Radical Belonging

Sermon: September 28, 2025 . Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of San Dieguito

Kat Armas, theologian and author of the book Sacred Belonging, encourages us to "refuse to let isolation be a tool of our undoing. Because we were never meant to carry this weight alone."

And yet that’s how we often feel, alone. Or at least different or other. No matter where we go in the world, there are really only two locations we can be sure of, where I am and where I am not. Inside of me and outside of me. And the two different spaces seem incredibly far apart even though only a thin barrier of skin separates the two. Bring another person into the space and now there are three spaces, inside of me, inside of you, and the space in between us. And that space in between can seem terribly far, especially when society, or politicians, or social media pushes us even further away from each other, increasing that distance and thus feeding our sense of isolation. 

The relentless social media machine used the recent Charlie Kirk assassination to push friends even further apart from one another. I witnessed people who generally agree on 95% of their values increase their distance from each other, unfollow each other, claim that they are now seeing the other’s “true colors” and further isolate. Our circles are being drawn smaller and smaller and every time we draw them smaller, it forces out one more person because they can no longer fit inside the boundaries of the ever shrinking island we create for ourselves. Oh, there goes John. And now Barbara’s gone. And what happened to Joe? Oh, that’s right. We lost him during the George Floyd days. It’s like remembering those lost in a war, except they aren’t really lost, just pushed out of our circles. 

It’s as if we are all on individual icebergs that are melting with the heat of the modern world. While global warming threatens the actual icebergs, the heat of our intolerance melts the foundation upon which we each stand. And we have been encouraging our icebergs to melt even faster, letting those who stand dangerously close to the edge slip into the oblivion of the sea instead of reaching out to them and saying, “Be careful. You’re awfully close to the edge. I’m worried about you. Please take my hand.” No, we chose to watch our friends and family fall into the sea as though we are eagerly waiting to be the only one left atop our iceberg, a single soul balanced on a tiny, floating circle of ice that threatens to give way underneath us. Perhaps in that moment, the moment when we are the last person standing, the moment right before we plunge into the darkness beneath, we can say, “I was right. I win.” 

But we’re justified, aren’t we? We’re cutting the toxicity out of our lives, the dysfunction, the trauma. We stand for justice and the best way we know how to achieve that justice is by putting others in “time out,” by ostracizing them in prisons or outside our social media circles. So, how is that going for us? Is it working?

Buddhist teacher Yasutani Roshi says, “The fundamental delusion of humanity is to suppose that I am here and you are out there.” But is the distance between us really a delusion? Because it feels painfully real. It feels bleak. 

It doesn’t have to. We can change how we interface with the world, with each other, and with ourselves. In a sense, I’m preaching to the choir because before me is a group of people who have already taken the first step of reaching out their hand, just by being here, by being a part of our community, by choosing to welcome others onto our iceberg. But welcoming isn’t enough. Welcoming is what you do when guests come over for dinner. You clean the house, you put out the nice dishes, you hide your dirty pots and pans in the pantry so you can pretend your house is cleaner than it actually is, you bribe the children so they behave, you sit in the less comfortable living room to talk instead of in the den... You put forth extra effort. 

Belonging is something else. Belonging actually takes very little effort. It’s letting people walk into your home without knocking when you’re wearing a robe and haven’t had a shower that day. It’s letting them get their own drink and sit on the comfy LazyBoy recliner that has a rip on the seat underneath the blanket because even with the rip, everyone knows it’s the most comfortable seat in the house. It’s knowing that they like their coffee black and that they don’t like onions on their sandwiches. Belonging is noticing when someone isn’t here on a particular Sunday, it’s talking authentically and not posturing in order to retain emotional distance, it’s relaxed, it’s homey, it’s comfortable.

Belonging sounds like, “Where’s Louise? I haven’t seen her for two weeks.” … or “You know who would be great at that? Greg. We should ask him.” … or “I have trouble staying on my harmony part when Caroline isn’t here.” It sounds like, “Betsy, do you need help with that?” … and “Do you have a ride home, Andi?” And yes, sometimes it’s following up on an offer to give someone your time or effort, but usually it’s not. Usually it’s just noticing and acknowledging. It’s saying “I see you.” 

When we talk about belonging, we often think of ourselves. How do I feel? Do I feel like I belong? The better question is “Am I creating a sense of belonging for others?” Because you can wonder about your own belonging until you are standing by yourself on a tiny circle of an iceberg or you can be the person reaching out your hand and making sure friends don’t slip over the edge. If you’re the one to reach out your hand, you’ll never be alone. And here’s the secret to a large and supportive iceberg: don’t hesitate before reaching out your hand. Don’t question whether you agree with that person’s latest social media post. Don’t judge their worthiness of whether they deserve to be on the iceberg because of where they are on their own personal path of growth.

I’m calling for radical belonging. The only way to this goal is through the complete acceptance of the other. Our third principle is the “acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations.” Acceptance, encouragement. It’s reaching out a hand and saying, “Be careful. You’re awfully close to the edge. I’m worried about you. Please take my hand.” It’s as our choir sang earlier this month, Draw The Circle Wide. Our Christian predecessors understood the power of belonging and the inspiring possibility that the church could fulfill that promise. In Romans 12:5 it states “Though many, we form one body, and each member belongs to all the others.” This is one way in which labels can support the idea of belonging, IF the label is offered to all. As a member of UUFSD, you belong to this community. As a Unitarian Universalist, you belong to a much broader community of likeminded individuals who share the same values. We don’t really have a word for that level of belonging, but the Muslims do. They call it “Ummah,” which roughly translates to community or nation, but it is a collective term that unites all who believe in Islam worldwide despite nations, races, or class divisions. 

So how do we act out radical belonging? What does it look like? Radical belonging means putting the relationship you have with the other before anything else. The duty of belonging is to care and protect the relationship at all costs. Relationships are sacred and as members of this fellowship, you have entered a sacred relationship with each other. We are going to disagree, but if we put our relationship first, we will honor the other with compassion. As members of this human race, we are also in sacred relationship with each other. When someone you know on social media expresses a particularly biting or caustic point of view, you should look past the angry rhetoric or false statistics and instead notice, “My friend is frustrated. When I’m frustrated, how do I want to be treated?” When you see someone you don’t recognize on the patio after service and they’re standing alone, you could have anxiety about approaching them and starting a conversation, or you can notice, “There’s someone who looks like they might feel awkwardly alone. If that were me, what would I want to happen?”

Radical belonging isn’t about you. It’s about the other. It’s always about the other. It’s about contagious love, absolute acceptance, and extreme authenticity.

And so… this a call for UUFSD to enter a year of Radical Belonging. We are going to move past Welcoming and into the realm of Belonging - not just belonging for some, but for all. How do we do this? Right now when we're engaged in conversation on the patio, we often rely on the normal small talk we all know makes others feel welcome. Where are you from? What do you do for a career? While these questions can help us get to know one another, it doesn’t foster Radical Belonging. A better question might be “What brought you here today?” Someone could reply with “I was struggling with the doctrine at my old church and am searching for alternatives.” That person might be interested in one of the spiritual groups like the Buddhist group or the Earth Centered Spirituality Group. If they say, “I’m just so frustrated with what I’m seeing in the world and wanted to find some people who feel the same way I do.” Then that person might want to attend the Social Justice Action meetings. If they say, “I’ve been looking for a new spiritual home.” Home means connection. Perhaps they’d like to come to a fellowship potluck or social group event. 

Creating a community of radical belonging involves inclusion and invitations beyond idle small talk. It exists when each member becomes a matchmaker of sorts, encouraging others on their own individual spiritual paths. (Again, our 3rd principle.) It thrives when we recognize strangers as longtime friends with the same desire and need to belong as our own. It blossoms when we don’t hesitate before reaching out our hands. It’s not always easy if you let your doubts cause hesitation. But thoughts like “What if they don’t like me?” become a non-issue when you know the community practices absolute acceptance. Thoughts like “I don’t have the energy to try and be charming” dissipate when you make a commitment to extreme authenticity. Thoughts like “I’ll wait until I see other people doing it” go away when everyone spreads contagious love. And this home, our UUFSD iceberg, is where we practice and hone these skills so that we can go out into the world and continue to spread radical belonging throughout our own individual icebergs. So, please join me in transforming our community to one of radical belonging. The investment will return to you in spades when one day someone reaches out their hand to you and says, “Be careful. You’re awfully close to the edge. I’m worried about you. Please take my hand.”

May we continue to reach out our hands out to each other without hesitation now and always. Amen.

*****

REFERENCED READING:

From “When Friendship Becomes Revolution” by Kat Armas

Empire does not deal in friendship. It thrives on isolation. Its dominion is built not only through conquest but through the slow separation of people from one another, from themselves, from the earth. It is in the way a body becomes untethered from its own history, in the way a community is fractured, the way an individual becomes convinced they are meant to withstand alone what was always meant to be carried together.

It is in this isolation that empire names us by our usefulness, our obedience, our silence. It convinces the worker that their labor is their only worth, convinces the oppressed that they suffer alone, convinces the faithful that the divine is too far away to touch. It teaches us that intimacy is reserved for the deserving.

But love is not transaction. Love is presence. Once you know this—that you are no longer a servant but a friend—empire loses its grip. Because friendship, true friendship, is the death of empire. It cannot be controlled or rationed out in wages or traded in the marketplace. It exists beyond the grasp of power.

Our resistance begins when we notice the cracks forming in another’s foundation and say, I will not let you bear this alone. I will hold this with you. I will help you rebuild. This is the defiance of isolation.

The question, then, is not just how to patch what is breaking beneath us but how to dismantle the conditions that allowed the fractures to go unnoticed in the first place. Who benefits from our silence? Who profits from the illusion that we must bear the weight alone? We must uncover the structures that made it possible for the ground to weaken in secret, the way systems insist that struggle is a private burden rather than a shared labor.

We reinforce what is beneath us. We trace the fault lines, strengthening what is weak, ensuring it will not break again. But more than this, we invite others into the work—into the seeing, the mending, the refusal to let isolation be a tool of our undoing.

Because we were never meant to carry this weight alone.

OTHER WRITINGS FOR REFLECTION:

"The House of Belonging" by Zoologist and Poet David Whyte

this is where I want

to love all the things

it has taken me so long

to learn to love…

[For] there is no house

like the house of belonging.

Albert Einstein (1950)

A human being is a part of the whole, called by us “Universe,” a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separate from the rest—a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. The striving to free oneself from this delusion is the one issue of true religion. Not to nourish it but to try to overcome it is the way to reach the attainable measure of peace of mind.

Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer, “Belonging” 

And if it’s true we are alone,

we are alone together,

the way blades of grass

are alone, but exist as a field.

Sometimes I feel it,

the green fuse that ignites us,

the wild thrum that unites us,

an inner hum that reminds us

of our shared humanity.

Just as thirty-five trillion

red blood cells join in one body

to become one blood.

Just as one hundred thirty-six thousand

notes make up one symphony.

Alone as we are, our small voices

weave into the one big conversation.

Our actions are essential

to the one infinite story of what it is

to be alive. When we feel alone,

we belong to the grand communion

of those who sometimes feel alone—

we are the dust, the dust that hopes,

a rising of dust, a thrill of dust,

the dust that dances in the light

with all other dust, the dust

that makes the world.