Victoria’s reading from last Sunday…

The Purpose of This Community is to Help Its People Grow

By Erik Walker Wikstrom

If you are who you were,
and if the person next to you is who he or she was,
if none of us has changed
since the day we came in here—
we have failed.

The purpose of this community—
of any church, temple, zendo, mosque—
is to help its people grow.

We do this through encounters with the unknown—in ourselves,
in one another,
in “The Other”—whoever that might be for us,
however hard that might be—
because these encounters have many gifts to offer.

So may you go forth from here this morning
not who you were,
but who you could be.

So may we all.

About the Author: Erik Walker Wikstrom
The Rev. Erik Walker Wikstrom is the former Worship and Music Resources Director for the Unitarian Universalist Association and has served congregations in Yarmouth, Maine, and Brewster, Massachusetts….