The title of my sermon this morning is the motto of the United Church - in Latin ut omnes unum sint - that all may be one. That motto expresses something of the founding hope of our church that the United Church would be but one step in a longer journey that would see a new spirit of unity not only among the churches, but among the whole human community, even the whole creation. The motto is drawn from the passage in the gospel according to John that we read this morning. This passage is a reminder that the motto of the United Church is not just the motto of the United Church, but a prayer that has been in Jesus' heart since before the creation of the world.

Nearly two thousand years after John's gospel was written, the quest for unity remains a profound and humbling challenge, as new divisions constantly arise to supplement the old ones. Today, we live in a globalized world in which the geographical and economic barriers between societies and nations are breaking down. Much of our food and clothing travels thousands of kilometers before it comes to us. With the right computer and internet access, you can talk for hours to someone on another continent via Skype and it won't cost you a penny. Some barriers are being broken down in dramatic ways. That doesn't mean that there aren't challenges and barriers.

Some of you will know that last week we had two visitors from Guatemala. Catarina Morales and Carmelina Sam. We were able to communicate by having someone translate from Spanish to English and back again, but perhaps you didn't know that Spanish is not the first language of either of those women. Their first language is one of the Mayan indigenous languages of Guatemala. I'm not sure, but I think it is Quiche. Language is a very difficult barrier to overcome.

Some of you also know that our two guests didn't make it home as planned. On Sunday Catarina didn't speak here in church because she wasn't feeling well. Fortunately Dennis Ethier was paying attention and was concerned enough to take her to the hospital. She went from the Lacombe Hospital to the Red Deer Hospital while Donna Pierson and Therese Thompson tried to track down their health insurance information. Carmelina stayed right by her side CAT scans and MRIs revealed that Catarina had suffered a moderate stroke and that a blood clot was lodged deep in her brain. Carmelina stayed with her and Linda Ethier stayed with them for several days, and then the national church found another person who could translate and provide some support. Spanish speaking doctors and nurses made sure that Catarina and Carmelina understood what was happening. Meanwhile Dennis Hueppelsheuser was helping with transportation back and forth between Lacombe and Calgary. It has not been easy, working out the challenges of health care, health insurance, language and distance.

In some ways Catarina was very lucky that this happened while she was in Canada. In Guatemala she has no medical insurance and if this had happened at home I don't know what kind of care she would have gotten. It can't have been easy for her to be in hospital so far from home, but with the support of our congregation and the wider church it has been much easier. I have been so impressed at the hospitality that some of us, on behalf of all of us, have offered these two travelers. It reminds me of the parable of a Samaritan who offered similar care to a person whose life had been interrupted by his medical needs.

In such a situation, it is worth listening again to Jesus as he prays for his disciples. His prayer is that they may be one, just as he and his Father are one. Traditional Trinitarian theology, deeply rooted in the gospel of John, is that the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit are one and yet three, three and yet one. There is a distinction between them, and yet they are unified. And Jesus' prayer is that the Trinity, the relationship he has with the Father and the Spirit will be the model for the unity among his disciples. "May they be one, even as we are," he says. The vision of unity that Jesus holds before us here is not a uniformity, in which we all think and act and serve in the same ways, in which differences are obliterated, any more than the unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit obliterates their distinctiveness. The vision of unity that Jesus holds before us is that of a community, in which diverse people with different ways of thinking, praying, worshipping and serving offer their different gifts in respectful and humble service to the common good.

For unity is never a possession that can be taken for granted, or an achievement of which we can boast. Unity is not a destination that we will reach, but a way of being together on the journey.

Can we be guided on our journey then, by Paul's understanding of the church as the body of Christ, composed of many different parts, just as the human body is composed of many different organs? Can we see our differences as different gifts intended for the building up of the whole? Can we keep our focus on the gifts that each denomination and communion bring to the body of Christ as a whole? Christ's body is greater than any of us alone, and our different emphases - on social justice or personal holiness, on evangelism or social service, on faithfulness to our heritage or responsiveness to the creativity of the Spirit, on the individual congregation or the universal church - are each contributions without which the whole body is impoverished. These differences will always cause tension, and just when it seems like we have resolved one problem, there will be a new one to test us again, but our unity cannot and will not come from all being the same, it can only come from all being together, committed to being in relationship, committed to neither ignoring our differences nor treating them as if they were ultimate. For we do not gather to worship ourselves. It is the one who we worship who brings us together, and it is only God's grace that is finally important, and in only in our dependence on that grace that we are all one.

I was asked to bring a symbol of unity. The symbol I chose is a representation of community, of several people dancing together around a central candle. It is a reminder that unity is found in a community of diverse creatures of God, but also that unity is not our own achievement, but emerges when we keep our focus where it belongs, on God's amazing grace that blesses us in many diverse ways.