Sermon- March 22, 2026

“Love Thy Neighbor…”

When I was growing up in a small bedroom community in New Jersey, we knew every one of our neighbors around our house. Across the street was the cranky old Mrs. Clause – don’t let your whiffle ball go in her yard or she’ll run out the door and snatch it. Directly across the street were the Cestaro’s, and next to them the Davitt’s.

A few houses up the street were the Lisk’s – they must be rich because they had a built in pool. Next to them were the Tiernan’s, a family of seven.

All of us kids played together, rode our bikes through each other’s yards, and occasionally fought together. During the summer, we were allowed to stay outside until the streetlights came on.

And god forbid a neighbor parent caught you doing something you shouldn’t have been doing – not only would your parents know in a New York minute, but you might also get punished twice – once by that neighbor and again when you got home!

It was a typical, blue collar neighborhood – parents working very hard to raise their kids, put food on the table and a roof over their heads. But it was a neighborhood, a real, honest-to-god neighborhood. I would imagine many of you could tell similar stories – different locations, different demographics, but similar stories. Although at a young age I would not have been able to articulate Love Thy Neighbor as a theme or culture, but I clearly remember what it felt like to be held and watched over by so many.

My goodness, how things have changed! Many of us can live in the same place for ten years and not know who lives next to us. A pleasant nod when pulling out of the driveway, or a short wave to someone across the street coming out of their front door, but very little in the way of real connection, real relationships.

Last Sunday, John Collier shared an article with me from the Sunday Times. It was an opinion piece by Thomas Friedman, titled “Why Minnesota Matter More Than Iran for America’s Future.”

Friedman starts the article by talking about how difficult the past year has been for him as a journalist – watching our institutions crumble, big businesses bend the knee to King Donald and indulged by a cabinet of clowns. But he goes on:

“But then I spent time in my native state, Minnesota, after something else that I’d never seen in nearly 50 years: a spontaneous uprising of civic activism propelled by a single idea — I am my neighbor’s keeper, whoever he or she is and however he or she got here.

It was one of the most courageous battles ever fought by American men and women not in uniform. It was led by moms ready to donate their breast milk to strangers and dads ready to drive someone else’s kids to school because the parents, terrified of ICE agents, were too afraid to go out outdoors. It was neighbors ready to hit A.T.M.s to help out neighborhood restaurants and businesses deciding not to open — thus forgoing their income — for fear that masked ICE agents might drag away their cooks or dishwashers or desk clerks.

And the best part was this: At a time when we have a president so shameless that he insists on putting his name on every public building he can, these good Samaritans of all colors and creeds acted without fanfare. “There were hundreds of leaders of this movement,” Bill George, a longtime Twin Cities business executive, said to me, “and I don’t know a single one of their names.”

Having been in Minneapolis myself, and witnessing the horrors of those days, I also witnessed the amazing transformation, the amazing miracle unfolding before our eyes. Neighbors caring for neighbors, black, brown, white – it didn’t matter. People showing up for each other, caring for each other in ways that many of us probably have never experienced. It was a peek into some of the worst human behavior I’ve ever seen, and the most beautiful testament to who we are as human beings. I’m not a big believer in the concept of heaven as an afterlife, but I will tell you that witnessing the metamorphosis happening in Minneapolis, I certainly can wrap my head around a heaven on earth! A change in the perception of who we are and who we can be as the human family.

Friedman continues:

“Many surely got to know one another, though, because they were all propelled by a verb I’d never heard before: “neighboring,” as in, Today I will be neighboring — going out to protect the good people next door or down the block. Not because I favor illegal immigration, but because I oppose the fundamental indecency of President Trump and Stephen Miller and the blessedly now departed Kristi Noem trying to fulfill their daily quota for evicting illegal immigrants by arresting my neighbors, most of whom work hard, pay taxes, go to church or mosque and help me dig out my car from the snow in winter.”

Neighboring – I love the sound of that word. It’s doing good for your neighbors, it’s love in action, it’s loving thy neighbor! So out of the ashes of this brutality and cruelty, emerges a new way of being, a new way of being together.

The other component of these brutal crackdowns, arrests and murders, was the singing. Thousands and thousands of people flowing like water down the main thoroughfares singing resistance songs. Flatbed trucks leading protesters through the city with megaphones singing “Hold On” or “Noones getting left behind this time…” The human power of song and resistance is a testament to what we’re capable of. A testament to good and loving hearts, just trying to love thy neighbor.

One of the things that Donald Trump and his goons never expected is that the human spirit is so much stronger and powerful then masked men with pepper spray and tear gas. What their antics are compelling neighbors to do is to take care of each other. Their antics are forcing us to take a deep look inside and decide who and what we want to be. And who and what we do not want to be!

Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis said:

“This was not a resistance movement,” Frey insisted. “It was about something far more powerful and expansive. It was ‘Love thy neighbor.’” ICE agents thought they were coming for random migrant strangers stalking Minneapolis, he added. What they learned the hard way was that, for many Minneapolitans, they were coming for their babysitter or their kid’s best friend — people embedded in their communities and not the caricature of the illegal immigrant rapist spread by the Trump administration.”

There is a powerful lesson for all of us to learn from this experience. And especially for us as Unitarian Universalists. What we do matters. How we support each other matters. And how we love matters. In this article, Friedman hits upon what a better world could look like. What building Beloved Community could look like. He puts into words the values that we, as UU’s, hold so dear. What you do unto my brother or sister, you do unto me. This is what our living faith calls us to do!

I have never been so proud to be a Unitarian Universalist minister as I am right now, in these times. These hard and scary times. Yet with profound miracles happening around us…some big like Minneapolis and some smaller, like our BLM vigils or the Bridge Brigade. And we keep on singing our songs, lifting our voices in both protest and praise. We are the threat that this administration is petrified of – people of faith who are capable of moving mountains with our love.

As we all try to figure out where we fit in with all of this, what our role is, remember what it was like riding your bike until the streetlights came on. Remember that feeling of being supported and held up by your neighbors. Remember that sacred scripture from Matthew “Love Thy Neighbor.”

May we, as Unitarian Universalists, always follow our moral compass. May our goal always be fairness, justice and equity. May our mission to Build Beloved Community always be underpinned by Love Thy Neighbor! And may we demand no less from our leaders, our communities, but most importantly, from ourselves!

May we make it so.