Won't You Be My Neighbor?
a sermon preached by the Rev. Dr. Tim W. Jensen
at the Second Congregational Meeting House on Nantucket Island
Sunday March 2nd, 2003
Reading: Luke 10: 25-37
***
Like a lot of other Nantucketers this past week, I’ve been scratching my head trying to figure out what to make of the latest mot mauvais out of the Oval Office, which you may have seen reported last Thursday in David Goodman’s “Here and There” column in the Inky. The quotation originally appeared in an on-line article by Eleanor Clift posted at MSNBC.com, where it was attributed to a White House aide, who reportedly said that “The President doesn’t care what Chardonnay-swilling Frenchmen think any more than he cares what the elites in Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard think.” Kind of a slap in the face to Dr. Frist, if you ask me; while I personally have been feeling tempted all week simply to uncork a bottle from Nantucket Vineyards, pick up a fresh baguette at L’Ile de France, and offer communion (Unitarian-style) to all who wish to partake.
But there is at least one “Nantucket elite” whose opinions I wish the President did care about, and this, of course, is Fred McFeely Rogers -- better known simply as “Mister Rogers” -- who passed away last Thursday at the age of 74 from a recently-diagnosed stomach cancer. I’m not certain when Fred Rogers first started spending his summers out in Madakat, but I know it was long enough ago that folks here proudly considered him a member of this island community, and I was really looking forward someday to running into him myself -- maybe out at the dump, or in the Stop-and-Shop, or any of the dozens of other places where Nantucketers tend to run into one another unexpectedly in the course of living their day-to-day lives.
I’m a little too old to have grown up watching Mr. Rogers myself, and by the time I became a step-parent my kids were also just a little too old to admit that they still enjoyed watching the program every afternoon either, so I’m probably not as familiar with Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood as many of you.
Obviously, I’ve seen the program a few times; it was, after all, the longest-running program in the history of Public Broadcasting; but I’m actually a lot more familiar with the parodies than I am with the actual show itself (everything from “Saturday Night Live” to “A Prairie Home Companion”), and my respect for Fred Rogers is primarily that of one adult for another, and is based on the interviews I’ve heard him give over the years, and my admiration for the things he achieved in his life, and to a somewhat lesser extent my appreciation for some of the things I’ve read that he has written.
And my overall impression of him, as a grown-up, is one that I have heard repeated over and over again these past few days by people who knew him far better than I did: that Fred Rogers was exactly what he seemed to be -- someone who was completely genuine, and authentically kind -- someone who could speak with children in terms they understood without ever seeming to talk down to them, and who could share those same simple truths with adults in a way that I wish more of us would take to heart.
One thing in particular that I especially appreciated about Fred Rogers was the fact that he was an ordained Presbyterian minister. And yet, it was never “The Reverend Rogers Neighborhood” -- and this was by design. His program was intentionally non-sectarian, and non-doctrinal...because, as he put it, he would “hate to see anyone excluded” because of his personal religious convictions, an attitude, of course, which I suspect reflected his most profound religious conviction. And I was impressed to learn the other day that it took him eight years to complete his seminary education, because he pursued those studies part-time while continuing to produce his daily television broadcast.
I also suspect that most folks, when they think of Mr. Rogers, don’t think of him in a clerical collar or ecclesiastical robes, but rather see him dressed in sneakers and a cardigan sweater. And I was delighted to learn this past week that all those sweaters, including the one now residing at the Smithsonian, were knitted by his mother, who was in the habit of knitting a sweater a month, and then distributing them in December as Christmas gifts to her family and loved ones.
But I’m growing a little weary of talking about Mister Rogers. I think it would be better if I let him speak for himself, in his own words. So here are some quotations that I found on his website (which I highly encourage all of you to find and explore), a sermon, if you will, from someone I would have felt proud to invite into this pulpit, the Reverend Fred McFeely Rogers, Minister Rogers, a long-time summer resident of this island, whom the world will sadly miss.
***
• Little by little we human beings are confronted with situations that give us more and more clues that we aren't perfect.
• If only you could sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet; how important you can be to people you may never even dream of. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person.
• As human beings, our job in life is to help people realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is, that each of us has something that no one else has—or ever will have—something inside that is unique to all time. It's our job to encourage each other to discover that uniqueness and to provide ways of developing its expression.
• Love isn't a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like "struggle." To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now--and to go on caring even through times that may bring us pain.
•A friend of mine made a calligraphy scroll that I have framed in my writing room. It reads: "The greatest gift one can give to another person is a deeper understanding of life and the ability to love and believe in the self."
• Relationships are like dances in which people try to find whatever happens to be the mutual rhythm in their lives.
• Something we all need in order to feel the fullness of life: It's not only a sense that we belong on our planet, but also that we belong in other people's lives—that we are loved, lovable, and capable of loving.
• Feelings are "mentionable," and whatever is "mentionable" can be more manageable. Whether we're children or adults, adding to our emotional vocabulary can often add to our ability to cope with what we're feeling. Using words to describe what's inside helps remind us that what we're experiencing is human...and mentioning our feelings to others can make those feelings more manageable.
• Often, problems are knots with many strands, and looking at those strands can make a problem seem different.
• We'd all like to feel self-reliant and capable of coping with whatever adversity comes our way, but that's not how most human beings are made. It's my belief that the capacity to accept help is inseparable from the capacity to give help when our turn comes to be strong.
• When I was a child and would see scary things on the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping."
• One of my wise teachers, Dr. Orr, told me, "There is only one thing evil cannot stand, and that is forgiveness."
• The older I get, the more convinced I am that the space between communicating human beings can be hallowed ground.
• Young children sometimes look sheepish when they confide in us, as though they already suspect there's something amiss in their interpretation of the world; and have you noticed how often older children, even teenagers, will start a confidence with a question like "Promise you won't laugh if I tell you?"
• People have said "Don't cry" to other people for years and years, and all it has ever meant is "I'm too uncomfortable when you show your feelings: Don't cry." I'd rather have them say, "Go ahead and cry. I'm here to be with you."
• When you combine your own intuition with a sensitivity to other people's feelings and moods, you may be close to the origins of valuable human attributes such as generosity, altruism, compassion, sympathy, and empathy.
• Whatever we do to show our children we love them, nothing can replace times when we give them our complete attention. I believe that the children who have learned that there will be such times for them are the ones who are at least likely to demand it and to compete for it.
• We have all been children and have had children's feelings...but many of us have forgotten. We've forgotten what it's like not to be able to reach the light switch. We've forgotten a lot of the monsters that seemed to live in our room at night. Nevertheless, those memories are still there, somewhere inside us.
• If the day ever came when we were able to accept ourselves and our children exactly as we and they are, then, I believe, we would have come very close to an ultimate understanding of what "good" parenting means. It's part of being human to fall short of that total acceptance—and often far short. But one of the most important gifts a parent can give a child is the gift of that child's uniqueness.
• Many mothers feel severely pressured these days. They often feel like they're falling short in one part, if not in several parts, of their lives. They often feel like they're failures. Well, people aren't failures when they're doing the best they can. Our performance doesn't have to be measured against anyone else's—just against our own abilities to cope.
• If I were looking for a child-care provider, I'd start with a short tryout. Then I'd listen to what he or she could tell me about my child. Does the account of their time together suggest alertness, interest, and those all-important three Cs: caring, confidence, and common sense?
• We need to remember that children are trying, too; trying to understand their feelings and their world, trying to please the people they love, trying to grow. When grownups and children are trying together, just about anything can be possible.
• I recently learned that in an average lifetime a person walks about sixty-five thousand miles. That's two and half times around the world. I wonder where your steps will take you. I wonder how you'll use the rest of the miles you're given.
• It's not the honors and the prizes and the fancy outsides of life which ultimately nourish our souls. It's the knowing that we can be trusted, that we never have to fear the truth, that the bedrock of our very being is good stuff. That's what makes growing humanity the most potentially glorious enterprise on earth.
• Please think of the children first. If you ever have anything to do with their entertainment, their food, their toys, their custody, their childcare, their health care, their education—listen to the children, learn about them, learn from them. Think of the children first.
***
As I mentioned when I first started speaking this morning, I didn’t really see that much of “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” during the years it was being produced and broadcast on PBS. And it makes me feel good to know that there is an archive of about a thousand videotapes, approximately 300 of which will continue to air regularly, as reruns, hopefully far into the future. Because there is a certain timeless quality to the program, an immortal spirit, if you will, which can and will continue to speak to subsequent generations of children, and adults, long after the death of its creator.
And this got me thinking, where IS “Mister Rogers Neighborhood,” really? Was it merely a simple set in a television studio, a place which, through the “magic of television,” came into our homes, through our television sets, and become such a familiar and important part of our lives? A living room (with a front door and that famous closet full of shoes and sweaters), and a kitchen, and regular trolley service to “the Land of Make Believe.”
And then there was my son’s favorite thing, “Picture, Picture” -- something I suppose can only be described as a “magic mirror” or maybe a “window on the world,” which could show us farms, or factories, or foreign countries, or literally anything else under the sun. And there was a front stoop as well, and, of course the place that always fascinated me most, the tiny model of an entire town which served as the background for the opening titles.
And it occurs to me that “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” is a little like Kingdom of Heaven -- it exists “amongst us,” all around us, even within us.
But I also suspect that much of the heart and the soul and the inspiration of Mister Rogers Neighborhood is right here on this island, out in Madakat, at a place called the “Crooked House.” A place that dates back to a Nantucket before the days of “trophy houses” and ostentatious affluence, when the island was not somewhere one went to celebrate one’s celebrity, but rather a place where one could come to escape it -- to sit on the beach, and maybe sip a glass of Chardonnay, enjoy a fresh baguette with a little aged brie, and watch the sun go down over Madakat Harbor, secure in the knowledge that we are ALL the children of God.
***
CLOSING SONG:
It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood,
A beautiful day for a neighbor.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?...
It's a neighborly day in this beauty wood,
A neighborly day for a beauty.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?...
I've always wanted to have a neighbor just like you.
I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you.
So, let's make the most of this beautiful day.
Since we're together we might as well say:
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
Won't you be my neighbor?
Won't you please,
Won't you please?
Please won't you be my neighbor?
at the Second Congregational Meeting House on Nantucket Island
Sunday March 2nd, 2003
Reading: Luke 10: 25-37
***
Like a lot of other Nantucketers this past week, I’ve been scratching my head trying to figure out what to make of the latest mot mauvais out of the Oval Office, which you may have seen reported last Thursday in David Goodman’s “Here and There” column in the Inky. The quotation originally appeared in an on-line article by Eleanor Clift posted at MSNBC.com, where it was attributed to a White House aide, who reportedly said that “The President doesn’t care what Chardonnay-swilling Frenchmen think any more than he cares what the elites in Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard think.” Kind of a slap in the face to Dr. Frist, if you ask me; while I personally have been feeling tempted all week simply to uncork a bottle from Nantucket Vineyards, pick up a fresh baguette at L’Ile de France, and offer communion (Unitarian-style) to all who wish to partake.
But there is at least one “Nantucket elite” whose opinions I wish the President did care about, and this, of course, is Fred McFeely Rogers -- better known simply as “Mister Rogers” -- who passed away last Thursday at the age of 74 from a recently-diagnosed stomach cancer. I’m not certain when Fred Rogers first started spending his summers out in Madakat, but I know it was long enough ago that folks here proudly considered him a member of this island community, and I was really looking forward someday to running into him myself -- maybe out at the dump, or in the Stop-and-Shop, or any of the dozens of other places where Nantucketers tend to run into one another unexpectedly in the course of living their day-to-day lives.
I’m a little too old to have grown up watching Mr. Rogers myself, and by the time I became a step-parent my kids were also just a little too old to admit that they still enjoyed watching the program every afternoon either, so I’m probably not as familiar with Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood as many of you.
Obviously, I’ve seen the program a few times; it was, after all, the longest-running program in the history of Public Broadcasting; but I’m actually a lot more familiar with the parodies than I am with the actual show itself (everything from “Saturday Night Live” to “A Prairie Home Companion”), and my respect for Fred Rogers is primarily that of one adult for another, and is based on the interviews I’ve heard him give over the years, and my admiration for the things he achieved in his life, and to a somewhat lesser extent my appreciation for some of the things I’ve read that he has written.
And my overall impression of him, as a grown-up, is one that I have heard repeated over and over again these past few days by people who knew him far better than I did: that Fred Rogers was exactly what he seemed to be -- someone who was completely genuine, and authentically kind -- someone who could speak with children in terms they understood without ever seeming to talk down to them, and who could share those same simple truths with adults in a way that I wish more of us would take to heart.
One thing in particular that I especially appreciated about Fred Rogers was the fact that he was an ordained Presbyterian minister. And yet, it was never “The Reverend Rogers Neighborhood” -- and this was by design. His program was intentionally non-sectarian, and non-doctrinal...because, as he put it, he would “hate to see anyone excluded” because of his personal religious convictions, an attitude, of course, which I suspect reflected his most profound religious conviction. And I was impressed to learn the other day that it took him eight years to complete his seminary education, because he pursued those studies part-time while continuing to produce his daily television broadcast.
I also suspect that most folks, when they think of Mr. Rogers, don’t think of him in a clerical collar or ecclesiastical robes, but rather see him dressed in sneakers and a cardigan sweater. And I was delighted to learn this past week that all those sweaters, including the one now residing at the Smithsonian, were knitted by his mother, who was in the habit of knitting a sweater a month, and then distributing them in December as Christmas gifts to her family and loved ones.
But I’m growing a little weary of talking about Mister Rogers. I think it would be better if I let him speak for himself, in his own words. So here are some quotations that I found on his website (which I highly encourage all of you to find and explore), a sermon, if you will, from someone I would have felt proud to invite into this pulpit, the Reverend Fred McFeely Rogers, Minister Rogers, a long-time summer resident of this island, whom the world will sadly miss.
***
• Little by little we human beings are confronted with situations that give us more and more clues that we aren't perfect.
• If only you could sense how important you are to the lives of those you meet; how important you can be to people you may never even dream of. There is something of yourself that you leave at every meeting with another person.
• As human beings, our job in life is to help people realize how rare and valuable each one of us really is, that each of us has something that no one else has—or ever will have—something inside that is unique to all time. It's our job to encourage each other to discover that uniqueness and to provide ways of developing its expression.
• Love isn't a state of perfect caring. It is an active noun like "struggle." To love someone is to strive to accept that person exactly the way he or she is, right here and now--and to go on caring even through times that may bring us pain.
•A friend of mine made a calligraphy scroll that I have framed in my writing room. It reads: "The greatest gift one can give to another person is a deeper understanding of life and the ability to love and believe in the self."
• Relationships are like dances in which people try to find whatever happens to be the mutual rhythm in their lives.
• Something we all need in order to feel the fullness of life: It's not only a sense that we belong on our planet, but also that we belong in other people's lives—that we are loved, lovable, and capable of loving.
• Feelings are "mentionable," and whatever is "mentionable" can be more manageable. Whether we're children or adults, adding to our emotional vocabulary can often add to our ability to cope with what we're feeling. Using words to describe what's inside helps remind us that what we're experiencing is human...and mentioning our feelings to others can make those feelings more manageable.
• Often, problems are knots with many strands, and looking at those strands can make a problem seem different.
• We'd all like to feel self-reliant and capable of coping with whatever adversity comes our way, but that's not how most human beings are made. It's my belief that the capacity to accept help is inseparable from the capacity to give help when our turn comes to be strong.
• When I was a child and would see scary things on the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping."
• One of my wise teachers, Dr. Orr, told me, "There is only one thing evil cannot stand, and that is forgiveness."
• The older I get, the more convinced I am that the space between communicating human beings can be hallowed ground.
• Young children sometimes look sheepish when they confide in us, as though they already suspect there's something amiss in their interpretation of the world; and have you noticed how often older children, even teenagers, will start a confidence with a question like "Promise you won't laugh if I tell you?"
• People have said "Don't cry" to other people for years and years, and all it has ever meant is "I'm too uncomfortable when you show your feelings: Don't cry." I'd rather have them say, "Go ahead and cry. I'm here to be with you."
• When you combine your own intuition with a sensitivity to other people's feelings and moods, you may be close to the origins of valuable human attributes such as generosity, altruism, compassion, sympathy, and empathy.
• Whatever we do to show our children we love them, nothing can replace times when we give them our complete attention. I believe that the children who have learned that there will be such times for them are the ones who are at least likely to demand it and to compete for it.
• We have all been children and have had children's feelings...but many of us have forgotten. We've forgotten what it's like not to be able to reach the light switch. We've forgotten a lot of the monsters that seemed to live in our room at night. Nevertheless, those memories are still there, somewhere inside us.
• If the day ever came when we were able to accept ourselves and our children exactly as we and they are, then, I believe, we would have come very close to an ultimate understanding of what "good" parenting means. It's part of being human to fall short of that total acceptance—and often far short. But one of the most important gifts a parent can give a child is the gift of that child's uniqueness.
• Many mothers feel severely pressured these days. They often feel like they're falling short in one part, if not in several parts, of their lives. They often feel like they're failures. Well, people aren't failures when they're doing the best they can. Our performance doesn't have to be measured against anyone else's—just against our own abilities to cope.
• If I were looking for a child-care provider, I'd start with a short tryout. Then I'd listen to what he or she could tell me about my child. Does the account of their time together suggest alertness, interest, and those all-important three Cs: caring, confidence, and common sense?
• We need to remember that children are trying, too; trying to understand their feelings and their world, trying to please the people they love, trying to grow. When grownups and children are trying together, just about anything can be possible.
• I recently learned that in an average lifetime a person walks about sixty-five thousand miles. That's two and half times around the world. I wonder where your steps will take you. I wonder how you'll use the rest of the miles you're given.
• It's not the honors and the prizes and the fancy outsides of life which ultimately nourish our souls. It's the knowing that we can be trusted, that we never have to fear the truth, that the bedrock of our very being is good stuff. That's what makes growing humanity the most potentially glorious enterprise on earth.
• Please think of the children first. If you ever have anything to do with their entertainment, their food, their toys, their custody, their childcare, their health care, their education—listen to the children, learn about them, learn from them. Think of the children first.
***
As I mentioned when I first started speaking this morning, I didn’t really see that much of “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” during the years it was being produced and broadcast on PBS. And it makes me feel good to know that there is an archive of about a thousand videotapes, approximately 300 of which will continue to air regularly, as reruns, hopefully far into the future. Because there is a certain timeless quality to the program, an immortal spirit, if you will, which can and will continue to speak to subsequent generations of children, and adults, long after the death of its creator.
And this got me thinking, where IS “Mister Rogers Neighborhood,” really? Was it merely a simple set in a television studio, a place which, through the “magic of television,” came into our homes, through our television sets, and become such a familiar and important part of our lives? A living room (with a front door and that famous closet full of shoes and sweaters), and a kitchen, and regular trolley service to “the Land of Make Believe.”
And then there was my son’s favorite thing, “Picture, Picture” -- something I suppose can only be described as a “magic mirror” or maybe a “window on the world,” which could show us farms, or factories, or foreign countries, or literally anything else under the sun. And there was a front stoop as well, and, of course the place that always fascinated me most, the tiny model of an entire town which served as the background for the opening titles.
And it occurs to me that “Mister Rogers Neighborhood” is a little like Kingdom of Heaven -- it exists “amongst us,” all around us, even within us.
But I also suspect that much of the heart and the soul and the inspiration of Mister Rogers Neighborhood is right here on this island, out in Madakat, at a place called the “Crooked House.” A place that dates back to a Nantucket before the days of “trophy houses” and ostentatious affluence, when the island was not somewhere one went to celebrate one’s celebrity, but rather a place where one could come to escape it -- to sit on the beach, and maybe sip a glass of Chardonnay, enjoy a fresh baguette with a little aged brie, and watch the sun go down over Madakat Harbor, secure in the knowledge that we are ALL the children of God.
***
CLOSING SONG:
It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood,
A beautiful day for a neighbor.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?...
It's a neighborly day in this beauty wood,
A neighborly day for a beauty.
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?...
I've always wanted to have a neighbor just like you.
I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you.
So, let's make the most of this beautiful day.
Since we're together we might as well say:
Would you be mine?
Could you be mine?
Won't you be my neighbor?
Won't you please,
Won't you please?
Please won't you be my neighbor?
posted by The Eclectic Cleric at 5:05 PM
