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Congregation Unitarian Universalist
Flower Communion Service
Where Have All The Flowers Gone?
History of our Interfaith Service: by Reginald Zottoli (adapted)
The flower communion was brought to the United States in 1940 and introduced to the
members of our Cambridge, Massachusetts, church by Dr. Capek's wife, Maja V. Capek. The
Czech-born Maja had met Norbert Capek in New York City while he was studying for his
Ph.D., and it was at her urging that Norbert left the Baptist ministry and turned to
Unitarianism. The Capeks returned to Czechoslovakia in 1921 and established the dynamic
liberal church in Prague; Maja Capek was ordained in 1926. It was during her tour of the
United States that Maja introduced the flower communion, which had been developed in the
Prague church, at the Unitarian church in Cambridge. Unfortunately, Maja was unable to
return to Prague due to the outbreak of World War II, and it was not until the war was over
that Norbert Capek's death in a Nazi concentration camp was revealed. When the Nazis took control of Prague in 1940, they found Dr. Capek's gospel of the inherent
worth and beauty of every human person to be-as Nazi court records show-- "...too dangerous
to the Reich [for him] to be allowed to live." Dr. Capek was sent to Dachau, where he was
killed the next year during a Nazi "medical experiment." This gentle man suffered a cruel
death, but his message of human hope and decency lives on through his Flower Communion,
which is widely celebrated today. It is a noble and meaning-filled ritual we arc about to
recreate. This service includes the original prayers of Dr. Capek to help us remember the
principles and dreams for which he died.
Since that time this flower ritual has been used in many interfaith and candle light remembrance services. The giving and sharing of one flower is a powerful message of love. The gardens of the world are full of many flowers, each different, each beautiful, each unique. May this flower remind us all the peoples of the world are like those flowers, no two flowers are alike, so no two people are alike, yet each has a contribution to make. Together the different flowers form a beautiful bouquet. Our common bouquet would not be the same without the unique addition of each individual flower, and thus it is with our world community. By exchanging flowers, we show our willingness to walk together in our Search for justice, peace and love disregarding all that might divide us. Each person takes home a flower brought by someone else - thus symbolizing our shared celebration in community.
Opening Words:
Love is the spirit of this church
The Flower communion service was created by Norbert Capek (1870-1942), who founded the
Unitarian Church in Czechoslovakia. He introduced this special service to that church on June
4, 1923. For some time he had felt the need for some symbolic ritual that would bind people
more closely together. The format had to be one that would not alienate any who had forsaken
other religious traditions. The traditional Christian communion service with bread and wine
was unacceptable to some members of his congregation because of their strong reaction against
the Catholic faith to other who came from a Jewish tradition it was also unaceptable. So he turned to the native beauty of their countryside for elements of a
communion which would be genuine to them. This simple service was the result. It was such
a success that it was held yearly just before the summer recess of the church.
Love is the spirit of this church,
and service is its law.
This is our great covenant:
To live together in peace
Seek the truth in love.
And help one another.
Prelude: Read Responsively
We come to this time and this place:
To rediscover the wonderous gift of free religious community
To renew our faith in the holiness, goodness and beauty of life;
To reaffirm the way of the open mind and the full heart
To rekindle the flame of memory and hope and
To reclaime the vision of an earth made fair, with all her people one.
.Let us worship together and learn to love.
Lighting the Chalice:
May this light that we now kindle
inspire us to use our powers to heal and not to harm
to help and not to hinder
to bless and not to curse
to serve in the cause of justice
to search for our path toward fulfillment and wholeness. Hymn: STLT # 361 Enter, Rejoice, Come In
Prayer: ( followed by a moment of silent meditation)
Oh blow ye evil winds into my body's fire; my soul you'll never unravel.
Even though disappointed a thousand times or fallen in the fight and everything would worthless seem,
I have lived amidst eternity.
Be grateful, my soul,
My life was worth living.
The one who was pressed from all sides but remained victorious in spirit is welcomed into the choir of heroes.
The one who overcame fetters, giving wing to the mind is entering into the golden age of the victorious. Joys and Concerns: (We throw a small stone into this bowl filled with water, to symbolize our thoughts, which move in circular rings eternally, like concentric waves.)
Story for All Ages: (the children go to Religious Education at the end of the story and the adults sing "Spirit of Life" )
Hymn:: Consecration of the Flowers
Infinite Spirit of Life, we ask thy blessing on these thy messengers of fellowship and love. May they remind us, amid diversities of knowledge and gifts, to be one in desire and affection, and devotion to good and beauty. May they also remind us of the value of comradeship, of doing and sharing with one another. May we cherish friendship as a most precious gift. May we not let awareness of another's talents discourage us, or sully our relationships, but may we realize that whatever we can do, great or small, the efforts of all of us are needed. May we be strengthened by the knowledge that one spirit, the spirit of love, unites us, and may we endeavor together for a more joyful life for all. Amen
(Capek, in Seaburg, p. 152)
Prayer:
Please be seated. I invite you to join in a spirit of prayer. #723
In the name of Providence, which implants in the seed the future of the flower and in our hearts the longing for people to live in harmony;
In the name of the highest, in whom we move and who makes the mother and father, the brother and sister, love and loner what they are;
In the name of sages and great religious leaders, who sacrificed their lives to hasten the coming of the age of mutual respect --
Let us renew our resolution -- sincerely to be real brothers and sisters, regardless of any kind of bar which estranges us from each other.
In this holy resolve may we be strengthened knowing that we are God's family; that one spirit, the spirit of love, unites us; and endeavor for a more perfect and more joyful life. Amen.
Sharing the Flowers From the Rev. David Bumbaugh:
Now, as we prepare to leave this place and our time together,
take one of these flowers,
take a different one than the flower you brought.
Take it not to keep forever and ever.
Nothing is forever.
Take a flower as a symbol
of gratitude for the beauty we did not create
of gratitude for blessings we do not deserve,
of gratitude for joys which come when unexpected.
Take a flower as a symbol
of your participation in the community of this fellowship
of your participation in the community of humankind,
of your participation in the community of all living things,
of your participation in the dedicated community.
If, by chance, you did not bring a flower,
take one anyway.
Take a flower as a symbol
that beauty
and grace
and joy
and love
are not matters of reciprocity.
In this world we cannot earn or deserve
that which is most important --
it comes to us as a gift.
Therefore, knowing how to receive
is fully as important as knowing how to give.
Second Reading: ( responsively) Make Not a Bond of Love Kahilil Gibran
Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls
Fill each other's cup but drink not from one cup.
Give one another of your bread but eat not from the same loaf.
Sing and dance together and be joyous,
but let each of you be alone, Even as the strings of a lute are alone though they quiver with the same music.
Give your hearts, but not into each other's keeping.
For only the hand of Life can contain your hearts.
And stand together, yet not too near together.
For the pillars of the temple stand apart, And the oak tree and the cypress grow not in each other's shadow.
But let there be spaces in your togetherness,
And let the winds of the heavens dance between you.
Love one another, but make not a bond of love.
Let it rather be a moving sea between
the shores of your souls.
ALL: Love one another, but make not a bond of love:
Hymn: What Wonderous Love
Discussion: What is love? (copyright: First Unitarian Church San José)
Love Defined ( excerpts) from The Road Less Traveled by M.Scott Peck
I am very conscious of the fact that in attempting to examine love we will be beginning to toy with mystery. In a very real sense we will be attempting to examine the unexplainable and to know the un knowable. Love is too large, too deep ever to be truly understiid or measured or limited within the framework of words.
One of the results of the mysterious nature of love is that no one has ever, to my knowledge, arrived at a truly satisfactory definition of love. I am presuming, however to give a single definition of love, again with the awarenessf that it is likely to be in some way inadequate. I define love thus:
The will to extend one's self for the purpose of nuturing one's own or another's spiritual growth.
First, it may be
Closing circle of hands
I have felt a presence that disturbs me with the joy of elevated thoughts;
A sense of the sublime, of something far more deeply interfused,
whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, and the round ocean and the living air.
There is a motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things, all objects of all thought, and it rolls in unending motion through all things. There is not one big cosmic meaning for all.There is only the meaning we all give to our lives, an individual meaning.
May we find it.
Let us pray
*Hymn: Final Thoughts: 1 Corinthians 13
Whether there be tongues, they shall cease;
Whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
And now abide faith, hope, love, these three
And the greatest of these is love.
Enter, rejoice and come in.
1. Enter, rejoice and come in.
Enter, rejoice and come in.
Chorus
Today will be a joyful day;
enter, rejoice and come in.
2. Open your ears to the song.
Open your ears to the song.
Chorus
Today will be a joyful day;
enter, rejoice and come in.
3. Open your hearts ev'ryone.
Open your hearts ev'ryone.
Chorus
Today will be a joyful day;
enter, rejoice and come in.
4. Don't be afraid of some change.
Don't be afraid of some change.
Chorus
Today will be a joyful day;
enter, rejoice and come in.
5. Enter, rejoice and come in.
Chorus
Today will be a joyful day;
enter, rejoice and come in.
It is worthwhile to live and fight courageously for sacred ideals.
We invite you to share your joys and concerns since our last meeting
# 123 (STLT)
"Spirit of Life" by Carolyn McDade (adapted)
Spirit of Life, come unto us,
Sing in our hearts all the stirrings of compassion.
Blow in the wind, rise in the sea;
Move in our hands, giving life the shape of justice.
Roots hold us close; wings set us free;
Spirit of Life, come to us, come to me.
Go now in Peace
Go now in Peace, Go now in Peace,
May the Love of God surround you
Everywhere, everywhere, You may go