This Clergy Sexual Misconduct Website Is For U*Us aka Unitarian*Universalists. . .
I just got a U*U heads up about a brand-spanking new website about Unitarian*Universalist clergy sexual misconduct in my email inbox this morning. A Google Alerts email set to notify me of new blog posts and webpages containing the words - unitarian misconduct - directed me to a new post on uugrrl's moribund 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog titled 'This Blog is Moving'. This new blog post announces that the content of the 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog will be deleted soon, ostensibly because uugrrl is worried about her internet anonymity being compromised as a result of the new Google Buzz app. That's the bad news, and I will be trying to persuade uugrrl not to delete her excellent UU clergy misonduct blog by submitting a comment or two to that effect, but the good news is that all of the content of the 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog will be hosted by "a group working on clergy sexual misconduct at First Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashville." The new URL for the archived version of the 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog is -
http://www.uusafety.net/uutruth/
uugrrl's blog has apparently already been archived, thankfully along with some, if not all, of the comments that were originally submitted to it.
The main URL for this new Unitarian*Universalist website dedicated to the issue of clergy sexual misconduct is of course -
http://www.uusafety.net/
The website is titled UU Safety Net so I guess that hosting the website on a .net domain was an intentional pun.
No doubt this will be a "good cop" website about how to appropriately respod to and deal with clergy sexual misconduct perpetrated by "less than excellent" Unitarian*Universalist ministers, and that is a good thing. After uugrrl's "good cop" 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog came to a *disillusioned* premature end I sometimes considered creating a "good cop" clergy misconduct blog myself as a counterpoint to the "bad cop" tactics of the Dark Knight of the U*U World aka The Emerson Avenger, now I do not have to go to that extra effort above and beyond the call of dU*Uty. . . :-)
I will be browsing through the Nashville Unitarian*Universalist Church hosted clergy sexual misconduct website and be providing my opinions of what is said on it here. I may even submit some "good cop" material of my own for them to consider hosting. Who knows? Maybe they will consider hosting some of the "electronic communications" that I have sent to UUA administrators, including UUA Presidents and UUA Board of Trustees members, over the last decade to decade and a half. Which reminds me. . . I must follow-up on my recent emails to UUA President Peter Morales.
Here is some of the content from the home page -
Purpose
Safety Net is a sub-committee of Social Justice. Our goal is to work in a positive way to effect much-needed change in the policies, procedures and attitudes surrounding clergy sexual misconduct in Unitarian Universalist congregations. Some ways we hope to do this are to:
Develop a certification program for UU Congregations that are "safe." This would be similar to the Welcoming Congregation Program. We hope to work with the UUWF (Women's Federation) and the UUMA (Ministers Association).
Develop a curriculum in support of the certification program.
Raise awareness around power differentials.
Raise awareness that clergy sexual misconduct is an issue of social justice.
Set up a resource for survivors of UU clergy sexual misconduct.
I can't help but notice that the following quote from Stanley J. Grenz's article 'We Dare Not Fail' is prominent at the top of the page -
"Despite recent attempts by many churches and denominations to raise the awareness of both clergy and laity to the debilitating effects of sexual misconduct, the list of persons whose ministries have been marred by illicit liaisons continues to grow."
This is a clear indication to me that the good people at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashville responsible for creating the UU Safety Net website believe that number of "less than perfect" Unitarian*Universalist ministers involved in "illicit liaisons" continues to grow. . . In light of my comparatively recent discovery of Rev. Calvin O. Dames' alleged (and apparently *actual*) clergy sexual misconduct which apparently devastated the congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Augusta Maine this does not surprise me in the least. So much for UUA Executive Vice President Kay Montgomery's decade old "pledge" that that the abject failure (if not obstinate refusal. . .) of the UUA to respond to clergy sexual misconduct victims in a manner that genuinely lives up to UU principles calling for respect for the inherent worth and dignity of every person and justice, equity, and compassion in human relations "will be remedied". So much for Kay Montgomery's "pledge" that the UUA "will change and learn and in this *untended* area, we (the UUA) will bend toward justice." The very fact that it is the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashville which is hosting this new website about UU clergy sexual misconduct only underlines the shameful failure of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations to live up to, aka honor and uphold, the "promise" of its official apology to UU victims of UU clergy sexual misconduct which was delivered by Kay Montgomery at the 2000 UUA GA in Nashville, Tennessee.
The irony.
The irony. . .
http://www.uusafety.net/uutruth/
uugrrl's blog has apparently already been archived, thankfully along with some, if not all, of the comments that were originally submitted to it.
The main URL for this new Unitarian*Universalist website dedicated to the issue of clergy sexual misconduct is of course -
http://www.uusafety.net/
The website is titled UU Safety Net so I guess that hosting the website on a .net domain was an intentional pun.
No doubt this will be a "good cop" website about how to appropriately respod to and deal with clergy sexual misconduct perpetrated by "less than excellent" Unitarian*Universalist ministers, and that is a good thing. After uugrrl's "good cop" 'Speaking Truth To Power' blog came to a *disillusioned* premature end I sometimes considered creating a "good cop" clergy misconduct blog myself as a counterpoint to the "bad cop" tactics of the Dark Knight of the U*U World aka The Emerson Avenger, now I do not have to go to that extra effort above and beyond the call of dU*Uty. . . :-)
I will be browsing through the Nashville Unitarian*Universalist Church hosted clergy sexual misconduct website and be providing my opinions of what is said on it here. I may even submit some "good cop" material of my own for them to consider hosting. Who knows? Maybe they will consider hosting some of the "electronic communications" that I have sent to UUA administrators, including UUA Presidents and UUA Board of Trustees members, over the last decade to decade and a half. Which reminds me. . . I must follow-up on my recent emails to UUA President Peter Morales.
Here is some of the content from the home page -
Purpose
Safety Net is a sub-committee of Social Justice. Our goal is to work in a positive way to effect much-needed change in the policies, procedures and attitudes surrounding clergy sexual misconduct in Unitarian Universalist congregations. Some ways we hope to do this are to:
Develop a certification program for UU Congregations that are "safe." This would be similar to the Welcoming Congregation Program. We hope to work with the UUWF (Women's Federation) and the UUMA (Ministers Association).
Develop a curriculum in support of the certification program.
Raise awareness around power differentials.
Raise awareness that clergy sexual misconduct is an issue of social justice.
Set up a resource for survivors of UU clergy sexual misconduct.
I can't help but notice that the following quote from Stanley J. Grenz's article 'We Dare Not Fail' is prominent at the top of the page -
"Despite recent attempts by many churches and denominations to raise the awareness of both clergy and laity to the debilitating effects of sexual misconduct, the list of persons whose ministries have been marred by illicit liaisons continues to grow."
This is a clear indication to me that the good people at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashville responsible for creating the UU Safety Net website believe that number of "less than perfect" Unitarian*Universalist ministers involved in "illicit liaisons" continues to grow. . . In light of my comparatively recent discovery of Rev. Calvin O. Dames' alleged (and apparently *actual*) clergy sexual misconduct which apparently devastated the congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Community Church of Augusta Maine this does not surprise me in the least. So much for UUA Executive Vice President Kay Montgomery's decade old "pledge" that that the abject failure (if not obstinate refusal. . .) of the UUA to respond to clergy sexual misconduct victims in a manner that genuinely lives up to UU principles calling for respect for the inherent worth and dignity of every person and justice, equity, and compassion in human relations "will be remedied". So much for Kay Montgomery's "pledge" that the UUA "will change and learn and in this *untended* area, we (the UUA) will bend toward justice." The very fact that it is the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Nashville which is hosting this new website about UU clergy sexual misconduct only underlines the shameful failure of the Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations to live up to, aka honor and uphold, the "promise" of its official apology to UU victims of UU clergy sexual misconduct which was delivered by Kay Montgomery at the 2000 UUA GA in Nashville, Tennessee.
The irony.
The irony. . .
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