...that bothers me.
I can't quite put it into words, and I don't quite have it sorted out in my head. I'm probably not going to say all this right. I don't know if it is the whole religion, per se, or just my tiny little corner of it, or maybe it's me. There are certainly people within the church who do not bother me in any way. But the church as a whole...something isn't right. This, writing this and hopefully getting some feedback, is my first step in deciding what, if anything, I could possibly do about it.
I know that it has to do with "diversity." I know it has to do with the almost total ignorance the church seems to have about a lot of disability civil rights issues. I know it has something to do with the whole church being white and "affluent" and mostly upper middle class.
I know it has something to do with LBGT issues.
From that, I mean, it appears to me that they are doing LBGT issues right. Someone might disagree with me and tell me I'm ignorant here, but it seems to me like they've gone out of their way to welcome and offer access to the church to LBGT individuals. There are classes exploring the issues, our current pastor is a gay man. There are efforts to go out and explore what people are doing in the queer community. There is the promotion of legislation that supports the inclusion and equality of the gay community. There are many individuals and families in the church who are gay. Same-sex weddings are a usual occurrence at our church. We have a plaque in the lobby that states that we are a "Welcoming Community," that we've put ourselves through several steps and activities to ensure that this is a welcoming place for LBGT individuals and families to be.
All this is good, Good, GOOD. Don't get me wrong. But what it does is, it exemplifies how bad, Bad, BAD we are doing in every other aspect of diversity. I don't know if this makes sense, because I really do support what the church has done in regards to gay issues, but I often get a shooting pang every time I hear of another wonderful thing the church has done to welcome and include homosexuals. Why have a sign proclaiming we are a "Welcoming Community," and then the small print underneath only talks about one group that we've made efforts to welcome? Maybe it is envy on my part, but sometimes I feel that their efforts with the LBGT crowd exclusively have made their lack of efforts elsewhere seem all the worse. It's almost more comfortable to go to a church where they don't even pretend to bother with any of it.
What about the rest of us? Why don't we matter as much? Why don't we count as much to be worth such an effort? As far as minority issues goes, it seems like most of what the church does is a matter of charity work. Except for some adopted children, there are no minorities in the church. (Oh, there is that one guy who is a Native Alaskan Inuit, I hear about him a lot, in terms which make me think his name is TOKEN.) Much of the way that we reach out to minorities, both race and class, is by work we do with the homeless. Again, nothing wrong with that work in and of itself, just it isn't really "welcoming" them into our fold. Treating them as equals. It feels like a way to just compliment ourselves on working with the racially and class oppressed.
Now, I do understand that historically, LBGT populations haven't had anywhere to GO. Whereas many minority groups have large and thriving church communities. Maybe that is part of it. Part of what brings us as UU's together is our commonalities. Culturally, Many minorities may be finding a more suitable home elsewhere. But really, although I do understand that there is a history of hatred and intolerance towards the gay community in churches, there has also been a history of intolerance of blacks in some white churches and of people with disabilities in many churches. The demonic hatred that surrounded disability in the past may have been overcome for the most part, but the segregation has still remained.
But we do the usual celebrations of Kwanzaa and Chinese New Year, and a Shout Out to this Pagan holiday or that Jewish Holiday. Sometimes this seems sincere, when there really are individuals in the church who are, for example, Jewish. Either by heritage or because they currently practice those traditions and they share them with us because it means something to them. But sometimes, when you are a bunch of white people celebrating Kwanzaa as if you have a clue, it makes me uncomfortable. It reminds me of those godawful "Disability Awareness Days" where they have you try on disability by riding around in a wheelchair or blindfolding yourself for ten minutes. Oh, now I know what it's like to be disabled! But what is the harm in a bit of awareness, you might say? Nothing, I suppose. But sometimes I feel like her. She writes a nice essay about this issue in regards to searching for a diverse preschool for her child. In it she talks about the concept of "cultural appropriation."
Cultural appropriation is the theft of rituals, aesthetic standards and behavior from one culture by another, generally by a "modern" culture from a "primitive" culture — often this involves the conversion of religion and spirituality into "meaningless" pop-culture
I don't know, I could be wrong about all of this. I am just a white girl trying to overcome my racist-ish upbringing and acculturation, but not knowing where or how to exactly do that. I guess I hoped the UU church would be of help. And it has not.
But if racial minorities are given lip service, people with disabilities aren't even on the radar. Or maybe they are way out in the hinterlands, like Appalachian children that are too far away both geographically and culturally to come to school. We know they are out there, we don't know what to do with them, so we won't do anything.
To be sure, our church has a long and winding ramp that goes up to a side door. Since the church is over 100 years old and it would ruin it to let us come in the regular door, I can accept the segregated entrance. However, it took a few emails and phone calls to get the door to be unlocked for us to enter the church. There is a semi-accessible bathroom, as well. They have put in effort to make the building wheelchair accessible. They also just bought an FM amplification system for the hearing impaired. The first few times I used it, it worked great. Since then, not so well. The equipment is not faulty, but people forget to talk into the mikes, they forget to turn the mikes on, they put things between themselves and the FM signal to make the reception bad. People have forgotten. I asked for the order of service to be emailed to me in advance so that I could actually read it. This was done one time, and then one other time with a reminder. I've reminded people of several things several times, and usually they are nice about it and it gets fixed at least once before it happens again. Then I start to feel like I'm that irritating disability bully that is on everyones ass to remember a bunch of little, insignificant, unimportant things. No one seems to understand that there is more to access and welcoming disabled people into the congregation besides building a ramp. It is an ongoing thing that has to be worked on. I know in a community of changing volunteers, this can be difficult. I'm not looking for perfection. I'm looking for the effort.
But the main problem for me is not the 'little' access issues. It is that I feel like a charity case. The church has a program called "lifeline." I don't know what the hell it does or what it's for. It seems like they have a lot of meetings to discuss that. The fliers for it just say, "Tough times? Call Lifeline" and then two phone numbers. I have called this number three times in two years. Maybe that is a lot. Maybe that is too much. Maybe I'm not calling it for what I'm supposed to be calling it for. I don't know.
The first time I called, I was very pregnant and D had a broken leg. I asked for help for someone to help D move. We hired movers, this was for packing/unpacking help. I had packed and unpacked all of my own stuff, and was getting to the point in my pregnancy where it was dangerous for me to even lift a box. D was to move a month later, and I knew I would not be able to help him by then. The only response I got from lifeline was from a very nice woman who told me that she didn't have any time to come over or help with anything, (fair enough) but that she had twin boys, too, and if I had any questions, I could call her.
The second time, they actually called me. It was right after the kids were born when I had lost all my vision. D had mentioned to them that I was struggling with the new kids and everything. And again, a (different) woman with adult twins called me and asked if I needed any help. I said, well, yes. I have two months worth of stacked mail here I can't read. Do you think someone could come help me sort through it? Her and her husband came over one time, and admittedly, I was very unorganized that day. They helped me for about an hour and then said they couldn't do it anymore. (They also babysat for me a few times. Which was very nice of them. Then they told me the kids were too much for them and they couldn't do it anymore.) I have NO PROBLEM with them saying that they couldn't babysit or even read for me anymore. What I have a problem with is that they just seemed to fade out of our lives, like they were purposefully trying to avoid us. It is tough to help people feel comfortable around you when they feel like you need stuff all the time. We don't only want people in our lives to do stuff for us. We'd like people to just come visit and relax and not look at what they percieve that we need help with all the time.
This is a disability thing. People don't mind helping nondisabled people once or twice in isolated incidents, but they avoid disabled people because all they see is someone who is needy. Sometimes, we go about our business and do our thing, and because we do it differently or it takes us longer, it bothers people just to watch us. We aren't feeling needy, we are just getting things done like we do, but they feel the need to jump in and help us do it faster, or just the nondisabled way. When we do need some help, they don't want to be sucked into a big time commitment. But we are not always needy, and we make an effort to spread around our neediness so that no one person is especially burdened. And we also feel that we can give back. We both pledge money to the church and I volunteer at Sunday School.
I tried to frame the third time I called into more of a 'help us help you' kind of deal by asking if there was any small project or volunteer work that D could do while he's incapacitated. I also said a few visitors would be nice, to keep D into the fold and to give him access to spirituality that he doesn't have access too. I called on Monday, and the woman I spoke too said she would get back to me.
Today someone got back to me, and he was just dripping with a condescending charitable tone. I can't describe it exactly. He was very nice, just...something about the whole conversation made me feel like I should be feeling all pathetic and grateful. I felt, again, like he was judging us for, the dopes we are, again getting ourselves in a fix. He kind of said that they were going to try to get fellow churchgoer, Mr. Amputated Leg to go visit him. (That is a whole 'nother thing. I am not Lisa there, and D is not D. I am "That mom of those twins who can't see or hear very well" and D is "That guy in a wheelchair who sometimes comes with that mom of the twins.") Okay, we don't have that great of attendance, but we've been going there for three years now. It doesn't matter what we do, nothing much else is ever bothered to be learned about us. So Mr. Amputated Leg lives a bit far, so we will have to see if he can get there. But if he can't maybe someone else can squeeze in a visit. Why Mr. Amputated Leg? I have nothing against him, and maybe he understands the issues and volunteered because of that. But I felt like they were trying to get someone out there who could 'identify' with D's problems. I don't know. That just bugged me.
I asked for visitors for D mainly because he is in a situation where he has lost access to much of the outside world. He lays in a room (not a mile and a half from this church) and has limited or no access to phone, newspapers, the Internet, food choices, church, work, the outside world. To me, this is an accessibility issue at it's core. If D can't come to the church, then I would like to get the church to come to D. Not the whole church, but just a few people so that he is included. He does not necessarily need special counseling about his situation, he doesn't need someone to bring him crossword puzzles or books on tape to keep him busy, he doesn't need emotional support in and of itself, or someone to cry over his predicament with. He needs access to the world and to the church. I don't expect the entire church to come over to the old folks home and hold service over there, but it would be nice if some aspects of the church could find their way over there.
To me, church members visiting him in a nursing home is an accommodations issue. It is not so much charity. Although I do recognize that the person doing it would be volunteering and taking time out of their schedule, and that is appreciated, I would hope that they would see it as just meeting D as an equal, as they might meet and share spirituality in church. The only difference is that the meeting place has been moved to accommodate D's medical situation right now.
I don't know if that makes any sense or if I sound like an ungrateful bitch. But it just seems like other people can ask for things on occasion and not be thought of as a charity case. D and I are always charity cases. It is hard to describe the subtlety of what I am talking about.
Okay, here is an example that is more concrete. A few years ago, a friend called D and I up and asked if we wanted to go to a movie. Sure, we said. So we all three went to a movie. A regular thing that people do all the time, right? I never thought much of it. Then, it happened that D overheard a conversation this person was having on the phone. (Okay, he was eavesdropping, he does have supersonic hearing.) This person described how they (yes, I'm playing the pronoun game) took us to the movie. How, even though D paid for everyone's ticket, this person had to drive us there, open the doors for D, allow me to hold on to their arm as we entered the dark theatre, and sit in disabled seating. All those things happened, but D and I didn't think a thing about them, and this person was looking at the situation like they did their good deed for the day. Like they took the disabled people to a movie and got them out, for we could not go to a movie without their help. And the few accommodations they made, sitting in the disabled row, driving us there, etc. were a sacrifice for them and it was charitable thing that they did to endure that. I had never thought of it like that. I just thought we all three went to a movie together and yeah, it was nice that I didn't have to hold the doors open for D.
It is sort of that kind of tone that is going on here. There is some nursing home judgment as well, I think. The church as a whole does not have a clue about the issues with politics and home health care and disability and abortion and disability and death with dignity and just everything.
Not that I expect them to. But at least they could recognize that they need to learn some stuff, instead of just building a ramp and celebrating Kwanzaa and then wiping their hands together and going, "There. We done did diversity today."
You know, I have to confess that I have never much enjoyed the UU Church. They have great politics on paper and all--go them. But I don't much enjoy the services.
It seems to me, you don't call and ASK "lifeline" to visit a parishoner in the nursing home. Seems to me, they call you, they bring you food, the pastor visits--partly because it's HIS JOB (not charity, but what he is paid to DO) and partly because you are members of the community and so, well...they treat you like members of the community.
I don't know, all this stuff you are talking about rubs me the wrong way as a life-long church-goer with a seminary education (I practically became a priest myself, and may go ahead and do it someday). It isn't how the Church is supposed to function.
And as genuine, died-in-the-wool LGBT person, I am sick of hearing how I should be UU. I don't want to go to some church that just wants my lesbian chic. I want to be part of church that is a church, doing what a church should do--welcome everyone. And while I do appreciate (especially since moving to the prairie where it can be harder to discern safe from unsafe spaces) the rainbow stickers on welcoming church doors, self-congratulation about how cool and hip UU's are on queer stuff icks me out.
Don't even get me started on a 99% white congregation doing Kwaanza. That's downright racist, if you ask me.
Sorry to knock your church, Lisa, and anyone else out there who is UU and loves it--I'm glad you love it. I just don't love it and I don't think their bending over backwards about gay stuff is a free pass to be old-fashioned, capital "L" Liberals instead of radicals like I think churches should be.
Posted by: shannon | January 29, 2006 at 09:58 PM
Hey, y'all, as a UU, and a happy one at that, I was really sad to see both the post and the initial comment here.
A few responses:
First off, Shannon, please feel free to go where the theology works for you. No one should try to convince you to be a UU just because you're a lesbian and I'm embarrassed that someone did.
If you don't fit in with us theologically, then you won't be happy as a UU. That's cool.
Shannon's point about the way she feels pandered to is part of why I'm none to crazy about the huge focus on gay rights and other political issues in our church. Speaking as middle/upper middle class white woman who is not disabled, it is really hard to know the difference between "reaching out" and "pandering." (e.g I'm sure the person who was so proud of that trip to the movies thought they were reaching out. I only ask people to the movies when I really want to see a movie with them, so I'm not pandering, but I'm not reaching out either.) The definitions of "reaching out" vs. "pandering" differ with the person.
As for the disability issues, I hate to use cluelessness as an excuse, but it just might be the reason. As you observed, "lifeline" programs can sometimes be very disorganized.
I think it is probable that the members of your church just don't understand how insensitive they are being. It looks like you've voiced some of the problems. Have you ever voiced them formally, like, to the minister or to the board?
My church has two blind members, and a couple more in wheelchairs and scooters, who are very active members. I think of them from the committees they are on and the active role they play, so when they need something from me, it never even occurs to me to think of it as charity work. I promise you that some UU churches can handle disability issues. But probably someone had to educate us first.
CC
Posted by: Chalicechick | February 03, 2006 at 02:20 PM
Lisa -
Thank you so much for what you have written here. I don't have any kind of answers or even much insight into your specific experiences, but I promise you that my eyes and my heart are open wider because of the things you have to say.
UUs are very self-congratulatory about the things we do right, sometimes to the point of blindness to the things we do outright wrongly. I would encourage you to bring these issues up directly with your minister and the board of your church, because your concerns are of vital necessity to the central mission of the Church - to embrace and accept all who would enter our doors, and to love them just as they are.
Again, thank you. Sometimes, okay, lots of times, people need to be (metaphorically) smacked around until we get it.
Posted by: Jess | February 03, 2006 at 10:01 PM
I have a theory that the 87% of UUs who are not GLBT are eventually going to stand up and tell the rest of us who are to quit talking about being gay all the time.
We have a bad habit of doing so, because there are so few areas in our lives where we can.
Your right we need to be paying better attention to other opportuanities of diversity. The good news is that a lot of GLBT persons are going to be some of your biggest supporters. I am willing to bet if you went to your minister and asked him to get the Gay community in your church together to create an initiative to reach out to mobility impaired people that he would be 100% with you.
We know how it feels to be left out.
Posted by: Jamie Goodwin | February 03, 2006 at 11:57 PM
Much food for thought. Thank you.
Posted by: h sofia | February 04, 2006 at 12:29 AM
"We know how it feels to be left out."
So do I Jamie. . . And I have saying what has been said here for about a decade now. In fact I long ago pointed out that Christian or otherwise theistic GLBT people would feel considerably less than welcome in no shortage of so-called U*U "Welcoming Congregations". . . N'est-ce pas?
Posted by: The Emerson Avenger | February 04, 2006 at 03:46 PM
I am sad to see that as adults you are still gettting this treatment. My husband was injured at a c5/c6 complete spinal cord injury at 15. We were friends then and started dating at 17...got married at 24 (after we both finished college in separate states.) We used to get that attitude that you can't quite place your finger on that feels like it is someone doing a charity favor rather than what one does when you are friends when we were younger. I put it to my husband's assertiveness and upfront attitude that has put that to a stop. I will say at times it seems we avoid those places where it seems we might get that "you must be needy attitude." We aren't needy at all. However, we have found ourselves in the situation of pressure sore problems and that is very scary and time consuming. That is a time when you definately need extra hands and contact with the outside world. A friend of ours, who was injured a couple of years ago with almost the same injury was in bed for 3 years (similar bone infection problems as D) He is now up and at school but those years really cut him off for the world. Not many people visited him. We noticed over time when we hung out that he was having a difficult time with social interaction.
I can see if you are part of a church you would expect the church to be a part of you. I hope this improves. Do you or D like organizing? Perhaps you could help set up a new system of how things happen for weekly services...such as the readers check to see the mikes are on ect. Make those things part of the routine of setting up each week. run a suvey on church memebers needs during services, outside of services, initiate a group that gathers socially after services for movies or lunch so there is more of a network and connection between the people? Play groups with other moms and kids so you can have other moms to talk to and the kids get to play? I know you are feeling overwhelmed right now...I hope that this gets worked out. People won't know you're feeling this way if you don't tell them. We've found a lot of people hold back because they don't want to seem pushy or insincere. I get all that you were saying so I really feel for you. Best Wishes.
Posted by: Lisa T. | February 07, 2006 at 09:27 PM