Usually square brackets on this page indicate that I modified or added something. In this case, square brackets appeared in the original body. I have changed these to parentheses.
Subject: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 00:26:58 -0400
From: "Billye Stevens"
To: Jim Nelson, UUCF Chat
CC: [Bill Welch]
UUCF Friends,
Hello, in the Gams this week, Rev. Nelson asks forbearance to read what he wrote with kindness. Billye Stevens asks for the same, that you read this with kindness and forgiveness.
The Tuesday group that prepares the Newsletter for mailing was just finishing, when Jim Nelson walked by. I did not say that it is "'our' job to make you (Jim) suffer," nor did I ask "whether he had suffered enough yet". What I recall asking Jim was if the conflict in the church "has caused you suffering"? Jim answered some words of what may have been denial. I was not certain. Bill Welch had walked up by that time; perhaps Bill can remember what Jim said.
Early in Jim's contract with the congregation, he spoke from the rostrum that he had experienced little adversity, and he may have said little or no suffering. When Jim first came here, at the point where he made a rather profound point, he would make a joke of it. I found that, I must confess, shallow. My thought was that adversity (suffering) usually makes a strong person stronger, that Jim could hardly go through life with no problems. That he would grow and mature in his experience and sermons. I believe that you have made that start, Jim.
My thought processes rushed to Emerson's statement that the job of a minister is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. In truth, I did say, "Then we haven't done our job." I do apologize. I have apologized to your family, the chat lines if I have been hostile in anything I said, apologized to Pattie Girman and the staff. I do not want to cause anyone to suffer. You, Jim, say that you are doing your best, that the fault or problem or conflict..lies with "others" as you e-mailed to a friend of mine, Jim. I own that I was wanting to "afflict" you some, that the dissension within the church for the last five years does not lie only with "others".
Jim said to a friend that healing must come from the person hurt. By e-mail, Jim told her that it is not his job to help a person heal. He/she must accomplish that himself/herself. It seems that element of pastoral care is not Jim's responsibility.
I hope that all of you in the congregation will share my admiration for young Hannah Nelson. Hannah wrote a strong hand printed letter telling me how much she loves her father. She suggested that I get another "job". She does not like being angry with someone she does not even know. Hannah took a step to heal. She wrote to woman she does not even know. Miss Hannah, stand up and take a bow.
Jim has said the person who is hurting (in your Gams, Jim, you say saddened), needs to make the first step across the bridge to heal. I have written priority mail to Misses Hannah and Claire, to Ms. Kathe and to you, Jim. My door, like the door to your office, is open. I want to be a part of healing between you and me.
Cordially,
Billye Stevens
From: Jim Nelson
To: Billye Stevens
Sent: Friday, June 09, 2000 7:00 AM
Subject: Re: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Dear Billye,
No, that is exactly what you did say. I did not find it funny then nor do I find your denial helpful. I would suggest rather than thinking that a trite hurrah to my daughter somehow makes up for what you did say that you could instead begin supporting the church, which is what this is about. And the way to do that is to come every SUnday to worship in order to deepen your faith, to pledge at a generous level - I suggest 5% of your income. (That is what I am doing. My Mom, older than you and on a fixed income pledges 10% to her church).
I would stop worrying about budgets and administration and instead think about learning. Read some UU history and theology. Your job as a member is to grow your own faith deeper and help other members do the same; it is not to pass blithe judgments on my learning or maturity. Your job is to trust and support the leaders of this congregation. And since you seem to have such difficult remebering what people say - including yourself - I would stop quoting anyone.
If your piece was at all meant as an apology - which you should offer to me - it is does not suffice. Actions are what matter here.
Rev Jim Nelson
Subject: Fw: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 07:41:26 -0400
From: Billye Stevens
To: Jim Nelson, UUCF Chat, Mary Foster
This is forgiveness, love, charity, and walking with God, Rev. Nelson?
[Jim Nelson, 07:00, 9 Jun 2000 is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Public and Private Emails question
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 08:28:40 -0400
From: [Mary Foster]
To: [UUCF Chat]
Hi All!
I have only been back on the chat list for a couple of months so I am not sure how we do things here. I am on several other lists on the Internet. On those lists it is considered bad manners to take someone's reply which was intended to be private and forward it to a public list. Kurt, I know that Cathy still hasn't moved the list to eGroups and I know you are really not 'in charge' any more here but are there any guidelines about this here? I'd like to know because I wouldn't want that to happen with any of MY private email. If anyone can help clarify this, I would appreciate it. :)
Mary Foster
Subject: private email
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 08:42:23 -0400
From: Jim Nelson
To: [UUCF Chat]
Dear List Members,
I am sorry that Billye Stevens decided to put on the list a private email I sent to her. I have communicated my disappointment with that action.
I hope we can all keep clear distinctions between what is private and what is public.
Jim Nelson
Subject: Re: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Date: Fri, 09 Jun 2000 10:28:32 -0400
From: "Kit (Christopher) Lueder"
To: Billye Stevens
CC: UUCF Chat
I think this is a good example of how a little growing up is needed. You are taking Jim's private comments and bringing them out in public, even though you don't really remember what he said. Better to deal directly with Jim than to flame him in public like this. Pretty pathetic and sickening to me. Kit.
Billye Stevens wrote:
[Billye Stevens, 00:26, 9 Jun 2000
is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Fw: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Sent: Friday, June 09, 2000 10:48 PM
From: Billye Stevens
To: Jim Nelson
Dear Jim,
First, I would very much appreciate your relaying this e-mail along with your reply, to any place you will. I will want to send this e-mail out later myself. Your own effectiveness as the spiritual example is your first issue; your ministry is on full display. No words in the computer are ever truly private. Possibly, the friction between you and me is more your immediate issue than anything. Do you not see that your number one issue is what the congregation will perceive of this situation?
Jim, the one day left before the Annual Meeting creates an opportunity to set an example of whoever you feel that you are. You are right; actions are important. Rather, you are given a setting, a situation, to show what the UUCF community represents. Is it (a) battleground or (b) a place to get away from life's battles? The minister's actions are more revealing than any set of rules. The issues at the Annual Meeting are large and complex, and the way the congregation votes are important for now and the Church's growth.
I started this before your softer, private message of this afternoon came, so I shall finish it. Your guidelines/rules for my spiritual reawakening are noted, Jim. I am sidetracked by the discord within our church and the stories and pain people feel now, as two years ago. So far the changes are on paper. Change takes time. I try to do my best. Then to hear myself say what I had been thinking, your role to afflict the comfortable was a shock. It is a shock to hear and learn the mean spiritedness of which I am capable. Get a grip, Babe.
I am not responsible for the other breaks in relationships within UUCF whether or not I attend meetings or live with the Bible. I do not think of my soul, or my god, or the hereafter. Rather I think of my life as plowing through the stuff to find jewels of the moment. Thankfully I have more jewels each year as I grow older.
I have never belonged to, and I really don't want to join any church where there are rules for spiritual healing. You stated them clearly in your several messages to me. They are the rules for the small groups you hope to form starting in the fall, are they not? My paternal ancestors came to America from the very location where Martin Luther posted his Letters. They were of the people called Pennsylvania "Dutch". They then moved west to Iowa.
You know that practice of Indulgences demanded by the Priests was a major issue for Luther. You come from the Lutheran Tradition. I must tell you that I began tithing 10% when I started my first job out of high school in 1942, making $75 a month. Then I worked, went to college, paid all expenses including a 2 room apartment with no running water, a shared bath, and lunches that were often Franco-American spaghetti and lettuce with oil. My husband and I tithed 10% of his gross income when we belonged to the First Methodist Church, downtown Charlottesville, VA in the 50's. He was asked to serve on the Board. We pledged generously to Epiphany Methodist Vienna, VA., in the 70's, and my husband was immediately asked to serve on their Board. He replied, "No, thank you." Church politics had disillusioned him. My adjusted gross income of a little over $6,000 would not impress any Council to ask me to run for the position of trustee. I am rather proud of how well I manage. A family income of over $100,000 for four with tax breaks is mindboggling to me.
During the previous campaign to start our Sanctuary, I did contribute, and I have lots of sweat equity on the grounds. I have worked on the grounds with Bob Armstrong, Bob Swan, E. B. Kirkbride when she gave so much to FUC, Charlie Boothby, Audrey VanVliet, Ann Wood, [Anonomous-2], Zeena Zeidberg, Steve Perlick, Pat Vernor, Bill Richardson.so many others. We spread a load of mulch by direct order of Rod Lay the day of Dedication. And for about 15 years since, in stronger days, I worked alone and with the grounds group, joyfully, spiritually.
I will contribute to the Endowment Fund again in honor of Betty Dillman as I was happy to do for Helen Stanley's memory. Both ladies shared a support group started through UUCF. The early members also included Mary Shea, Linda Wright, and Helen Stanley, now deceased. Amy Fielder Armstrong joined us for awhile. Present members are Dot Cole, Kitty Arone, Jane Coffman, Nikki Adams, Nancy Hughes, and we hope, soon Jean Walker. Lois Borreson did belong, then left our church and went to Accotink before she moved out of the area.
You should learn that I honor the Leaders present and past who earned my trust and do have my respect. They are assuming the roles like the All Committees nights during Ralph Stutzman's time here as our membership grew to nearly 700. I appreciate the hours they given to our church administration, and I do like to see them in action.. I am rather old to be told where my trust is to be, on demand.
Please let me repeat that my door is open, and I own a phone, as you know. You called me after surgery when I learned the cysts on the ovaries were not cancerous. We have been cordial until now. Again, in time, when we heal, and the actions of us both speak true, we will be cordial again.
Your attention is on your Sunday sermon and the Annual Meeting. I am going to sleep earlier for once. I enrolled in the adult ed. spiritual journey at the church tomorrow. Now that is one of Life's ironies. Right? Good luck and good night. Billye Stevens
Subject: Re: Fw: No pity, no sympathy. Billye Stevens' mistake
Date: Fri, 09 Jun 2000 11:18:45 -0400
From: "Kit (Christopher) Lueder"
To: Billye Stevens
CC: UUCF Chat
Billye, your behavior is too disgusting. I am unsubscribing from
uucf-chat.
Kit.
Billye Stevens wrote:
[Billye Stevens, 07:41, 9 Jun 2000
is quoted in full here.]
Edward Cacciapaglia, 12:14, 9 Jun 2000
Subject: RE: Fw: No pity, no sympathy
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 12:14:32 -0400
From: Edward Cacciapaglia
To: Billye Stevens
CC: UUCF Chat, Kit Christopher J. Lueder, Ruminations
Billye,
I applaud your courage in exposing the response you received. Some may say you were violating privacy, but within the uucf community, I believe the senior minister is a "public" person, just within the country at large, the president is a "public" person, whose actions are subject to public scrutiny. (What would happen if we were dealing with a minister who was a child molester? Should that be kept in the dark, too?)
Ed Cacciapaglia
[Kit Lueder, 11:18, 9 Jun 2000 is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Re: Fw: No pity, no sympathy
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 14:29:52 -0400
From: Karen Lee Block Cacciapaglia
To: Birds of a Feather
Dear Billye,
I am disappointed with several scathing responses that you have received. My love and support are with for your bravery and willingness to risk and to care when so many others appear to be hiding. Although my spiritual journey is elsewhere I maintain my UU membership as I believe strongly in the principles of Unitarianism. As for UUCF as it exists now, for me what was, hasn't a prayer. For whatever reason the denial and dysfunction continues and I feel for many new members and some 'old' members the lack of dogma and some return to traditionism still look good compared with their churches of origin and the congregational approach of some of the New England Congregations.For me this does not work. I love you and your incite and determination to be heard. Sorry Kit.
Karen Lee Block, Secular Humanist
[Edward Cacciapaglia, 12:14, 9 Jun 2000
is quoted in full here.]
Alison Eskildsen,
14:38, 9 Jun 2000
Subject: [uucf-info] Re: Public and Private Emails question
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 14:38:13 -0400
From: "Alison Eskildsen"
To: [UUCF Info]
Yes, Mary, there are netiquette guidelines which I will re-post shortly. They include not sending private messages out on either e-mail list without prior permission. No matter who the sender is, they are private messages.
All new subscribers to either list should receive a copy of the netiquette guidelines. And, like the UUA does with their lists, they post them regularly. We probably should do the same.
To protect subscribers from inappropriate private messages, if, in a private message you believe you have been cursed, threatened or otherwise abused, you may notify the Board, the chat listmaster, or a Minister to lodge a complaint and forward the offensive message.
The Newsletter and Online Editorial Committee (NOEC) composed of a listmaster, a Board member, and a Minister, will review the offense and decide what, if anything, should be done. If the offensive message involves any of those on NOEC, the alternate listmaster (info or chat), the alternate Minister (Sn. or Assoc.) or an alternate Board Member (from the remaining trustees) will sit on the committee in their stead.
Habitual repetition of list offenses may result in the offender's removal from the lists.
Ideally, all members should monitor themselves, think before they post, and make the rules unnecessary.
Alison Eskildsen
[Mary Foster, 08:28, 9 Jun 2000 is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Billye
Date: Fri, 9 Jun 2000 20:46:35 -0400
From: Stefani Cochran
To: [UUCF Chat]
Dear Billye, no matter what my issue is with anyone I'd NEVER put on a list something you or anyone else might say directly to me or post a private message to the whole list. Jim didn't deserve that, and neither did we; I feel violated knowing that someone might do the same to me.
Stefani (this message is to the whole list, so it is considered public).
Subject: RE: Billye - The Hurt and Our Right to Know
Date: Sat, 10 Jun 2000 08:29:53 -0400
From: Edward Cacciapaglia
To: Stefani Cochran
CC: [UUCF Chat], [Birds of a Feather]
Stephani, (This is a public response, too.)
I am surprised and sad that you (being someone who works as a mental health counselor) choose to castigate Billye rather than show some concern for the hurt she must have felt by the response she received to her apology. I believe Billye's action was motivated by a deep hurt she must have felt by Jim's response. Our communty deserves more sensitivity towards even the least of its members by the senior minister.
Also, Billye has a right, indeed some of us feel a duty, to let us know this happened. The right for us to know can sometimes outweigh the right of a public figure to his or her privacy. In the uucf community, the senior minister is the most public person and his or her actions should be open to scrutiny by our community, especially when they involve a long time (or even a new) member of the congregation. Besides we, the members, pay his salary. If Jim can't take this scrutiny, I question his fitness as a minister.
We as a caring community can choose to do something about it. Or we can turn our heads and defend the right of the senior minister to say whatever he wants in private, even if it is hurtful to his congregants. Have many of our members grown so cold that they refuse to see the cruelty and anger towards Billye here?
Ed Cacciapaglia
[Stefani Cochran, 20:46, 9 Jun 2000
is quoted in full here.]
Billye Stevens, 08:38, 10 Jun 2000
Subject: Re: Billye
Date: Sat, 10 Jun 2000 08:38:38 -0400
From: Billye Stevens
To: [UUCF Chat], Stefani Cochran
CC: Birds Of A Feather
Dear Stefani and All,
You are a person who has represented our old FUC as a star when I first joined the original caring comm. Our membership had reached over the medium size to large. You and Lola Usack were at the first meeting in the old Bldg. 1. Then you were chair of a canvass dinner, the coordinator and liason when we began to cite what w wanted for the new construction -- the Sanctuary.
A few others have written tome about netiquette, and now I know what you are reinforcing.
I still am wondering if, when I read the messages what one person says, then a reply, what the difference is. I shall learn quickly, no doubt.
The bully pulpit which the ministers and Board members have in the Newsletter is now balanced in a small way by the Chat and Info lines. When Rev. Nelson said that he plans to make the several incidents the topic of his Annaul Meeting sermon, I surely needed to tell as many as I could that I was the culprit. John Krutilla's counterbalance was another e-mail yesterday. I have and do own to saying, "We haven't done our job."
I apologize to you all again. From where did my anger, yes meanness come when I said that. I can only speak for Billye. Jim will have every opportunity to speak for himself. I can show how much charity I possess.
I am on my way to, of all things, a UUCF spiritual meeting. I can use it, right? Since I am late already, I can't send the attachment for a softer e-mail to Jim. Jim has e-mailed a much kinder one to me. I shall ask for his O.K. to put that out later this afternoon.
Stefani, thanks for taking your time. Older women (of which I now one) and ministers are really just people.
Real affection,
Billye
[Stefani Cochran, 20:46, 9 Jun 2000 is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Re: Billye - The Hurt and Our Right to Know
Date: Sat, 10 Jun 2000 10:42:53 -0400
From: Laura Sheridan
To: [UUCF Chat], [Birds of a Feather]
I'm not sure about a right to know, but it seems fundamental to me that a minister should accept a parishioner's apology, if only to heal a rift.
Laura S.
[Edward Cacciapaglia, 08:29, 10 Jun 2000 is quoted in full here.]
Subject: Re: Billye - The Hurt and Our Right to Know
Date: Sat, 10 Jun 2000 23:26:25 -0400
From: Billye Stevens
To: Laura Sheridan, [UUCF Chat], [Birds of a Feather]
Dear Laura,
Thanks for your many kind words. I expect our paths will cross.
The rest of you, hear this story. At the Machina's home tonight, the first person I met was Laura Sheridan.
Jim did e-mail a private message in which he thanked me for my offer.
There needs to be a choice. I have never belonged to, and I would not now choose to join any church where there are sets of rules for spiritual growth. I do not think of my soul, or my god, or the hereafter. I think of my life as plowing through the stuff to find jewels of the moment. Thankfully there are more jewels each year."
Tomorrow we shall hear the sermon about love, justice, mercy, forgiveness, and walking humbly with thy god. Rev. Nelson has the podium to speak for himself.
It was very nice to meet you, Laura. See you at the Annual Meeting tomorrow. Billye
Subject: Re: public and private emails
Date: Mon, 12 Jun 2000 14:38:51 -0400
From: Nancy Byrd
To: Billye Stevens
CC: [UUCF Chat], Stefani Cochran, Birds Of A Feather
Friends, consider this:
Apparently, and this is admittedly hearsay, some people have used private emails as a way to attack members of this congregation. On some occasions, I have been shown the private emails. Because these were "private", they could not be addressed in public; nevertheless, they hurt, and some members were driven from the congregation by their receipt. Part of the problem with emails is this privacy, which allows one to inflict hurts in private that they would never get away with in public. Perhaps we should talk to one another as if the whole congregation were listening.
- Nancy
Subject: Time for a Moratorium
Date: Thu, 15 Jun 2000 21:38:10 -0400
From: Billye Stevens
To: Steve & Winnie Gold, Mary Foster, [Mary Binderman]
Cc: Pat and Robert Moore, [Chris Mason], Pat Bernhardt, Audrey VanVliet,
Stefani Cochran, [Nancy Byrd], Judy Gallimore, Sue Berman
Dear Wini, Mary Foster, and Mary Binderman
Bruce Vernor was Pres. and Craig Goff was V.P. when I first wrote a letter to Jim in 1996, that I saw him taking steps toward authoritarian role over the Church. In my opinion, the Boards have acquiesced to Jim Nelson before 1996, and ever since. As my friends left the church because of whatever difficulty they had with Jim and as I lost trust in Jim and the Board 1997, I began to attend Board Meetings. I wanted to see for myself how our church functions in setting policy and prioritizing programs.
In my Board Feedback form I suggested that the Board insist Jim take a course or courses in conflict resolution. (I am getting lessons in conflict myself.) Jim rightly perceives that my problem with UUCF is our Rev. Jim Nelson. My saying anything to Jim Nelson was so stupid, and brought out the worst in me. I have been avoiding him at most opportunities. Jim could certainly have felt pushed to his limit with the Annual Meeting coming up Sunday, by my remarks to him in Bldg. 1, and some inaccuracy in my early Saturday morning e-mail. I remembered my comments as less hurtful.
I sent the e-mail to keep him from misquoting John Krutilla and using John and me as objects for sympathy in his Sunday sermon. In my apology to Kathe Kelly, I said, "I am trying to fathom why a Leader would tell his daughter what happened before he came to me." My frustration and anger at Jim's comments in his Gams and feeling abused in his early morning e-mail pushed me to click send. Alison has sent an official notice not to forward private e-mails and I will not repeat such action.
Bill Welch wrote to me very puzzled and concerned about my comments to Jim Nelson two weeks ago. I responded and invited Bill Welch to lunch so that we can talk. I made a second offer via e-mail in response to the official notice from Alison in her position as Pres. to adhere to netiquette in e-mails.
Of course Jim does not like my focus on him. As my minister, Jim's advice for my being a good church member and his seeking 5% or even 10% of my small income is unusual for pastoral guidelines. I started pledging 10% when I went to work right out of high school. Then my husband and I pledged 10% of his gross earnings about 7 years after we married.
One whose name is on the April 18 letter said that when they get together with UUCF friends, much of the talk is about Jim and always negative. She and her husband stay members and pledge a little to keep in touch with church activities and their friends in the church. They usually attend a different small UU church. As a couple, they agreed to step forward instead of just talking. Another inactive member told me he stayed in touch with members through his gourmet dinner group but does not go to Sunday services anywhere else.
Nancy Byrd sent a public e-mail with statements directly to Rev. Nelson. Then she said, "Perhaps we should talk to one another as if the whole congregation were listening."
Jim seems to have a basic need to control. More than a few of the 350 people who pass through our revolving door of membership either do not attend Services or have left. Other than the expected moves in this transient area, some leave because of the friction in the Church. Still, Fairfax U has a history of factions who do not like any current Minister. The number of people disaffected with Rev. Nelson is higher than any members in the past. 120 signatures on the petition for outside help, speak loudly. So far I have refrained from leaving the church. We need a conflict consultant. I keep asking, "Of what might the Board be afraid? What can the Church lose?"
Some members who received calls to participate in applause when the 1997 group brought up very similar issues, have told me they did not stand or applaud last Sunday. Very likely the Board orchestrated the person who stood up to praise Jim as they did last year and in the fall of 1997. I heard a message from the 2/3 members I do not know. They are satisfied.
My observation is that Jim shows his basic insecurity when you work with him. Jim Nelson's display of anger and defensiveness plus his plan to control are like no pastor of my experience. In forwarding the complete private e-mail instead of the usual practice of responding, I intended to let Jim speak to the internet as he often has spoken to my friends. He has all the other mechanisms for speaking to us. The April 18 group must pay to get their message out.
I did expect to receive reprimands when I forwarded Jim's message. Jim Nelson, Alison, Mary Foster, Stefani Cochran, Kit Lueder, and Edwin Butterworth have done so. I never expected the telephone calls and e-mails applauding my "guts" to show the anger lurking under Jim's pastoral facade.
This Monday, I went to Charlottesville to see friends, some of them friends for 40 years. We lived there 8 years. The 2-day visit was a melodrama and a step in time. My Methodist friend of 40 years in Charlottesville is the daughter of and is widow of Methodist Ministers. Her advice was for me to go to another church or the church find another minister.
All this attention on me is too heady. No one attends church for a battleground.
"Enough Hell" (per Hal Fuller's suggestion). I love you all,
Billye Stevens
Subject: Minister's Role
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 13:45:48 EDT
From: [Marcia Helme]
To: [Birds of a Feather]
Dear Birds,
As you know, I just returned from being out of town for a while.
I am appalled at the letter from uucf's senior minister to one of uucf's long time supporters and members. I applaud Billye's exposure of the letter. If the author wanted to keep it private, then why did he send it by email at all?
So Billye made an unkind remark and did not say exactly what she meant. Which she acknowledges , and for which she apologizes.
Where is the acknowledgment and apology from the author of the letter? The letter violates so many of my ethical principles and runs so counter to all other UU experiences I have had, that I hardly know where to begin, were I to respond to it.
Is THIS the wonderful man that 80+ percent of the congregation want to support? What does that say about the uucf congregation?
At the risk of being redundant, I quote from Jack Mendelsohn's book, Being Liberal in an Illiberal Age: Why I am a Unitarian Universalist.
"To minister -- and here the work embraces laity and clergy alike -- is to be called out of our pretensions, poses, and protective facades and into the great, open, windy world, where we are at least alive, even if tremblingly so, and where the changes of confirming the sanctities of our blundering hears are endless.
"To be a minister does not mean to be religious in a particular way, to cultivate certain techniques, which any bright woman or man can master, but to be a person. It is not some eccliesiastical act that makes a minister, but participation in the lives of humans, individual and associated, though it often brings one into painful relations. . . .
"And I am not talking about phony attempts to feint people into a position where the minister can get past their guard and whisper moral blandishments . . . .
"In the more traditional religious ranks there is a caustic observation about clergy who stroke the cross but are very careful never to get crucified. Liberal ministers have their own unmoral equivalent in absent-minded wandering from room to room in humanity's tragic house, making gestures toward sisterhood and brotherhood, mumbling somelthing about all-powerful reason, and contributing their own share of shallow faith with which religion so often pollutes the human atmosphere. In more ways than we like to contemplate, we disgrace with our actions the burning life-giving zeal we preach with our lips. Theodore Parker said: 'I determined to preach nothing as religion which I had not experienced inwardly, and made my own, knowing it by heart.' " (1985 edition, pp. 26-27)
Goldfinch
Dear, dear Jan,
Thank you for your sweet and unexpected note of June 20. I hope you did get my telephone message. I reread your note today and will try to express what I have been thinking all week. You may share my letter with whomever you will. Yes, I am very bitter about what is occurring in UUCF and how Jim is seeking his supporters through division. Select people in his leadership classes become leaders. Some become disillusioned early. Jim is proceeding to fulfill his dreams without regard for the people he uses and sometimes abuses. I hear their stories. Jim denies their stories and their pain. The faults are always with "others".
I shall no doubt continue to believe strongly that Jim Nelson is in the wrong profession and at best, would fit in a church other than a UU. As I read and ponder on statements in books by respected Unitarian ministers, I read what mature, confident ministers and for that matter, adults believe. Jim must constantly reassure himself and us in his Gams and sermons that he is loved. In the pulpit and in his Gams, our Senior Minister has all the advantages to sound superior or humble according to his theme. So new members agree with him. Few of our members attend meetings or take leadership classes. We all have a need to belong somewhere, and our church has much to attract people and has many committed people who work.
Many members are also leaving. How can I personally heal with a 50 plus year old man who wants to be my minister when he relies on others, even his own daughter, to speak for him about love and forgiveness, and let us all get along in our community? You have written, and I have heard from Wini Atlas and Nancy Rooney. Mary Foster wrote both chastising my forwarding a personal e-mail and the suggestion that we talk. Harriet Meyer offered to talk some time ago. >From Pat and Robert Moore, I expected support, but there were more people than I ever expected. Bob Hatfield offered to mediate between Jim and me. Chris Mason said that she really does not want to know the background but supports both Jim and me. Stefanie Cochran wrote that she would hate to think what she sent in a personal e-mail would be made public. If that is the case, why in the world write it?! Alison and Mary Foster quoted Netiquette, as did Jim Nelson.
Jim did call out a cordial greeting from his car in the parking lot of the church the Saturday I was leaving the uplifting Spirit Journey for Women. Later that afternoon Jim sent a third e-mail acknowledging my offer of peace. As my minister, he repeated suggestions that my concern is to be a good church member and set an example for others. I am to attend church every Sunday, stop attending meetings and fixating on budgets and finances, trust my church leaders, and tithe 5% even 10% of my income.
Jan, I earned from 25 cents to maybe a dollar baby sitting for families when I was in high school. I tithed 10% of my earnings from the time I graduated from high school. To get to work I sometimes walked 7 miles each way to get to a steel foundry during World War II earning $75 a month. All the male clerks were going into service. My husband and I began tithing 10% of his gross income of $25,000 a year to the First United Methodist Church in Charlottesville, VA., and my husband served on the Board. When we joined the Epiphany Methodist Church a block from our home in Vienna, VA., we pledged 10% of his $50,000 annual income, the amount sufficient to warrant an immediate invitation to my husband to join the Board there.
My discretionary income from $6,000 adjusted gross income for tax purposes will not go to support the Senior Minister's appetite to live better than he has ever lived before. His over $104,000 with tax advantages and another $2,400 to go to Romania...well, let him dream on. I've been in churches enough to know the politics. I have as friends, wives of ministers and hear that their husbands are not the men we see and hear in the pulpit. I expect that, but do not have to like such a wide dichotomy in Jim. I hope not, but we could soon find difficulty fulfilling Jim's plans with so many unhappy members cropping up every two years. Our former members are helping the other UU churches to grow. Jim may learn or he may wound himself into recall now or with another disillusioned group in a few more years.
A friend wrote a supportive e-mail early June 10, in which she said "We would not need to bring the issues with Jim Nelson to the attention of the congregation, if the Board would bring in a mediator to resolve the problems. Unfortunately, right now, it is up to our leaders to make these decisions, not us . . . . This seems out of balance, too. In a church environment, people expect their ministers to lead the effort to bring healing to suffering members. So far, there is no strong indication our leadership . . . . . . . (like it or not), care. They are coming from their own place of hurt and do not understand ours. Instead of understanding us, they seem to be discounting or accusing us talking about it. We are hurting and so are they. Hope-fully, we will all move forward together. To me, a mediator offers the hope of bringing us together in a "safe" (i.e., psychologically safe) environment to talk, share honest feelings, listen carefully, and develop/redevelop compassion for each other. So we can begin to trust again, work toward cooperation, compromise and love."
During Jim's sabbatical, many friends came most every Sunday. Other more faithful members commented how peaceful it was. Perhaps organizations thrive on controversy. I do not want to continue to let Jim be the focus of my spiritual journey this second half of the first year of the new century. He feels that I have a long way to go and that the first step will be hard for me. This is from the man who is undermining what we had when he came here and about whom I hear bitter stories from former members or those who come when Jim will not be preaching. My son said, "Mother, this is ridiculous. Go to another church." You have used your energies your way, as I have in other churches. You and your cohorts are now our leaders. Where will you take us?
Thank you, . . . . Jan. Come see my garden while the rains are keeping it beautiful. I love you too.