Sermon Library
“Schweitzer and Goethe “
Rev. Dr. Gregg R. Anderson
July 24, 2011
Service Theme: Pentecost VI-2011
Source: Pentecost VI-2011
Pentecost VI-2011 July 24, 2011
Schweitzer and Goethe
A Bug Scratch
A young farm boy wanted to become a preacher so he went to the country church deacons and asked for their permission. They asked him why he wanted to become a preacher. He said, “Last night I went to bed and couldn’t sleep. Then I heard a bug scratching under my pillow. I turned the light on, raised the pillow, but there was no bug. I decided it was the Lord calling me to become a man of the cloth. One of the deacons asked, “Brother, don’t you have a little more Christian experience than that?” Before he could answer, the eldest deacon interrupted and said, “I vote we take him in. We have had a lot of preachers here in the past who have never even heard a bug scratch.”
Being Called
I know that I have never heard a bug scratch, but I do believe that I have had some sort of “call” (quote-unquote) to be here. There was really never any time in my life that I particularly decided to become a minister and then look for a church to serve. Yet, as I look back on my life, there was simply one small step in front of the other not being sure exactly where I was going, but it all ended up as being a minister at this Aspen Chapel. I often tell people that this is not my fault. I am here in spite of myself. I think this is what it means for me to be “called.”
Called to Aspen
I do love being here and I am very grateful. Not only did I become a minister, but I became a minister because of Aspen and this Chapel. During my very early years in Aspen including time that I was just vacationing here, I would often observe and think about the lack of religious observance, conversation, or any spiritual attention or awareness in this town. In the early 70’s there were a half a dozen churches in town all with a very small portion of the population involved. In fact, statistically, Aspen had and probably still has the lowest percentage of people involved in any religious body than any other town or city in the United States. There are, however, more people involved in religious organizations in Aspen today than in 1970, but the percentage is still relatively low.
Spiritual, But Not Religious
I have long discovered that the majority of people here are very spiritual and I envisioned this chapel being here for these seekers but not belongers. I have simply been motivated all along to support people wherever they are in their own spiritual journey. It often begins by reminding people that they have a spiritual journey in the first place. I am equally motivated to let people who have been turned off by religion know that there is another way, a way of faith which is very real and holistic and not in conflict with who they are and the world in which they live.
Chapel as Light House
I am very grateful that the chapel stands on this hill as a light house to the entrance of Aspen. One pictorial book of Aspen stated that the Aspen Chapel stands as a reminder to all people that there is a spiritual existence to all of life. I love that caption. I hope that the chapel can continue to meet people where they are in Aspen and grow in this endeavor. The mission of the Aspen Chapel is to promote open and progressive theology, spiritual enrichment, and peace through interfaith engagement. We are a place of seeking and living spirituality.
The First Generation
In many ways those of us who are connected to the chapel and I mean everyone who is involved and attended over these past forty years one time or every time, have really been the first generation of the Aspen Chapel. I hope that we can all realize the role that we are playing in establishing some original roots of the Aspen Chapel in a place which was re-established within a context of body, mind, and spirit.
Goethe Bicentennial
Walter Paepcke brought the Goethe Bicentennial to Aspen in 1949 because he thought “Aspen, far removed from the distractions of urban America and buffered from materialism, would provide a context of purity to deeper aspirations for global healing from the division of the Cold War and the threat of nuclear annihilation.” In many ways Aspen remains as a refuge from the real world and at the same time takes leadership in establishing a better world in many ways. Aspen can be considered exemplary in what a small town and community can be.
I would like to think that this quality began in July of 1949 with the Goethe Bi-Centennial anniversary featuring the Minneapolis Symphony, speakers Jose Ortega, Thornton Wilder, Robert Hutchins, Stephen Spender, Arthur Rubinstein and keynote speaker, Albert Schweitzer. I might also add that such a theme and characteristic continued the very next year in 1950 when such well known speakers came to Aspen such as Clare Booth Luce, Mortimer Adler, Karl Menninger, Isaac Stern, and theologian Reinhold Niebur. All of these people represented body, mind and especially spirit.
Machiavellian Versus Platonic
As years go by, these values are influential, but as Aspen became more and more popular it succumbed to other influences. Mortimer Adler, the Institute’s resident philosopher of half a century ago, said that two competing triads are at work in Aspen. One is the Machiavellian triad of money, fame, and power. The other is the Platonic triad of the good, the true, and the beautiful. Local writer and columnist Paul Anderson stated just a few weeks ago, “Life choices in Aspen determine which triad touches you most. Take a look around Aspen and you may conclude that many align themselves on the Machiavellian side. Others aspire, not so visibly, to the Platonic. Regardless of one’s chosen triad, most people who live in Aspen revel in a self-realized paradise of nature, art, music, and ideas. These cultural riches are the work of another triad, one that is defined by life choices available to anyone with a discerning mind, an open heart, and a seeking spirit. This triad – the ‘Aspen Idea’ – is both readily accessible and damnably elusive.” For myself, and depending on semantics, I do not think that the two triads need to always be mutually exclusive. In other words, I believe it is possible that someone who has money, fame, and power can also be good, true and seek the beautiful in life.
Schweitzer’s Speech on Goethe
What I think is very interesting is the fact that Schweitzer’s keynote speech about Goethe included extensive references to religion and spirituality. Furthermore, it was a theology which was quite progressive and engaging. Just like the 1949 convocation set a precedent for the Institute and Music Festival, I would like to imagine that the theology as expressed by Goethe and Schweitzer became a theme for Aspen as well and part of the spirit of body, mind and spirit. I believe and know that the spiritual values espoused in Schweitzer’s speech are very compatible with the founding purposes of this Chapel.
The Speech and the Chapel
In 1949 Schweitzer said, “Sometimes Goethe liked to call himself a pagan, but this does not mean that he considers himself irreligious. Instead, it indicates only that he clings to a religion which does not follow the tenets of dogmatic Christianity. He asks teachers of religion to consider it their duty to conduct the faithful more and more away from traditional forms and toward pure religion.” In 1969, the founders of the chapel said, “To this place gather, in lively encounter, leaders of religious thought to redefine spiritual values, to question, to seek relevant answers in a troubled world.”
In 1949 Schweitzer told a story about Goethe who interrupted a religion teacher reading from the book of Esther by taking the Bible from him and turning it to the Sermon on the Mount and asking him to read something more relevant. In 1969, the Aspen Chapel dedicated its Beatitude windows from the Sermon on the Mount.
In 1949 Schweitzer spoke about Goethe’s non-dogmatic natural philosophy saying, “The fundamental idea to which one comes to is that in nature there are both matter and spirit, the two together.” Goethe’s principal complaint about dogmatic Christianity is that it pictures God as being outside of nature instead of within and manifest in it. Goethe, said Schweitzer, does intend to abandon the idea of God’s identity with nature, in favor of Spinoza’s notion of God or nature. He is convinced that only the idea of the immanent God will make it possible to be pious and honest at the same time. In the year 1999 Rev. Trevor Lewis initiated a series at the Chapel on Fr. Matthew Fox’s book entitled Creation Spirituality based on such theology of nature. Matthew Fox said, “For we all share creation in common. And we all share responsibility for that creation. Therefore, we are all called to re-create. And I can think of no better place to begin this re-creation than with religion itself.”
In 1949 Dr. Schweitzer said, “For Goethe, true religion is not found in the dogmas about Jesus and his work, but in the religion of love which Jesus proclaimed and practiced.” In the year 2000 Rev. Ron James spoke about Castles of Orthodoxy and how “The letter of the law kills, but the Spirit gives life.”
In 1949 Schweitzer quotes Goethe, “I hold to faith in the divine love which, so many years ago for a brief moment in a little corner of the earth, walked about as a man bearing the name of Jesus Christ – as the foundation on which alone my happiness rests.” Schweitzer continued, “Thus, love is for Goethe the highest expression of the spirit; he cannot think of God, the epitome of everything spiritual, except as the fulfillment of love.” In the year, 2009, Elaine Pagels spoke at this chapel about Schweitzer’s book on The Quest for the Historical Jesus and said that the historical reality of Jesus was to bring in the kingdom of God on earth and to be an exemplar of loving God and our neighbor as our self.
Our Purpose
I hope my purpose this morning is relatively obvious. I believe that the purpose of this chapel is in sync and in keeping with the foundations of modern day Aspen. I think that the spirit of body, mind, and spirit too often gets left behind in Aspen today, but this is still the vision of this chapel and its founders. I would like to think we can do our part and we have made some progress. We have taken a chapel which was somewhat empty in 1978 and filled it with programs and people. But now we can be further purposed by returning the spirit to mind, body, and spirit and then to an even broader community within Aspen so that people will not only come to Aspen to attend the Institute, listen to music, hike and ski, but to also come to revive their spirit.
Called to Aspen
You know, being called to be a minister in Aspen is a pretty “cushy” deal. It is a long way from Mother Teresa’s call to Calcutta and Schweitzer’s call to Africa. (And by the way, he became a physician because of his faith and how he felt he could serve people the most.) Yet there are people here even in Aspen as well and the needs are just as real. We all know that Aspen has its image, but it also has its reality. People are people where ever they may be.
I think of the joys and the sorrows, the successes and the challenges, the laughter and the tears, which are expressed at this chapel just about every day. I can think about any given week where there are highs and lows when we interact together at this chapel with people who have been connected with it for over thirty years and people we have known for three minutes. I think of the stranger in need who we helped yesterday in Rifle, the joy of two baptisms this week (remembering our scripture this morning) and the wedding on top of Aspen mountain last Friday night, the plans for a memorial service, the calls about a young man I baptized, confirmed, and married who is just hanging on to life right now, and all the people who help and serve and give to make all of this happen. I would love to name all of you.
I could go on and on, but I will simply conclude with one last quote from Albert Schweitzer. “Reverence for life comprises the whole ethic of love in its deepest and highest sense. It is the source of constant renewal for the individual and for all of humankind.” He also said, “One thing I know: the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve and the highest proof of Jesus and the holy spirit is love.” Amen.
Rev. Dr. Gregg Anderson