptance.

With optimism and hope,
Loring Fiske-Phillips