As part of the membership meeting in June, 2010, I asked members to remember two incidents this past year that stood out for them in the life of our Ethical Society -- one that they enjoyed, and one that they didn't enjoy so much.  I also asked that they try to boil down to one word the quality of life that they were wanting -- a quality of life they found in the moment they enjoyed, a quality of life that they found wanting in the moment that they didn't enjoy.  Out of those words, I created this word cloud:

As Memorial Day approaches, I remember that the day was initially created to honor the dead on both sides of a major conflict – the American Civil War – and in that remembering, to re-unite the nation that had nearly split in two. It was not to glorify war, or to justify the rightness of either side, but to mourn those who’d died and honor them as people, and to move forward in unity. (more on that: Memorial Day Origins)

Some of the topics which are discussed on the platform of the Northern Virginia Ethical Society are controversial topics.  Unless otherwise specified, the opinions expressed are those of the speaker -- even when I, as Leader, am speaking.

Ethics, in the view of an Ethical Society, is not about a list of rules or commandments. It's about a process of thinking for ourselves, and developing that ability over our lifetimes.  How many of us feel exactly about all ethical issues at age 30 as we did at 20?  At age 40 as at age 30? and so on.  Ethics is a lifelong exploration, and not everyone will come to the same conclusions.

Many of the other Ethical Societies have, somewhere on their building and often near or above the area where the platform speaker stands, some version of the Felix Adler quote, “The place where people meet to seek the highest is holy ground.”  (Felix’s original words actually were about “men” but he did seem to mean that in the inclusive sense.)  The reference is to the idea in many religions, and especially in the Hebrew scriptures, that there is some space that is especially holy — a place set aside, a place to be especially respected.  Adler’s idea was that it was not the place that was holy; it was the act of taking seriously high ideals together, as a community, that created “holiness.”

On Sunday, July 17, 2008, I spoke at the Washington Ethical Society (WES), giving a slightly-updated version of an address I gave at NoVES in 2005. The audio version of that is available at the Washington Society's website. [updated: the audio file is no longer available -- see below for text version] Here's the description as WES announced it, and following that, a downloadable text version:

I developed the list below using principles learned in Straight Talk™ and Nonviolent Communication™ as well as "best practices" for small group work in general -- with a little common sense added in. I invite you to consider these basics as ideals -- ideals, in the sense that we all fall short of meeting these at some times, and yet we can continue to improve. One of the goals of belonging to an Ethical Society is to get support for learning to live more in accord with our ideals!

Jone Johnson Lewis, 2003

While we don't require every member of an Ethical Society to consider Ethical Culture their religion, the Ethical movement as a whole and the national and local institutions within that movement have defined themselves as both religious and educational. The question isn't whether we are a religion, but in what way we are a religion, how we are a religious movement.