I want to explore with you this morning our hopes for the future, the "House of Tomorrow" that our children will live in -- Rianne and Erin and all the others in this congregation and in our families and everywhere in the world. It's going to be less about how we prepare our children for this world than about how we prepare the world for them - how we might work to make that House of Tomorrow a happy dwelling place for them. The title, by the way, as some of you have probably recognized, comes from Kahlil Gibran's writing called "On Children". He says, "Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of life's longing for itself. ...... You may house their bodies but not their souls, for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams."

Gibran says we cannot visit the House of Tomorrow, even in our dreams - I think he means that because it's in the future, not now, we're limited by our knowledge of the present; but one of the wonderful things about human beings is our capacity to imagine, and to act on our imaginings! I was reminded this week by a thoughtful person in this congregation that we need to be careful to nurture, rather than stifle, that capacity, in ourselves and our children. For a few moments now, using the metaphor of the House itself as a framework, I'd like to imagine with you what it might look like, how it might feel - while recognizing that even our dreams are limited by the very fact that we are not our children, and that it is they who will ultimately shape the future. Even if we can help build the House, it's they who will decorate and live in it and determine how its rooms are to be used and who can have access to them.

Ah yes, access. It sometimes looks dismayingly as though that good House of our imaginings will be entered by only a tiny fraction of those human beings whose inherent worth and dignity we have covenanted to affirm and promote, and that our children will inherit a world very far from the goal of our sixth Principle, "world community, with peace, liberty and justice for all". Even in relatively affluent Waterloo Region, we have people without homes, literally and physically, as well as those who are metaphorically, spiritually homeless. How has it happened that as the standard of living of most of us, and of the country as a whole, has increased, more people are living on the streets, even as the snow begins to fall and winter closes in? Consider, by contrast, the warm world reflected in this little piece from the beloved stories of Winnie the Pooh, in the part where Eeyore's house has been blown away by a strong wind and he's had to find temporary accommodation:

Christopher Robin had a question to ask, and he was wondering how to ask it.

"Well", he said at last, "it's a very nice house, and if your own house is blown down you must go somewhere else, mustn't you, Piglet? What would you do if your house was blown down?"

Before Piglet could think, Pooh answered for him. "He'd come and live with me", said Pooh. "Wouldn't you, Piglet?"

Piglet squeezed his paw. "Thank you, Pooh", he said. "I should love to".

That's the kind of tomorrow I yearn for, where the homeless are invited in out of the cold by their neighbours - and where, in the words of one of my favourite hymns, we "take as our neighbour both stranger and friend". In that future, the most important thing about the House of Tomorrow is that all can enter there and be at home in it, safe and cared for. For those of us who share that dream - well, we'd better get working, hadn't we, because a House like that seems to be vanishing further into the distance. Let's not allow it to disappear!

The House image lends itself to picturing and seeing how various aspects of it might look. We needn't get too grand in our dreams - a small place with a couple of bedrooms, bathroom, kitchen, living room, and at least a little space for gardening - you can picture that, can't you? As we come up to the front door, let's glance at the front yard. In my dream house of tomorrow (which may not be exactly like yours) - can you guess? -- yes, the garden, both front and back and all around, is full of flowers and other plants, and birds and butterflies -- and pesticide free!

If you're not sure why that's an important gift to give our children, do talk to one of our Green Sanctuary people - they'll be only too happy to explain. And if you already know that it's important, then you can help build the good house of tomorrow by following some of the action suggestions which Theo Raynham and his team can give you. I want to pick up one of the signs for my little patch of a front yard which says "Pesticide Free," but I'm a bit shy about doing that for fear my overgrown flowers and shrubs might be a bad advertisement for pesticide free gardening! I guess, though, that having the sign would be a good stimulus to me to keep the shrubs trimmed back from the sidewalk, so I expect I will get one. What I'd really like to do (and perhaps I can) is to add an invitation: "Come round the back and see flowers thrive without chemicals of any kind"! I hope there will be biodiversity in the House of Tomorrow.

If you wonder what all this has to do with religion, consider that another name for the Green Sanctuary's work is "The Seventh Principle Project". In all the activities of our congregational life, there's an underlying assumption, I think, that one of our chief purposes in meeting together is to help shape a better world. Even if social action is not one of our major interests, even if we come to church largely to find a haven from the affairs of our everyday lives, even if we're pessimistic about how much we can do as individuals or a group to influence the future, when we walk in this door we're saying that we believe the way we live matters. The world that Rianne and Erin will live in is the world that we are making: that surely gives an urgency to our consideration of how we want to be, and what we're doing to bring it about. However much we may disagree on the means, keep in mind that we, inescapably, are shaping that future.

All right; we're up to the front door of our House of Tomorrow now; let's go in, and let's visit the kitchen first. What's cooking? It smells good, but do you think there's enough for everybody? You probably know that a large proportion of the people in our world don't get enough to eat, and that children who don't have proper nourishment don't grow properly, but that's not just true of people far away. Here in Canada, too - and even in Kitchener-Waterloo, there are children who go to bed hungry and who aren't getting what they need for their health and growth. These are our neighbours. They're connected to us. Have you heard the phrase, "six degrees of separation"? It's based on an experiment thirty years ago by psychologist Stanley Millgram, who investigated how a parcel with a name and some identity clues on it but no address, might get to its destination if he started it off by giving it to someone.

The participants in Milgram's experiment were to try to get the package to the person it was intended for by giving it to someone who might know someone else who might know the person ..... By doing enough experiments to give valid results, Milgram found that between any two strangers in the United States there are on average just five or six links separating them. That's where the phrase comes from. My partner John, who has dual citizenship, keeps remarking how much commoner it is for people in Canada to find they're connected than it is in the States - so perhaps here in Canada there are even fewer than six degrees of separation! Let's go back to our House of Tomorrow. The food that's cooking in the kitchen - will it stretch to feed those hungry people who are connected so closely, separated by so little? How can we help make sure there's enough food in the house for them all?

As we look into the dining room of the House of Tomorrow, let's try to imagine the people living there have planned a feast and invited in all their neighbours and relatives and connections - what a party they'll have! We wouldn't want any of those guests to be disappointed, would we? They're our family. I find myself for once in perfect harmony with that staunch old agnostic rationalist Bertrand Russell, who said that if we're to build a better world, "There will have to be a realization at once intellectual and moral that we are all one family and that happiness of no branch of this family can be built securely upon the ruin of another."

Well, you already know many charitable ways of working to make sure there's enough food at the party - but keep in mind that this is the House of Tomorrow - however generous your gifts to the food bank or other social service organizations, they won't touch the underlying issue of poverty and need and inequity. If we want that future party to be joyful, even though we won't be there, we need to think ahead, to causes and remedies, don't we? More than a year ago, just after 9/11, I came across - and read to you then - a small story which fits right into this kitchen and dining-room theme, and bears repeating, I think, as we ponder causes and remedies for present problems and hopes for the House of Tomorrow. It's the true story of a father and his daughter:

My daughter is 4 years old. She and I were walking in the woods today playing a game. She was pretending that there were monsters in the forest and that they were coming to eat us. We had to be vigilant. We had to defend ourselves. I asked her, "What is the plan? What are we going to do if we see one of the monsters?"

She replied, "Feed them."

"Feed them?" I said.

"Yes," she said. "If we feed them they won't want to eat us."

Let's go on, now, to the living room. This is the place where the family relaxes and plays; perhaps it's where the kids do their homework, too; it's certainly where they have some good conversations. I'm going to let you in on a conversation: one of the adults has just asked a child that good old question, "What did you learn today?" only she forgot to mention the words "in school" and said "What did you learn here today?". Here are some of the wise answers she's hearing - answers that were actually given by some children between 4 and 8 years old when they were asked, "What does love mean?"

From Rebecca, aged 8: When Grandma got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So Grandpa does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love.

A boy named Billy: When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You know that your name is safe in their mouth.

Chrissy, aged 6: Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French fries without making them give you any of theirs.

Danny, aged 7: Love is when mommy makes coffee for daddy and she takes a sip before giving it to him, to make sure the taste is OK.

And finally, from Jessica, 8: You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget.

And in that living room in our good House of Tomorrow, the adults (those are the children of today) - they have things to say, too, but they take care not to preach anything they can't or don't practise. This is so hard for us, isn't it? We know our own weaknesses only too well sometimes, and want very much to help our children avoid our mistakes. But it really doesn't work to tell them not to do what we do - at least, not unless we're prepared to act as a kind of horrible example to them, and most of us wouldn't choose that role! I expect there's television in the House of Tomorrow, and I expect it carries trash as well as the Learning Channel, but I also envision people recognizing that growth and development don't stop at the end of adolescence. Perhaps you've heard the story of Gandhi, who was often asked for advice, and most often asked to give advice to other people.

A mother once came to Ghandi. "Please," she said, "my son respects you so much. Could you tell him to stop eating sugar? His teeth are becoming rotten."

"Bring your son back in two weeks," Ghandi said, "and I will tell him."

The mother waited, then came back with her son in two weeks. Ghandi sat and talked with them both. "I myself eat no sugar," Ghandi said to him. "It is not good for one's health."

After the conversation was over, the mother returned to thank Ghandi. "I have a question," she said. "Why could you not tell him earlier? Why did you ask me to wait for two weeks?"

"It took me that long to stop eating sugar," Ghandi replied.

We've looked in at the living areas of our House of Tomorrow but there hasn't been time for more than a quick glimpse in the bedrooms and bathroom. I hope there's a good supply of clean water in the bathroom - that it hasn't all gone down some gigantic drain to someone offering big money for Canada's abundant resources - and I hope that the bedrooms are good places for the people who live there to dream of the Day After Tomorrow. Sorry to rush us through this imaginary tour, but I don't want us to miss a little incident taking place in the house next door. It was Richard Gilbert who drew my attention to the little neighbour girl whose mother had sent her on an errand. She was gone a long time and when she finally returned home her mother asked what had taken her so long. She had stopped to help a friend fix his bicycle because it had broken. "But you don't know anything about fixing bicycles," exclaimed her mother. "I know," replied the girl, "I stopped to help him cry." I hope that's how it is in the Houses of Tomorrow, that children and grown-up people will stop to help each other cry - and to laugh and dance and sing together, too.

I've said little or nothing about how we can best prepare our children for the House of Tomorrow, but I don't think that's really separate from how we build the world. The greatest preparation we can give our children for their lives in that House which we cannot really visit is to pass on to them the values we hold most dear, our own dreams for a better world, our vision of peace, liberty and justice for all. Oh, they may not become Unitarians, or vote for our preferred political candidate, or adopt our housekeeping standards or choose what we consider an appropriate line of work, but they will absorb our values in much more subtle and pervasive ways. As Antoine St.-Exupery said, "In a house which becomes a home, one hands down and another takes up the heritage of mind and heart, laughter and tears, musings and deeds. ...... We live, not by things, but by the meaning of things. It is needful to transmit the passwords from generation to generation."

Let's do our very best, for Rianne and Erin to whom we've pledged our best today, and for all our other children, to transmit the passwords to them and to help prepare a good House of Tomorrow for them. And the exercise of our imaginations has not been, and never will be, a waste of time. I'll end with words of Henry David Thoreau: "If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.

So may it be.