Binding to Tradition: Such a Messy Practice
by Meck Groot
from our Tending to Spiritual Leadership Blog
While the New England Region staff team’s introduction of the concept and practices of Spiritual Leadership has been enthusiastically received, there’s been some pushback about the one we call “binding to tradition.” Most Unitarian Universalists don’t like the idea of being bound to anything. This one might not make the list of Spiritual Leadership practices for people in other traditions, but Unitarian Universalists tend to ignore or disavow the claim the tradition has on them.
Our use of the word bind for this practice is based in “religare,” the root of the word religion which means to "fasten, bind fast.” Unitarian Universalism comes out of a freedom-seeking tradition. The idea that UUs are bound or would bind themselves to anything feels abhorrent to many. Freedom is one of the faith’s greatest values. The desire for a “free faith” brought the Pilgrims to Turtle Island 400 years ago this fall. So great was their desire for freedom that they committed the capital offense of treason when they separated themselves from the Church of England, the state religion. As descendants of Pilgrims and Puritans, UU congregations are rooted in the tradition of separatists, dissidents, Protest-ants and “lovers of leaving.” It is in UU congregations’ cultural DNA to herald freedom and autonomy.
Binding to tradition is to acknowledge we are not the first ones here. For good and ill, we are all inheritors. In binding to tradition we are not saying, “I allow myself to be chained, oppressed, tyrannized.” It is to recognize we are part of a chain — by birth, adoption or choice. We have ancestors and a legacy. Our ancestors are to be reckoned with — whoever they were and whatever they did. If they delivered gifts to the world, it is on us to continue delivering those gifts in our time. And if our ancestors delivered harm to the world, we must not disown them but interrupt the harm they caused, seek healing and make restitution. Continued...

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