When I worked in Yellowstone National Park as a youth, we loved to climb mountains.

[Edward Rothstein, in Emblems of Mind, introduces his book by a reference to Wordsworth’s climb, p.3.]

Wordsworth, a friend, and a shepherd guide, decide to climb Mt. Snowdon.

They start before the sun is up; they want to see the sunrise from the mountain top.

The summer night is warm. A fog hangs low. The air is thick with moisture.

They start from a cabin at the mountain base.

Dark. They climb in silence.

The fog obscures their surroundings. They see just the trail before them.

Wordsworth’s head is fixed downward, on the path.

He describes it like the earth is set against him, like an enemy.

He concentrates on just this little patch of ground … rocks, twigs, a log.

But gradually, the dawn comes, the fog lifts, the ground begins to brighten up.

With each step, things become clearer. His perspective broadens.

And then comes the moment, the sudden moment, when he looks up.

The moon hangs in a brightening sky.

A vast ocean of clouds surrounds the base of the mountain.

Ø Life falls into perspective.

Ø Priorities realign and we know what’s really important in our life.

Ø We get a sense of our moral compass

Claiming spaces for perspective is a regular part of the practices of the world’s religions.

It’s not a time for finger pointing.

It’s a time to look deep within oneself and make course corrections.

This year, an interesting thing is happening.

Rosh Hashanah and Ramadan are occurring on the same day.

There is something symbolic about this, not lost on the clergy of both Judaism and Islam.

Judaism and Islam follow a lunar calendar which has 354 days in the year.

That’s 11 days short of a full year, according to a sun calendar.

Jews correct this discrepancy by adding a month, every three years.

Islam just continues counting lunar months and lunar years.

Which means that the two calendars do not work together.

Once every 33 years, these two central celebrations come together.

So this is a special time, both for Judaism and Islam.

Rosh Hashanah is the Jewish New Year.

It is a time to blow the shofar and reflect, looking back at the mistakes of the past and determining how to change in the coming year.

Rosh Hashanah is a time for New Year’s resolutions

Rosh Hashanah moves toward Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement.

For Jews, these are High Holy Days.

Ramadan is a time for fasting and repentance.

Around the world, Muslims will not eat from sun up to sun down.

This is sacred time for self reflection and course correction.

I picture Moses leading the Israelites out of Egypt and returning to Mt. Sinai where he first received his call.

Moses wanted to see God (much like the little Jewish girl in our children’s story, this morning).

But the brilliance of God is too intense. No one can bask in the presence of God and live, according to Jewish theology.

So God hid Moses in the cleft of the rock when he passed by, and placed his hand over Moses to protect him.

As God passed by, Moses only caught a glimpse of the backside of God.

Spiritually speaking, this implies that no one can completely merge consciousness with God in this life.

The spiritual implication in the Hebrew concept, "Glory of God," is that it is something to which we can only "draw near."

I also imagine Moses peering out, through the cleft in the rock, to the Israelites camped below.

There’s the tent to Joshua. And Miriam. And Caleb. Campfires outside of each.

The whole Israelite encampment.

By what system of law, what set of principles, what structure of moral integrity, can this group of people live, prosper, and pass their tradition on to untold generations?

To live in peace with one another; and with a strong connection to God.

Looking down from his mountain, as well as up, Moses received the Ten Commandments.

Four commandments on one side, to perfect our relationship with God.

Four commandments on the other side, to balance our relationship with others.

To me, this is not a system of "shoulds" and "oughts" imposed on people.

It is not a guilt-provoking arrangement we make with religion or society.

This is an opportunity to hone our spirits for God.

Spirituality can only be founded on morality integrity.

Spirituality and morality are not the same things.

But as I like to think, they have a "launch pad-rocket" relationship with one another.

We have a white feral cat that is showing up at our home.

She shows up with a couple of little kittens … I don’t know why?

Maybe because of the food we leave out for them of an evening.

I remember this cat.

A couple of years ago, we trapped feral cats and had them fixed before releasing them back into the wild. The "Fix a Feral" program is great!

It stabilizes the population

I had this feral in a trap, and during the night, it managed to escape.

I had neglected to secure the back latch.

This white feline is wild, blazing eyes, mistrusting, flinching at the slightest sound. In spite of our kind gestures, each time we draw near, she hisses. Psssst!

I’ve know people like that. Draw near and they hiss.

And sometimes we feel like that. Ever just want to hiss at the world?

Ever want to say something, and hold back. Button the lips.

Or kick someone under the table; nice and smiling above the table, but under the table?

But we hold back … because we want to be "good." We don’t want to tempt any of the "commandments." After all, we believe that to be religious is to be "nice."

But is that religious?

I have a book tucked away in a box somewhere that speaks about two responses we can have, excitation or inhibition.

People run into serious problems when they inhibit their excitation.

We hold it in, and all sorts of stresses and breakdowns can occur.

Over five years ago, Don Felt preached a sermon for Northbrae on "The Theology of Nice."

I read that sermon and remember it well. Excellent sermon.

We get the idea from religion that we are supposed to be nice, and that often translates into inhibiting our natural responses.

Perhaps sometimes, the most religious thing to do is to be not so nice and speak up.

So, which way to go? How do we know?

The value of our mountaintops and our sacred spaces is that they guide.