Ruminations: Covenant – Part 1

A lot of folks in the congregation have been asking what it really means to be a covenantal community. Although covenant is central to our faith tradition, some Unitarian Universalist spaces haven’t focused on being covenantal. Even worse, the language and concept of covenant has been weaponized in some spaces, which has left some people wary about what it really means to be in covenant with one another.

The word covenant still shows up in a weaponized form in our larger community—namely on property deeds. In Shaker Heights, as in a lot of communities across the country, the original deed to many homes includes a restriction about who can buy the home if it is ever sold. Specifically, these deeds state that the homeowner cannot sell the property to a person of color. 

Some people don’t even know that this language exists on the deed to their home. This kind of racial restriction is no longer legally enforceable. But it’s there. And the people who put it there chose to call it a “covenant.”

This is really painful. A word that Unitarian Universalists hold as foundational to sacred space is used in these documents as a way to exclude people based on the color of their skin. I have had to sit with that for awhile this week. 

And yet, this doesn’t mean that there’s something wrong with the word covenant. Or that there’s something harmful about the idea of being in covenantal relationship. It means that sometimes human beings attach beautiful words to harmful behavior so that we can pretend what we’re doing is justified. 

Sometimes, we attach beautiful words

to harmful behavior

so that we can pretend what we’re doing is justified.

At its core, a covenant is a mutual promise. If I think about the kinds of promises I make when I’m scared of something, it’s easy to understand how the idea of covenant has become clouded. When a useful tool becomes weaponized, it can feel tempting to throw out the tool. But we’re also capable of reclaiming the word and concept of covenant and using it to create something of compelling beauty and wholeness. 

In UU spaces, covenant defines a way of being in relationship that exists between harsh legalism and unbound individual freedom. 

When we are anxious about something, some of us tend toward trying to control things. We want to make rules that can be policed and enforced. We want to require people to conform. We want consequences that keep people in check. In other words, we take comfort in the control of law.

Some of us, though, respond to feeling anxious by demanding complete individual freedom. We want to do what we want, when we want, however we want, without restriction or consideration for how others might be affected. In other words, we take comfort in unfettered individuality.

Covenantal community exists somewhere between these extremes. In covenantal relationships, our actions flow from shared values rather than rules or individual preferences. We mutually give our word and expect others to honor our mutual promises with integrity. Our behavior is intentional, grounded in the identity of the group without giving up our own identity in the process.

While the concept of covenant may be central to what it means to be Unitarian Universalist, that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Or that we ever get it perfect. But it’s the common well from which we draw sustenance as a faith community. 

What about you? Are you more tempted to gravitate toward legalism or unrestricted freedom? What about your perception of covenant needs to evolve?