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St Valentine's Day

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

ee cummings

Prelude:    # 18  (STLT)   What Wonderous Love

Opening Words: Love is the spirit of this 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 wondrous 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 reclaim 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:     # 6  (STLT)   Just as long as I have Breath

1. Just as long as I have breath,

I must answer, "Yes" to life:

though with pain I made my way

Still with hope I meet each day.

If they ask what I did well,

tell them I said, "Yes " to life.

2. Just as long as vision lasts,

I must answer, "Yes" to truth:

in my dream and in my dark,

always that elusive spark.

If they ask what I did well,

tell them I said, "Yes " to truth.

3. Just as long as my heart beats,

I must answer, "Yes" to love:

disappointment pierced me through,

Still I kept on loving you.

If they ask what I did best,

tell them I said, "Yes " to love.

Prayer: ( followed by a moment of silent meditation) adapted from The Four Agreements by Miguel Ruiz

Today, Creator of the Universe, we ask that you come to us and share with us a strong communion of love. We know that your real name is Love, that to have a communion with you means to share the vibration, the same frequency that you are, because you are the only thing that exists in the universe.

Today, help us to be like you are, to love life, to be life, to be love. Help us to love as we should love, with no conditions, no expectations, no obligations, without any judgment. Keep us from judgments, from guilt and from the need to impose punishment, may we truly pardon all.

Help us to love unconditionally all that has been created, other people, especially those closest to us, our family, neighbors and those with whom we work. If we reject them, we reject ourselves, and the spirit of love that surrounds us.

Today may we open our hearts to love again. Let us say to one another," I love you ".Come to us, use our voices, use our eyes, use our hearts to share ourselves in a communion of love with people everywhere.

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.)

We invite you to share your joys and concerns since our last meeting.

Story for All Ages:  (the children go to Religious Education at the end of the story and the adults sing "Spirit of Life" )

Hymn::    # 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.


First Reading: From the Old Testament of the Bible: Song of Solomon Chapter 2: Verses 10-14

Rise up, my love, my faire one, and come away.

For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;

The flowers appear on the earth;

The time of the singing of birds is come,

And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land;

The fig tree puts forth her green figs and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.

Arise, my love , my fair one, and come away.

O my dove that are in the clefts of the rock, in the secret places of the stairs,

Let me see your countenance, let me hear your voice;

For sweet is your voice, and your countenance is comely.

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

Love one another, but make not a bond of love:

Hymn:   STLT # 10   Immortal Love      Lyrics by John Greenleaf Whittier

Immortal love, forever full,
Forever flowing free,
Forever shared, forever whole,
A never ebbing sea!

Our outward lips confess the name
All other names above;
Love only knows whence it came,
And comprehendeth love.

Blow, winds of Love, awake and blow
The mists of hate away:
Sing out, O truth divine, and tell
How wide and far we stray.

The letter fails, the systems fall,
And every symbol wanes;
The Spirit over seeing all,
Eternal Love remains.

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 unknowable. Love is too large, too deep ever to be truly understood 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 awareness 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 nurturing one's own or an other's spiritual growth.

First, it may be it may be noticed that the behavior is defined in terms of the goal or purpose it seems to serve, in this case, spiritual growth.

Second, it may be noticed that as defined, love is strangely circular process. For the process of extending one's self is an evolutionary process. When one has successfully extended one's limits, one has grown into a larger state of being. Thus the act of loving is an act of self-evolution even when the purpose of the act is someone else's growth. It is throught reaching toward evolution that we evolve.

Third, the unitary definition of love includes self-love with love for others. To be dedicated to human spiritual development is to be dedicated to the race of which we are a part, and this therefore means dedication to our own development as well as "theirs." It is actually impossible to forsake our own spiritual development in favor of someone else's. We cannot be a source of strength unless we nurture our own strength.

Fourth, the act of extending one's limits implies effort. One extends one's limits only by exceeding them, and exceeding limits requires effort. When we love someone our love becomes demonstrable or real only through our exertion- through the fact that for that someone ( or for ourself) we take an extra step or walk an extra mile. Love is not effortless. To the contrary love, is effortful.

Finally, by use of the word "will" I have attempted to transcend the distinction between desire and action. Desire is not necessarily translated into action. Will is desire of sufficient intensity that it is translated into action. Everyone in our culture desires to some extent to be loving, yet many are not in fact loving. I therefore conclude that desire to love is not itself love. Love is as love does. Love is an act of will-namelly, both an intention and and an action. Will also implies choice. We do not have to love. We choose to love. No matter how much we may think we are loving, if we are in fact not loving, it is because we have chosen not to love and therefore do not love despite our good intentions. On the other hand, whenever we do actually exert ourselves in the cause of spiritual growth, it is because we have chosen to do so. The choice to love has been made.

Love Defined ( excerpts) from The Road Less Traveled by M. Scott Peck

Discussion Questions:
• 1. What are your thoughts or feelings upon reading the above definition of love? Do you think love is inextricably linked with the spirit?
• 2. What are your thoughts on love and the rational mind? Are these two ever at odds, or can a person love and retain use of their rationality?
• 3.Scott Peck states that we "cannot be a source of strength unless we nurture our own strength." Yet often love is measured by the extent a person spends thier resources ( sometimes to the point of exhaustion), in order to nurture the object (s) of that love. What are your thoughts on this common scenario?
• 4."Love is effortful, " says Scott Peck. Yet hard work is not commonly associalted with love. Au contraire, one often hears the admonition that "if the going get too rough, then maybe love is not really there." Do you think love is an enterprise that requires arduous work and perseverance? Do you think love makes hardship easier to overcome?
• 5.These days, it is considered "hip" and "cool" to be "loving." Are we truly "loving" ? Do our intentions translate into actions? Can our love be experienced by ouselves and other, regardless of definitions? What are ways in which we can "choose to love" so that our love manifests in the world?

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. Let us pray

*Hymn:    Go now in Peace     

Go now in Peace, Go now in Peace,
May the Love of God surround you
Everywhere, everywhere, You may go

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.





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